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af4 @lemmy.fmhy.ml
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How to improve social skills?

I need help. I'm completely socially isolated and inept. I have been for the majority of my life. I'm in my late 20s now and I've never had a friend, or any kind of relationship. I feel I'm too depressed to begin extraciting myself from this deep chasm I've drifted into now. I work as much as I can, never turning down a shift, but if I'm not at work I sleep or lay on the floor at home, crippled. No energy or motivation to do anything, even eat. Work is my only chance to socialise. I'm grateful my coworkers are nice to me, and they're the only good thing in my life. I'm far more attached to them than they are to me. They're not friends. They just put up with me.

I can't do this anymore. I've sold all my possessions of any value, and I'm ready to go. I've already attempted suicide and ended up in the psych ward before. I don't know how to form relationships. I'm too fucked up. I want friends, but what do friends do? How do you know if someone's your friend? I've been isolated for so long I don't know how to be with others. I'm past the physical symptoms of social anxiety. I used to shake, sweat profusely, stammer, feel like my clothes were choking me, etc., but now I'm just numb all the time. My mind still goes blank when I attempt to converse though.

I'm miserable and repulsive. I know that. No one wants to be around people like me, but I can't fix this alone. I don't know how to fix this. I'm too ashamed. I can't face people.

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Coping with childhood neglect and isolation

I am one of six children. Our childhoods were characterised by neglect and isolation. My mother has cronic fatigue syndrome, yet she took it upon herself to "homeschool" all of us. This led to extreme isolation, as my parents were on the fringes of society, and we children occupied a space on the fringe-of-the-fringes. There was no larger familial support, as my parents were both the black sheep of their respective broken families. Nor was there community support, as they were not members of any community, both being friendless. The education recieved was a joke, and in the latter years any pretense of homeschooling was dropped completely after my parents divorced. My mother sunk into a great depression, isolating herself in her room, crying daily. The children, now fatherless, and whilst the mother was physically there, she was mentally absent, ran the household. No adults to offer guidance. There never was, as it would be disingenous to have ever called my parents adults at any stage of their lives.

Years later, my mother's an unemployed drug addicted husk of a woman. My father's obese, with rotting teeth, constantly in and out of work. Both are still friendless. Not even superficial ties to any communities. There's no attempt from either of them. They're people who have given up on life.

Us children, mostly in our 20s now, some having reached early 30s, are complete wrecks. One has turned to drugs to cope. One has become a mute, pedophile shut-in. One is trying to recover after being groomed and abused by a pedophile for many years. One has insomnia and an addiction to alcohol. Only the youngest, who thanks to the divorce and my mother's deteriorating mental health, was shunted to school at an early age, is doing OK. And OK is depressed, suicidal, and violent. Then there's me...

I'm in my late 20s. I'm chronically depressed. I have visual snow syndrome and tinnitus. I didn't even know these things were abnormal until recently, having had them for as long as I can remember. My main struggle, overlooking the great shame and humiliation of not having an education, is that I can't socialise. I've never had a friend, and I don't know how to form or maintain relationships. I make people uncomfortable. The lonelyness is killing me, but I don't know how to be with people and not make them uncomfortable. Being around other people makes me uncomfortable too. I wish I was normal, and could laugh and interact with other normal people.

I'm trying to fix things now. I'm on antidepressants. I'm seeing a physchologist, and a psychiatrist. I'm trying to get hobbies. I'm trying to do "normal people things". However, the more I try, the more I realise I'm not normal. I'm so far behind my peers in education, socialisation, career, etc. that there never will be a point where I'm not seen as an abberant anomoly. I feel like a pathetic failure in ever dimension. I've had my first tentative atempt at suicide, and I'm pretty sure that's how I'm destined to go out.

The isolation as a child left me hallucinating, and bored. Oh so very bored. Pretty sure I developed maladaptive daydreaming to cope. The isolation as an adult is leaving my suicidal. I see both my mother and father reflected in me, and I hate it with all my being.

This post is just venting, and perhaps looking for some guidance or communication with other people. The only time someone contacts me is if a sibling wants money. I live a sad fucked up life and I'm over it.

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