Almost 25 and still NO life

I was born shy, around puberty I was getting more issues with it. I was having social anxiety, depression by times and a overall feeling that there was something about me but I did not know at that time what it was. I never really maked friends myself In my teens I had some "friends" but that was mostly because I knew them from primary school. I'm now 24 I don't have any friends and have stopped school to early because I feel so bad about myself. Sometimes I don't understand myself why am I the way I am right now? is there something wrong with me?.

The last 4 years I have serious avoidance issues I work only part time, and in my free time I only sit behind the computer. I always seek distraction, and the computer is the best to give it to me.
Now lately I realize my youth is coming to an end. I'm almost 25 and feel like I have wasted my life. I wanted all those things that "normal" people do, I want friends, I want to have fun.
Now I see that people in mid twenties are going to the next level in life. They getting serious jobs, relationships, our even kids.
I'm far from that, I don't even want that right now.
I still want the "fun life" that I didn't get.
But I'm scared of people, I feel very low around others and being around others makes me depressed.
Also my avoidance is not just in the external world, it lives in me. Its like my real desires, wants, interests are hidden for myself. I don't know who I am. Its like I don't have a personality. I avoid internally who I really am.

I don't know what to do with my life anymore. But I'm scared of the thought I am going to be 30 one day and still live my life like this. That would be so painful.

Advice would be nice.

Avoidance pd is a curse..it robs you of your life and by the time you wake up and realize you want to change, much of the damage has been done..

my advice is to start working out, get stronger and faster...this will improve confidence to a degree..it helped me but im 34 and i feel like im stuck..i have wasted so much time that now im trying to make up for lost tiome and when you are avoidant, just going out and socializing feels like a job in itself...it leaves you exhausted etc etc i know it does me...throughout the years i lost my sense of identity as well...i dont know who i am either..

have you tried medication or therapy??i have tried both and they helped somewhat but not enough..

thats the key problem for avoidant, just getting out there and 'living' and enjoying life...seems impossible alot of the time..

That was a really good post actually so well done

I felt like that a long time ago and i'm sure other people can relate to that as well

Being avoidant is real, every second of every day we are trying to figure out how to have to do the things we do without that contact

You already know your own way of doing things and i think we are all in the same boat basically

Whatever your age or circumstances if you have true AVPD then it never goes away, ever

There isn't a 'cure' as such but you eventually get to a point where you actually have to accept yourself and try to live with that

In terms of employment, which is always going to be a problem because people are involved, you can only do something like get qualified in the subject you like and work from home or find a career outdoors that doesn't involve too much interaction
with other people on a daily basis

i'm sorry you are going through this but bear in mind a solo career or one without too much personal invasion

It really doesn't get much better than this

Best wishes

^^another thing is its easy to just force yourself out to talk to people but when you feel the way an avoidant feels, its usually no fun socializing..that leads to more isolating and more frustration..vicious cycle, one i dont know how to even crack..

While other people's lives can serve as a guide, precedent, or bellwether for our own, at the end of the day we all have our own worldviews and personalities. Each person is unique. What do you want to get out of life? For me, I want to have as much joy and as little pain as possible and I build my life around that. Yes, many are settling into careers and marriages but does that make them successful? Not necessarily. It's our false interpretation of their success that haunts us, and our false interpretations of our wrongdoings. No one can intimidate you, no one can belittle you unless you let them. I know how frustrating that is to hear. It haunts me as well. I have the disconnect within me. How to give ourselves a break and gain higher self-esteem? That's the crux of the matter with AvPD.

There's still plenty of people in their 20's and 30's who just want to have that fun life, too.

Clydedenver took the words out of my fingers.

(by the way, ouch! )

You DO have a life, Jake.
Can you breath deeply and fill your lungs with air? Then you are alive, and therefore have a life.
It's okay if you're unhappy with where you are now. But instead of beating yourself up over it, use this as an opportunity for self-reflection. Figure out what YOU want, not what society has you believing you should want. It isn't easy, but the pay off can be enormous and so liberating

now

clydedenver wrote: Yes, many are settling into careers and marriages but does that make them successful? Not necessarily. It's our false interpretation of their success that haunts us, and our false interpretations of our wrongdoings.

Exactly!
Please no more beating yourself up over things you don't even want.

Have you considered enrolling in an online college? That's what I did for a year until I felt ready to transfer to a university.
Online learning is like a gift from heaven sent directly to us avoidant folk.
Seriously. Give it some thought.

Well wishes,

Evol

Thank you all for your kind words.
I will answer most questions in the post at once.

I haven't tried therapy our medication, I'm not diagnosed. Like I said I was always shy, and around the age of 13/14 It was beginning to cause real troubles in my social life. By the time I was 16/18 I was getting real anxious and uncomfortable around others. I did not know what was wrong with me, I just thought I was still shy and had to force myself to get over it.
I did force myself, I did go to the gym, go out, to school. But still I wasn't changing. Maybe I was physical not hidding anymore but from the inside I was always in avoidance "mode". I was and always am very aware of myself and my surrounding and the things I say.
I was never really speaking my mind, I was just saying what I was learned to say, that what is supposed to say.

