TA_OAO

It's been months of going back and fourth like this in my head and in paper... My therapists seem to think he's awful, but i think he's great... he just doesn't like me. Which makes me feel ashamed and low, like if I were to just act "normal" then he would treat me like he used to and treats others (very kindly and nurturing).

Everyone I seem to explain this situation to (including three different therapists) seem to HATE this friend. I just feel like i'm explaining only the negative parts... but maybe they're right and that I do deserve better? I think I just made a normal person exhausted and anxious with my presence...

You're absolutely right ! I try to keep my personal life/struggles to myself but when they said I could trust them to talk I believed them... I don't want to emotionally rely on anyone beyond myself again because I risk getting very hurt. I am planning to re-enroll on a different course in September, so I have 7 months of time to heal and grow as a person I guess.

I can't learn self-love because of my fear of hurting others Hello all, I'm a young on the journey of learning self-love. Recently, I 20m have gone through one of the worst periods of my life. I was a university student who thought they made friends with someone in a group, only to find out that none of them liked being around me. I thought the person I was friends with was really special and I'm very upset that they didn't really like me at all. They think I'm "cool" but not compatible with them. It felt like we were becoming close. I asked them if they wanted to hang out and they emphatically said yes via text, only for nothing to come about from it (they said it was more of a "passive yes", and they didn't really mean that it would actually happen because they don't really go to anyone's house to hangout...?) he basically said, in a long paragraph, that he doesn't feel comfortable around me, that he has never himself and that he doesn't want to hang out with me outside of class. This is fair enough, sure the rejection hurts but I don't know how he expected me to go to class every day and talk to him, knowing that he doesn't like being around me. It's like he wanted me to be all normal and happy despite knowing that he's not even himself around me. It hurts so much because I knew the friendship was over and we were already a year into the course, so most of the classes' friendship groups were pretty much set. So I spent that summer feeling extremely depressed. I later found out they spent the entire summer hanging out with the rest of the group without me and I felt so low and worthless. When we did return after the summer break, I tried my best to do the whole "friends but not friends" thing but I couldn't do it. I couldn't be in a group where the majority of them didn't like me, and the one person I did like only pitied me. He even said "I don't mind talking to you... But again I don't think we're compatible... I just don't want you to be alone" which in retrospect is just him saying he feels guilty, not that he wants to spend time with me. The embarrassment of being labelled as "someone I don't really like but talk to out of obligation" compared to the rest of the group who are his actual friends hurt so much. So, I ended up leaving university, because I was close to ending it all. When I messaged them that I had left because I felt like the situation was too much, they never responded. I know I've written a lot about how terrible the situation was from my perspective (which is incredibly skewed), but it only hurt because this person was great. I've never met anyone like them, someone who knows themselves and has enough self-esteem and self-actualization to reject someone. Someone who has deep knowledge of his emotions and expresses it. The type of person who can and has cultivated a life of happiness (grades, girlfriend, friends who love him). It hurts to know I'm clearly not a source of happiness for him (as he said). But that's where my fear lies. I know I need to live a life of self-love rather than fear and living to be liked by others, but every time I try I feel like *him*. I don't want to hurt someone like I was hurt, just because I love myself. I don't want to reject someone like I was rejected, even if it was the best thing to do. It's a block I can't shake. And yes, I have a therapist and I'm on antidepressants. TL;DR : I don't want to hurt someone like I was hurt, just because I love myself.

Yes, prior to university I was actually quite the social butterfly, quite easy to get along with according to others. The first day of university, I will admit, was quite bad at the start aha. I can easily see why people avoided me at the time, but after the first day those feelings quickly went away, until around Cyrus asking me that question which really flipped a switch in my mind (in a terrible way)

@catfeederThis is a fantastic idea! My university does have a dedicated "future careers" team that deals with soft skills, so I'll definitely give that a try, thank you

