Until recently, I never viewed my introversion as much of problem. I was told at work that I "need to be more social". This really struck a cord with me because I never thought that as I began my adult life my introversion may limit my success . So I decided to start this blog and chronicle my journey of becoming 'more social'.

Why are you so quiet? He must me hiding something...

Now this is easier said than done of course. My whole life people have been telling me, 'you're so quiet', 'you should talk more' or my new favorite 'be more social'. It's gotten to the point where some people feel uncomfortable around me because I'm so quiet. What is it that makes them so uncomfortable? Is it that my behavior or lack there of, is so unusual they just can't stand it? Is it that I'm some psycho who's going to snap at any moment? Is it the natural human tendency to be afraid of someone who's not like you? Not my problem right? They should be more understanding. Well unfortunately in a world of extroverts it is my problem. As much as I would love to live in a world where everyone accepts each other the way they are, that's just not reality. It's an extroverts world and if I'm going to thrive and not just survive, I've got to get to work and figure something out. So I'm going to be more 'social'. I'm not sure what that will look like, but in the following months, if not years, I will try and look deeper into the complex relationship that introverts and extroverts have and attempt different strategies for becoming more 'social'.

Why is it that quiet people make others feel uncomfortable?

Please share your thoughts.

*Trigger* This is a long story but I will try to be as brief as possible. I am very new to forums and anything I say is without judgement of any form of disorder, as I am all to aware of the impact it has on all parties and how the sufferer is impacted. Please do not take any offence as I'm still trying to understand, accept and work with its far reaching concsecuences and would ask all posters to remain non-judgementa. Thank you.

My wife and I have been in a relationship for 16years, married for 4 and have 3 year old Daughter together.

Most of the revelations from the events of the past two months have made me realise that in hindsight my wonderful true love has suffered from more than the diagnosed general anxiety and depression that has been interwoven in our lives for all this time.

Two months ago my mother in-law lost her on/off 10 year battle with cancer. We were all left devastated, but my wife who has always been considered the most emotional member of the family showed little grief, despite being greatly consumed for the entire decade of this fight.

Two days after her passing, my wife had a memorial tattoo and immediately confessed she had fantasised over the artist and made sexual advances towards him. My wife has always despised adultery and we had talked openly about friends who had committed this most "despicable" of acts. My wife has also always been very timid around strangers, sexually unadventurous and incredibly attached to myself. I put this down to the trauma and suggested that some form of therapy for her grief, along with open discussion would help and that I would support her all the way.

The situation became worse on the day of her mothers funeral, as the following day she confessed she had been awake all night sending naked pictures of herself to men she had never met. She made in her own words " throw away " comments that she would be better off dead, how a massive hole was consuming her and how she was unable to love anyone or inflict her "issues" on me anymore.

Her family although unaware of the full facts all agreed she should see her GP immediately, who subsequently referred her directly to A&E. The Doctors fortunately could see the full picture and my wife's reluctance to open up, or even admit she had a problem. They talked to both her sister and I and after discussions at board level, generally agreed she suffered from a personality disorder and offered immediate therapy and support, this has sadly been refused and ignored by my wife.

During this period our daughter was also suffering from pneumonia and my wife was unable to fully cope with this and embarked on offering herself for NSA sex via the Internet, sleeping with 6 unknown men (at least) in a period of weeks, all of the encounters potentially dangerous given the unknown quantity of the individuals and the environments the acts were taking place.

My wife has always suffered from angry outbursts, issues of social acceptance, 'living in and blaming the past', fear of abandonment and an inabilty to focus on positive aspects of life. Its also important to teveak that she was beaten by her father as a child, along with her sister and mother and her fathers family also had a history of sexual abuse, although my wife claims she was never assaulted in this manner.

Whilst this has left me devastated and whilst an exact diagnosis is not possible without therapy and dialogue from my wife, I know the most caring and loving person I fell for all those years ago, now has some form of explanation as to why she feels like this, as do I for the roller coaster relationship we have experienced.

