Feeling out of place / disconnected with family
English is not my first language :)
I am not sure if I have anxiety officially, but I think this is the best place to ask.
I alway feel like I don't belong there, and always feel very alone in the group, whenever I'm with my family. No matter if it's a birthday party, or even just a drink with my own sister.
It's hard for me to hold any conversation, I don't know what to talk about or how to join the conversation. Even if I did, I feel like people are just being nice to me but not actually interested. They are good people, just not my type of people I think. But I do love them.
The weird thing is that friends or strangers are no problem for me. I can be very open and talk a lot, make jokes. But my humour doesn't really fit in with my family, and my interests are very different.
I am very different from the rest of my family. So different, that I actually never ask how things are going with their life, because I honestly don't care about the small stuff.. And that makes me feel bad about myself.
I have always felt like I'm in my sisters shadow. She's amazing, and everybody always loves her. When she enters a room, everyone is happy and talking with her. When I enter a room, not so much.. (not at all). She is spontanious, or actually, my whole family is. And I am only spontanious with my friends. But the things we talk about are different, and the way I talk with them.
My family is a group of very nice, but normal, average people. And I'm a person who listens to metal, likes living on my own, goes to concerts and festivals, is gay, dyes her hair in weird colors.. My humor is very sarcastic and dark, (and my friends love that, but my family members don't get that). So, not an average person..
I just don't know how to connect, even though I want to. I'm just not the type of person to talk about the weather. I'm the type of person to talk about deeper things, or just not at all, and talk about nonsense like the weirdest food combination you ever ate.
If I am truly myself with them, like when I had a beer to much haha, people are weirded out..
I love them and would like a better connection, and I would like to feel part of the family. But it never feels like I am..
Sorry if my story was chaotic, but thanks for reading if you did
Well , there is always at least one person who is different from the rest of the family, but there is nothing wrong with that. You might never guess it, but some of these average people in the family are different too, they just hate the idea of standing out because being in a group kind of sets the rule that you have to obey their customs:)) the reason why most families do all of the boring small talk, is common ground.
Without holidays, weather, recycling last year's dinner conversations and jokes, families would not have a thing to talk about ,if you live apart and only get together with a group of people couple times a year, it is natural to have only a few things in common. Your family would rarely get into an in-depth conversation about youre thoughts and feelings about pretty much anything that you are interested in ,but they would gladly describe in detail the lenght and duration of the last rain. i dont think that stuff changes ,because people get set in their ways and it probably would seem rude to them to try and disturb them , but you should definately keep being you and not go out of youre way to fit in.You have strong, independant thinking , and that probably is by now what everyone expects from you .
@Ylina
I guess you're right. It's just a shame I also feel like this with my mother, for example, who I see 3 times a week..
Thank you :)
My dear @Cosmicsea... A lot of things that you say resonate with me, and my own experiences and feelings of being out of place or different from all the others in my immediate family.
If you'd like, please read my listener profile (I wrote a really extensive one), and if you also feel that we have some common ground, do drop me a line some time so we can chat.
And no matter whether we chat directly or not, I wish you the best of luck in your journey. Always remember that there is nothing wrong with being different, no matter how much the world may make you feel that way at times. Without people who question, rebels, free-thinkers and eccentrics, the world would never have advanced and we would probably all be sitting around campfires and living in caves still!
(Wait... Would that be so bad??? Must go think on that...)
