I Just Don't Fit In, Not Even Here

[Iam]

I find it strange, if I post very happy things I get comments. The same if I am totally freaking out. When I am just doing ok, being myself, commenting on or encouraging other's posts, or just sharing how I am feeling when it is not an intense emergency, nothing. So I really don't fit in even here. Not at least if I am just being my ok self. I don't want to be a person who is noticed because they are crying out for attention. I don't want friends who only want me when I am happy. I want real relationship, people who care when I am just being me, the good, the bad and the not exciting, mundane me. Guess that just isn't to be. Oh I can go to my therapist and he'll listen to every word, sad happy or indifferent....of course, that's how he makes his living, off people like me, who just need someone to listen and act interested, no matter what it is I say. Thye get rich off that don't they. Ha....what a scam that is huh? God am I an idiot.

 

[James B.]

So I really don't fit in even here..

Sometimes getting no replies to posts can be misleading.

Have had feelings of not belonging my whole life, feeling alien or "outside" the mainstream. Some days are better than others. It's an emotion, and for me it's related to my trauma. Maybe some of it is relating to original feelings of being a non-person. Myself? I think you fit in here Iam. I wouldn't worry about not getting replies all the time though, it might be just a fluke, or who knows. Sounds like it hasn't been a great day for you. Hope you feel better soon.

 

[AvoidanceRulez]

I dont feel like i fit in anywhere either..i always feel like a round peg in a square hole...but that's ok. IMO..its better than being boring..and if people dont like/accept u..just flip 'em a bird and go your merry way
have a good one~!

 

[Jawn]

Iam you fit in just fine. I also sometimes don't get replies to my posts. I just figure either people are busy that day or maybe they just didn't feel a need to comment because I was "OK". I wouldn't let it bother you.

Whether you realize it or not, with the many posts you have on here you are like a beacon of light to many people trying to find their way through the fog.

Hang in there 'cause there are better days ahead. Remember you are making progress, so don't let a bad day get you down.

Jawn

 

[bluecat]

AvoidenceRulez, you made me laugh out loud, thank you!

Iam,

gosh, listen to PTSD speak. I know its PTSD, because I could have written your post verbatim. That is EXACTLY how I feel ALL THE TIME. I don't have the answer to give you for a solution, because I don't have one, but if it helps any, I know where you are and how lonely it feels. But I also know that I like you and your posts and besides finding you very supportive and enjoying your sense of humor, I also very much appreciate the posts where you share the difficult times. The posts where you talk about how YOU feel are the most touching. Like this one. Thank you so much for formulating what has been on my mind for so long. I didn't know how to start talking about it.

Also, James is right. Sometimes the things people write are so dead on, I can't respond, because I have to take time to process them. I actually have been meaning to comment on another Jamese's post and still haven't found the courage because it was too emotional for me.

I hope you feel better soon,
:Hug_emoticon:
Bluecat

 

[goingonhope]

Have had feelings of not belonging my whole life, feeling alien or "outside" the mainstream. Some days are better than others. It's an emotion, and for me it's related to my trauma.

Ditto on that.

Also Iam, just continue to be yourself, "the good, the bad and the not so exciting and the mundane", and resultingly your all the better off for doing so; despite what our emotions tell our brains, or our brains tell our emotions, or our observations tell our brains to tell our emotions. (smiles)

Otherwise we find ourselves thinking dependently upon what others (maybe) thinking of us, and therefore far too often experiencing our fears, doubts and insecurities. ........Or, we find ourselves dependently (wondering) why others are not thinking of us; What's wrong with us? ...we can obsessively ask ourself. And that's usually a problem, because we seldom tell ourselves the truth about that one.

Too often, numbers of us end up mistakenly concluding that we're not being thought of because we're not worth it or we're unimportant. Or, because we haven't quite figured out just how to be, in order to fit in, and be worth it.

So we're generally better off IMO, just being who we are and no matter what. And, it's ok because once we're increasing more acceptable of ourself, then these questions, struggles and problems seems to take care of themselves, because the solution is always the same this way: I'll just let go and naturally be, as much of myself, in my varied relationships as I can, and ought to be, on any given day, and no matter what, so therefore I'm worth it!

