Do you ever feel like you can't talk to anyone

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Sometimes when I'm really depressed I don't want to tell anyone how I feel because I think they will just point out how it's my own fault.

Like I was invited to a party last might, there were too many people there, most of them were younger than me, the only single men were far too young for me. I felt lost in the crowd.

I feel like i'm supposed to be grateful I was even invited in the first place. The fact that it made me feel more depressed can be blamed on how I didn't really talk to anyone. On the other hand no one really wanted to talk to me.

There's nothing worse than being lonely in a crowded room.

Yeah I do feel like that, If I am already feeling down or extra stressed/anxious I try to avoid going to anything involving people and just relax. But of course sometimes such feelings just hit me out of nowhere like maybe I already agreed to go to some party and am there and just end up feeling crappy. I do drink though so if I end up feeling crappy and not wanting to talk then I can just play it off as being drunk/stoned even if I am not actually that drunk or stoned no one really questions it.

I hate feeling alone in a crowded room, hence why I prefer to try and be alone if I feel that...at least that makes sense.

I don't like going to parties. I don't know what to say to people. when I get sad i tend to shut down and not speak. which my family takes as me being mad at them. so they push and try to apologize which just makes me feel guilty.

I tend to always say the wrong thing. or do the wrong thing. I try to help but always mess up and make family mad at me. so I try not to talk.

it's easy to say you can't talk to anyone if you're in a situation of social anxiety in an environment you don't thrive in. i never do anything at parties. i never go anymore. i just look for an isolated chair and play games on my phone.

I do know the feeling. Action makes a big difference, but it's easier said than done and mental blocks are a very real thing. I only started becoming comfortable with social gatherings after being able to attend several with a friend in the past. Knowing a few people helps.

I do not have social anxiety, I'm just awkward, mind-blind and often come off as incredibly rude. sometimes on purpose. But I do have to consciously think about engaging with people, I does not come naturally.
So, in case of parties at which I don't know people, I usually go by going straight up to someone and saying 'hello, I'm ..." - and that usually works.
Most of the conversations at parties follow the same patterns and are pretty boring and in bulk they are very repetitive. A tiny fraction is good though. Can't really say it's worth it for this tiny fraction, but while you're there, you might as well....

The more people around me, the more lonely I feel.

Times' Square on New Year's Eve?

I may as well have been in Solitary Confinement.

Been there with being lonely at parties.

It can be frustrating.

What I do to combat that is I go armed with a few questions to ask people I do not know. That being said, I usually know people I see at parties.

How long since I've been to a party that didn't involve family? I can't remember offhand. But a long time.

There's definitely a wall there. I have a problem with opening up and trusting people. And it's so...exhausting.

Constantly. I'm actually a good conversationalist, but an inevitable consequence of being reputed as a walking encyclopedia is recalling vast sums of derivative opinions, knowledge and experience I'm sharply aware would never be apropos subject matter for the discussion at hand. It's numbing and arduous all at once. For once I can agree with Fnord; my mind makes short work of handling loneliness. It's the other humans that reflect my misanthropy back in my face.

_________________
"Standing on a well-chilled cinder, we see the fading of the suns, and try to recall the vanished brilliance of the origin of the worlds."
-Georges Lemaitre
"I fly through hyperspace, in my green computer interface"
-Gem Tos

"People think being alone makes you lonely, but I don't think that's true. Being surrounded by the wrong people is the loneliest thing in the world"- Kim Culbertson

It is rare that the people surrounding us are not the wrong people

If I could communicate about the significant things in life, I don’t think I would feel so alone. But can I get the words out? Do I have anything to say? Nope. For years I have sat smiling, nodding and questioning others at parties. They talk, I listen, people love to talk about themselves, kids, achievements, their clothes, hobbies, shopping, diets, on and on, the same conversations over and over. Problem is it gets repetitive and no one ever remembers one thing about me. If it’s noisy I can’t hear them and focus on their lips and have sent weird signals to others but that is a whole other topic. So yes in party situations, I feel very alone, but expect to feel that way when I go to them.

I haven't been to a "real" party in years. Only little "gatherings."

When I'm at a party/gatherings, I could dispense niceties--but, generally, the conversation veers towards boring things.

People just don't want to hear about the weather in Australia, and why the weather is the way it is in Australia LOL

Or about the Evolution of our species.

All people care about is the latest fads, current events, who wore what at whatever award show was on recently, and some of those "reality" programs.

I used to (and to an extent still) hate what a linguist once ago called "phatic communication," which is a fancy term for "banal chatter." While I enjoy waxing semi-poetically about philosophy, politics and art, these are all topics that are not that accessible to most people. Since many of our communication is in fact phatic, I decided to incorporate some material into my reading routine, such as the reading of newspapers, keeping up with current events. Once I started doing this, I could actually join a conversation, and then twist and turn it into a more interesting direction (for me) without alienating people. As a teacher in high school once said: If you want to alter a language, you will have to learn to speak it first. "Banal chatter" might be extremely stupid or mundane or irrelevant, but it is what allows many people to actually communicate in the first place. Do not look down upon it, but learn to speak in the same register, and try to alter the topic or direction of the conversation in another direction that you consider to be more interesting.

Sometimes, "banal chatter," or "phatic communication" could express metaphors which illustrate, quite well, abstract ideas.

The problem is with some of the people who engage in this "banal chatter," not the "banal chatter" itself.

To be honest, it's not really the topic of conversation that bothers me. I just feel overwhelmed when there are too many people in a room and I don't know who to talk to, especially if the people there are only acquaintances and I have no common ground to start off on and everyone else seems to be engaged in conversation and I don't want to interupt.

Strangely enough, that wasn't my initial point. I meant that I can't tell anyone how lonely I feel at parties, but that's not true, because I told you guys and you understood and said that you feel the same way. I feel a bit better for having read these responses.

Since the party that overwhelmed me, I decided to organise a party of my own and invited only 6 people. That's a number I can handle. We all were involved in the conversation and we had a good time.

I guess I shouldn't go to big parties, they are not for me.