Utter Loneliness

deche23 · ‎24-11-2020

Hello everyone,

I have a problem.

I am 34 years old and have never been in a relationship. I'm not terrible looking, I have a good stable job, but I've just never been sought after by the opposite sex. Just before the second lockdown in Melbourne, I met a girl via online dating. We met up for a walk, and walked and talked for hours. She was a lovely, kind beautiful girl, who was open about her past, her aspirations and her insecurities. With the lockdown continuing, we went on walks around the parks in Melbourne and talked for hours in the day. Eventually she started coming to my place and we would watch movies, have dinner, talk and laugh for hours on end over the weekend. We read the same books, liked similar things and are both quiet people. I couldn't believe my luck. It was like someone had put an angel on earth just for me.

Recently we met up and she said she doesn't feel the same energy. It's been two weeks but I am still just incomprehensibly heartbroken. I don't have many friends and in general and I don't relate to many people. I despise saying this because it sounds aloof, but I'm an intellectual person and prefer quiet, in depth conversations to wild nights out.

I've learnt some things about myself that terrify me - my crippling loneliness being one of them, as well as my relationship inexperience. I placed value in her which probably isn't healthy. I was fine at 'playing it cool' and am not an overbearing person. She said to me that I did nothing wrong and that she still thinks I am a great person.

I can't sleep nor can I concentrate at work. Every hour of the day I am tight in the chest and at work yesterday I genuinely felt as though I was feeling an onset of some form of psychosis.

I am so scared because I rarely meet a woman that I feel that I connect with and am attracted to, and it may be another 34 years until it happens again. It was like someone switched on a light for a 5 month period, where I could see a type of love and beauty (not just in the aesthetic sense) that I didn't think was possible for me. Before hand, I had accepted my fate that I would grow old, single and lonely. I have tried online dating apps and meet up groups, but I just can't seem to find anyone that wants to take the time of day to speak to me or ask me questions.

This girl was so kind and loving towards me, that for a moment in my life I felt a degree of love and contentment that made everything around me seem beautiful and possible.

What do I do?

Help.

Guest_1643 · ‎24-11-2020

Hey Deche

I can understand and relate to wanting to meet someone but not finding the opportunity or connections easily

Do you want a serious relationship at the moment? Could you see yourself getting to know someone over dates with no pressure/assumption that it would lead to a relationship, or is it only a relationship that you are after?
Maybe taking the pressure off might help.

Warm welcomes to the forum,
Sleepy

AliasKind · ‎25-11-2020

Hi deche23,

I sympathise with you for I am like you, lonely in the love department and inexperienced in the history of relationships department and I'm a little older. How wonderful you felt something with someone - proof, it is possible. And then how crushing it wasn't reciprocated. I wish there was an easy answer for both of us, our perfect partner would just appear in our lives. I don't know what the solution is and I have no helpful advice for you. Just wanted to let you know your not alone (as I received from reading your post) and to keep some faith. It's terribly difficult to believe the cliché's of 'it'll happen when it's meant to happen', 'if it's meant to be, it'll be' etc. but that's where I put some of my faith. My thoughts are with you.

Guest_1643 · ‎26-11-2020

Hey there all - I think when you've had limited experience or haven't had a partner for a while or had bad experiences (i have had very bad romantic experiences) - it can make it harder to want to be in a relationship. There's a wariness there. I wander if it's better for people in that situation, myself included, to have relationships of any kind, just to get out there. Obviously not abusive or negative.
I don't want to put my partner on a pedestal or except perfection which I feel in danger of doing... is there a way to be in between - in the space of just dating and trying and meeting which might help ease the process.
Just thinking