Anybody else have a problem living with other poeple?

[smirkymonkey]

Not that you get in arguments or anything, but just that you find it extremely draining and difficult to share your personal space with someone. Especially someone who takes offense at your needing to be quiet and alone.

It's like I can FEEL their energy tentacles creeping into my room and grabbing me by the throat because they can't stand the fact that you are in the apartment/house and you are not interested in interacting with them.

Unfortunately, I live in NYC where it's just too expensive to live alone, although I might have to cough it up and get a place the size of a closet just to have some sanity. I mean I really, really hate living with someone. Even when I go to visit my family, I need to take naps just to shut out their energy.

Does anyone else have this problem? And how do you deal with it? I feel like there is something wrong with me for not wanting to live with another person.

[mainegreen]

1. Personal time is the best time in my opinion! nt

[kitkatrose]

2. YES!!!

My freshman year in college, I was homicidal the whole time because I had a roommate, who wasn't actually that bad, but just the fact that I couldn't have a place to be alone (except the toilet) was more than I can take. Now, I share a suite w/ another girl in the dorms and while we each have our separate rooms, I still can't take sharing my kitchen, etc with another person. When I graduate, I'm just going to have to live alone; fortuanely, my grad school searches are in affordable places, cuz I don't think I could do it in DC.

Does anyone else have this problem? And how do you deal with it? I feel like there is something wrong with me for not wanting to live with another person.


There is absolutely nothing wrong with you. Unfortunately, the mere precense of people seems to bother me a lot of the time (just being in a crowd all day fulfills my social requirement) so I think I either need a house, or a really, really well soundproofed apartment. For now, though, I have a pair of earplugs and that's helped immensely with shutting other people out. :)

[smirkymonkey]

3. Yes, that's exactly how I feel.

It's suffocating to me to have another person around all the time. Especially when I have to work all day around people (argh, more people) that I don't necessarily want to be with. Also, I live in Manhattan which is another thing, constantly running up against other people's energy - when I get home, I just want to literally wash it all off me and feel renewed. Having another person there just frustrates me beyond belief.

Thanks for your input! :hi:

[nofurylike]

4. i knew someone who made cards saying "i am on a speaking fast..."

then gave them to everyone and anyone, regularly.

maybe after a couple times doing that, make a deal for the few check-in times you would both agree to, all other times being as non-speaking as possible.

or quiet zones in the apartment.

just wishing for you that something can help, smirkymonkey. i know how stressful it can be...


i wish you luck!


Peace!

[LWolf]

5. You describe it perfectly.

can FEEL their energy tentacles creeping into my room and grabbing me by the throat because they can't stand the fact that you are in the apartment/house and you are not interested in interacting with them.

I prefer to live alone. The only other person I'm comfortable living with is my adult son, who is another introvert. He lived with me for 3 years in a little 800 square foot cottage during a particular crisis in my life, and we could go for days at a time without ever speaking, yet with no one taking offense.

If you have to have a roommate, try to find another introvert; someone who doesn't need interaction.

[Sisaruus]

6. I recently wanted to kill my best friend when we shared a hotel room

I've lived alone for years, even while married (we lived in different states because of our careers - we agreed to divorce when I told him that I didn't plan on sharing a residence after we retired). I went to Mexico in January for a week with my best friend and the presumed hotel suite of 2 separate bedrooms turned into one room/two beds. It has taken me five months since that trip to even go out to dinner with her again.

[astral]

7. I feel just like all of you

When I had roommates I felt like I was losing my spirit sharing a space. Usually I had compatable people who didn't need excessive interaction, but I would literally go into a closet with a radio and a book if I had to to get away.

Now I do live alone, and can barely afford to but I don't care. It is perfectly normal for us loners to love being alone. (It's just that we can be more of a 'loner' than we really want to be, too.)

I have figured out: some people get 'charged up' being around other people; they like to be around other people all the time and love interacting and talking and 'being seen' and all that stuff.

For some of us it's a total drain and stress-out and we re-charge in solitude and, whether we like quiet or background noise, we need the **Total Privacy** of being alone, and no one **Too Near** to us to where we know they are aware of exactly where we are and what we're doing. Having my own room was never private enough for me, although I tried real hard from time to time in my life to adjust.

Financially, I'm in the wrong part of the planet to try to swing it all by myself, but hey, I have my solitude and that is priceless.

[flaminbats]

13. that happens whenever I share a room..

my sloppiness eventually becomes too much for the roommate, and then it ends in a terrible fight. Then I am overjoyed move into my own room..but then the depression slowly sets in. And it only gets worse with every passing day!

Is it just my mess..or my personality that's the problem?

