"Dying alone" has become something I take seriously

I used to find the fear of dying alone ridiculous. I love people but I know I lack the basic traits and also flaws that make them click and mix with one another, and call each other friends and lovers. I'm 23, lived a life of lonesome, I'm thankful for all my blessings, I try to be humble and happy and I always knew that I was meant to live alone, and by proxy, die alone.

But this new roommate in my campus dorms is changing this for me. He is a 40 year old man from Chile who's come to my country for a month. No wife, no kids, lives alone back at home, goes to his job and gets drunk.

This guy comes back to the dorm drunk once a week, at night. Sometimes he brings a new girl that he tries to woo with wine, and he ends up falling asleep next to the empty bottle. Today, in the afternoon hours, the guards helped him up to our dorm, and he can't speak or find his keys, he's kicking a bag on the ground and has the most fucking heartbreaking look in his eyes.

I also have been growing a habit of getting drunk lately. It's the only way I deal with staring at the walls around me and fantasizing about having a girlfriend, nowadays. Is this me in 20 years?

He tried to hug me but he was a little aggressive and unpredictable, I tried to help him find his keys but he dropped to the floor and started crying. Then my other roommates came out and we put him outside on the sofa, with a cup of water.

I don't want to be this man one day and it, now, frightens me to know I've tried all the tricks I know and can muster up, yet still cannot seem to make any friends or lovers. The clock is ticking and all I have is hundreds of acquaintances yet not a single person I call dear.

It's terrifying.

High is the way but our eyes are upon the ground

I was in a similar position, the way I managed to change the routine was to do something out of my comfort zone and go out of my way to meet new people and try and move into new social groups. The best thing you can do is to look for courses or hobby clubs of things your maybe not super interested in doing, but would force you to interact with new people. Maybe learn a new language?

My wife died last year. I get drunk this year a lot. I'm alone. I have two dogs. My house is a mess. My crawl space is flooded. And I don't care. I have a job. So they say. I'm alone. I will die one day.

Death never really concerned me. If I die an untimely death then so be it. My life never was much to live for anyway...

yeah...

This, a million times. If the life you lead isn't leading to the results you want, it's time to change it up a bit.

Find a hobby you enjoy and look for local meet-ups. Comic/gaming shops usually offer tables to play games at. You'd be surprised how many people feel exactly the way you do and are just looking for other people like themselves. If there's anything I've learned, it's that people have more in common than you think. Don't give up.

You are still young, there are so many things you can still do to change your situation, it takes a hell of a lot of effort, a shit load of will, and a complete change in lifestyle, but it is worth it in the end to dig yourself out of this rut. I thought I was slowly losing every person I called a friend at one point in my life and I let it drag me down for many years but I've tried damn hard to change that and now I have a few really good friends and a girlfriend who might just be my soulmate. This site really helped turn things around for me:

http://www.succeedsocially.com/

And once you think you are ready to tackle the dating scene, give this site a perusal:

http://www.doctornerdlove.com/

Good luck man, it's tough out there, we just gotta be tougher!

I'm sorry for your wife. And your situation explains the 15,000 + posts. Maybe you should... try and do something about that messy house of yours, and get some real friends. I don't want to sound rude or anything, but you should take your life back.

You wanna hangout. I could use a friend.

I'm good dude. Just playing the dead. In truth, my life is really in flux after my wife's death last year. I do drink a lot of beer. But I've found my niche, albeit not the most widely acceptable terms of service. But I get by. Ryan's death kind of fucked me up. I've been on Giant Bomb since the beginning. The majority of my posts were when my wife was alive.

@jouseldelka: I don't want to get too armchair philosopher down here, but in life I don't think we're really "meant" to do anything. Nobody has assigned you the role of dying alone, you have free will and can do what you want with your life. Deciding at the age of 23 that you're going to die without people around you is a hell of a thing to do. If you don't want a family that's one thing, and not having one doesn't mean you're going to turn into some kind of awful drunk, but if you want to meet people it's a perfectly attainable goal. You've got your whole life ahead of you. Reach out to the hundreds of people you know, go out to social events and meet people.

