Agoraphobia and Online Social Anxiety

[BabyAlligator]

Over the years I Developed Agorphobia..
I wont go outside without a damn good reason. I dont even really like leaving my room where my computer tv and bed are, the bathroom and kitchen are in different rooms tho. I can manage one day a month outside my apartment to get my groceries my booze my tobacco and my meds, sometimes I check my mail to that day.
So Online Interaction is pretty much my only way I can communicate with other people.
I wont and dont communicate with anyone unless I am "socially" drunk, as in drunk enough to feel social and want to talk to other people because I feel lonely. Sober I am completely content in my solitude, dont feel lonely, and have no interest in talking to anyone else. I just game, listen to audiobooks, watch stream serials and movies. Drunk I want to talk to other people and listen to music.
Some people's meds put them at risk of coma or death if they drink, mine make it hard for me to get drunk. I used to drink two tallboys of 211 and start singing for a couple hours before calling it a night. Now it takes me 10hrs sipping liqour to feel social and that persists for about 20 more hours during which I am fully cognizant, capable of rational thought and communication, until fatigue overcomes me and I roll out of my chair into bed to sleep for 12-24hrs. In this state I'm more aware of my emotions which is prolly why I enjoy music more but most the time the feeling I'm aware of is being Desperately Lonely. I feel like a Mutant, unlike other people because I am a Mutant, Im looking but sofar I havent found anyone else who can maintain a conversation after 30hrs of drinking. I have some kinda healing factor like Wolverine and Deadpool that processes alcohol almost as fast as I can drink. It makes people uncomfortable when they fall asleep talking to me and I wait for them to wake up again to resume the conversation. If their the only person worth talking to it seems worth the wait to tolerate them being boring for a couple hours. Even when Im not drinking I have Non24 sleep disorder meaning normally I sleep from anywhere from 5-16hrs and dont wake up any given time of day or night regularly for more than three days at a time. My "day" isnt in synch with anyone elses, I just Am When I Am. I cant really appreciate what any given time of day means to anyone else because no time of day means anything to me, people are just awake or asleep when I try to talk to them.
Thats not the only factor that makes it difficult for me to talk to other people.
Im not from the twitter generation so my thoughts and sentences dont fit into 120character blocks. I dont use clipped jargon or emojis and have to ask people to explain their Nadsat when try to use it with me. Havent texted since I lost a flip phone in 2006, only started using a mobile last year when my landline's cord didnt reach my room. Avoided Social Media like it was Covid for the most part. Stopped taking pictures with my analog camera at burning man because I didnt feel like being just a witness or a voyeur and never had a camera on my phone, so I dont have an instagram account. I did facebook for a time when I was an mmo addict and quit when I decided it was enforcing bad social protocol; forced I Am, forced Post, forced Share, forced Community. These were not social ideals I deemed to be correct for human society or at least not the one I wanted to be part of myself. Just As offensive as Apple's Public Decision that Gaming was not a Priority for Technology in Society. I still went back to facebook a couple years ago and opened a Mask account so I could chat with a few select friends who weren't part of a community that ostracized me. After self exiling from alot people who were my real friends because a few of them had become a toxic contagious poison in the community, I still became lonely and missed some of them and I wanted a select few of those friends without connection to the plague back. Mostly I just wanted to talk to some people because I was lonely. That's when I started finding online communication problematic on that platform. The first old friend I refriended, this was pre-meds, ghosted me because I blacked out while talking to him. I now have a total of two friends who dont mind me rattling on at their messenger when I'm drunk like Gordon Way leaving a voicemail. Other people tell me Im spamming because of the way I talk, One even specified a boundry of ettiquete as not leaving more three messages without a response. Prolly a Phone User. I would never use my phone for social media, its a telephone its used for direct communication. When Im expressing a complex thought I punctuate the sentences as individual messages. Phone users dont seem to be able to appreciate several sentences expressed this way.
Trying to talk to people accustomed to a social protocol I've never been a part of makes me feel Autistic because I cant express myself without using sentences that look like a paragraph. I hate when Im trying to say something and it exceeds the character limit, its like I have to translate to a different language.
I've been banned from twitch channels just for hanging around a talking, one channel banned me just for staying online and watching reruns overnight.
I cant even use Discord, been banned from just about every server I joined, even the ones I really wanted to be apart of like one for a live RPG I used to watch. I tried a discord for shut-ins and hikkikomori, they timed me out after two hours for just talking to the other people online with the same candor as them. I had one good discord experience, that was when I used to voice chat with other players playing SWtoR and got drunk together and sang songs, it was a guild discord tho so they banned me when the ****** people in charge of that guild kicked me out. I dont even leave discord On anymore, I hate hearing notifications all the time even if theyre from channels Im not banned from, that must be like what having social media on your phone is like.
People telling me Im Spamming just cuz I use long sentences and speak in paragraphs makes me wonder if its worth speaking to them

