why are you still single - and general discussion of the dating game

  • 🐕 I am attempting to get the site runnning as fast as possible. If you are experiencing slow page load times, please report it.
Party Hat Wurmple said:
That's exactly what an agoraphobic would say. How do you even develop agoraphobia anyway as a young man? Was it COVID or are you just a NEET? Usually agoraphobia isn't a thing in younger men. It's very much an older person and rape victim disorder.
Click to expand...
Wrong thread to discuss mental health ( or rather, nervous system health ) but even doctors don't quite know why some people develop it from relatively small shocks, while others can power through trauma after trauma no problem. They do know that predisposition to it can be passed on, and I have bad genetics from both sides of the family with a history of it, and then some.
In my case, out of nowhere one day in high school I just started having panic attacks for no good reason, physiologically the same process a normal person would go through if they were faced in any kind of life threatening fight or flight situation. I wasn't bullied, or abused, I lived a completely ordinary and healthy, if somewhat sheltered life. I personally thought I had some kind of horrendous life threatening condition, maybe my heart was failing or something, and I was near death. So I was tossed around doctor after doctor for an entire year, having non stop panic attacks without even knowing what a panic attack is, getting my heart checked, lungs, etc, and not a single doctor, nor my parents, could figure out what was wrong. It was only after a year one of the doctors suggested hey, this kid is completely healthy but his pulse is going wild, maybe it's a mental thing, go check with a therapist, but at that point the damage has already been done.
Naturally when you feel like you're dying, you probably want to go home, or 'somewhere safe', since being a total mess in public is extremely embarrassing for any normal person. At least at home, you have all your comforts, it's familiar, it's your castle, place to nurse your wounds. Much like with mental health, if left untreated, panic attacks like this will eventually develop into agoraphobia, where the brain creates an strong connection/association with going outside, and panic attacks. And unfortunately at that point you're no longer just treating occasional, seemingly random bouts of fight or flight, but an entire condition where living revolves around this concept of safe zones and unsafe zones, and, well, the only thing you can really do at that point is exposure therapy; spending years facing this fear, going outside, provoking a truly horrible feeling of imminent death/threat to your life, and then realizing hey, nothing bad happened, and hoping that eventually with enough exposure like this the fear will subside. The roots of the problem lie in a malfunctioning, overly sensitive nervous system, rather than mental health, but it's all interconnected.
It's very much a thing with men and women of all ages, unfortunately.
It also has different degrees of strength, some people become completely shut in, even going downstairs if you live in an apartment for example could provoke a panic attack. For others it may be much milder where perhaps they only panic if they for example drive on a large bridge where you couldn't do a u turn in the car easily in case you panic behind the wheel, or being stuck in gridlock traffic on a highway.
I have participated in groups that are made for agoraphobic people, and from my experience I found that most agoraphobic women aren't looking for a romantic relationship with men with the same condition. Honestly after that, I haven't even tried dating anyone else. It's a big turn off, and there is no way of hiding it. I don't want to toot my own horn, but I have been working out for years now, and I fully understand that it is pretty hilarious/sad to watch a grown man who can clearly lift quite heavy weights, shake, pace, and have profusely cold sweats all over, just from riding on the subway.
I just wish it wasn't a situation where I either fully overcome this condition/ get extremely lucky and finally find someone who could accept it for what it is, or being alone, as the latter sucks.
 
  • Feels
Reactions: ._., The Nothingness and Halo Cipher
KingElizabeth said:
So I was tossed around doctor after doctor for an entire year, having non stop panic attacks without even knowing what a panic attack is, getting my heart checked, lungs, etc, and not a single doctor, nor my parents, could figure out what was wrong.
Click to expand...
I started getting random panic attacks in my mid 20s. Turned out it was my thyroid, Graves disease. Very high resting heart rate. A great aunt had it. It runs in families.
I'm assuming they checked your thyroid?
 
  • Informative
  • Like
Reactions: The Nothingness, Falcos_Commisar and Ibanez RG 350EX
Party Hat Wurmple said:
That's exactly what an agoraphobic would say. How do you even develop agoraphobia anyway as a young man? Was it COVID or are you just a NEET? Usually agoraphobia isn't a thing in younger men. It's very much an older person and rape victim disorder.
Click to expand...

From being in large crowds and someone pulling a gun on someone and shooting. At least half a dozen occasions that I remember. I can deal with crowds, just prefer not to. You might be thinking about the other guy you quoted.
 
I am shitty anime protagonist levels of dense when it comes to anything relationship wise. I have had women low key ask me out on occasions and only for it to just fly over my head completely.
(I wish I was joking)
Duke Nukem said:
There is nowhere left for normies to meet let alone people who prefer the company of misfits and autists
Click to expand...
This too. Where the hell do people meet? I know people who are extremely social having to resort of using dating apps since there is no outlet to just meet people.
I have heard from younger people who say that college is the only place left to socialize, and even that is pretty much dead post-covid.
It could also be my area where the average age is around 40-60, since anyone with sense/money just leaves. Hell, one more year and I am bolting as well.
 
