Weird situation: Alone, sad and burying myself under my work

LegacyUser

Regular Boardsie here. Going Unreg.

Basically I'm a 23 y/o male, in college, no depression or history of; but a bit down lately. Otherwise a normal, functioning member of society that you'd walk by in the street and forget instantly. In terms of attractiveness, I give myself a 7. Maybe a 6.

Anyway, I find myself in a bit of a weird situation. It involves a lack of relationships, sex etc... but not in the usual "OMG can't get laid" way which pops up on PI daily. I kind of wish I had that problem tbh.

Until I was 19, I was in a relationship (only relationship ever, since we were 16, yada yada). Totally over it, but it's about the only benchmark I have for love and relationships.

I have been single for the past two years. And by single I mean no sex, no relationship, no kissing... not even a casual flirt or an interest on the horizon. For the past two years anything, in any way shape or form romantic, has been absent from my life. For over 24 months I was living the life of a monk basically - all work, no play.. (One exception, I'll explain later.)

And I've been happy. Kind of. I'm generally quite self assured. I have my own interests and, although I do have some friends in college, I'm quite introverted and prefer to work on my own personal projects. Day-to-day I just kept on trucking and focused on other things.

Around August 2013 I stumbled upon the Meyers-Briggs test online. It's a personality test used by companies and psychologists to understand a person better. I took it and I'm an INTJ. When I read the INTJ profile it hit me like a ton of bricks. It described to to a tee. Every little facet of my personality was there. Particularly on the "romance" part.

Basically, it said that I attract a partner best when I stop looking for one. It went into more detail but that was the gist of it.

For the past two years I'd obviously been keeping my eyes peeled and have had urges and desires to connect with someone. It gets lonely being the lone ranger even if I'm happy in a day-to-day sense. So I decided to change tactic based on my new discovery, said "**** it" and wrote off any idea of a relationship altogether.

The first house party I attended in ages a few months later (December, just gone - goes to show how often I go out),true to my INTJ nature of attracting someone when I'm not even trying, a girl started flirting with me. Zero initiation from my end. If anything, I blanked her a couple of times. When I realised she was flirting with me I was like "Da fuq? Someone's flirting with me?" and I let it run on for a while to make like 100000% sure I wasn't getting my wires crossed.

We ended up kissing and ended up in an upstairs bedroom later. Happy days, thought I. Two years, no sex, no kissing, no connection with anyone on that level. And here I was, getting all three on one night with a gorgeous, smart, funny, cute girl with skin as smooth as milk. She was frankly beautiful. I don't put women on pedestals or anything like that, but objectively speaking, if this was a hundred years ago, she'd have fcuking poems written about her.

You'd think I'd be delighted with myself. And I was. Until I realised that my d1ck wouldn't work. Literally zero communication between mind and manhood. I panicked in my head, made some crap excuse and bailed. Could have been nerves (I was nervous), could have been the drink. Could have been my lad had forgotten what he's actually intended for. Dunno. Some combination maybe.

So its been like two months and I've been beating myself up about that. For about a month I felt really bad and pretty much swore off ever attempting anything like it again, but I realise now that's a ridiculous plan. I didn't add her on FB after that, which although I wish in fantasy world I did, I'm glad I didn't let my emotions take over and add her - I'd only just met her, failed badly in the bedroom and bailed. Didn't seem like a FB request would go down as anything other than unwanted. Nevertheless, a missed opportunity that was the ONLY opportunity stings badly.

There's one other thing: I find normal social conduct regarding dating/flirting absurd. I've felt like this for years - ever since I was a young teenager. It all seems so stupid to me. I GET it and I understand why it's done. But it feels totally unnatural to me. When the girl was flirting with me, she seemed like she was having fun doing it. And on the exterior I was giving off a happy fun vibe in response, trying to mirror whatever she was doing. But in my head I was thinking "What the hell are you doing? What's she doing? What's she thinking? What does that MEAN?".

So now, I find myself in a bit of a catch-22. I'm 100% naturally a ****-up when it comes to flirting or attracting women the way the Internet tells me to. I've read everything from blogs to that retarded piece of crap "The Game". Whatever regular people have I must not.

So I just have to stand here and do nothing basically and hope that someone nice happens to pass by and find me attractive, all the while knowing that my last opportunity for sex/possible relationship ended in an embarrassing disaster and that the next relationship/opportunity is more than likely years away. I'll be lucky if I connect with another woman by the time I'm 30.

