u/daikaijuu

I’m 38 years old, and I don’t have any friends. How sad is that?

My school years can be summed up by girls ridiculing me, boys openly said I was pretty until I opened my mouth. Both would shout hurtful things at me, and laugh.

My last and only group of friends was at the end of secondary school. We had a shared history of bullying because of our interests and behaviours.

They were friends long before I joined in, they were boys and I was the only girl in the group. We shared our love for history, politics, philosophy, anime and most of all progressive metal.

I spent my afternoons with them, and they brought joy to my life. But life gets in the way, we sought different paths. We all moved to different countries.

After years focusing on living, I wanted to try and become closer to the only people I interact with: colleagues. I started studying and memorising their behaviour, I tried to blend in. But the effort made me anxious about my every move, my every thought, every word I said, every smile I gave.

The exhaustion led me to have a meltdown due to someone thinking it was appropriate to prank me by hiding some paperwork and my water bottle. I had an anxiety attack in work.

I took some time off, sought out help from my GP to review my depression medication, to pursue therapy, to prevent another suicide attempt. I got a new med prescription for my anxiety, and referrals for both Autism and ADHD.

But after resuming work, I could feel the disdain, the judgement, the incredulity, so I buried myself in my work and put a lot of pressure on myself to excel. So I had another meltdown last week due to unexpected changes in staffing, workload and service pressures.

I feel incredibly ashamed, I feel like a child in adult clothing. I wanted to grow up as fast as I could to get away from my school bullies, now I can’t even adult properly.

I want someone I can talk to, share my passions with, feel like I belong.

I’m 38 years old, and I don’t have any friends. How sad is that?

My school years can be summed up by girls ridiculing me, boys openly said I was pretty until I opened my mouth. Both would shout hurtful things at me, and laugh.

My last and only group of friends was at the end of secondary school. We had a shared history of bullying because of our interests and behaviours.

They were friends long before I joined in, they were boys and I was the only girl in the group. We shared our love for history, politics, philosophy and most of all progressive metal.

I spent my afternoons with them, and they brought joy to my life. But life gets in the way, we sought different paths. We all moved to different countries.

After years focusing on living, I wanted to try and become closer to the only people I interact with: colleagues. I started studying and memorising their behaviour, I tried to blend in. But the effort made me anxious about my every move, my every thought, every word I said, every smile I gave.

The exhaustion led me to have a meltdown due to someone thinking it was appropriate to prank me by hiding some paperwork and my water bottle. I had an anxiety attack in work.

I took some time off, sought out help from my GP to review my depression medication, to pursue therapy, to prevent another suicide attempt. I got a new med prescription for my anxiety, and referrals for both Autism and ADHD.

But after resuming work, I could feel the disdain, the judgement, the incredulity, so I buried myself in my work and put a lot of pressure on myself to excel. So I had another meltdown last week due to unexpected changes in staffing, workload and service pressures.

I feel incredibly ashamed, I feel like a child in adult clothing. I wanted to grow up as fast as I could to get away from my school bullies, now I can’t even adult properly.

I want someone I can talk to, share my passions with, feel like I belong.