@claude: I know we've talked about this a few times before but I still want to give you my condolences over all the shitty stuff that happened to you. I don't think there's anything I can say that won't seem pathetically lacking, but I hope you can hang in there as best as possible Claude, you're a good guy.

I keep typing stuff... but it all seems silly. Sorry I'm no help to you guys... but... I tried. XD

I have a four of bachelor uncles. Two have died among family, not alone, but their going was rough.

My mom told my sister and I when we were teens, that we would have to looks after those uncles. It may seem macabre, but It was planned that way for years. My sister and I were to be first line and last line of defense for these men, there were other nieces and nephews, but we were entrusted with helping and giving them a home. In every extended family there are doers and sit by the siders, we were expected to be the doers...but we were also likely to be the best educated...and likely to be the most financially stable.

This past year my youngest uncle died, he spent the last few months of his life at my parents home. I helped out as best I could, but my mom took the brunt of it. The last month was hard, like what seemed impossibly hard, because my uncle was very weak, very angry, and very scared because after four years of cancer he was really about to die. He died this past spring just minutes after my mom when off to get some dinner after sitting with him all afternoon. He was too drugged to know which was good because his life had become painful. Just caring for him, even though my mom was retired, was an all day 24/7 ordeal. She is 74 a retired nurse, but the last four years and the last few months have aged her...it aged all of us. Sick family members take a psychological toll no matter how prepared or how strong you are.

Now, I fear going the same way, not dying alone but dying among family. I am now a bachelor uncle myself, I'm 44 and unmarried. I don't want to be a burden on anyone, thus I don't as much fear dying alone as I fear the stress of my care hurting others. It is a paradox you want to be there for family, but you know the toll it takes so you don't want to do that too anyone else.

Duder I have had the same fears. It is scary to think about not leaving any "legacy" (whatever that term means in the grand scheme of things), but you just have to look at what you have in the now and move forward. Worrying about tomorrow will just diminish the positive things you have in the present. Just know that life can take you in weird places so maybe spice things up and step outside of your safety zone. I agree with Gamer_152 and the fact that in life we are not prescribed a definite path or role. You are only 23 so I think you have more than enough time to shake the shackles of "fate" or "destiny" off you wrists and contextualize where you are at. 23 is very young my friend and I am sure that one day you will find peace in whatever form it takes.

@gamer_152: You're the best Gamer. Through your writings I can see the wild side in you. You have great peripheral vision when it comes to seeing things and describing them as they are. One smooth character. One blog to question them all and maybe a little question too. Thank you.

This thread reads like a Depeche Mode song.

I live my life in the moment, so I don't think too far ahead in life. My wife and I are in our mid-30's and in good health. She has a scary family medical history and just lost her mother to breast cancer, my biggest fear is losing her and being alone... but (hopefully) that's so far in the future that dwelling on that feeling would eat me up.

Find happiness wherever you can, as the great modern-day philosopher ZeFrank would say... CHASE THAT HAPPY!

Can I just give everyone in here a big hug and lighten the mood? Cause fuck this thread is a bummer. You're all swell people and you are worth something don't let anyone tell you otherwise.

@demoskinos: Exactly how much are we worth?

It's my greatest fear! High five

And also can we sell it?

@fourwude: @sploder:

"I used to think that the worst thing in life was to end up all alone, it's not. The worst thing in life is to end up with people that make you feel all alone." - Robin Williams

Great quote by a great comedian who meant serious business. Just try to find someone to hang out with, though it probably will take a while.

Tell me about it. It's one thing that is constantly on my mind. I'm lucky that I still have friends that I can talk to but I'm literally alone . I feel alone in this city, where so many people live but I feel no sense of community. There's no real gaming scene here, Chinatown Fair is gone and that was really just hardcore fighting dudes. No, place to geek out since there aren't conventions here. No one is friendly to strangers, unless your very well off or attractive. And the last thing I want to do is pull the race card but I'm not ghetto and I don't like hanging out in the hood, so when I go to midtown or other trendy areas I can see the resentment, the hesitation of other people to interact with me.

