Living with the loneliness and isolation

How do you do it? I am alone all day. I have no social contacts except people who call me to talk about their problems and don’t make room for me. My mom calls me daily to unload her stress. If I try to talk about me, she makes it about her. She knows I see a psychiatrist but doesn’t know why. She never asks how I am. My husband is very busy with work right now and doesn’t have much time. I have 5 children and 2 have special needs. It’s a lot of stress and work. Due to covid, I have had no social contacts since March and have lost touch with most of my friends.

I’m so desperate for human companionship. The isolation is making me feel very depressed.

How are you surviving?

I am so sorry, busymom. I am in a similar situation. I have 3 IRL friends, a daughter, a son I have no contact with, and an elderly dad. So, my support is here largely.

I got a kitten and that has helped enormously. So sweet. And he loves me. I have mafe a rule to lv the apt at least 2x a day, even if for a brief walk. Joining a whole new church thing. And trying to text somewhat often withe the tiny group of people I still have.

Walks? Playground? Dog park? DBSA or Meetup groups maybe?

Just really hard with Covid.

Hugs. PM me any time.

Busymom, sorry that things are difficult. You have your hands full with your family. Special needs kids need extra attention, too. Juggling everybody's else's needs can be draining, and one may lose one's self.

This is a difficult time. So I try not to take others stress personally. That is their stuff and they are may be struggling, too.

I can't control others, but this is a good time for me to learn to and be a better friend to myself. Self-talking kindness to myself as if I was comforting a friend who is struggling helps comfort me. I can do that when no one else is available.

Journaling helps me vent stuff, including awful stuff that I wouldn't want to tell anyone. Journaling helps vent those thoughts and feeling loose so they are not draining me without taking my thoughts and feelings out on others. I can write it down and then throw it away or if it is in a computer, delete the file. Journaling can be done at the tiny breaks in a day.

Talk-venting to myself out-loud or by just moving my lips also helps me vent stuff safely without the requirement of another person who is not available.

I find if I can put my thoughts and feelings into actual words and express them it helps. Others may be able to do this through singing or art.

Prayer and talking to a Higher Power also helps me.

Practicing gratitude for what is available rather than practicing ingratitude for what is not helps me. If I don't feel grateful, I try to look creatively or more deeply to find things for which I can be grateful. In my loneliness, I can be grateful that it is teaching me the value of a good friend rather than just taking good friends for granted.

Making and effort to take and live just one day at a time rather than suffer now by imaging an endless run of days with suffering.

Sending prayers and best wishes your way!

How do I do it busymom? I don't. I am failing at life every day. I just cannot forgive myself for past mistakes. Covid made me break down further with having to wear masks and all. Covid became the great divider of the human population. I am distressed and depressed. I am with you in desperation.

We cannot heal if we cannot forgive ourselves. Why can you not forgive yourself?

I am haunted by patients I could not save. Every day. I tried my hardest. I was good at my job. I blame me.

"Why can you not forgive yourself?"

Because some things cannot be forgiven, nor should they be. I don't know about anyone else; I just cannot live with it any longer, and there really is no hope in the future for a change simply because I long ago crossed the point of no return. I know it's coming, and I've got some ideas about how; I just don't know when. Pretty sure it will be from rage-induced impulsivity.

lmao Someone asked me if I was an incel the other day. Wtf. You have to want to pursue someone in order to be rejected, and I recoil from the idea of any social interaction because I already am 99% sure that any one now entering my life is an agent of the Pattern and attempting to lure me out far enough to get a laugh at my expense at the inevitable fall.

No, thanks. I'm just going to keep withdrawing and whatever happens happens because I already know how this story ends, and it doesn't involve rainbows and unicorn farts.

Well, you sound like someone with untreated depression to me. And I am a world authority on that one. 50 yrs worth. I believe your judgment is impaired by a neurochemical storm. Involving dopamine, serotonin, norepinephrine, and glutamate--among other things. Praying for you.

I have another friend who is haunted by patients he could not save I know you tried your hardest. (and were good at your job). I hope one day you are free from the demon of self blame (''too'' many seem to have the opposite issue, for example, blaming others who do not ''deserve'' that blame, like their young kids grr )

ETA I think part of the ''problem'' can be the issues with

Of course it is; I knew this before I hit puberty, and I hit puberty early af. I knew even then something was off, it just wasn't until later on that I had the life experience necessary to be able to put words to it.

Out of courtesy, with apologies to the OP, I will enclose a bit more of the reason why in a hidden box so as not to intrude on the thread...

Well, Paul was a murderer and he became a saint...

