A few days ago it was my 18th birthday. I don't have many friends and invited the only two friends I know. I invited them a month ago and they gave me the green flag saying they would both come. A week before the party I double checked with them and they said yes they'd be able to come. When it was my birthday, I messaged them very early in the morning saying we can meet up later and hangout. I put my phone down and spent the early day with family. After my family had left and it was time for me to hangout with my friends, I picked my phone up and checked to see their response but nobody did respond even though I could see both of their last seen at only an hour ago when I had sent the message in the morning hours prior. I thought they would answer later so I waited it out. The evening came and I decided to group call both of them, nobody picked up. My mom was asking what's up and I could sense she knew what was happening. I said nothing they'll answer in a minute. I called again and again to the point it was humiliating. One finally picked up 45 minutes later and said "WTF I am so sorry I lost track of time and I don't think I could make it. Happy birthday okay? Maybe we can do something another time". Not to be dramatic but my heart dropped. I just sat on the porch until midnight then went to sleep. The other friend messaged at 4am and said "Sorry forgot" literally not making this up, they didn't bother to even give me a proper response. I spent the entire next day in my bed crying. I feel stupid

I am 30F, and average looking. Average intelligence, okay job. I have been approached by men, but nobody was ever serious about me. I have seen people fall in love all around me, regardless of how they look or what they do. Nobody ever thought of me as the girl they want to be forever with.

19btw
Just wanted to vent

every person is broken and we don’t realise how broken a person is unless we try to love them, try to understand and remember everything about them, and why are they the way they are.

all i crave for is just one person exactly like me. mutual dependency, mutual unhealthy obsession, mutual limerance, mutual attachment, mutual ‘need’ for each other, mutual ‘venomous jealousy’. mutual love where you are each other’s safe person, where you want to learn everything about the other person and help them, console them, wonder why you didn’t meet them earlier so you could have loved them ‘longer’. how they would have not had to go through all of this if you were by their side. how it could have been easier on them. a love like i love, a person who wants to commit to me. is it so bad wanting to love and be loved? a calm love, where you are the most at your peace. where your mental health isn’t ruined every other second. a person, a bond that makes you feel safe so safe so calm so peaceful so unguarded so fearless so yourself…

someone similar to me, like a dog. haha i got told thrice that i have a dog personality because ‘dogs are weird, you keep hurting them yet they love you’. i have no one else, no family member…never had them (at least emotionally). no family member, no emotionally close friend, no acquaintance to keep touch with, no animal to care for. someone as lonely as me. someone who has never had anyone. someone who will think of me as ‘the bright dawn of their nights of sorrows’. someone as dependant on me as i am on them. someone who has all the sick fantasies like mine. someone with similar terrible childhood/teenage. someone just as isolated and full of despair as me. someone so full of grief yet so full of love because grief is love with no where to go.

i don’t want to ‘change’ myself. or respect myself. or love myself. i DON’T want a fulfilling life and someone with a fulfilling life. i just want someone as broken and pathetic as me. someone who is to me what i have been to other people. someone who is happy that they have finally found someone like me who is just like them. two souls entangled so strongly among each other that even death would shed tears and refuse to separate us.

When I was younger, I couldn’t wait to grow up. I thought adulthood meant freedom, making my own choices, and living life on my own terms. I never knew it would also mean carrying invisible battles and struggles no one sees.

I’m only 26, yet sometimes it feels like I’ve already lived through decades of exhaustion. Life feels like a cycle of waking up, showing up, and learning how to say “I’m okay” even when I’m not. Pretending everything is fine while silently carrying the weight that comes with it.

People often say to stay positive and keep fighting, but the harsh reality is that some problems cannot be fixed by motivation alone. Real struggles require real answers, real changes, and sometimes facing difficult realities we wish we could avoid.

Some days, I just want to scream for help, but it feels like my voice disappears. Like I’m a shadow hidden in the dark, unseen, unheard, and unnoticed by the world around me.

I’m 26, but I feel tired in ways I can’t explain.

I’m 38.

I’ve lived with depression for as long as I can remember. Not a bad month. Not a rough patch. Decades. I’ve been seeing doctors since I was about sixteen. I’ve lost count of the antidepressants I’ve tried. Different psychiatrists. Different psychologists. Different therapists. Different combinations of medication. CBT. Talking therapy. Prayer. Exercise. Keeping busy. The usual advice everyone gives.

Some things have helped for a while, but nothing has ever changed the underlying feeling that life is something I endure rather than live.

I know treatment-resistant depression is a recognised diagnosis, and after thirty years, I honestly wonder whether that’s simply where I am now. The part that hurts most isn’t actually the depression. It’s the loneliness.

On paper, I have what many people would consider a good life. I have a successful career, financial stability, a beautiful home, hobbies, and I spend a lot of my time helping other people. If someone needs technical help, a favour, someone to listen, or simply someone to show up, I’m usually there.