Now, I'm not a troll physically or really even socially awkward, but I guess living in NYC my whole life from the lower end of the spectrum has beat being adventurous and personable out of me.

I've heard a saying before that encompasses the way I feel, thought I can't remember it exactly. "A city so big, but I've never felt more alone"

Tl;dr I'm gonna die alone too dude.

You're 23. Calm down.

I am getting very close to starting my stupid dream of being a real and proper trans girl and the closer I get, the bigger the fear of being killed for basically no reason gets. I am trying to be as realistic about this as possible, but that means coming to terms with very likely being murdered or committing suicide before I am thirty and I don't really know how I feel about that. I have wanted this for quite a while, and while I flip flop on what I want to do very very regularly, it still seems like the correct path to take with my life, but I know that it will be forcing myself into a life of sadness. My gut tells me that I am going to be followed home one day and a group of people that hates me will know where I live and my story will end with five pissed off jerks breaking down the door to my house after weeks of harassment and beating me to death with baseball bats just because I decided to follow my heart.

I would find dying alone by choice preferable to being alone and having my life taken from me.

This may be unrelated to the reasons you feel so bad OP, but this can apply to anyone out there who might be in a similar situation. I'm talking about being unhealthy.

If you're fat--which many of us might know doesn't exactly fill you with confidence--go out there and fucking lose that shit. I've spent the last year of my life (whilst unemployed) trying to lose weight, and I've lost somewhere between 80-100lbs in that time. I've still got a few months' work left until my belly is totally cut from my body, but I know it will happen eventually if I keep up the work.

I'm finally starting a new job this month too, and with every stone I've lost over the last year I've felt that much more willing to go out and there and start dating again. I haven't yet, mainly because I'm stubborn and want to remove as much excess weight as I can before I venture out there, but boy howdy do I feel better for it. Some chick called me "hot" the other week--that's probably the first time in about four years.

So again, this may not be related to you OP, but to anyone else out there: get fit. Find exercise routines that work for you, stop eating so much shit and eat decent stuff..and sooner or later you'll be a thousand steps closer to being the person you really want to be.

You're still young dude, don't be such a pessimist.

Eh, I'm thirty, haven't achieved anything I wanted to (even by some of the most basic standards), and whenever I try to fix any of it I just make it worse. I'll probably die alone too. Sucks, but that's my lot in life I guess.

I feel for all of you that are having a rough time right now. I, myself, was in the same boat as some of you 3 years ago. I was perfectly content being by myself and felt that I deserved to live (and die) alone (for reasons I do not want to get into). I was also (and still am, to an extent) anti-social and just do not like being around people. That changed, however, when I got back into contact with a girl who is now my girlfriend. We have known each other since we were kids and she has always been the only one that made me feel like my life was worth a damn. Now, while I am still anti-social, I realize now that it is actually quite terrifying for me to even think of dying alone. I think it is something I always feared but I just kept it buried. Sure, we all basically still die alone no matter what but the thought that I will at least have someone before then makes it a bit more bearable. Not to mention that, for me, I have a daughter now. She has made things better for me as well.

... I do not really know what to say but to just hang in there. Knowing someone on a personal and emotional level who cares for you really helps make being on this planet more bearable.

It sounds like you weren't meant to live in solitude in the first place and you were lying to yourself all along.

I haven't found anyone I could live with and maybe I never will, but that's fine because in the end it's only secondary.

@claude: I fuckin' love you Claude.

If you don't want to be alone I'd say follow some of the advice in most answers to your post. It's good advice and not out of anyones reach. If the problem is that most of the time, you actually WANT to be alone, well you and me are in the same boat. But I wont assume that.

Hey man, you don't need a girl when you got the Giant Bomb community!

@fourwude: $3.74 don't spend it all in one place.

@jouseldelka: at 23 I wouldn't worry about the clock ticking. The average of getting married for the first time in canada is around 30, so your not even behind the curve ;)

Why do you think you "lack the basic traits and also flaws that make (people) click and mix with one another"?

