Incapable of Emotional Connection?

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This could also have gone into Love & Dating.

Does anyone else feel as though they are incapable of “feeling close” to anyone? I put that in quotes because it is so difficult to even conceptualize or explain. I feel completely alone in this world despite having regular social contact with several people that I am “close to”. Day to day, I move through the motions interacting with the major characters in my life as if they are exactly that instead of real people. And as a result, the only dialogue that feels cathartic or fulfilling (although it isn’t actually) is that which I have inside my head, with myself. No matter how much that I share with people about myself, I still feel “spiritually isolated”. For example, I have had endless crying meltdowns to my mom about my various struggles with mental health, including one in which I confessed exactly what I’m confessing in this post. To that specific confession, she responded that she feels the exact same way, and I proceeded to feel and take away NOTHING. If there was anything that could make me feel less alone in this world, it would be that. Therefore, I feel like it is truly impossible for me to ever feel connected to another person (whatever that even means). I have multiple family members, friends and have had girlfriends, but nothing will ever feel good enough. When I am with any of these people, I don’t really appreciate it or seem to get remotely anything out of it. And whenever they’re not in the same room as me, they feel completely faraway, as if they are not even real. I pessimistically don’t think any advice can change this, so I am mostly wondering if anyone can relate to this?

I remember feeling this way until age 21 or so, when I finally met a woman with whom I had some unusual hobbies in common and who eventually also became a sexual partner. Unfortunately that relationship didn't last more than two years, but it was my first experience of deep emotional intimacy.


... except that she is your parent. As such, she has always been one of the main "major characters" in your life.


I don't know you and I don't know whether your pessimism is justified. I can only guess that it might not be.

Do you have any hobbies/interests that you are (or have been) deeply into?

due to trauma and training I learned to hide all my emotions and have had the devil of a time finding feelings other than fear. I am quite sure my version of "love" and "caring" is not the same as is depicted on any social media, books, movies, etc. I think society's expectations and definitions of various emotions and how they are presented to us as ideas can be pretty far away from what is reality for most folks. For those of us with years of training not to show our emotions, it is tough work to try to find them.. once I redefined my expectations about what I would feel and how I would react, I was able to find my own version of many emotions, and believe me they are nothing like society's expectations and presentations of "what it should be".