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Comment by donatj | Hacker News Reader

I have a small handful of people I would call my friend. Most of them since grade school. Yet, in my life, I have had three people I have really truly opened up to. One of them died suddenly, I miss you Meka. One of them stopped talking to me for reasons I don't understand. One of them cheated on me repeatedly.

I'm just frankly not sure I'll ever truly fully open up to someone again. I have been seeing a therapist for a couple of years now and I still go in with a pretty thick shell I have trouble piercing. I'm so slow to warm up to people, I just really doubt there will be another person in my life I'll ever be around enough to get to that point with. Work from home for the last five years has not helped that at all.

Being an adult just kinda sucks.

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> One of them stopped talking to me for reasons I don't understand.

This is relatively common from what I've seen. People who just ghost a friend, or ghost an entire groups of friends. A lot of the times it's because they're unhappy with their life and trying to make a clean break from what they were connected to before.

I’m sorry for what happened to you.

I don’t know if it can comfort you but personally I’m trying to accept that it’s ok to be "vulnerable" with mostly everyone. Most of the time it creates interesting bonds with people. Sometimes you are being "vulnerable" to authentic jerks and so what ? Most of the time you can just ignore them.

I find that acting like this is actually an effective automatic filter for my social interactions.

The only place I’m more protecting myself (without being totally closed) is at work because, probably due to the environment, people aren’t acting normally at work.

One of the things I've noticed is that there is a huge discrepancy between people who can "bounce back" from someone behaving inappropriately to them when they are in a vulnerable position. People who are able to go "yeah fuck you too buddy, anyways onto the next thing" are way more able to handle things. People who end up dwelling on one person who did something bad years ago and are unable to let go of that pain end up closing themselves off for fear of exacerbating it.

Yeah but like I said, I’m just trying to do that. I’ve been like the former people you described.

In my case, I feel it’s just the wisdom of just being older. I also have the luck of having a stable life, a few friends and nice little family. I’ve never been more emotionally stable than today so of course it’s much easier not to care when people randomly betray me.

It’s an awful feeling to have a trusted friend distance themselves with no explanation. It amplifies any insecurities we have.

I hope you find someone you can connect with. I’m rooting for you man.

Sorry about your losses, especially Meka. Showing up for therapy is courageous. That's not small.

Sort of the same. I’ve lost touch with or been sabotaged by the people I used to be close to. Now I have acquaintances, people I know and am fine hanging out with, but I don’t have anyone close that I’d really trust or open up to. And I’m fine with that, the effort it takes and the risks of being very open with someone are not worth it to me. And if someone tries to open up to me, I’m immediately suspicious and will start to distance myself. At this point in my life I’m not interested in taking on someone else’s emotional baggage.

It's not as hard as you think to get close to people, but you have to be intentional about it.

First step would be to widen your "funnel" of new people in your life before then filtering them down. Simply need to go to social events, meetups, etc.

I believe there are lots of people I'd open up to, but it's complicated because I would want to sleep with them

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