Your prolly gonna jump to the conclusion that I only have bad interactions with people because Im drunk. Nope, people are just ******** who dont appreciate who I am, and cant understand me because I use not just big sentences but big words also. Im ONLY social when enough alcohol overides the inhibition that keeps me a social shut-in/shut inside my own head. Maybe it makes me aware enough of my emotions that I might act on them, mostly that only affects my choice in music. Maybe it makes me too talkative, thats kinda an improvement from being mute. Maybe it makes me tactless and brutally honest, rather be a True Punk than a Mask in Suit. Just enough Booze breaks me out of the prison where my rational self keeps me enchained and lets me be my true self for a couple hours. Im the Man in the Silver Chair.

Makes me Wary. I cant really help being a Bull in China shop if I walk into a House of Glass, Im a Punk Rocker covered in studs and chains that are gonna cut up a fragile world and if it breaks its not the place I'm lookin for, Im still gonna Shout out a Freedom Song. Where's the Narnia for teenagers, Why do you have to be a Pirate if you get to Neverland late? Can I be in Wonderland if I'm a Boy?

I'm afraid of falling on my face and getting banned just about anywhere I go,
I just cant talk in that clipped pigeon english syntax thats considered Common Knowledge social media ettiquete. I shouldnt need to read an entire wiki before I approach any group but I gUess Ill have to...
IRL I can walk up to anyone and charm or awe them or stand my ground with my presence, and have a conversation of any kind, I just dont go outside anymore. That kinda physical charisma and demeanor stat just doesnt translate to online interactions tho. Here I'm just that Creep who talks like the guy from Idiocracy, and thinks Punk is an Idealism and not just an Aesthetic


Anyone else have trouble with the interface problems?
Anxiety about communication or posting?
Feel like you need to wear a mask?
Fear Rejection?
Ever Care about what other people think about you?


I dont care about being Liked or Hated
I just hate being banned blocked and ghosted
Only on the Internet can they Ban Free Speach
Forget Social Darwinism, now they have
Social Eugenics

Sticks and Stones cant Break my Bones
but Words will Always Hurt Me

 

[okidoke]

I don't think I've welcomed you to the forum yet, so welcome.

In all that you said, you didn't say WHY you don't like going outside, just that you like being in your room. I can see you're a talker. I don't know how some people have so much to say, and hopefully they're not the only ones talking. And I hate to sound awful, but I've had my fill of intoxicated (by drugs or alcohol) people talking at me. I say "at me", because they're not interested in a conversation, they're just interested in getting out whatever is in their head. I don't know if you fall into that category, but you do, maybe. That can put people off.

Anyway, here you can say as much or little as you want. Hopefully you'll get what you need from it.

 

[TropicalStarfish]

In my experience, there is often a certain knee-jerk reaction to certain kinds of rejection. I'm fairly new to both the reaction (which is like a wincing, or a flinch), and the rejection.

In short self-analyzing, I think there are some patterns, for me. There are my day-to-day habits, what I do to socialize, and what I do when I'm not socializing; there are also my needs, desires, and wants, and to what degree I lack in having those met.

I find I will often isolate as a response to social failures; conversely, it's my loneliness, that drives me to want to socialize. So, in a way, my needs, wants, and desires, often motivate me to socialize; then, the socialization, when it doesn't go well, often inflames my sense of loneliness.

A vicious circle.

Though, lately, some times, I choose isolation, when what I crave most is connecting. Sort of like not itching the scratch, in that, it may only make it worse. And then the converse of that, might be, choosing socialization, when I want and crave isolation.

Thnx for your courage, in sharing your experience and thoughts.