Oh yes! I remember that, a cool old guy

Forgiveness is divine for a reason. Forgetfullness is not. Do not confuse the two. Mercy does not require a deserving candiddate. Free will is a gift.

If you consider the quantum nature of things it makes sense to see that we are never just one thing. There is never just one outcome. There is no inevitability. You're the particle and the wave and the difference lies in the conscious observation. The observer decides. You see yourself as one thing. I see you as infinite possibilities. We are both intelligent, so how can we be so different?

If you want another way, shift your perspective. If you cannot shift it on your own, reach out for help. When two people collide, or when you engage an entire team, the possibilities increase exponentially.

And... My brain goes to places yours goes when I am sick. Antipsychotics were a lifesaver. I wouldn't write meds off completely. You're stuck in your mind, not God's. There's a way out of the rabbit hole that does not involve hurting yourself. The paths laid before us are infinite. We choose. Even the choice to accept an absolute outcome is not final. There are other forces at work, but you can only see what you allow through your filter.

Everything you're thinking now is wrapped inside your own subconscious mind. The demons there can be difficult to overcome. They are very persuasive and mask as an external source, but they aren't. It stems from within and you can shift out of its control. The will is strong, but you have to believe enough to see the other side.

Hope is a beautiful thing. I hold it for you.

I perpetually look for that catalyst; the Pattern refuses to provide but for removing. Everyone leaves in the end. After my last ex, that was it. I have nothing left to give anymore. Therefore, there are no possibilities to increase. The proof of God's existence lay in the math. Every choice hurts myself because it's a pyrrhic choice. All choices are pyrrhic choices in my life. I don't need meds; I need to find my anodyne, only she doesn't exist. The particle and the wave...lol The duality of yin-yang, the two wolves, of black and white...I've tried to shift my perspective...and meds are artificial, gone as soon as you stop taking it so that's not really me, then, is it?

The cynicism has spawned spitefulness, and I fear that when the anodyne does come along, it will be yet another lure, impermanent and ephemeral, like trying to grasp sand.

The Self has many personas. Choosing to only identify with exactly one is just that. A choice. A confusion of the ego.

Particle and wave is just an example. I'm not speaking of duality. Duality is one small possibility in a quantum world. I am speaking of infinitude.

As for the real you... Let's just humor me and say that you have abnormal neuro activity. Your temporal lobe, the home of processing for many of the subjects you contemplate is firing abnormally. Maybe your neurochemical balance is off. Maybe your receptors are off. Is that really you? Does it matter if you could find peace of mind with your neurons firing in a more normal capacity? If you had diabetes would you refuse to treat it because the real you couldn't regulate your blood sugar levels normally?

Consciousness is more than what we see as the result of our electrochemical activity. I get that taking meds shifts consciousness. The physical is intricately linked to the non-physical, but we do not have to settle for imbalance because a physical structure within the body affects non physical attributes.

For example, my episodes are very mystical in nature. They are also steeped in physics and metaphysics. I contemplate some very deep subjects because the real me found interest in in them long ago and and I followed. I made a choice to open those doors.

When I am in the midst of an episode my world turns inside out and the synchronicity of events has an almost magical dream-like quality to it. That's great and it is a part of who I am. It all came from my choices.

However, it all eventually goes to a dark place and is dangerous and puts me at risk for losing all I hold dear. That's me too. The darkness is twisted and difficult to understand and accept, but its me. It has its place in my subconscious. However, it puts me at risk for death when my brain is out of balance, so I fight back. Pills are just one tool of many. They are actually the smallest took in my arsenal.

You are many perspectives. All quantum. All existing at once. Pull from the strength of the team that you are and have been and will be. If you're missing an aspect, connect with it. Create it. If you believe in God perhaps you believe you were createeld to be a creator. If you cannot find it within, a friend might light the way. They are not saviors, just wayshowers. You're the anodyne. <---thanks for expanding my vocab. I had to look that one up.

There must be poles, though. Reality demands that there be poles, and polar opposites. At least in this dimension, it does. Because otherwise, all is chaos if there is nothing to define anything against. I chose mathematics (despite hating it) because of the purity of its answers. It's either correct or incorrect. Mathematics is eternal and unchanging...unless you count that "fine-tuning" during the expansion period of the big bang, but we won't talk about that--ahem--where were we? lol And what is worse, nature is fractal which means that nothing is new under the sun. Any possible outcome will eventually happen in this universe or the next--yes, that's right, the next, per the Conformal Cyclic Cosmology, which fits in the DeBroglie-Bohm model of the universe, using Bohmian mechanics. "Free will" is only a half-right descriptor--we have a series of probabilities at the zero spacetime node level, and there are only so many possibilities in the age of the universe. That means, if I'm not Asian right now (I'm not), I will be at some point far, far in the future long after the universe fades to gray and suddenly pops into the next aeon via Big Bang. This is nothing but the Banach-Tarski theorem applied to a four-dimensional spacetime construct, i.e., the universe.

