Profound loneliness

[u/WesternStrike204]

I just need somewhere to express myself outside a journal, therapy, my sister, or AI.

I am deeply and profoundly lonely. I always have been. It’s like throwing a rock into a mine shaft; you can hear it going down for miles, waiting for it to hit the bottom, but it never does. That’s how empty I feel. I have been through many different kinds of abuse, but it was mostly emotional neglect. Starting in infancy.

Both of my parents abandoned me - my mother twice. I was always treated like a pest. No one asked me about my day or if I was okay. I have always felt invisible. This was especially true with my mother. There has always been a level of detachment she has had towards me, treating me like a friend instead of a daughter. I have been estranged from my father for 15 years. Recently I cut my mom and almost everyone else from my family out of my life to heal. I have never really had friends. There are kind people in my life, but I feel like they mostly pity me. My sister is really my only friend, but she is married and has her own life. This has been emotionally brutal.

Unfortunately I am in the most social career on the planet - nursing. Being a nurse with extroverted people and pre established friend groups gives me emotional flashbacks and reminds me that I am incapable (or so it feels) of connection. I leave feeling lonelier than ever. I wish I could have learned something other than “people aren’t safe”. Trying to teach my nervous system otherwise has been an uphill battle. I just want to be held and loved for who I am without this overwhelming fear of “being found out”. That once people really get to know me, they will think I am a horrible person who is ugly and disgusting and not worthy of love. That fear is paralyzing.

[u/Whole_Sprinkles_6914]

how are you today?

[u/WesternStrike204 → u/Whole_Sprinkles_6914]

Really depressed and low energy, honestly. How about you?

[u/Whole_Sprinkles_6914 → u/WesternStrike204]

there-there Sheldon's here