As for the opinions. Free Speech to me, means I can critique and criticize my government. Text, audio, voice, images, and video is pretty much the same as it's been since the advent of the T.V. and the computers of the 60's and such. Times change though. Fidelity, processing speed, quantities, and flow of the data has changed, as well as the aims of the economies in which data exchange occurs. For the worse? I think so. But there is good, too.

I often blame society, culture, trends, and this and that. And there is ample blame to rest there. But, it's a largely futile endeavor.

We need love and understanding, and I think it's difficult to cultivate love and understanding when fear and anger are present.

 

[BabyAlligator]

In my experience there are certain knee jerk reactions to certain behaviors or use/misuse of social protocols that provoke rejection.
TropicalStarfish lets bring okidoke in on this conversation, point in practice
okidoke you reject people because they are intoxicated and cant engage with them because their life has no relevance on yours
Its cool to be Straight Edge, no smokes, no booze, no drugs, no meat, no sex, no rock and roll, Punk For Life
the last three are a joke to some but the last one is true
the straight edge kid I knew in town liked to claim he was the most proficient masturbator in town, he had an over developed muscle between his thumb and forfinger from clenchin and he liked to tell people to "touch it" he was a ****** *******, dude once tried to set fire to my dreads with a bic three times, the first time he did I told him Id kick him in the balls if he tried it again, I had to kick him in the balls twice, I wear steal toe boots. he still wanted to fight me after that so I had to ask a girl to hold my pocket mouse. Then I took two punches from an arm devoted to masturbation and barely staggered, he chilled out because I wasnt fighting back. He was also reknown for being the best fighter in town, because he got in fights with everyone and finished them looking like a winner
Two Ball Kicks vs Two Head Hits
damage to each of our respective jewels
He later had to have testicular surgery, cant claim that tho
Ive been too drunk in public too recognize social syntax, too drunk to even differentiate people from talking animals
Ive also been in public and seen people too drunk to utilize social zyntax, being loud and hellbent on their own agenda
There are a couple ways you can react there are a couple ways you can engage
Avoiding this situation all together and fleeing the scene is prolly the best choice
If youve been drinking yourself or have some gumption of social justice you might engage
You can be a sober person trying to assert your will or rationale over someone who has their own agenda, usually the only argument that works is "Hey!Cops"
Or even if you are sober you can engage them in Drunk Logic
This requires a psychic state known as Empathy
In which you can feel and understand other peoples emotions even sense their causes
More importantly you have to be aware of the exact logistics of the situation
If you know the Solution, restate it like it was their idea, thats suggestion
you dont need psychic abilities to deal with other people, understanding them just gives you some shortcuts
Being as High as the Other Guy gives you Inherent Empathy otherwise not availible
okidoke that sounds like your major hangup, not being able to engage with people enough know when you can say something, listening to people matters but people also need to know they are heard, even if you disagree its important that respond to their real issues. if you cant interject during their ramble then wait till the end and say something. I dont think you should write anyone off regardless of their mental state. Most people need to tell their story first before they have a setting of consensual reality where they can even have a conversation. The empty page of the internet has to have something written on it first before people can start writing notes to each other on the corners. The first time I ever passed notes in class was with two girls in french class, I got kicked out for writing gothic poetry.
My Voice is only My Voice I speak from the body aware of my mind. Cogito, Ergo Sum. If I were a Muppet the other Voices would be Singing.
As to "WHY" I dont like going outside? IF I was aware of that my Borderline Agoraphobia wouldn't just be a Pathological Condition, it would be a logical compromise I was forced to admit and therefore soluable.
Conversation is why I joined this group. If yer willing to continue the one I started I'd welcome it so long as you dont mind talkin to a drunky, okidoke
My Crippling Social Anxiety only extends to online interaction, I cant even contemplate speaking to anyone unless I'm a little drunk
I mean I dont even think about it, ever.
just like you say
TropicalStarfish
or like the exact opposite
Everything about my physical needs is like the last thing Id want to feel social about
being drunks to social is the closest I can get to talking about my physical disability
Ive pretty much just perma isolated when all that bad **** went down with my family, all my friends are dead
