Can't live with other people.

[Weirdo]

It's been a while since I last came to this site, but I'm on my low again so...yeah, I can't live with others. I'm living in a college dorm, this is my 3rd year, and every year was with new people.

They're not even bad people, I just can't seem to learn how to socialize when living with someone in the same cell/flat/etc. We don't even fight or anything, I just try my best to avoid everyone as much as I possibly can, which of course makes things even more awkward if I have to see them.

For some time we will greet and exchange a sentence or two, but I bet that by the next semester they'll think I'm so weird, that they'll just pass me in silence, like last year.

Right now I'm caved in my room(thank GOD I don't have a roommate this semester) and listening to giggly chatter in the kitchen of 2 guys and 2 girls, waiting for them to finish their everyday 5 hour long sitting-around-the-table-talking routine, so I can grab some food from the fridge. It's worse when I have to pee, but at least my bladder is expanding.

Anyone else with similar painful stories?

 

[Beatrice]

Yes, absolutely. I went to a boarding school for high school, and I was so shy when I first got there. Pretty much everything you described, happened to me. It's not like it slowly got better either, it took over..... I think it was two years - for me to actually begin to open up to the girls I lived with. And even then it was HARD.

I'm in college now, and my very first roommate I had was difficult to live with because she was friends with everyone in our hallway, and I was only friends with one of them, so she went and talked with them for hours and then got back in the room and was silent with me. I tried talking to her, but she acted really snotty and just gave me one-word answers, left passive-aggressive notes asking me to clean up my books on the floor, etc.

The roommates I'm with now are really nice and considerate, but they're best friends and have their own little social life going on that is completely separate from mine, so it is a little bit awkward to live with them sometimes.

 

[takethislife]

I'm familiar with this kitchen situation. My advice is, go out there at least occasionally when they're there, and try your best to say something. I know how hard it is, but force yourself to do it.

 

[Weirdo]

It's just practising and sticking at situations like this that helps you improve socially.
I know at first it can be daunting, but.. it's always good to try. It's a gradual process of building up your interactions with them.
And if there's still no response (and you'll probably get a sense that they're deliberately acting like they're not interested for whatever reason) then...they're arses. And you shouldn't really be bothered with them. And then you can come talk to meee, haha

Nah, I'm hopeless, but at least you cheered me up with your attitude

I'm familiar with this kitchen situation. My advice is, go out there at least occasionally when they're there, and try your best to say something. I know how hard it is, but force yourself to do it.

Maybe I'll try, but it's hard because my door leads directly to the kitchen, so when I go out they will all look at me as if I was some monster crawling from it's cave, and interrupt their conversation, waiting for me to say something.

The roommates I'm with now are really nice and considerate, but they're best friends and have their own little social life going on that is completely separate from mine, so it is a little bit awkward to live with them sometimes.

I have this situation too, the 4 of them seem like BFFs, so that's one more reason for me to stay out of their clique. Maybe it wouldn't be that bad if I had a roommate, at least I could learn how a normal person socializes with such a group.

 

[Silatuyok]

I know what you're going through. My first year of college I had two different roommates. There's nothing like trying to avoid someone when you both sleep in the same room which is like the size of a bathroom. I absolutely hated every minute of it, and only spoke maybe ten words to my second roommate the entire time I roomed with her. I didn't dislike her or anything, I just never, ever, ever had anything to say---I didn't know what to say to her. I guess she felt the same way about me, but at least she had her own friends to hang out with. God, that was an awful year.
My advice to you would be to find a way, if at all possible, to live on your own. There's absolutely nothing wrong with preferring to live on your own, and you'll be happier for it.
Personally, I couldn't go back to anything like the situation that you are describing. That would be torture.

 

[NP88]

I've went through the same thing recently. I had a roomate who I avoided like the plague. He was a nice guy and the few times I actually talked with him were pleasant though I couldn't help feeling awkward and had the constant need to escape. I just felt that living the sheltered life I live I had nothing of value to say. though I think if I exposed myself to the situation longer I could have actually made a friend. Advice at the risk of being hypocrytical : Force yourself to goto the bathroom when they're around, make some food when people are in the kitchen. Get through it the small victories are really the most important. The interaction will never be as bad as you think. Maybe if possible goto a party with them? It would set some common ground.. my two cents.

 

[Moa]

At least you're out there doing it. When I was in college, as much as I wanted to go to a good school elsewhere, I picked a local college and lived with my parents because the thought of dorming somewhere just terrified me.

So at least pat yourself on the back for that small victory.

 

[TheRadicalAnxiousLefty]

Right now I'm caved in my room(thank GOD I don't have a roommate this semester) and listening to giggly chatter in the kitchen of 2 guys and 2 girls, waiting for them to finish their everyday 5 hour long sitting-around-the-table-talking routine, so I can grab some food from the fridge. It's worse when I have to pee, but at least my bladder is expanding.

Anyone else with similar painful stories?

Absolutely champ. I have been living in the same house for about four years. For the first three years, I would never never leave my room if the house was full of people unless I was going upstairs to have a shower. And I would only go out into the kitchen to make food if no-one was there. Things are pretty much the same still, but maybe like 0.5% better. In other words, little to no difference.

If I ventured out into the kitchen and my landlady was there (lovely woman, bless her heart), I would sometimes pretend I made a wrong turn and was actually going to the toilet to have a pee. Then I would either fake a pee and go back to my room, or fake a pee, prepare myself and go back out there, do what I had to do as quickly as I could, and go back to my room.

If my landlady and her partner were both out there, it would be usually too late, and I had to do my walk into the kitchen, out of fear of looking completely stupid (Landlady's partner sits at the table where he can see all my movements as soon as I exit my room). When in the kitchen, I usually kept my head down, pretended to look preoccupied in my thoughts with something important, and got the **** out of there as quick as I could. As I said, things are more or less the same still; maybe an absolutely miniscule, tiny modicum of improvement, but really not much at all.

I pay my landlady a little extra each week, and she provides me with dinner nightly. I eat in my room; I do not eat with them. When she comes into my room to set my plate down on my desk, I feel awkward (used to feel EXTREMELY awkward) and sometimes even dread the moment.

She is very fond of me, regards me as part of the family, yet I still feel awkward. It is bizarre. I guess I have that nagging, paranoid feeling that I am a huge burden on them. And I always imagine that she compares me to her sixteen year old son, who I know will grow up to be far more successful than me in every way imaginable (goes to a top notch private school, gets straight A's, etc). I don't know if she does it in real life or not, but the very thought is enough to be disturbing.

It is horrible. I can't even pluck up the courage to go out and join an innocent, non-judgmental family of four in conversation, or even eat a meal with them. Imagine what I would be like in a share-house with a bunch of rowdy young people.

I could not live with people my age, especially young, lively, extroverted people. I am just not designed that way.