When I was 18 I saw a big difference between myself and other people my age. I lacked enthusiasm and spontaneity. I tried to act normal and could succees to a certain point. But there was a limit to my skills to seem normal and socialize.
After the age of 19/20 I quited school, and stayed in home as much as possible.
Until recently I always thought I had social anxiety. I readed before about Avoidant PD but never thought that was my problem. But now I think it is.

I experience great problems with breaking habbits. Its like I can't change things. I want another job but I want this for several years now, and still I don't take action to change things. But that has actually much to do with the social contact that involves changing jobs.
I feel totally stuck in my own life. Other people see opportunities for me and yes when I'm in a good our better mood I can see them to. But my social problems are keeping me where I am. And I never talked about this with anymore. I feel so ashamed. I already feel ashamed of myself and telling other people I feel ashamed of myself is much more shaming.

My personality is so closed of that I don't feel any motivation for anything, I think that's because Im not doing things that I want to do. Because I really don't know anymore what I want to do.

@Tongue
You are totally right about forcing yourself to talk to people. I can make a "decent" conversation about subjects that has nothing to do to me. But It's all fake, I'm not talking, its like I force my mind to handle this talking thing just to seem normal.
(sorry if that sounds weird)

@Clydenenver
You basically say I must not compare my life with that of others. And I agree with that, I have to do what I want in life. But thats also a big part of the problem. I feel not free to do what I want. And after long time I don't even know what I want.
Also, I want social contact, I want joy and happines and friends. I think its very hard to stop comparing to others if I eventually have to reconnect to them. If I'm going to be perceived as totally weird that is not going to help me to reconnect.

@Evol222
Yeah physically Im still here, but emotional Im not living anymore.
I'm not from the USA , we don't have online college, well we have home based study's where minimal class time is necessary.
I'm planning to do some kind of study to improve my life.

One thing Im currently thinking about is moving out and try to create a better life in a different town. I'm scared to death, but I hope it will free me from my environment which also keeps me the way I am because I'm afraid to change in front of my parents and other people.
What do you all think about this. Is it helping for people with AvPD to move to a different town?

(ps. sorry for the length of this post and for my grammer, im not a native English speaker)

[quote="jakethinks"]
What do you all think about this. Is it helping for people with AvPD to move to a different town?


I moved country, i have been relieved of the anxiety i felt around family. Helping? I honestly fill with indifference as to answer. Sorry

jakethinks wrote:
@Clydenenver
You basically say I must not compare my life with that of others. And I agree with that, I have to do what I want in life. But thats also a big part of the problem. I feel not free to do what I want. And after long time I don't even know what I want.
Also, I want social contact, I want joy and happines and friends. I think its very hard to stop comparing to others if I eventually have to reconnect to them. If I'm going to be perceived as totally weird that is not going to help me to reconnect.

One thing Im currently thinking about is moving out and try to create a better life in a different town. I'm scared to death, but I hope it will free me from my environment which also keeps me the way I am because I'm afraid to change in front of my parents and other people.
What do you all think about this. Is it helping for people with AvPD to move to a different town?

In my first post I said I want to have as much joy and as little pain as possible. If I may be so bold, I will go right ahead and state the entire human credo is: the most pleasure, the least pain. We all share that similarity. How everyone goes about these is different. You say you don't even know what you want. But from the little bit you have written I can tell you at least one thing you want. You want to be free from this anxiety. Let's take steps to get that point. For some it is raising the self-esteem. For others it is medication. For some it is following existing passions. For some it is counseling. For some it is a psychological revamping of how you perceive the world. Some of these solutions overlap, by the way. For example what seems to be working for me lately is I have changed my worldview in that through beating in my head over and over that others are not inherently superior to me maybe I'm finally starting to believe it. So there we have both raising of the self-esteem and change of worldview. Full disclosure, I'm also on some medication at this time which may be aiding as well.

Sometimes the change in environment works, sometimes it doesn't. Environmental triggers can play a huge role in keeping the avoidant avoidant.

But I'm scared of people, I feel very low around others and being around others makes me depressed.

Also, I want social contact, I want joy and happines and friends.

You're scared of people but you want social contact at the same time. On the face of it this is a contradiction. I get exactly what you mean because I'm the same way. It's not a contradiction if we define more specifically. We are afraid of certain kinds of social contact. We do want certain kinds of other social contact. We are afraid of rejection which can come through social contact. We want acceptance which can come through social contact.

I'm 24 and I feel like I've wasted a lot of (what should have been) the best years of my life. I, too, spend a lot of time in front of a computer, or playing video games, and yes, it is very much an escape, a "distraction." Social interaction was (and still is) a low priority. I'm going to college to be a nurse, which is not really my goal as opposed to that of my family's—although, I've tried to embrace it since I only have a few semesters left (if my grades maintain). After that—I tell myself—I'll do what I want to do, but then I still have to confront the fact that I'll be 25 years old and have never had an 'intimate' relationship, have been on two (or three?) dates, have only a few close friends that I could rely on, and an immense difficulty in developing new relationships/getting close to people.

The weird part is that I'm a volunteer firefighter (which may be as much as a 'distraction' as the video games, now that I think about it) and I believe I've experienced what it is like to feel alive, but I've had difficulty in applying that energy to forming relationships—and that's catching up to my conscience.