extreme introversion

[debbie downer]

i'm an introvert.

i am literally my own best friend.

i am an only child, and both of my parents work, so i'm home alone most of the time. i didn't grow up with cousins that were my age because they're all 17+ years older than me (my parents are both the youngest in their families with huge age gaps between them and their siblings, who all married at 18 except for my parents...). at family parties, it has always been me sitting around with all these adults with no one to talk to and nothing to do.

to make matters worse, i have social anxiety and am terrified to interact with people. because of this, i don't have many friends.

these things have contributed to my extreme introversion.

i don't think MD has contributed to this. i think this has contributed to MD.

even if people are close to me, they still don't know a lot about me because they don't know what i do when i'm by myself. i journal a lot because whenever i need someone to talk to, i don't want to talk to anyone, so i just write it down. i have inside jokes with myself, and i keep a lot of things to myself (such as books that i'm reading, bands that i'm obsessed with at the moment, etc). i'm my own best friend because no one can understand me like i can, and i feel like other people will judge me. but when i daydream, i can come up with people who will understand me because i can make them understand me. my characters get me because i control their thoughts and make sure that they get me.

and as always, i'm not sure how to end this blog post. but yeah.

[OhMyMagenta]

I'm also an only child, have some social anxiety, and consider myself an introvert. When I was younger, I didn't have many friends. I preferred the company of the characters from my favorite books and movies to real people. After I get home from work, the last thing I want to do is talk to anyone, as I'm exhausted from doing it all day. I don't trust many people, so I don't talk about myself much. Relationships I have with the characters in my daydreams are significantly easier...and at times more rewarding, than my 'real' relationships.

[The1andonlyAbber]

I have inside jokes with myself as well. Well, with my characters actually, but I control them, so that means they're really me, right?

[The1andonlyAbber]

In my old town, our house was in a weird spot with no other houses around (it was a parsonage). I was an only child and also had to be homeschooled. There were a few kids at my church and in my homeschool group I was friends with, but I only saw them a couple of times per week for about an hour. I was my own classmate, sibling, and neighborhood buddy. I would literally pass notes in "class", ride bikes, hang around in special hideouts, play games, and sometimes argue with myself (or rather, with characters that I had created). After we moved to a different town where we lived in a neighborhood and I went to school, I was bullied and didn't have friends for quite a while. Even after I made friends, I still wasn't really able to see them outside of school that much for scheduling reasons. Now I have more friends and more freedom. Problem is, social situations terrify me and I have very poor social skills. I've gotten very good at faking it, though. I can pretend that I'm confident and love socializing. Everyone thinks I'm a bubbly extrovert. I want to tell them the truth, but they would never believe me because I've been faking everything for so long.

[debbie downer]

thanks for your replies, guys.

water lily, i watched the ted talk, and i enjoyed it a lot. thank you for sharing! 

[Water Lily]

Hi Meghan,

I feel the same way you do. I often tell people I'm an introvert living in an extrovert world. I draw a lot of inspiration from this ted talk: http://www.ted.com/talks/susan_cain_the_power_of_introverts#t-8224. 

I think MD plays into introversion - it makes me actually prefer being alone so I can concentrate on my characters. In the MD-universe I can control what people say to each other. Yet in real life, when there are 3+ people in a group - I never seem prepared for where the convo is heading...it's overwhelming! And in-comes the anxiety!  I much prefer small groups or one-on-one convos. 

I think it's really important to find at least 1-2 people you can trust/confide in. It is hard, but a support group is so fundamental to human happiness. Feel free to talk to me! We can be friends : D. 

[Tanya]

im not exactly an introvert. Im somewhere between an introvert and an extrovert. im also like this. i can't share thing about myself with anyone not even my own family and friends because i have trouble trusting people. also im afraid of people judging me.

[Dusty]

You sound a lot like me actually. Most people don't know much about me because I don't share much. I just don't like to talk about it because I'm afraid of judgment (on my more esoteric values and goals, types of music and shows I watch etc.). A lot of people I know have no idea what my interests are.

And that is so funny, I just realize I have inside jokes with myself as well. About guys I've liked, specific situations I've been in etc. that other people either don't know about, wouldn't care about, or it's too private to share.

I don't MD a lot anymore but when I did, my characters were definitely just representing different parts of my personality.