@catfeeder Ohh, sorry there might have been some miscommunication in my original post, or rather it was poorly explained. I wasn't the original person becoming personable or emotional at the start, it was Cyrus. I was actually quite closed off, but he did insist in wanting to talk more and tell him about deeper stuff which I did find odd at the time, but I thought it was just heading in the direction of a friendship. So we both naturally acted like, well, friends. That's why it was so odd that he all of a sudden didn't seem comfortable with being "actual friends". I'm usually fine just having the work colleague thing, but doing the whole friendship dance and then walking it back just felt so odd? I spoke to someone about the entire situation today and they also found it bizarre. Also I just want to say thank you to every you wrote to me in this thread, it gave me a lot to think about and I have a greater idea of what I want to do now 💚

I don't really see the point in trying to be friends with someone who doesn't want to be actual friends? I feel like that only serves to hurt me, like the past couples of months slowly has. Also I don't think people are only nice to me out of pity, and I do actually already have a therapist but we're currently doing childhood trauma work. Thank you for the advice on the clubs though. @Andrina

This is exact mindset I want to have going forward on this course, thank you. I get that i'm meant to be friendly towards them still but it's really hard to interact with someone with "remember, you are not actual friends" at the back of your mind. It's like being friendly but not too friendly since you still have to act professional and guarded but not too much that it comes across as cold or hostile. I know this might be annoying to read from a third party perspective but everything just hurts and is really confusing for me. I feely genuinely heartbroken but I have to get over it and it feels so difficult. Oh one more thing I just want to say; I'm not usually like this ! I'm usually very easy to get a long with, this feels like such an anomaly, but I suppose we all end up having this awkward-cringe phrase with someone in our lives. Do you mean by doing that small apology talk I was recommended before, and then just act like I'm with work colleagues? Or another thing, sorry? @catfeeder

Yes and no... I understand from a third party perspective it seems very strange that i've been thinking about this for months and this intensely, but at the time my home situation was very brutal so having someone like Cyrus around me really helped. And I might have developed a small crush on them... which is probably why it feels like a heavier rejection. It might be illogical but that's how I feel. I think you're right. I think I'll try to at least have a small talk with the other two to hash out any awkwardness/hostility I might have presented last year. I honestly just want to get on with my work, I can't believe I let my "social life" get in the way of my academics. @Jaunty

I just realised I mixed up the comments! so sorry aha

Oh this is almost certainly the case. I was definitely the major problem, but I also don't think they hate me or anything, they just don't feel comfortable around me, which makes me just want to avoid them because I can't STAND feeling like a burden or actively making people uncomfortable with my presence. It's so hard to explain my thinking, but I feel like this only adds more burden? I know they're going to respond with "It's okay, no need to apologize, no hard feeling" because they're nice/passive people who don't really care about me. Not in a mean way, they just don't know me enough to care, at least for Scott and Luigi. I can really see him sitting next to me on the first day back out of kindness, but I'm thinking about just saying to Cyrus "Hey, sorry I had you feel so uncomfortable last year. I want you feel like yourself at university and I want you to thrive on this course, whether that's with me around you or not.", just to give him the option to sit and interact with others excluding me, whilst letting him know there are no hard feelings. Aha, that's true. Thank you so much for your comment, it's given me a lot to think about, and i'm thinking what would be the best way to return for me that I can feel comfortable doing, though I know i'll have to be a little brave. @boltnrun

@catfeeder I think that makes a lot of sense, thank you! My university does have a lot of societies, so I think i'll make it a priority in my second year to join as many of the ones that interest me as I can, even if only a little, and see which ones stick.

@ shouldhavelearned I didn't mention dating once in my post...

@Tinydance Thank you so much for the lovely reply, you don't know how much I needed to hear it... I don't know exactly how i'm going to survive September just yet, but I think I need to push university out of my mind and actually focus on being more self compassionate to myself and my emotions. I'm going through a lot right now and that's okay.