First, let me say that 23 years old is YOUNG. . . you will realize this in about 10 years or so.

If you asked me when I was 23 if i was going to die alone i would have told you "Absolutely." I am now 39 years old, I am happily married and have two children (Ages 2 and 6). You have a lot of time to figure this shit out. . . my advise is to try to make an effort, a REAL effort.

I heard the internet is full of equally socially inept women looking for love. And there's always money and success. Or just go and live in a low income country with some high income country money and get hitched. Put some anchor babies in your gal and you've got family to feed for life...

Stop listening to Tool would be a good start, nothing wrong with the music, but it's pure lady repellent.

Everything we do in life is a choice, we make our own destinies and write our stories. It's not the circumstances of our birth that are important, it is what we do with the gift of life that determines who we are.

If you don't want to die alone, it is your responsibility to go out and make that happen.

Bullshit! Those are the girls that do crazy things and then the next thing you know there's 3 of them in your bed.

I can imagine that's a horrible feeling. But the solution has been given by multiple people already: get out there. Go to places and meet people. I know that it's a lot easier not to go out there saying that you will fail anyway, that you don't want to, etc., but it is THE way to find new people. Yes, you will meet a lot of people you will not care about and vice versa, but remember that you are only there to find the few that are actually interesting. And yes, it will be hard in the beginning, but you will get better at it. Just don't be afraid to fail.

As has already been suggested: finds sport clubs, hobby clubs, cooking clubs, and what have you not in your neighbourhood. Go out and meet people.

@jouseldelka: Easier said than done, and you probably don't need to hear it from a random dude like me, but you should cut the booze. Plenty of fine reasons to drink, but if it's out of a lack of anything better to do, all it's serving as for you is a big ol' pause button. It's a good way to make sure things stay exactly the same for you. Also, sitting around dwelling on things you're unsatisfied with tends to make them feel all the worse.

If you feel like you need something more in your life, try to get involved in more social activities. Get more proactive about pursuing your interests or hobbies. As long as you're taking care of yourself and doing something you enjoy, the rest generally falls in place.

And for what it's worth, not having all of your shit together at age 23 ain't nothing to be ashamed of. That's still the beginning of the story.

Though, expanding on this to send a more positive message:

I started seriously considering this whole thing back in December, but I kept finding reasons as to why I couldn't do it; it's very expensive, I am very poor, I can't get to my appointments, my friends will hate me, etc. I got over that and started saving money back in the beginning of June to start this whole thing. At the beginning of September I will have a little over $1300 saved up.

My first therapy session was July 1, 2013. My first doctor's appointment was July 29, 2013. It took me 28 days to begin seeing the results of my actions, and my next doctor's appointment is on August 20, 2013, and my therapist believes that this is the day I will start on hormones and begin realizing my dream. It took less than two months to begin feeling like I am actually doing something with my life that I can be proud of and show off to people as "this is me, this is my choice, I did this." Two months to do something compared to the five or six it took me to get off my ass and actually start it.

It's terrifying, has been the entire time, but I will say this to all of you duders: When it is December, inevitably, it will end up being September again at some point. Decide where you want to be when September comes around, and go forward. It is scary, but you are human, and you will adapt, and you will find that you will love yourself for it.

@jouseldelka: Dude, you are twenty fucking three. Stop looking at your feet and just live your life. You shouldn't be married with kids right now, you should just be enjoying life, working towards a career or purpose you love.

I mean, hell, you should be happy you're "alone." As the child born to parents a little younger than you, I can assure you it isn't the way to go.

Shit, you've got a nice civilian life ahead of you. Enjoy it, do some learnin' at school, and ignore the sad old drunks.

And seriously dude, you're only 23, don't go thinking you'll always be alone because of your current social state. In fact, it's common to be in your position at your age. People are coming and going from your life, going to this college and that state and the other service branch. It's just life man, and you'll move on to a new phase of enjoying life soon enough.

And trust me, you need to be one fucked up asshole to end up like that old man. He sounds like my old man and he was a fucking prick even to his own children. He's divorced and estranged from most of his children because he was an asshole, not because he wasn't an amazing socialite.