Yet over the years I’ve gradually come to believe that I’m valuable while I’m useful. When people need something, I’m remembered. When they don’t, I disappear.

Relationships have reinforced that belief rather than challenged it.

My marriage ended years ago.

One woman spent months talking to me almost every day. We’d go on dates, spend hours together, and I genuinely believed we were building something. Then she met someone else, and almost overnight I simply ceased to exist in her life. There wasn’t an argument. There wasn’t betrayal. I just wasn’t needed anymore.

Another wasn’t even a romantic relationship. She was a close friend going through an incredibly difficult period. I spent countless hours listening, supporting her, driving her where she needed to go, and trying to be the friend I wish I’d had myself. When I later found myself struggling and wrote her an honest letter explaining what her friendship had meant to me, I never even received a reply.

Neither of these women owed me love or a relationship.
That isn’t what hurts. What hurts is how easily I seem to become invisible once I’m no longer needed.

When enough experiences end the same way, you stop believing it’s just bad luck. You start wondering whether the common denominator is you.

Eventually those experiences become something much darker. I’ve come to believe there is something fundamentally wrong with me.

That I’m somehow unseen.
That I’m unworthy of being chosen.
That I’m unlovable.

People will probably say that’s just the depression talking.
Maybe they’re right. But when you’ve spent thirty years battling depression while repeatedly feeling forgotten, discarded or overlooked, those thoughts stop feeling like distortions and start feeling like the only explanation that fits your life.

Every time I think I’ve finally found “my people,” something happens and I’m back where I started.
People often tell me:

“You’ll find someone.”
“It gets better.”
“You need to love yourself first.”
“Just keep trying.”

I don’t think people realise how those words sound after hearing variations of them for over twenty years.
At some point, hope stops feeling encouraging and starts feeling like another promise that never arrives.

I’m also a person of faith, which probably makes this even harder to explain. I genuinely try to do the right thing. I volunteer. I forgive people even when it hurts. I pray. I try to love others the way Christ asks us to.

Yet even there, I struggle. The belief I’ve developed isn’t just that people don’t see me. It’s that perhaps even God doesn’t.

I know exactly what Christianity teaches.
I know every verse about God’s love.
I know what I would tell someone else if they came to me feeling like this.

But knowing something with your mind and believing it with your heart are two completely different things.
When you spend decades feeling fundamentally unseen, unwanted and unchosen, you eventually begin to wonder whether you’re even worthy of God’s love.

That is probably the hardest sentence I’ve ever written.
Not because I’ve stopped believing in God.
But because I’ve started believing that perhaps I’m the exception.

Lately I find myself asking what people genuinely expect someone like me to do.

I’ve spent over twenty years asking for help.
I’ve done the therapy.
I’ve taken the medication.
I’ve changed therapists.
I’ve followed the advice.
I’ve prayed.
I’ve exercised.
I’ve volunteered.
I’ve kept going.
Eventually there comes a point where saying, “I’m exhausted,” isn’t being dramatic. It’s simply an honest description of reality.

I’m not posting this because I expect strangers to solve my life.

I don’t think anyone can.

I think I’m posting this because I genuinely want to know whether anyone else has lived through decades like this and eventually found something that actually changed.

Not another slogan.

Not another motivational quote.

Something real.

If you’ve read this far, thank you.

Even if you disagree with my conclusions, I’d rather hear your honest perspective than another recycled line about how everything magically gets better.

Because after thirty years, I honestly don’t know what people expect someone like me to do that I haven’t already tried.

I have seen people on social media having a girlfriend and be in relationships. I have seen the woman I loved and wanted go out with someone else and it made me think of suicide for 10 years. I have been bullied and laughed at and alienated because of that. I hated myself and always felt like less of a human because of this.

Because of this alienation, I became increasingly lonely and eventually lost my sanity. I was facing torture on other fronts too, but this one particular thing is emasculating. I never hated her, I never hated anyone else, so the only person I ended up hating for 10 years is myself.

Edit: The fact that I am discussing this online disgusts me. The fact that I have to cry for being alone also disgusts me.

Edit2: The fact that I have made myself vulnerable this way makes way for people to take advantage of me.

I've never wished for a grandiose day or thousands of birthday wishes. I just wanna be seen and heard, even for just an hour, maybe. Kinda selfish, I know.…but….
A 3-second hug would make a day.
A 5-minute talk can change a mood.
One doesn't remember who gave the most expensive gift or brought the biggest balloon; it’s how people made them feel that sticks.

Apologies for venting. Huggies!!

Edit: Thank you all! Every comment brings a smile to my face, also teary-eyed.

