YOU ARE NOT ALONE - A companion online community discussion board for The Mental Illness Happy Hour podcast with Paul Gilmartin

First of all, thank you to anyone who's taking the time to read this. As far as I can tell I'm the first person in here to post on this particular topic. Despite the anonymity, it's making me quite nervous to type out these words.

I'm a heterosexual male in my late 30s and who has never had a relationship. This is due to my lifelong problem with depression and anxiety (specifically social anxiety) combined with a dysfunctional upbringing where I was effectively raised to have low self-esteem.

I've made progress with this issue and I'm still in the process of dealing with it, but part of the difficulty that I face is the intense, secret embarrassment that I feel over this predicament. It sometimes feels like I would rather die than have people know this secret of mine.

My therapist tells me that the problem is more common that I realize. Finding out if that's true or not is part of the reason I'm posting in this forum now. I would love to hear from anyone who has had this problem either in the past or currently, or if you know someone who has.

And even if you're someone who's never has this problem, if you have any thoughts on it that could help then I'd love to hear them.

Thanks.

Glad to hear you are trying to reach out.
Have you never had sex or just never had an intimate relationship?

I think the more you talk about it and put it out in the world the less power it will have over you.

There is so much pressure put on men and women and their sexuality in our society. These are the pressures that seem to be affecting you.
Unfortunately, sexually active men are seen as "real men" while sexually active women are seen as "sluts"
Where as a man who is not sexually active is seen as less of a man, and a women who is not sexually active is seen as pure and moral.
WTF!?!

So, i know its a bit late to say this but, dont beat yourself up too much about it. Be honest with who ever youre with, and if they cant empathize with you
then theyre not worth your time.

Intimiate relationships are hard enough to achieve as is, so just do what feels right, try not to put too much pressure on yourself and just let life flow, fuck society and all those stereotypes.

Hope this helps.

I'm in a similar situation.

Hey Mort,

That problem is seriously so common sometimes I wonder how the human race continues to populate itself at all. I happen to have a cute face and large breasts, so relationships have never been too hard for me to come by. But my self-esteem and anxiety and depression are so severe that I can never suppress doubts that any boyfriend I have just wants me for my looks -- and if those fade I'm fucked. I'm a serial monogamist. I thrive on the love and attention from my partner and can't function for long when I'm single. I'm apathetic towards all topics unless my boyfriend has an opinion on it. It's disgusting, really.

So um... I guess my point is that mental illness is incredibly debilitating. I'm sorry if this post comes across as "lols I'm pretty, wut's celibacy??//?" I just wanted to let you know that even people able to get into relationships find themselves paralyzed thanks to anxiety.

Hi Mort,

Another hetero male here, who was was in a situation a lot like yours. I had a non-serious girlfriend for a couple months in high school, but no relationship and only a handful of dates until my late 20s. I had a *lot* of social anxiety, especially before grad school (where it was there, but better because I fit in a lot more).

I was depressed to some degree or other, off and on, starting about age 12 or 13, mostly due to not fitting in socially and not having a romantic relationship. I was intellectually smart and academically successful, but that didn't fix my huge lonliness.

Also, anxiety and fear suck. Really, deeply, and truely. Mine are not limited to "social anxiety", and have definitely caused me to seriously fuck up awesome things that have come my way. And I didn't even realize how crippled I was by it until I was in my 30s and had already screwed up a lot of stuff.

I am very blessed (or fortunate, depending on your worldview) that I'm no longer alone. I did meet someone in my late 20s who's now my wife of 13 years. Right before we met, I was feeling so hopeless I was starting to seriously consider that I might never have a relationship, never get married, and that I should somehow come around to accepting that and being happy with being single. (Not saying this is something you should or shouldn't do.)

So that's the "you're not alone" part of the post. (And dude, you are *so* not!) Next is the advice part, such as it is.

Fear. It's all in your head. I know, believe me, that it feels a lot bigger than that sounds. But it doesn't have to stay that way forever. I really, really recommend getting help for it. For me, what helped was medication (anti-depressants and anti-anxiety for a while), therapy, and journaling. Oh, and this podcast! It's *your* head and you *can* do things that will make it more like a head that you want.

Another cheesy trick that helped me some was thinking about everything as practice. "That girl I just met is really cute and probably wouldn't go out with me in a million years. But someday I might meet someone who would, so I'm going to ask this girl out now as practice for if/when that happens." I'm not saying ask out every eligible female you meet, just don't stress so much every time you do (or want to and are afraid to). (Yeah, yeah, easier said than done.)

Good luck. Hope this has been some help.