Unless I drink, then I am aware of society and want to be a part of it, until Im sober, then I hate everything MURDER MURDER DEATH KILL MURDER MURDER DEATH KILL thats my favorite hiphop song, I was denied service at a hospital cuz I was singing the lyrics while I filled out paperwork
had to go out of county
Its like most the time Im cool, then its like Im Soul Killingly Lonely and have to hunt out a social situation like a starving vampire, just to come out of the dark and say "BOO" I mean, "Hi" "Hello" is prolly less creapy. With Non24 sleep disorder If found this is less weird at 3pm than 3am
As For Opinions
Free Speech is Punk Rock. Punk Rock is Honor and Honesty. Punk Rock is Free Speech. Ska Punk is Honor and Honesty. Dressing Punk is an act of Freedom. There's all kinds of Punk, but that's what Punk means to me. Anyone can be a punk, punks are ********. There are different kinds of ********. People will see you as a punk if you dress punk. Dressing punk and being punk is different. jail punk is not punk rock. Dont Ever become Part of a Prison Community, being broken by the facist state is very unpunk. Mahatma Gahdi was punk. Che Guevara was Punk. Martin Luther King was Punk. Nelson Mandella was Ska. Zach De La Rocha is Punk. Poli Punk is path of anger and a path of change. Its a big world thats gonna take to alot to change. Most the time Id rather rebel against **** I can change, like the breakfast cereal my mom buys for the homeless dude who sleeps in my garage. I have to eat that **** too and I want some ******* Marshmallos. Used to have LuckyCharms before dad left, now its just Marshmallow Mateys. Swear Im gonna kick that guys ass next time he lays a hand on mom not like last time when he gave me a black eye, Im Punk Rock, I can stand against! I wouldnt be punk rock if I was alone, I'd just be alone. My friends helped me realize that not all demons can be faced on your own and some you just have to run from, we all had bad homes to run away from, running away made us punks, listening to music made us punk rockers.
If I was gonna runaway today Id go chase the SkaPunk scene set up by Tim Armstrong; OpIvy, Rancid
thats prolly the safest scene of positive punks and rudies
I havent even scratched the surface of what "PUNK" really means in america, or how it relates in the UK
IF yer really going back to the 60s , the first episode of Doctor Who aired after the Assassination of an American President, did they need the rating bump?
In the movie TRON a human being was transfered into the digital reality as it could be imagined at that time and a movie plot happened
the internet since then has become a sort of otherworldly being [Yog-Sothoth] encompassing all human knowledge that has been uploaded into it, not all of human knowledge can be translated to this medium yet but sofar its the best record of beer to blocks granite if yer building a pyramid. these days its used mostly for developing a mating profile or shifting potential slabs of granite from continent to continent shave pieces off, rather than incorporating all human knowledge into an accessible form, the relevance of Art compared to Fact is probably gonna be when everyone comes to recognize the multiverse paradigm
Or an Extintion event where humanity fights over the relevance of any scrap of written word when they become unable access the internet with tech
Some people can portray themselves as the part they want to be in a screener which is the life they want to live
ME? you'd only remember me cuz I threw a cat at your face
Seriously tho
Dont Blame Anyone. How can you even keep track of them and how are they relevant? To yourself. consider the distance, do they matter? Really
What's So Funny about Peace, Love and Understanding?

Gin&Tonics All Round, Conceptually. -Douglas Adams

 

[okidoke]

okidoke you reject people because they are intoxicated and cant engage with them because their life has no relevance on yours
Its cool to be Straight Edge, no smokes, no booze, no drugs, no meat, no sex, no rock and roll, Punk For Life

okidoke that sounds like your major hangup, not being able to engage with people enough know when you can say something, listening to people matters but people also need to know they are heard, even if you disagree its important that respond to their real issues. if you cant interject during their ramble then wait till the end and say something. I dont think you should write anyone off regardless of their mental state. Most people need to tell their story first before they have a setting of consensual reality where they can even have a conversation.

Wow, you’ve really judged me hard from the little you know about me, but feel free to keep rambling on dude.

 

[TheSkaFish]

If I was gonna runaway today Id go chase the SkaPunk scene set up by Tim Armstrong; OpIvy, Rancid
thats prolly the safest scene of positive punks and rudies

I admit I didn't understand most of this, but then again I only went through it once.
But when it comes to this bit here, I agree.

Does the scene still exist anymore by you?
I feel like I'm the last follower of that ancient religion sometimes.

Cheers