I've had inexplicable things happen to me that are far more than de ja vu. When I was three or four, long before I learned letters, for instance, I was down at the marina with my mother, and glanced over and said, "Look, Ma, there's the Donna Lou!", and sure as the sky is blue, there was a boat named the Donna Lou. She almost crashed her jeep. lmao How did I know that without having already been through this life an infinite number of times in an infinite number of variations before? I've had even weirder stuff happen, too, but I already sound loony enough.

None of the meds I have tried do anything but lower my sperm count and make me get auras when I don't take them or make me feel miserable and spacey. Remeron, lithium, pamelor, meloril (?), inderal, buspar, wellbutrin, celexa, effexor/venlafaxine, prozac, Seroquel, amitriptyline, thorazine, Xanax, Zoloft, Paxil...I mean, how much longer am I going to have to play guinea pig? It doesn't work, or the side effects are ridiculous. Jesus, I had second degree burns on my hands, back and face after taking prozac and going into the sun. I still have scars. Because they put me on something else that made me photosensitive without waiting a week or two for the prozac to purge.

I've probably made it worse by doing some rather serious psychedelics on multiple occasions to chase down where the bleeding edge of conscious perception meets reality. I get what you're saying, though. But...I don't want to bother with the responsibility anymore. I always forget to take them, and for whom am I improving myself? For what? Prolong my life for what exactly, now...? The statistics for single men with depression as they age are public knowledge and rather grim. And I have the specter of Alzheimer's to look forward to, so I get to live through prison all over again! Yay!

I look for things that will tell me what will happen after I breathe my last. I need proof before hand. The idea of consciousness simply ceasing to be is unnerving on a primal level for me, and I find I think about it more than anything else in my day to day life. I have obsessive thoughts over likely scenarios, each new bit of information that can be fit into the tapestry triggering a fresh cascade of going through probabilities in my head while simultaneously wishing I would not. Will I know the dream is death? Will I dream at all? Will I think I made it for years and years and years in the perception of time, only to realize at the last moment it was all a lie? I don't even like to talk about it like this it is so disturbing to me.

I am completely neurotic. Obsessively so. There are none who would willingly walk through that mine-field. I need someone whom I can grow with because all of the people in my life have been intransigent with the exception of a few family members, and they are dying off. I know no one. I have no one. Once my mother is gone, I will most likely get in my car and simply leave. There is nothing left to build a life upon because the foundation has rotted out from underneath. I am a ghost. Nothing more.

I agree about the poles, but the rainbow has a lot of colors to explore. And... As you say it is fractal, but the fractal changes in intensity imho. So it is holistically the same, and yet wholly different at the same time like the note of G on multiple octaves.

I hear you on the deja vu like experiences. I have had some so strange that it rocks my world. It feels as if I meld a bit with zero point and it scares me. Maybe I'm just not strong enough to take it, but numbing that out a bit has been healthy for me. It lets me participate in the movie of my life as opposed to directing it and analyzing every detail on a micro level. Having the ability to lift the curtain behind Oz is a gift in some regards, but it can also be a curse. Its like trying to have the streaming source code of a program as your only experience. The UI exists for a reason. You only lift the hood if you have to.

Wow, yeah that's a lot of drugs. You've been through the ringer. I'm sorry. I've had adverse reactions to a few, but Geodon works for me now. I've been comparatively lucky.

The thing about the proof is we would have it if we were meant to have it. Nobody has anything difinitive for a reason and we will drive ourselves mad trying to grasp it all while here. I try to think of it in terms of what value am I meant to experience while here. Am I meant to spin on what's next, or enjoy what is now?

Neurotic...I could describe myself as the same. I am glad you had people in your life you could connect with. That's a precious gift. I am sorry for your losses.

I have found others who can walk along these lines and it is theraputic to speak with them on occasion. I've found though that peace for me lies in reconciling the opposites. My husband carries an intelligence and manner of seeing I do not. He does not dive deep the way I do and just has a wisdom and knowing about him that I admire. He anchors me. Together we make a well rounded home. I also enjoy those who are 'other than'. I learn so much from them. They don't understand me completely, but that isn't the point.