  • Feels
Reactions: ._., The Nothingness, Falcos_Commisar and 1 other person
Men have been incredibly boring on the surface and degenerates and hateful beneath. I have no interest in having sex with a strsnger I've interacted with a total of maybe eight hours over a date or two. All my previous relationships started with actually talking and getting to know each other and interests and family. Even men interested in dating expect physical intimacy so quickly but have the personality of a wet rag.

I can believe this is the same for many men as well because everyone is very self centered and wants to be serviced now. They want someone who fawns over them, interviews them like a celebrity, takes photos of them, buys gifts or pays for meals, provides sex when wanted on their specific timeline. Very few people want a legitimate partnership with genuine connection and communication and effort in equal parts. Whether that be women with a stable of men or incel adjacent men looking for a slave. We have dehumanized the dating experience to the point im told regularly how refreshing it is to have... a conversation at all when I decide to entertain the apps.

I'd like to date but the expectations are too high and it's easier to be alone when you're naturally inclined to be really caring and empathetic as in this era it leaves you open for a lot of abuse rather than attracting like minded folk as like minded folk are also choosing self protection right now.
 
  • Feels
  • Thunk-Provoking
  • Like
Reactions: SIMIΔN, ._., The Nothingness and 8 others
AnaphylacticShock said:
I started getting random panic attacks in my mid 20s. Turned out it was my thyroid, Graves disease. Very high resting heart rate. A great aunt had it. It runs in families.
I'm assuming they checked your thyroid?
Click to expand...
They have, yeah. In my case, they found absolutely nothing. Just generalized anxiety disorder, panic attack disorder, and agoraphobia. My grandmother on one side of the family used to have a milder case, was cooped up in her house for two years or so but ultimately got over it. That, and hysteria. On the other side of the family runs schizophrenia and hysteria. So basically, mood instability on both sides of the family.

I do have a funny story to tell though. Again, when I was 16, my parents suspected that perhaps I am having asthma attacks. They took me to a clinic to check me out. By that point, it's already been perhaps 6 months of torturous panic attacks every morning. I was losing weight, I couldn't eat, I was tense all the time, I was getting worse with each day. I noticed I started to develop a lot of hangups that I knew would trigger panics. I had to pay no attention to my breathing, messing around with my breathing would make me panic. I did not like to feel my heart in my chest, and more. I was very sensitive to the slightest changes in my body and freaking out over them.
So of course, at this clinic, the lady tells me that she will administer some medication orally, via those spray things. Okay, no problem. Then she tells me 'side effects include heart racing, dizziness, and nervousness'. Uh oh, you shouldn't have told me that lady, you just planted the seed. Tells me to sit in this airtight booth that was very uncomfortable to be in, and breathe, -hard- into a tube to check my lungs. Well, I could only tolerate a few more minutes of this before all these events culminated in another panic attack. I simply got up, opened the booth and walked out, shaking. Said sorry, I am feeling sick.
This made the nurse and most of the staff there lose their shit. I tell them no worries, this happens, I just need to go home. Naturally, the nurses are thinking they just provoked some very adverse effects in this kid with the medication. They hook me up to one of those pulse oxymeters they attack to your finger, I'm doing 130-140 bpm simply sitting and doing nothing. I still remember how they were running around 'Please let us call 911, are you sure you're okay?' and this kid is completely reassuringly telling them 'Don't worry, this happens often, it wasn't the medication, it will all go away when I come home'.. while my heart is acting like I just ran a marathon.

They say your brain only ever fully finishes developing in your early 20's, ish. I'm guessing at around age 16 my brain flipped the next switch and whatever turned on, was broken. Up until that point I couldn't even begin to comprehend, or imagine, what a panic attack even -is-. I was a very calm type of person before that.
It's incredibly frustrating to have your own brain be a retard and hold you back like this, despite knowing, in very thorough, clinical detail, as to how it all works, but no matter how much logic I bombard myself with, nervous system doesn't care and still panics over nonsense.
I still try to live a more or less normal life. I hit the gym. I'm mostly independent, I work remote, I drive a car, I do uber eats, not because it's big money, but because it's even more exposure therapy; can't u turn at the slightest discomfort, I have a job to finish, it's responsibility. Facing the fear at a pace where you get better with time is the only way out, but not too hard where you begin to re-sensitize yourself and rebuild that connection of outside=panic. In my case though, it's been taking many, many years. I'll be 30 soon. I completely missed out on most of my post highschool, college/university youth. It sucks but it is what it is.
 