Just let it all happen and you'll be a-ok. I've felt pretty shitty about similar situations but I always keep faith that it'll come to an end. And it's usually in those times that I meet the most important people in my life.

If you want to meet people, you just gotta get out in the world, talk to people, and let them talk to you. Go to a place where things you enjoy happen, and see who you meet. I met my best friend when I was in the shittiest fucking mood over being forced to move right after my first socially successful year at school (freshmen year at high school), because she made me sit with her in history. And as long as she's around, I know I'm not alone. It wasn't hard. It didn't take a ton of effort. I just had to open up no matter how much my shitty attitude made me want to close up.

Look on the bright side. You've got a long ass life ahead of you. At least you aren't stupid/crazy enough to wanna go to war and get your dumb ass killed.

Sure I'll be among brothers if it happens but you've pretty much got the next 40 years of your life to enjoy and there's not much that's going to get in the way of that other than you.

And hey, don't worry about finding love.Young love sucks. It's either fake or will end horribly or at the very least will stress you out. Just find companionship. A friend, a casual lady/dude friend, hell just an intellectual companion even. Way, way better for where you are in life, if you just let yourself enjoy it.

My best friend makes me as happy as any special lady/man could make me, and especially for someone going where I'm going, that's awesome. So I can speak from personal experience that you just need a friend or two.

You aren't going to die randomly. Your life is worth a hell of a lot and through the hell you may go through as a result of who you are, you have the opportunity to become an incredibly strong individual if you let it harden and strengthen you instead of convince you that your best option is to take your own life. Trust me, your life consists of nothing but opportunities.

I know you probably feel like the world, or at least some large part of it, is out to get you. But they aren't.

You can make one choice, and sacrifice EVERY OTHER CHOICE you would have had otherwise, or you can put your chin up, spit at the fuckers who say you can't be who you are, and move on.

And if you're really that worried about your safety, make friends with the biggest dude you can find :) But really, you shouldn't. There are pricks out there, but they are all a bunch of pussies. Most of them would crack under the pressure the people they treat like shit put up with on a daily basis.

You're probably pretty awesome, and taking that from the world because you're afraid of selfish little pricks would be a terrible, terrible shame. Trust me. One day your life will change, and you'll be glad you gave it a chance.

If you need a friend, PM me and I'll give you my information. That goes to anyone on this thread. I'll happily give my personal number, email, etc to people in need of help or assurance. I know I'm just a random stranger but hey, it might just be better than nothing.

Other than that, y'all need to cheer up! Don't be so down. Most of you are young, and the rest of you still have the rest of your lives ahead of you.

Video games!.. ?

@claude said:

@sploder said:

It's my greatest fear! High five

@fourwude said:

@demoskinos: Exactly how much are we worth?

And also can we sell it?

God dammit that image.

And also, holla back claude, it's been a while dude - hope you are keeping well <3

If you're really that concerned about it, you can just take the perk that drops a live grenade when you die.

@jouseldelka: You're only 23. Try your best and be patient. You'll get someone to call dear one of these days. :)

My first true girlfriend was at the age of 23 too.

@claude: We're right there with you. So treat yourself nicely, and make us happy by being happy. :)

@omegapirate said:

@claude said:

@sploder said:

It's my greatest fear! High five

@fourwude said:

@demoskinos: Exactly how much are we worth?

And also can we sell it?

God dammit that image.

And also, holla back claude, it's been a while dude - hope you are keeping well <3

Hahaha. It's been so long since I've seen that, I got this strange urge to salute that .jpg. You're the best Claude.

You're never alone with Cloud Face watching your every move.

Also, you'll be fine. Do good things and have good fun, try to stay away from things and people that drag you down (that doesn't mean you shouldn't try to help people in need, but remember it's a two way street, you have no obligation to hang out with people you hate/don't like/don't like hanging out with).

I was far more of sad sack than you think you are right now, and I'm the happiest I've ever been right now.

New day coming, yo.