As a footnote, not only does my wife not accept their is a problem with her actions or health, she has also started drinking heavily and vilifies me to anybody that she is able to convince, normally those who have infrequent contact with her or myself and are unaware of the full picture . These individuals are now validating...

[ Continued ]

Plz help me. i'm very much confused about my sextual identity.
i have a strong attraction for boys. i watch gay porn movies. had sex with some guys also before marriage. i though every thing will be ok after marriage but thats not the case. i dont really like to spend time with my wife. and i still have strong feelings and attraction for boys. i dont know am i gay?
i enjoy when i spend time with a boy while having sex. but after that i regret for what i did. help me please what should i do.

I just don't understand my "family". I leave my purse and wallet out on the table and they come and go through it. They just pick my wallet up and flip through my check book. And when I said something my grandmother got mad. She just got mad and smarted me off, then walked away. It's like this all the time, it's like I'm supposed to let them run over me and do or say whatever they want about me or my stuff, and if I say anything I'm a bitch or I don't know what I'm talking about. Honestly it makes me sick just to be here. Sometimes I just feel like I can't take it anymore, like my time is over and I should just commit suicide.

so my boyfriend of a year and a half has bipolar disorder. We've broken up and fought many times over the past but everything always goes back to normal once he's done with that particular cycle. I know it sounds awful to go through but I am willing to and it is worth it to me. I'd never hold it against him because I've done my fair share of learning about the disorder and I know that he can't help it. I love him and I want to see him happy and I know I make him happy it's just when he gets moody it's always me. And I know that when he doesn't know what's wrong he's going to take it out on the person closest to him which is me, and I know I can't do anything about it, and that sucks. We've talked about his disorder before and he realized that I'm the only one who's there for him.

Now getting to what's going on right now, we hadn't fought in two months and everything was perfect and I knew that it was long overdue for him to go through a depressive, angry or manic cycle. Last Sunday I saw him and everything was fine, then that night when he was working he texted me and told me he was depressed, I know better than to ask him why or what's wrong so I just told him that if he needs me I'm here but if he needs his space I understand. He told me that he needed some space he just didn't want to have to say it, so we didn't talk because I wanted to respect that he needed space. On valentines day, that tuesday, I didn't want to waste my card so I drove the hour to see him and I put it on his doorstep and I left, as to not bother him. In the middle of the night he sent me a long text saying how he needs someone more mature and how I'm too negative and how he wants to break up. I'm neither of those things. He said he's on a path to self discovery as well. After we talked about that I asked if he got my card and he said yes and no, that he got it but he didn't read it, he hid it from himself in case he has a change of heart like he does other times with the things I give him when stuff like this happens.

We didn't talk all week and then today, Saturday, I don't know why but I had to say how I felt. So I sent him this long thing about how I felt and he was really nasty about it (which I was expecting). I just needed him to think about what he's doing. Also all week he has been tweeting all these sad song lyrics or he sounds happy. And in the past he's seemed happy and he would be out with his friends having a good time and not talking to me but that's expected and he'd always come back. The last time I told him how I felt and how his bipolar disorder was affecting me (because he knew he was bipolar he just had no idea what it meant) he got really angry at first but he called me later and told me that I was right and that he was sorry.

Everyone I've tried talking to about this just tells me I need to tell him to go on medication. He's tried it and doesn't like it and it's not my place to push him to do so. I know the real reasons he's upset are because he's a 20 year old boy who thinks his life is over because he hasn't started college yet, and I've been trying to help him to go to college, and I'm in no way trying to hold him back. I know he's just going through a cycle and he's not being himself right now and all of the other times he's always come back. It's just never lasted this long. I know it can't be the same every time but I just wanted to see some other opinions.

For now I just know I need to give him the space he needs and respect that and hopefully he'll come back sooner or later. I've been told I should leave him countless times by others but that's not what I want to do in the least bit.

Opinions? Advice?