What Helps When You Are Alone, And It's Not A Good Thing?

[Justmehere]

Being alone used to feel ok to me. I was lonely, but actually being alone didn't feel bad. For a variety of reasons, that has changed. It feels awful.

It is also not a great idea for me to be alone this weekend. My family is not healthy or safe to connect with and the offline friends that I have are distant right now or not available.

I need to work on making new connections, or maybe reconnecting to old ones. I need to build a life that isn't so alone. For now, I am where I am.

My battle to survive trauma and now survive PTSD and myself has left me very alone in life.

Anyone struggle with being alone? What helps to either reduce the alone-ness or reduce the pain of being so alone?

 

[watundah]

Sometimes. I find these things help or at least lend distraction.

Simply getting out of the house -
- a coffeehouse with a book
- a hike to be with nature
- meditation in the park
- a bike ride
- getting lost in the library
- when I feel really gutsy, a Meetup group

 

[jaccat]

Walking, reading, writing, drawing, cooking. Going out each day to get myself a little treat- even if it's just a fresh loaf of bread. One weekend when I was left alone in our student house at uni I cleaned all three floors of it, top to bottom. It was very calming, satisfying, therapeutic even;). Mind you, when my housemates returned they didn't know what had happened!

 

[falling_wave]

Things I do to help with feeling isolated. Take a long walk.
Go to the gym even if to just walk on the treadmill or take a class,
Go do homework or just read at a coffeehouse (I often walk to one)
Take a risk and call someone I trust even if it's been a long time since we've talked or text a casual invite to dinner.
Go to the movies (even if it's the same thing you do at home it changes your environment and gets you around people)
Don't know if I should recommend this one but sometimes I put on good clothes and makeup and sit at a bar for a bit by myself (getting ready makes me feel better and a lot of people willing to make small talk at a bar)
Get ready just for the sake of it, open windows, put on music, light candles, and clean the house (changing your environment helps too)

Things to increase connection. What I've been doing is:
Working extra so I'm not so broke when I want to get out of the house
Creating a meetup group (even if it's not active you can contact members individually and invite them out for a coffee. Sometimes it's less intimidating.)
Inviting neighbors over for wine now and then.
Putting energy into being there for people who need it. (Sometimes out struggles consume us and it's worth it too get out of our own way and be there for others who need it)
This is sensitive to your beliefs but I found a good church to start going to weekly.

 

[Meadowsweet]

Work helps me, and online forums. I sometimes feel like the latter is a bit sad and highlights my inability to connect in a 'normal' way. But although it's good to recognise that talking with online strangers is not a complete replacement for real face/voice support, it's good also to recognise that it is a viable source of support when needed.

But mostly I don't think of what life would be like 'IF'. And I fill my life with stuff that enables me to avoid the lack of real interpersonal relationships in life = work, gym, online, running kids around. In short - keeping busy.

 

[dougyhowzer]

A lot of great suggestions have been made that I think is worth taking up .

I myself was in a situation like yours a year ago , and I had to try new things out to see what did and didn't work for me .

I think one thing that might perhaps work is to take a self inventory and make a list of what you liked doing in the past .

Do you like being productive , and if you did , what were the types of activities you enjoyed .

Or do you like being apart of community , and what did you like about it .

One other thing that I want to mention that perhaps it might be good to consider trying out new things , and that may require going out of your comfort zone .

You could discover some new things about your self in the process .

Do you also have a therapist that you can talk to and see what suggestions hector she has to offer ?

 

[Deleted member 12723]

Distraction, distraction, distraction. Keeping busy doing projects that need to be done or escaping in good movies and books. Getting out of the house and reaching out to safe others for contact purpouses. I wish you the best.

After the big crash we have to start over and rebuild our lives and it takes time to really get to know a person i have learned to build trust.

 

[Justmehere]

These are really good suggestions. Today is a really crappy day with all of this, and I'm trying out some of these ideas. Distraction is a biggie. Also, I think acceptance. Not sure how that fits in yet... I wish this was easier. I'm sorry that others struggle with this too, and I'm also really glad to know I'm not the only one. Ha. I'm not alone in the struggle with being alone. :D

 

[Changing4Best]

I used to feel lonely, but now I have a kind of schedule of sorts which helps. I go to the local Senior Center on weekdays. I do laundry on Saturdays and go to church on Sundays. We all, a bunch of us, go out to eat after church every week.

I often listen to the radio, read books and magazines and stuff like that when I am home alone.

It took me some getting used to being alone to enjoy it. I am a widow, and it has been ten years since my beloved died. I still miss him a lot and always will I suppose. However, I had such a good marriage that I doubt I would be fair to a new husband. I would be comparing him to my beloved, I think, too much so to make a new marriage work out.

I have neighbors I visit with sometimes, that helps me too, with the loneliness.

 

[Gadgie]

Yea! that's what I do, keep myself busy, which is OK in the summer time, but it's the winter when I get really depressed. I think it's because you can't get out of the house so much, and the days are a lot shorter.

This winter seemed to last for ever to me, so it was great to see the sun when spring came. Must admit I was at the point of cracking, but then I had a lot of cr*p to deal with, over the wither months.

I've lived alone now for eight months since my wife passed, yet I still talk to her as I go around the house, cleaning and so on. We both knew my wife was terminally ill, and I thought I was ready for it, I got that wrong for sure.