For a ghost you have a lot of value to offer. I have enjoyed this exchange. It has a depth that many interactions I have lack. Perhaps you have smiled or laughed in speaking with a stranger tonight? I hope so

I weep, both in joy for you because you have your anodyne, and in despondency for myself simply because you just illustrated my point. You "dive deep" as you say in a way your husband does not. I'd wager that has something to do simply with the way the vast majority of people are wired to ignore the minutiae, but therein is where God is to be found, if He is to be found at all. The trace of His fingers upon the scales of the universe, as it were. Most men, I have found, do not think so deeply about these things; I have done so as a matter of boredom and ability to do so, when I probably shouldn't have. I have opened doors, and seen things through them that now demand answers and leave an itch in my head that I cannot scratch.

Women do not, on the whole, want to deal with neuroticism and someone who is an obsessive. Would that I was a mute and had to type everything out, my thoughts would come out a lot clearer, and I may have hung onto my ex...lol But thanks to not having been able to socialize when I was younger, I am now forced to play a game of catch-up, only, I don't know anyone anymore. Not irl.

I have indeed enjoyed this exchange and hope I have not come off as some pretentious *****-hat...I second guess myself even as I say stuff sometimes. lol I'm always analyzing. Part of my gallows-humor charm. 😂

Also, busymom, I say take your kids outside. Children have not been shown to be vectors of covid, and only immune-compromised people really need to worry outside. Covid doesn't spread well in sunlight and a natural environment. Go to the lake, picnic in the park.

As Frank Zappa would say, "Turn off, Tune in, and turn on your life."

Speaking only of the Judeo-Christian tradition, God makes painfully clear again and again and again that He has ZERO interest in providing scientific data verifying His presence. He is never gonna do it. Never. He is interested in hearts. Souls. The eternal power of love. Not gigantic brains. He is waaay more impressed with a brittle schizophrenic homeless person struggling under the Steel Bridge and trying to pray to Him or read a tattered bible than He is by someone like Elon Musk or some other genius. not throwing shade on Elon, he may be fantastic.

God is after people who are willing to put their hearts on the line for something they believe and hope for and wish for and cannot even see. That is what impresses God, in my opinion. Not the Higgs Bison.

Hugs and love to you. Praying my *** off for you tonight!!!!#God loves you very much.

Well my brain perhaps takes a slightly different approach to God. I am a details person for sure, but I also focus on the other pole. I went looking for God down a road similar to yours and then had to simply laugh when I came to see the truth that the proof is everywhere. It is in the most complex and the simplest of forms. My tendency to dive deep served my need to see the big picture. Then I looked between the two poles and found the answer was the same.

My husband doesn't need the minutiae because he can simply know and trust. I lack that. I had to prove it and see it and know it from experience. Both paths are worthy. Mine was more laborious and perhaps ended up with a depth of understanding that his does not have, but he continuously held a faith I could not hold myself for a long time. What is better? Neither. Both.

Learning not to scratch that itch is a journey in wisdom. Learning to live and appreciate the moment fully without needing to break it down is difficult, but the fruits are worthy of the effort. I'm still working on this. My brain always pulls me to 'know' more, but then I am reminded of the fool card of the Tarot. There is no more to see. If God is fractal, the now is complete with all I need to know.

Taming that obsession may be your great work to be done here. It certainly is mine. It is a gift, but I must learn to tame it when it detracts from the value of my life. As for women, we are as varied as the stars in the sky. What attracts us is different for everyone and I have little doubt that there could be someone who would find beauty in your mind. However, it may require some form of greater balance on your part. A partner will sense the truth of your state and may choose to refrain of you cannot let go a bit and enjoy life alongside them. How ever you get to that point is unique and I feel you have the faculties to devise such a strategy if you turned your higher processing power inward.

I do not find you pretentious. I share many of the same thoughts. It is just who we are. I just wanted you to know you are not alone and you're worthy of friendship and love. I wanted to pass along what I've learned which is that the most important friendship and love comes from within and radiates outwardly. It then serves to attract that which balances the whole.

Too many thoughts generated by running your mind at full power all of the time generates excess entropy in your system. It does for me anyway, and the disorderd state takes hold. The great thing about our personal systems is that we are the designers and the users. We have the power to shift and then bring feedback into the system allowing for change. It is a tremendous opportunity. I used it to learn to relax a little and cool down my brain on fire. I learned to laugh at myself. The entropy is lessened as a result and then I can choose where to focus instead of focusing on everything constantly. That may not serve you, but I wanted to toss it out in case it gives you some ideas.

Be well my friend, and start a thread sometime. I'd love to speak with you again.

First of all, thank you for that thought out response. So much to unpack here, but I wanted to accept your invite to carry this conversation over to another thread.

Please do come into the Blue Nebula and strike up a convo! I'll take the dust cloth off the bar and turn on the lights! Would love to carry this over!