Just another rant from a depressed virgin 20 year old guy with no life...

xxx

...But hopefully shedding a bit of new light and a vaguely unique perspective on my life.

My story is pretty generic, always struggled socially when growing up, covid happening at a time when I could have been making progress socially didn't exactly help. I was pretty miserable about how difficult I found it to make friends most of the time but kind of just accepted all the usual cliches - 'it gets better','you'll have more opportunities at uni', 'life will be easier for you as an adult' etc. As I went through secondary school and then sixth form and then my gap year (which admittedly was a bit better) I started to tire slowly more and more of being unhappy and coming into 1st year of uni it definitely got to the point where I felt like if things were not better after first year I'd kind of just snap.

Well guess what? Things have not really gotten better after first year and I've snapped. Admittedly I did make friends initially right at the start of uni which I really enjoyed and was briefly happier than ever but that broke down very quickly when I got completely frozen out of my group by a girl who changed her mind about whether she wanted a relationship with me. It probably doesn't help that I don't normally get into disputes with people and one of my few bits of pride I had used to come from the fact that I generally didn't get into arguments. I basically spent the entire rest of first year just alone, intimidated to go outside and generally feeling the way I have often felt throughout my life but 10x worse. Every now and then I would get a bit of motivation and try to make some kind of effort but normally it would not really work very well.

I put 'virgin' in the title and although it's certainly not 100% of the problem it definitely weighs on my mind a lot. It's almost disengenuous to call it a 'stigma' because it's basically true that at this point having no proper romantic experience is just embarassing after so long and reflects on me as a person whether I like it or not. It also definitely changes the way people look at me and I feel like there is just no good mindset to deal with how I feel. I feel like the only things I ever see about how to do deal with this is the 'embrace the single life' minset which I can't really relate to at all (I'm not kidding myself into thinking loneliness is actually independence) particularly as someone who does not really have a social life otherwise, and Andrew Tate and all his fellow Top Gs' self improvement (yuck). I have to give TSR credit because the 'still a virgin in your 20s?' thread is probably the best resource you are going to find anywhere about how to feel in this situation. But even then it is pretty defeatist, basically saying the situation sucks to be in, try not to get too depressed about it, good luck.

And to be honest at this point it is getting really difficult to find the motivation to put myself through more pain trying to make things better. People often tell me that things will eventually get better and I might find being an adult and having a job much easier but at this point I don't really care - it's not consolation to tell me I might enjoy being 40, I want to be able to enjoy being young. Your childhood/teen yeras and your first year of uni are special times you will never get back and I've thrown them away. At this point regardless of where life takes me in the future I am always going have to grow up and deal with the resentment of not really having had a childhood and missing out hugely on all of the social opportunities and that is difficult to accept. I know I can't change the past, only look to the present and future and that just makes me feel more upset and humiliated.

Some people have tried to tell me that I should try to channel my anger and resentment, or maybe try to improve in my life as some form of 'revenge' of the people who were rather unpleasant to me at uni. But logically this just doesn't make sense, the reality is these people don't care about me at all and have gone on to have a great 1st year and enjoy being popular while I am the one mopeing around being unhappy, causing huge stress on my family and thousands of pounds of financial strain for therapy and psychiatry. There's no way for me to 'beat' them - I have 'lost' and that is just something I have to accept, but it's also just embarassing that I've let this ruin me that much and it doesn't give me confidence or hope for things to improve in the future. I have seen every generic response to similar threads to this with advice for what to do if you are socially isolated ("have you tried going to a society?", "do you talk to people in lectures?", "nothing is going to change if you sit in your room all day!") and I have tried that to an extent but regardless of how well I understand them it's not really the problem anymore. After all, it makes making friends seem like a painful and stressful process which you do in the hope of eventually getting a good result and that is pretty demotivating. For most people their social life is something to enjoy and relax and it has been that way for me when there have been brief periods of positivity as well. Working hard on myself so I get to the point where maybe I'm below average at socialising to the point that I have enough of a life that I'm not unhappy 24/7 isn't really an attractive proposition for the future...

This turned out really, really long and I've probably only said a tenth of what I could have or would like to. At this point it is difficult to know what to do. I stopped being able to put up with miserable, lonely summers like 4 years ago and this summer break is longer than ever, just me stuck with my thoughts of misery and unhappiness. I love my family and can't complain about them trying to do stuff with me but there comes a point where it just feels embrassing being forced into doing stuff you don't particularly want to do with them while most other people your age are out with their mates having fun. At least at uni there is a chance something could change or improve. But then in a uni environment it is more difficult to distract myself from the depressing reality which is my life. I am trying out a few new therapists which I hope might have some positive affect on my mindset. It has not really worked previously for me and I've generally found mental health professionals unconvincingand not really understanding of me but I hope someone else might be able to change that.

Have you spoken to anyone from the friendship group that ostracised you recently ?

Couple of points here:

- The first is that, no, being a virgin does not reflect on you as a person. The people who judge you based on this are a waste of your time. Trust me. No normal person cares or treats you differently because you've been or haven't been in a relationship. I think that it reflects more on them rather than you. The key is to try and be happy on your own. Once you start doing things that you enjoy and things that make you happy you won't give a crap about any of this nonsense.

Hello mate, you obviously have a lot of courage writing this thread. I know that when I was in a similar position a couple of years ago, I never would have had the bravery to lay out my feelings this bare in front of everyone. I just wanted you to know that as bleak as things may seem, they do get better. At the end of the day, the only thing you can do is get your head down and push through it. Once you feel ready, maybe try taking up a new hobby, going out and meeting some new people or whatever. While it might seem impossible at the moment, it's the only way you'll eventually be able to break free from this cycle of self pity. For now though, just know that I'm rooting for you and I know you'll get there in the end.
In times like these it always does me good to think about quotes from some of my heroes; "success is not final, failure is not fatal. It is the courage to continue that counts" -Winston Churchill.

Love,
Howard

Being desperate or wallowing in self pity won't help you lose your virginity

Thinking positive, you've got another two years at uni to turn it around. Not everyone likes their first year that much (I didn't, my second year was far better). Just be grateful you're not in my situation mate, I've graduated and I'm back home which is a total dump up north where all the nice girls are taken and it's literally 90% chav and full of people who don't want to know you if they think you're "posh"..