I [20M] started university just over a year ago, just now having finished my first year and having my long summer break. I’m on a course I really like and I’m learning so much about something I’ve been passionate about since I was a child. This then brings me to the major issue, my social life. On the first day of University, I was really, really irritated, a mixture of anger and anxiety (anxigerty?) due to the place I had moved to all the way from home and being scared to interact with classmates and start university. Naturally, everyone avoided me, I did have a scowl on my face lol, all except one person who I’ll refer to as Cyrus. They needed one more person for the group work and despite my sour face, they asked me. From there we started talking and naturally became “friends”. We didn’t have a lot in common but we didn’t mind being near each other so it kind of just worked like that. We progressed to messaging each other outside of class and we both had a very sweet and caring disposition towards one another, he would talk me through times were I was feeling down and try to help me with class work and I would all check in on him to see how he was sleeping, eating and feeling both in class and via text. Honestly, I hadn’t had a friend who took on that caring role like that before, usually, I’m that friend for others, so this really made Cyrus seem a little special in my eyes. We worked really well together, especially on one project in which the other two classmates in our project didn’t do much of any work, so it was just me and Cyrus. But then it started to go south slowly over time. There are two other classmates, I’ll call them Scott and Luigi, who were a part of our group on the first day and from then on. These two are incredibly gifted in our subject, I think they’ve been doing it since secondary, so a good five years head start on practice vs others who are just starting in this field with this course (me included) and it shows in their work. I was standing at the bus stop with Cyrus one day after lessons and he says to me “Is the reason you don’t like Scott and Luigi because they’re so much better at the subject than you?”. I was shocked and taken aback, I didn’t think I was genuinely showing dislike for either of them. The only times I think he could be referring to is when I would sometimes tease them by saying hi to one of them, but not the other, or if they asked to borrow a pen I might say something like “hmmm, I don’t know, I only give these to people I like…” in a very over the top, very light-hearted way but maybe it wasn’t light-hearted? What if I was subconsciously actually feeling this way and conveying it through jokes? And what’s worse, people like Cyrus can see it clearly and have labelled me as insecure? People I’ve told this to seem to think Cyrus might be projecting his own insecurities about how well he’s performing in class but I don’t know. I’ve literally thought about that one interaction since it happened months ago. Slowly over time it seemed like insecurities about my own work, friendships, and me as a person, started to get worse and it really did reflect on my interactions with them. It felt like they were afraid to be near me, to make me upset, which is an awful feeling to know that you’re burdensome to those around you. There would be ups and downs in how well I thought my friendship was progressing with Cyrus. One day I’d pluck up the courage and ask if he’d like to come over to my university house to play games or hang out (something I don’t do with friends) which he’d agree to, only for nothing to come from it. Or he’ll just randomly start gaming with Scott instead. Just little things like that over and over again and it made me feel so low. It’s not exactly like he’s making plans and then blowing me off, it’s just small things that make me feel so unimportant and unworthy. So after months and months of this and feeling extremely low, I finally sent him some long paragraphs (which I now cringe at a little) basically explaining (more like whining) how I’ve felt over the past couple of months with examples. He then sends me back his own sets of paragraphs explaining that he thinks that I’m “a great person” but he doesn’t feel like himself around me and he doesn’t want to be friends, in fact, he never wanted to be friends outside of university because he doesn’t have time for that (girlfriend, travelling back home, studying). This message broke me. I was already feeling extremely low about myself and this message tore my heart in two, I felt so unlovable. I just broke down sobbing to myself and hyperventilating. I don’t know how I’m going to face them all in September, let alone my own coursework. I’m studying during my summer because I enjoy learning new things and it would prove extremely useful for 2nd year, but even now it feels impossible, I can’t stop doubting my abilities and thinking about university and how I basically killed a friendship with my insecurities. The thought of them saying “oh poor OP, he’s going through something, I hope he gets better” whilst I sit away from them from a distance makes me feel sick. Like I’m something to pity whilst they can all just, be normal, get along with people normally. I feel like, if I hadn’t interacted with them, or this situation didn’t happen, I could really thrive in this course. I love what I’m learning, I’m hard-working. But I don’t think ill be able to get them out of my mind. I’ll always be second-guessing myself, always thinking about what they’re thinking about what I’m doing or saying, even if I’m not sitting next to them. I know I can’t control what they think of me but I just don’t know how, I don’t want to limit myself. I just want to be confident and comfortable… TDLR: My insecurities ruined my friendships and I don’t know how to undo awkwardness. How can I return to university feeling confident and comfortable in myself and my abilities.