advice on loneliness??
hey guys! creating an account to ask this because I don't really know where else to go lol. I'm also not on reddit like at all so if this is the wrong place to post just let me know.
I've always struggled to make friends because of my (undiagnosed but peer reviewed ad nausem) autism. I'm not the greatest at texting people (although trying to get better!) and also super awkward. I desperately want a best friend or close frienship, as I've spent most of my life being the last pick of any friend group. I have spent the last few years of college trying to put myself out there and meet people. I know that the "college is the best time of your life!" stuff isn't for a lot or even most, and I didn't really expect much, especially given: 1) I'm pretty serious about school and that requires a lot less time for the socializing stuff; and 2) aforementioned troubles with making and keeping friends. Still, I've been really hoping that I would finally find friends who I actually like. feel close with and relate to and get to hang out with all the time. Like the kind of friendship you see in movies and shit, idk. Like that's all I want! Friends who I spend time with outside of obligation!!
And the thing is, after several years, I really have met tons of great people that I enjoy hanging out with!! But it feels like everybody I know (like literally every single one of my close friends) is in a relationship. and I'm not jealous of them (I'm probably aromantic, who knows lol understanding emotions is hard) but it's really tough trying to ask people to hang out or invite them to things and they always, ALWAYS have something to do with their bf/gfs, or are otherwise busy (d1 student-athlete life is hard haha). It also feels like since they've all started dating people I've always had to be the person asking them to hang out, and never the other way around, and that kind of sucks because it feels like I'm the only one who still cares about our friendship anymore. It's feels like the same pattern every time--we meet and become close friends, they get a partner, and then suddenly it feels like I'm begging them to keep being my friend.
And I understand that the way our society is structured that a romantic partner is always going to be a higher priority than "just" a friend, but I've struggled quite a lot with feeling unwanted and really lonely because of this. I'm feeling especially down today because I was basically kicked off of team vacation trip (exenuating circumstances, nobody's fault) and I've been trying to find someone to spend that time with and everybody is busy. (this isn't late notice, it's like three weekends from now). I'm really sick of crying over being lonely every month or so, so honestly looking for anything I can do. Thank you for reading if you got this far, and also for the mess of grammar/formatting (still crying haha).
tdlr; I'm an asexual college student and I've really struggled lately with loneliness due to all my friends getting into committed relationships and not having the time to hang out anymore. Anybody have advice for dealing with loneliness as someone who's ace and neurodivergent and surrounded by amatonormativity--how to communicate to my friends that they mean a lot to me and I want to hang out more???? how to find friends that won't stop hanging out when they get a partner??? how to not take someone saying no to hang out as a personal stab in the heart??