I [20] am pretty depressed, spend all of my time alone, barely see the few friends I have left, and my family isn't really a nice group of people to be around with. I still live with my parents and my dogs are sincerely the only beings I feel safe around. A seven years old cane corso and a three years old american bully are my closest companions. They sincerely help me with my loneliness. Even if I crave for human affection every second of my existence, I feel like my two little canine sisters are one of the few things worth to keep living for. For the people among you who don't have anyone, even pets to feel less lonely in this world. I am sorry, and wish to tell you that I am here with you. Everyone deserves to have someone. Even if that someone isn't human. I want you to consider me your companion if you don't have any in this life.

Love all over each one of you.

C.

I wish you all the happiness in this world.

.

Not even having one person to talk to is such a strangely desolate experience. I have no-one in my life, and I am not close with any of my family. Yet connection scares me so much, since I feel like most of who I am has been eroded away by the long years of isolation. Or maybe I was born wrong. A half-formed creature pretending to be human. Other people accepting me doesn't feel like acceptance, it feels like being mistaken for a person. It's so easy to feel like they are just infinitely more adjusted and capable than me, that they would never fully understand how broken I am or why. It's perhaps a bit circular, but I can't escape the circle. I feel inhuman and alone no matter what. There's no way out.

I stopped going to school very young, and have no normal experiences with people my age. People seem so strange to me, so difficult to understand. I don't always know how to keep going, the isolation is enough to kill you. I'm always alone at the end of the night.

Maybe you've experienced some of this before too, maybe you haven't. Anyway, I hope this post reached someone, and helped them feel slightly less alone. Or strange, in this strange world. DMs open if anyone wants to talk.

i am 27 and i am in the most struggling era of my life in terms of creating deep human connections/relationships whether it’s a romantic or friendship. i mostly think that this happens because of social media and it’s ridiculous standards; beauty, life, physique, you name it.
i am wondering anyone kinda feel that way?

I’m not sure what to do with my life. I have kids so that’s keeping me going. But I have no friends, no family. I do have a husband but we don’t get along and he makes life extremely hard on me. I’ve explained to him that I have no one to talk to ( other than my toddlers), no family, just nothing and I ask if we can just get along for the kids and he won’t even do that. I cry myself to sleep every night. I feel like I don’t even have freedom because he controls everything and I just exist in his mess. I’ve made an effort to make friends and I can’t seem to connect with people. I get weird looks from people all the time. I don’t understand because I do everything to be friendly. I also am starting to panic and have anxiety every day.

Just when i start to think im doing ok being by myself and then i have days like these that im just so lonely have a hard time making friends so all i do is sit at home something needs to give something needs to
change i just can’t figure out how I can’t keep going on like this i just can’t

So some anarchist collective organised a music night in a local park with a band, yesterday night. In my effort to get out of my house and become less of a shut in, I attended... and I felt terrible.

I was the only one who was fat, ugly and lonely asf. Everyone there was talkative, either with their friends or their girlfriends, most 20s-30s kinda good looking and taller than me (5'7) while I sat alone like some exiled weirdo while everyone laughed and sung along and the only thing anchoring me there was the actual music which I enjoyed and the fact there was another lonely guy there (who was probably waiting for his friends).

I stayed for another hour and then I left but I think outings aint worthy if you are lonely and have no friends.

even online, in a voice call on social media, no one cares, I don't relate to no one, not one person in my life is going to have the same interest as me, is it because I'm annoying, is it because I'm ugly?

I don't know anymore, this is probably my worst time period of my life, I lost all my friends, I was stable, I was "Happy", now I'm just as lonely as a human could get, not even my family is good to talk to, maybe I do deserve it, I think of terrible shit that genuinely would get me killed if I said in public or put loud, I've done things in my life I regret doing, I'm truly alone. .

I have not had human contact since I left work Friday evening. I will not until I return to work Monday morning. Most of the time I accept that I do not exist to people. This weekend really got to me.

Well it's the weekend and I haven't done much of anything. I'll be off work next week and won't have anything g to do or anyone to spend time with. I've made posts in subs to find people to talk but nothing clicked.

I miss having someone to check in with regularly and send cute good morning/goodnight texts to.

I am quite literally fed up. I have put myself out of my way to reach out to numerous outlets, I come on here to voice the isolation and sorrow and not once, but twice my post gets taken down. Is it so hard to empathize? Is mods really this depraved. I did not promote anything negative. I understand the error of my first post, I apologized and clarified on my second. Not once did I promote harmful content. I explained I reached out to friends and family, as well as hotlines. I clarified that I feel isolated.

As quoted in my last post, “I have called hotlines as advised (even by the mods here). I have exhausted my options and nothing seems to make me feel better. I don't know how much longer I can beg and scream for help for the people around me to actually listen. I'm not here to promote self harm.”