- TS

I happen to be gay, but I'm in a very similar situation. I'm 40. I've had only two very short lived relationships (3 months each) back in college, and they only occurred because the other person made the first move. I also have social anxiety, depression, and low self esteem about my looks, which keeps me from ever reaching out to anyone or making myself available for a relationship (not that anyone has actually attempted to pursue one with me in an extraordinarily long time.) I pretty much wake up every day thinking about how pathetic I am, how pathetic my life is, how embarrassed I am for being so old and inexperienced, how lonely I am, and how I don't foresee it getting any better as I get older and even less attractive. I've kind of come to the conclusion that I'll die alone and lonely having never known romantic love or what it feels like to be in love. And, honestly, that's too bad, because if I actually allow myself to toot my own horn for a bit, I think I'm a great guy who I think others would want to be with. But, nobody ever gets to know that side of me because I'm too damn scared to ever put myself out there.

I certainly have no idea how to fix this. I mean, I do have ideas...but, they involve doing things I'm terrified of doing. So, even though I may theoretically know how to solve the problem, I can't actually bring myself to do it. I've been told, and I'm sure you've heard many times, that you have to be confident to attract people. Well, if that's the case, I'm fucking screwed (no pun intended) because that's never going to happen. But, I'm currently trying to take baby steps and move forward. I've started seeing a therapist again and trying medications. But, I'm a big ball of stress right now and want to give up. I mean, just thinking about going through the motions of dealing with the social anxiety freaks me out. We'll see where it takes me...

But, no...you're definitely not alone.

Mort24 wrote:I've made progress with this issue and I'm still in the process of dealing with it, but part of the difficulty that I face is the intense, secret embarrassment that I feel over this predicament. It sometimes feels like I would rather die than have people know this secret of mine.

Wow, this was me exactly. It was how I lived my life from high school to the age of 25, when I had a complete breakdown. I also have the issues of depression and anxiety, and social anxiety.

Please don't have a breakdown! It was very dangerous. My biggest gift to myself was seeing that my ego was making me hate myself and making me hate other people. My ego went to such lengths to preserve my false sense of identity that it was willing to leave me completely isolated.

My ego refused to let me be open to women who might be open to the idea of dating me. My ego refused to let me treat available women in a kind, sensitive, loving, giving, generous way. On some level, I desperately wanted women to give me the benefit of the doubt, but my stupid ego refused to let me treat women in that same way -- especially women who were available and who would be receptive to dating me. So I had very self-harmful fantasies of unavailable women. The whole thing was a mess.

The only good thing about my breakdown was that my ego and my sense of identity was completely crushed, but I can't recommend that route to anyone, because the risk of suicide was too great.

Eckhart Tolle in the book "A New Earth" writes marvelously about the harm done by the ego.

However you advance in your journey I wish you the best of luck, and I wish for you to treat yourself in the loving way you deserve, and I wish for you the greatest today and tomorrow!

Thank you for all the responses everyone. They are much appreciated.

Mort,
Hey man.
What you describe is very common.
I was a virgin until I was thirty. I didn't get my first real gf until 31. I didn't kiss any girls or go on a date from age 24 to 30.

You are not alone. I wish you well.

Saying the following was true for me, and I only speak for myself. I am 36 today, and get female attention.

When I was in a situation similar to yours, I told myself two things:

1. I could be right/proud or I could be successful.

In practice: If I kept doing the same things, I'd keep getting the same results. I saw men who were successful with women. I decided that if I wanted what they had, I should do what they did. Fortunately for me, these men wrote books.

2. Social anxiety in meeting women was a learned behavior.

Babies, they say, are born with two natural fears: falling and loud noises.

Speaking only for myself, I learned the behavior of fear of talking to a beautiful woman. Now, that fear was felt as very very real my friend!

But, thanks to the books I read, it was a false fear.

In fact, beautiful women are very easy to talk to. After I did what the books suggested.

Women are people, just like you and me. Just like you and me they poop, they fart, they get food stuck in their teeth. They're human. When I feared a woman I put her on a pedestal. I won't speak for her, but she probably didn't want to be there. She probably wanted to be related to as a person.

The fear of women can be overcome. I know, because I did it. I kept trying different methods until something worked. Then I kept after it.

Today, right now, at 7:51 pm on a Sunday we could go anywhere women congregate. If you were here we could go to Chipotle or the mall; you could point out any woman and I would gladly go introduce myself. She might decline the conversation (accepting "rejection" is a healthy part of budding sensuality), but chances are she'd be glad to talk to me. And I'd be glad to get you fully into the conversation too.

When I was in a similar situation, I found an answer that worked for me. There is an answer to your situation. I wish you luck and courage in facing it.

Choose wisely.

It is a common problem. I was SO afraid to date and go up to girls for the longest time. I came upon a really interesting exercise that can help with social anxiety if you are willing to go there. Because most of this kind of thing is due to fear of rejection, the best way to help yourself is to overcome that fear. So...

Make the goal of an interaction to be rejected, not to get a number or a date. I would go out and tell myself "I am going to be rejected by 10 women tonight." Then I would go to a bar I would never ever go to again and just talk to people, letting it all out. It only took two nights for me to get over the fear completely. All it took was a change of expectation. Of course there was more tweaking to do after that, but once the fear was gone, everything else was easier too.