Iam, great job expressing yourself!


Hope

 

[Steve]

Hi All,

I too can relate to what Iam is saying and the others here. For me it has long been my feeling that when I'm not well at all I am a bit scary, When ok I'm boring and all wrapped up in funny lookin. It sometimes appears as if the only time anyone is remotely imterested is when I have something they want or (as already mentioned) its there job.

The thing is there is some irony here. I wonder if we can find a way to fit in with those others who dont fit in? I wonder if our depression and such has left us having difficulty making small talk even when we are not so bad or is it that our lives leave us with little positive stuff to say?

Iam I'm new here but I would be delighted to get to know who the mundane you is. I would ask if you think that a forum in here totally dedicated to ordinary things and small talk would be a good idea. A few ordinary disscussions in it designed to inspire people as well as make contact with people. Something like that anyway.

I'll see what I can come up with.

Steve

 

[Jade-]

I feel like I don't fit in so much that I'm having a hard time writing this. Although I can really relate to feeling like you don't fit in, I feel even further away from that, like I'm in my own category, that I don't even fit in with others that feel they don't fit.

I don't always feel this way, but most times I do. I worry that what I have to say doesn't matter or even make sense. Other times I worry that I have no right to post because I am so screwed up. Other times I worry that what I say will be taken the wrong way, that I'm too blunt, don't think before I write. or people will think it's stupid or psychotic.

Even though you're my friend Iam, I really have a hard time responding to your posts. You have seen me at my worst, I was chatting with you when I got banned, I didn't even realize I had been banned until you told me. I have said and done so many stupid, crazy things on here and you have seen/heard them all. You may have your moments, but you always bounce right back, where as I really struggle, constantly. So alot of times I feel you and I are in different categories. You're able to make positive posts, welcome the newcomers, offer sound advice and encouragement, etc. and it draws people to you. I tend to be negative and feel I have to hide out for awhile after I've made some off the wall comment or thread. I guess what I'm trying to say is the way you're feeling will pass soon for you. It always does.

 

[anni]

Everytime I wish to respond to this, someone has already said it. :) I was actually ( really! ) thinking about you yesterday, about the post you did saying you were a 'runner'. I can be also, and was turning over in my head why one does not from the forum. Beyond all the obvious, glaring reasons, I think it could also be because there always is another thread to plug into, if one feels one has become too intense, dmeanding, personal or exhausting that day. It goes without saying not everyone is everyone else's cup of tea but who cares? So you can leave that one alone because there are so many others, completely compatible. I don't wish to go anywhere, either. It's too nice, after all these years quite simply feeling like a kook, not to be alone with this any more.

We're all so reactive, and fragile, and squishable in spots that I don't think anyone feels they fit in anywhere much. We all do just fine in the end-it's the head insisting to us we do not. Every single post here said it all so there's nothing left - that was already said, too.

For what it's worth, I do not always respond in general to regular old chatty posts from anyone, really because contrary to how it can look, I suck at it. :) Oh, I do it sometimes, and then spend inordinate amounts of time worrying how foolish I may have sounded.

 

[Nighthawk]

Well once again I can say thankfully I am not the only one that feels this way. The difference is you have the courage to start a post.

Nighthawlk

 

[Cthulhu]

I know the problem. I know it very well.
I call it my personal social invisibility, it has always been there, for my whole life, in the real life like in the virtual.
When I write about me, really me, my problems, feelings, thoughts, whatever almost nobody seems to recognize it. Well, at least almost nobody ever answers on threads I've started. This has nothing to do with this forum, it's something I recognized on many different forums, chats and so on, on the most different topics thinkable. I even recognized it as a child, in my first memory of it I am about 4 years old. Many others followed.

People always tend to say that this lies only in one's own imagination and just isn't true, that one gets as much attention and answers es everybody else does. But that's not true, not really. It may fit for most 'normal' people but it certainly doesn't fit for me (and others here). Just because I'm (we are) different, think different, speak different, feel different. Function different.