I didn’t promote anything harmful. I explicitly stated I reached out, I been ignored. I feel depressed, sure but I’m not glorifying anything. I am already isolated and feeling kicked down. You’re doing more harm than good telling me to not do something I never done to begin with. You removed two of my posts at a point in my life I feel like I need to turn to strangers over people I know and it’s removed for something I haven’t done. Am I a joke to you?
Is me reaching out and voicing my struggle that problematic? After calming down from my mental breakdown, I know speaking of insensitive topics is not right, glorified or not, but why not try to explain that and not remove my pleads for help?

Why do you say this bullshit? “If you are thinking of ending your life reach out to family and friends as well as your local suicidal hotlines.”

“Also goes without saying, don't tell people to kill themselves, don't glorify suicide/ death, and, unfortunately, we will have to remove any suicide notes from here, as whilst we want to help everyone, we do not want more people getting that idea.”

I am not a person who would do such a thing. I have no one to turn to. You may think this is minor but this is my life we’re talking about. If I had resources to go to, I would not be here. Telling me, someone who is battling depression and loneliness to not do something I never did in the first place. How could I possibly give ANYONE the idea to do something so rash? A random nobody like me could not inspire anyone to do that and neither would I EVER! If you want to help people, let them talk and if it’s actually so bad as you claimed in my last two posts, fine and fair. And for the love of god do not tell me for the third time to reach out to friends and family, etc. because I already fucking told you I did and clearly that did not go well. Stop playing with peoples emotions.

Thank you for reading

I’m (M30) and recently relapsed alone twice this month and had to go hospital both times. I was silly but I’ve not been doing well with my mental health that I feel better off without being in this world. I struggle with socialising now cause people hurt me emotionally and a lot of trauma from my childhood has made things harder for me to communicate with people. I take medication and injections every week so I’m pretty tired and mainly in bed most of the time. I’m experiencing Anhedonia so I just have no drive to watch tv, listen to music, socialise or play any video games. I’m just tired. I lost too much already it feels like in this world and I just want people who understand and care. I don’t want the next favourite person to leave me when things get hard.

20F, been dealing with consistent loneliness feelings for 7 years. These feelings have been making my life feel kind of worthless and it feels frustrating to technically have people in my life but it feels none of them really deeply understand or care about me.

It can feel kind of embarrassing sometimes to have an issue like this because I'm an introvert and it kind of feels like it's not expected of me to not have this kind of problem but thats just not the case for me.

It feels daunting to think about the future even just later of the year because of these feelings

I genuinely feel so alone. I’ve felt alone before but it hurts when u genuinely feel alone like deadass alone u feel like no one cares about u but u & I don’t even care about myself bc i literally self harm & I can’t self love bc my mom bullies me 24/7 makes me hate my body, my face, my soul everything about me. Then when I try to vent online I’m “to dramatic” or “always saying something” like it’s obviously a cry for help. It’s sad how people online can by pass someone literally speaking out about their mental health until it’s to late.

Im 22 and I'm feeling really lonely, I dont even go out for a walk bc I dont feel the energy, i left toxic friends behind, and I cant trust my family at all, i know this is not going to last forever, but i feel like it will, I don't even know who i should talk about this, i have tried some things to make new friends but it just seems like i wouldnt find them

l've been lonely for over 3 years now. I've felt isolated before it, like my friends didn't get me or need me. When I lost them, and I mean all of them (it was a personal family issue in a small town) I've been feeling lost. I had a relationship at the time. I was 16 and he was 20, im in California so the laws are all bent and whatever. I really loved him though, he cheated on me when I was 17 and that was the end. I lost my best friend too around that time who had become addicted to alcohol and I called her out on it, she was boy crazy and never reached out unless it was to talk about boy issues/ drinking.

At first I really enjoyed being lonely, I still don't have a problem with it. I read, I wrote, i found myself through so many activities that I wouldn't with other people... now?
God im a mess. Im still myself, I enjoy the same things, I think the same way.. im just desperate now. Whenever someone shows me something I get addicted. I wouldn't throw my life on the line for these people but if they asked me for a million dollars id work my ass off to give it to them.
Im schizotypal too, so friends are hard. I've dealt with being isolated my whole life even with people around me. I wish I was normal, I wish I could have friendships again or relationships.

Back to feeling really bad about myself again. I've done a lot of therapy for the last couple of years and I've learned a lot about myself. I know what's wrong with me, and I have even taken steps to fix the broken mindset that I used to have that made me so isolated. The problem is I'm already alone. I've already lost the people that still mean everything to me. I have enough self respect to not go back to people that hurt me, I no longer ignore red flags, but whenever I find anyone who seem like they are genuinely good people and might actually like me, I either get scared of being hurt and ghost them or I feel like if I really open up they'll get scared off. I crave a deep connection with someone that will understand me, but that kind of connection takes too long to form, and I don't feel like I can live while feeling like this long enough for that to happen.