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  • Wendy_Pleakley [they/them, he/him]@hexbear.netEnglish
    4·
    4 hours ago
    friendship, dysphoria

    I still don’t get how things go from “we see each other in class and interact positively” to “we text regularly outside of obligations and make an effort to spend time together”, let alone “we travel to see each other and consider each other close”. My classmates have all been in school together for years already. These people have histories and pasts with each other. I don’t know if I’ll ever have a past or a history or a long-running kind of anything with anyone. A Man Without Relation.

    Someone asked me what I do outside of school and my brain short-circuited. All I felt comfortable saying was “YouTube” because “smoke weed and wish I were a girl” is kind of off-putting? Runner ups include failing to choose a new TV show or video game, or pacing around my apartment.

    I wish there were a way to guarantee that a social interaction would be positive. I feel like I just keep waiting for a social cue that isn’t coming, some obvious sign that it’s okay to ask questions, it’s okay to say how I feel, it’s okay to want to hang out. I can’t imagine any outcome other than a no. Truly.

    If I felt like I could try and make girl friends without feeling like a guy who is trying to make girl friends and more like someone who is just naturally becoming friends with people who are naturally and obviously becoming friends with him/them, then maybe it would be easier. If I just were a girl, and just were 7 years younger, maybe, but obviously it didn’t happen that way.

    Like goddamn I just want to be cute and silly and whisper about dumb shit in my room together and go shopping and try on makeup and outfits and hold hands and gaze at the stars and go on drives and shit. If I knew how and where and when to want that you would have to put me down to get me to stop having that for myself. I’m that fucking confused and livid at everyone and everything

    • TerminalEncounter [she/her]@hexbear.netEnglish
      3·
      4 hours ago
      spoiler

      Sounds like you should pick up some kind of hobby or volunteering! Then you’ll have something interesting to say next time~ its also a good way to make friends. I used to volunteer at the animal shelter and I did a lot of board games, board games are a little harder cause you generally need other people. You could look through stuff like meet up for DnD oneshots, that’s a good way of finding people who are into other stuff like war game minis, other ttrpgs, board games, etc. One time someone invited me to sing at a Catholic choir so, uh, I did that for a few months lol. There’s lots of other hobbies, RC airplanes, gardening, painting, video games, anime apparently counts as a hobby

      One of the hard thing about making friends is that gap between reaching out and finding out if you’re being rejected or they accept going out to do things. It’s not easy, it can be scary. Sometimes you’ll have to invite people out, more rarely you’re going to have to agree to go out and do things you may not be into (me singing in the catholic church) but you want to let the friendship grow. Rejection is always going to be hard but the more it happens the lower the stakes get, eventually you get to a point where if someone turns you down for a hangout you think somethings wrong with them vs something wrong with you.

      The thing you point out about friendship between women, the thing you seem to be longing for, you can have it. It’s going to be easier if you start to some out socially. I had a way easier time with friendship with women and getting in those kinds of spaces after I socially transitioned. If you want to start, maybe change your pronouns here (I’m assuming you want to be in a she/her or they/she kind of zone, excuse me if that’s not true, you’re not the first person I’ve met who thinks they have to “deserve” those pronouns vs realizing they have the right by mere fact of what they want). And it’s going to take some time to start getting more intense and closer where you can hang out and suggest going for a night drive spontaneously, but shorter than you might expect!

      I wouldn’t get hung up on not being a cis women and older, that doesn’t mean you don’t deserve to have friends with the people you’re around it means you have something real and interesting to offer by dint of your experience.