I just want to feel something again for someone. I don't really expect a reply to this post. Fcuk knows where you'd start cos I don't. I just wanted to vent on another Saturday evening spent alone working on projects.

If I could describe my feeling about myself right now I'd pin it down on feeling really alone, sad and, as much as I hate to admit it, desperate. I live in a shell where I pretend to the world that I'm their version of happy.

Thanks.

Tokyo

That is quite the read... where to begin?!

No disrespect OP, but the most of your post is fluff - the truth is in the last couple of lines:

If I could describe my feeling about myself right now I'd pin it down on feeling really alone, sad and, as much as I hate to admit it, desperate. I live in a shell where I pretend to the world that I'm their version of happy.

...and it's perfectly reasonable to feel like that. Most of us have at some stage in our lives. There's nothign wrong with feeling down, and alone, and wanting to change that.

First off, stop doing surveys on the internet/reading "The Game"/taking advice from blogs etc. The internet by its very nature is subjective as hell, full of all sorts of people, each with his or her own view on the world. All you're going to end up with is an awful lot of conflicting information that may or may not work. Either way, people won't be meeting *you* - it will be meeting a cheat sheet of one liners and instructions that someone downloaded form the internet.

As cliched as it sounds, honestly the best approach is to be yourself. If you feel that you need improvement in that area, then improve the confidence that you have in yourself. And, I'll repeat the advice I hand out on a daily basis - focus less on meeting a girl so you can bed her, and more on meeting people in general - guys and girls - that you can make friends with. You cay that you are happy working on your own personal projects, but have you tried taking part in group activities or projects, or joining a club that pursues the same interest as you do? There are clubs for pretty much everything out there these days - it shouldn't be too hard to find something that you like. Meet new people, form a new social group. Don't make the mistake of thinking that by doing that you "just have to stand here and do nothing basically and hope that someone nice happens to pass by and find [you] attractive" - that is being proactive. Be confident, and form friendships - the girl that you want to be with and wants to be with you will come along in it's own time.

As for the incident of not being able to get it up? It's exactly that - an incident. It's happened to the best of us, be it drink, nerves, shyness, insecurity, whatever. Most people just wouldn't have the balls to post about it online. The more you stress about it, the bigger you are going to blow it out of proportion in your head. write it off as an unfortunate event, nothing more.

IrishEyes19

mike_ie wrote: »

That is quite the read... where to begin?!

No disrespect OP, but the most of your post is fluff - the truth is in the last couple of lines:



...and it's perfectly reasonable to feel like that. Most of us have at some stage in our lives. There's nothign wrong with feeling down, and alone, and wanting to change that.

First off, stop doing surveys on the internet/reading "The Game"/taking advice from blogs etc. The internet by its very nature is subjective as hell, full of all sorts of people, each with his or her own view on the world. All you're going to end up with is an awful lot of conflicting information that may or may not work. Either way, people won't be meeting *you* - it will be meeting a cheat sheet of one liners and instructions that someone downloaded form the internet.

As cliched as it sounds, honestly the best approach is to be yourself. If you feel that you need improvement in that area, then improve the confidence that you have in yourself. And, I'll repeat the advice I hand out on a daily basis - focus less on meeting a girl so you can bed her, and more on meeting people in general - guys and girls - that you can make friends with. You cay that you are happy working on your own personal projects, but have you tried taking part in group activities or projects, or joining a club that pursues the same interest as you do? There are clubs for pretty much everything out there these days - it shouldn't be too hard to find something that you like. Meet new people, form a new social group. Don't make the mistake of thinking that by doing that you "just have to stand here and do nothing basically and hope that someone nice happens to pass by and find [you] attractive" - that is being proactive. Be confident, and form friendships - the girl that you want to be with and wants to be with you will come along in it's own time.

As for the incident of not being able to get it up? It's exactly that - an incident. It's happened to the best of us, be it drink, nerves, shyness, insecurity, whatever. Most people just wouldn't have the balls to post about it online. The more you stress about it, the bigger you are going to blow it out of proportion in your head. write it off as an unfortunate event, nothing more.

Completely agree with this. After months of not going out and building these feelings up, what do you expect? Mike is right!! Just chalk it down to experience, but you need to shake off this negative attitude in regards to yourself.

Ham Sambo

Seen this happening before, no sex for a long time, all your birthdays come together and just when you want your d1ck to work he lets you down with a bang! I reckon it was a case of nerves stepping in, from what you said it all happened so fast, flirt, room, naked, shag, doesn't give a guy time to relax and appreciate what's in front of him, or under him whatever the case may be!! softly softly catches monkey next time! :-)