[LWolf]

8. "feel their energy tentacles"

This is a good description. I no longer live alone. My adult son is not so bad; he also likes his space and stays out of mine for long periods of time. It's my grandson. We can't shut ourselves in our rooms at the opposite end of the house and refuse to interact with a 6 yo; he needs contact and interaction. When his weekend away happens each month, we often go the whole weekend in the same house without even seeing one another, soaking up as much solitude as possible.

[LWolf]

11. An update:

After a year of sharing space, I am:

*physically incapacitated by weight gain, back, knee, joint, and nerve injuries, blood sugar, and complete lack of anything approaching energy

*mentally and emotionally drained to the point that I cringe when the phone rings or when I hear footsteps approaching

*depressed enough to spend most of my vacation in bed

No one has done anything "to" me but take up space and ask me to pay attention to them.

I, on the other hand, am so drained that what little energy I do have is spent on avoidance tactics. Avoiding contact, avoiding mundane chores that we don't usually think about, hiding in my shell.

I spent a week by myself when my family went on vacation, and was suddenly energized and getting things done. No problem. Optimistic. Feeling good. Three weeks later I'm right back where I was.

[smirkymonkey]

15. Interesting that you say that - I have found that when I live alone

(and don't work around other people) I come back to life after a few months. Living and working with others in my personal space not only harms my mental health, but my physical health as well - I just lose interest in taking care of myself and have no energy for exercise or even doing anything social.

Being forced to be amongst others makes me swing to the other extreme and become extremly introverted.

[mdmc]

9. people up above and people down below

if someone disappears you would never even know (Talkin NY Blues - Bob Dylan).

I always wanted to live in NYC, but there are just too many people there.

I live with flatmates, and it more or less sucks. I have my own bedroom, which can be my quiet spot.
I go out at night, or real early in the morning (3 or 4 am) just to be by myself. I have a car and I drive around or go to a diner.

I used to flex my work time to avoid co-workers / flatmates

[kitkatrose]

12. See, I don't have any problems living in a big city--

I'm in DC for school--because while there's a lot of people, I don't have to interact with any of them. I can melt into the crowd, more or less, although I do need some time to recharge if I've been doing it a lot. But I'm in Petersham, MA for the summer (ha! try to find that on a map) with 20 other interns living in one house. If I didn't have my own room, I'd go stark raving mad. As it is, I work on the weekends to have some alone time, simply because there's too many people in my bubble.

I also just spent an alternately wonderful and hellish week in Chico, Ca for a conference--way too much mingling and stuff, even though I have the feeling that most of the botanists there are a lot like me--would rather talk to plants than other people. :) But since it's just once a year, I could deal with that, assuming I had enough down time afterwards.

[Deja Q]

10. I'll let you know.

I've been alone all my life and I'm starting to get sick of myself too... :spray:

[moggie]

14. It's unimaginable

Looking back on my childhood (mostly a "forgotten boredom", in Larkin's words), I'm amazed that I managed to survive until leaving the family home to go to college. Living alone during my college years was such a release! A few years later, between renting and buying, I had to move back into the family home for six months, and it was agony. Don't get me wrong: I don't hate my family, but those energy tentacles (you have it exactly right) were almost unbearable. They almost killed me (and, worse, someone else): at weekends, if I had nothing else to do, the pressure would sometimes drive me out of the house to my car, to drive around aimlessly releasing tension, and on one particularly bad day, I took a corner too fast and almost collided with an oncoming car. No therapeutic driving for me after that. Fortunately, I soon found my own place, where I've lived in cool isolation ever since. I now find the idea of sharing a living space literally unimaginable: if I try to picture it, my mind veers away from the idea.

I live in London (UK), so, expense-wise, my situation is similar to yours. My place is really not big enough for anyone who owns stuff: I'm at the point now where I'll probably have to start disposing of books, and, you know, that's painful. But big cities are probably the best place for people like us: ok, you can't afford your dream home, but they accept loners. I grew up in a village, and everyone knew everyone else's business. In London, I'm barely on small talk terms with my neighbours of 17 years, and nobody thinks that's odd. And, of course, in the city I can soak up the energy of those millions of people by osmosis, while enjoying all those amenities which small towns lack (for example, it's almost 22:40, and I'm about to go shopping, on foot).

Only you can decide what's right for you. You feel that something's wrong with you because the norm is set by loud extroverts. But are they happy? Look at the divorce rate. Look at domestic violence figures. Make the best of what you are. I won't pretend that being a loner is ideal, but there are worse burdens.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

16. While I need solo time, I actually prefer to have someone around

the house to interact with. I LIKE day-to-day familiarity, as long as the person doesn't try to smother me with unsolicited advice or won't respect my wish for solitude.

I recently spent 11 days on a group tour, and I enjoyed having a dependable crowd of people to hang out with. I even enjoyed having a roommate.