I want to start off by saying I have friends/acquaintances and they’re pretty much all men I meet on Reddit. It’s like I can’t make friends with anyone if they’re not Redditors. It’s so easy for me to talk to a man and build a connection within a few hours.
With women, I don’t know what to do or where to go. I’m in a running group, and have played sports – none turned into friends or even acquaintances – except the one guy who subbed for my hockey team… and turned out to be a Redditor. So now I just do sports for fun.
I’ve read memes about people just going for it and latching on, but how do I know if they’ll be receptive? How much should I text? Is there a good guide for this? I Google and learn stuff but still feel overwhelmed.
For context, I struggle with this because I am neurodivergent and have anxiety (plus bipolar) and I was bullied by my peers in grades 4-6 (and often by my dad as well). I had very few friends until I discovered Reddit when I was 21. I think I’m a decent person and I enjoy being alone, but I’m at my happiest doing things with friends. I’m working through some self-esteem stuff and habits of taking too long to reply to people (I set a 24 hour limit on text responses to improve), I now ask (some) people out instead of waiting for them to ask me out, and I’m trying not to be vain with who I approach at events.
Even when I work through these things, what’s the next step? How do I do the social dance?