I analyzed my social invisibilty a few years ago because there really are times when I sense it very intensively and others where I don't really recognize it at all.
My sense of it really depends on my own actually way of being, if I'm quite depressed and lonely I tend to recognize it in a very intensive way and it hurts, it hurts so much. It hurts because it reminds me of the thousands of situations like that which I experienced throughout my life.
When I'm feeling quite good it just doesn't matter to me. It still happens nevertheless, and in no way fewer than in bad times, but it just doesn't matter. I do other things that equal the negative feelings and everythings ok for me. Even if I'm all alone like in bad times.

I think what many others here wrote is totally right- my thoughts often are weird and don't fit to other people, my inner self is so different to other people just because many of the things I experienced are just far off the "normal" life. That's why few people ever know what to answer to my postings- how should they.

Says my mind.
My emotional core says something totally different. The old thing of being use- and worthless, boring, not interesting not even worth getting a single answer on a whole site of postings. What other explanation could there be.

Some years ago I developed a coping strategy for that- it's not a good or healthy one, but it's a working one that keeps me alive- I just never start threads by myself so I don't get hurt. I seldom write anything about myself, instead I explain what others wrote and search for solutions for them.
I just answer to other people's postings and because I sometimes am quite good at it I get friendly responses and thanks. That's good for my self- esteem, quite sure. But it really has nothing to do with my own healing, it just overwrites my own inner pain.

It doesn't change anything about the thing as such. I just modified my view on it. That's how I built up my 'new me' some years ago. It works quite well most of the time but still... My core keeps broken and hurting because it still recognizes what really happens. Because it really happens, objectively.
And that's exactly why I joined this forum. To learn how to finally heal my core because I already cognitive- behaviourally- therapied myself. But that wasn't the answer, not deep down there inside of me.

Only answering other's posts and trying to help can't be the answer. That's what I did for many years, that's how I lived in my relationships. So I have to bear the pain my diary here sometimes brings to me. Not pain about the things I wrote but the pain about getting no response.

Well, I got quite off topic- I see many people here feel the same, many share your problem. But unfortunately it seems that we can't really help one another with this problem, everybody stays somehow on his or her own and has to find his or her way through it. I hope for us all that it evenutally will get better, and if not the thing as such then at least the feeling about it.

 

[curiouser]

In the movie Julie and Julia there is a part where Julia Child's sister talks about going through life being freakishly tall and says "From the beginning you just don't fit in. Literally. -So then, you don't"

I like it because it reminds me that fitting in is just a concept or belief, not a rule or something we have to do in life. Why do we view not fitting in so negatively?

Who said it was not ok for you to be different and act different from someone else? Who actually decides if you're "fitting in" or not? Usually the answer to who, is you.

I use to look at other people, who seemed so happy and "normal" and think it's not fair, I wish I was like them. But how did I really know their lives were so perfect, that they were "normal" just by looking at them? Even if you know someone, you'll never know what it's like to go through life in their physical body and through their thoughts and feelings. My point is we all have some challenge, physically or emotionally, that we are dealing with that makes it impossible to be "normal", whether others are aware of it or not.

"Normal" and "Fitting in" are just concepts or beliefs, and the only way to stop feeling like you "don't fit in" is to stop trying to fit in. Let go of the belief that "fitting in" means something and matters. Like Anni said, it's the head insisting to us that we don't fit in.

As far as replying to posts go, I agree with James, who knows the real reason why someone replies or doesn't. I can speculate, and say that I think people try to be very supportive on this forum. So when someone is experiencing struggles or successes, people may feel more of a need to show their support. When you're not experiencing one of the two, people may either find it harder to show their support because they don't know how to, or it may just be that the topic of your post is something that they personally can't relate to, so they don't reply. However this is only a guess, and there are probably lots of different reasons as to why. I know it can be difficult, but in this situation maybe try to cut yourself and others some slack?

I hope you can see by these replies that people do care about you and what you have to say, mundane or not. I think it speaks volumes about the affect you've had on others here and the connections they've made with you on this forum. :smile: I hope you feel better soon.