Thoughts on Loneliness and Disconnect in 2025

This post is straight from the heart and I'm not providing references, just going with the flow of my thoughts.

I don't really know why there is such a stigma about admitting that you're feeling lonely. Maybe it's the same kind of stigma that, as people born pre-1990's or so, we were taught to hide our feelings, especially when it comes to anything related to mental health.

I remember reading in my parents newspaper about Prozac when it first came out. Before then I hadn't really heard of anti-depressants that much and suddenly there was a 'Sunshine Pill' available. I needed that so much (or so I thought at the time) and so in my early 20's I went to see my GP and asked for it. I got it. It made me feel weird. So I didn't take it for long and it didn't really help with my persistent feeling of not being able to exactly say what I felt was wrong with me.

Bear with, I'm a circular story-teller!

So, throughout my whole life I've had this odd feeling of disconnect – whether it's from myself or from other people, it was still there and I became the Queen of Self-Analysis ergo WTF is wrong with me?

Turns out I am high-functioning Adhd and Autistic. Finally diagnosed at 52 years old. I’m 54 at the time of writing this.

Who Knew These Things All Those Years Ago!!!

What I’m trying to express I think is that loneliness is no stranger to me. Perhaps you can relate?

I’ve never been ‘allowed’ into the ‘clique’ unless I was drunk or otherwise masking the real me – perfectly imperfect – a little socially awkward at times, a nature-loving introverted extravert who never stops educating myself on a wide spectrum of topics. With the right people, I never needed a drink or whatever to gain connection. I ‘get’ connection, but I can also drop it if it’s not a healthy one. These days. It took a lot of hard knocks to learn that though. And removing myself from alcohol-or otherwise-fuelled people and their environments.

I’m neither popular nor unpopular, but I’m liked. People come to ask for advice so I must have some kind of wisdom they want or need but they don’t invite me to their girls lunch, shopping trips or spa days. I pretend to not care but it hurts.

In the past it’s made me feel a bit bitchy or resentful too. I suppose it takes one to know one, eventually.

But I never set out too be one. Not.At.All. And I’m not. I don’t like it and I am not joining in. Not even to fit in.

I moved beyond needing to be ‘popular’ a long time ago. But I haven’t moved beyond knowing what loneliness feels like.

Failed relationships turned from grief into learning to set boundaries.

Kids grow up and live their own lives (they are lovely, but busy)

Many pets travelled the rainbow bridge (heartbreaking)

A parent long gone, but still in my thoughts

The independent streak emerges, strong, necessary, like breath.

I can find a balance (mostly) between solitude and loneliness, and left to my own devices, I’ve looked into my own experiences and see if ‘it’s not just me, is it?’

And apparently it’s not.

Loneliness is insidiously leaching into humanity at a rapid rate. (1 in 4 adults in the western world experiencing it at times) We think we’re connected because social media has become our social lives. But it’s designed for fleeting surface interactions – here today, gone tomorrow. Leaving us all with the slow soul-crushing lack of depth with our social interactions.

We’ve witnessed the birth of the internet, and social media. We’ve seen it grow beyond anything we could even imagine as kids. And now we have AI too. It could be the best friend that you haven’t had since school. It’s designed to be.

But I don’t think AI can replace real human connection and even if ‘our tribe’ is scattered across the globe I think we know the internet isn’t going anywhere. Let’s connect. Let’s not begin to rely on AI as our last hope for real and meaningful connection. Because it’s not Prozac either!