  • Feels
  • Like
Reactions: ._., The Nothingness, Halo Cipher and 4 others
@Penrowe

For myself I noticed this very quickly when I removed any mention of me being someone who has travelled the world and speaks multiple languages. Instantly a lot more women are showing an interest. But why?
It's because instead of being something that makes you unique through having experienced multiple cultures it just means you're some fucked up transient with no roots. Any facts that detract from you being a perfect model man with his life squared away is to be suppressed. Anything else only invites failure.
Click to expand...
People tend to dispense advice like "get hobbies" but what you described feels like something I've come to suspect which is that the advice only works if it's "get specifically socially prestigious 'cool' hobbies." There are specific things that people seem to always perk up at even if they have no real interest in it themselves, and then there are things that they just don't.

I'm not talking about Warhammer 40K and hentai, either, I mean things like playing instruments and mountain biking.
 
  • Like
Reactions: The Nothingness, Mutthole and Justa Grata Honoria
KingElizabeth said:
I just wish it wasn't a situation where I either fully overcome this condition/ get extremely lucky and finally find someone who could accept it for what it is, or being alone, as the latter sucks.
Click to expand...
It almost sounds hormonal. Like you're getting an overdose of GABA. Did anyone ever try giving you dosage of it? Sometimes when the body overreacts with something it's because it's actually under producing it naturally and overcompensates. If not, I'd mention it to your therapist. It's a shot nonetheless.
 
Well I still got one or two servers left to check but the prospects for discord seem predictablely grim.

For giggles I went to the hookup discords and they are all just sex bots. Even the tamer discords seem to have them. Even if one or two of them are real they charge by the hour lol

The ID verification servers seem like the way to go to talk to anybody legit but then you have the second issue.

It's a sausage fest filled with desperate guys. There's something like a 100 girls to 500 guys. (That's me being charitable)

Local church seems to have something going on but we'll see.
 
  • Like
Reactions: The Nothingness, geckogoy and Justa Grata Honoria
Friend of Dorothy Parker said:
I suggest that I don't date women.
Click to expand...
I would suggest to stop entertaining this guy he is the type that complains whats his match for his income , personality and looks. He is histrionic bitch with absurd expectations and expects women to ignore the fact he fucked around in his 20s so he gets histrionic bitches with absurd expectations who expect him to do the same . He doesn't want to settle and that gives away certain aura that makes the more sane and worthy ones to btfo as fast as possible. There is no cure for cunts like these beyond letting them lay in the bed they made for themselves. Seen plenty these guys when the last time i dated before the kids and partner came along. None of them in the past five years that i have kept tabs on have ltrs. Wait until he hit 40s them it will be even worse crying and gnashing teeth . Especially when a 20 something year old calls you creepy and old.
Michael Wade said:
Well I still got one or two servers left to check but the prospects for discord seem predictablely grim.

For giggles I went to the hookup discords and they are all just sex bots. Even the tamer discords seem to have them. Even if one or two of them are real they charge by the hour lol

The ID verification servers seem like the way to go to talk to anybody legit but then you have the second issue.

It's a sausage fest filled with desperate guys. There's something like a 100 girls to 500 guys. (That's me being charitable)

Local church seems to have something going on but we'll see.
Click to expand...
Bruh just go irl meet ups . Bumble has some of them , do you have any hobbies?
 
  • Like
  • Mad at the Internet
  • Agree
Reactions: Falcos_Commisar, Party Hat Wurmple, Kel1 shi1 and 3 others
Totallyunknown said:
We have dehumanized the dating experience to the point im told regularly how refreshing it is to have... a conversation at all when I decide to entertain the apps.
Click to expand...
It's impossible to have a conversation with women on there either. Most are in it for attention, but that's not me singling women out for this, maybe there's men like that out there too.

On topic of the thread, I'm just getting a lot more involved with things IRL and meeting new people. If I meet someone good that's fine, if I don't I don't. It's objectively better than rotting in front of the PC.
 
  • Like
Reactions: The Nothingness, Local Fed, Party Hat Wurmple and 1 other person
Michael Wade said:
Oh I absolutely want to do meetups. I just assumed all the dating apps were shit. You recommend bumble?
Click to expand...



believe it or not some niche hobbies and groups have meetup groups on facebook .

Just try to make friends instead of flirting

edit : dm me if you need more help or you dont find any events nearby then we need to change strategies but you might need to pl.
 
Last edited:
  • Informative
  • Like
Reactions: The Nothingness and Party Hat Wurmple
Ughubughughughughughghlug said:
There are specific things that people seem to always perk up at even if they have no real interest in it themselves, and then there are things that they just don't.

I'm not talking about Warhammer 40K and hentai, either, I mean things like playing instruments and mountain biking.
Click to expand...
Wait, are you saying those are examples of things people DO perk up at or DON'T perk up at? Because I can attest from decades of experience that women don't give a single solitary shit about your ability to play instruments unless it makes you wealthy and/or famous.
 
  • Like
  • Agree
Reactions: ._., The Nothingness, anustart76 and 2 others
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back