I (21) wasn’t very good at making friends as a kid. As a queer autistic kid growing up in a religious private school, I never really had any friends and I was often bullied for the things I liked. My mom’s family also isolated me for never acting normal and often punished me (either physically or mentally) for things that either weren’t my fault or were due to my autism. When I finally made friends in middle school, they stabbed me in the back after finding out I was queer. Finally made some friends in high school, but my long-term friend group slowly split apart during covid right after our graduations both because of various drama and because of natural college separation. My last two relationships ended poorly (because i realized i was being abused and because the other person got dragged into a religious cult respectively, but those are stories for another day). Now I’m in college and while I have a lot of friends, in the back of my mind I know it’s only a matter of time before they ditch me because they find something wrong with me. So, I don’t let myself get too attached to anyone. So I’ve got a big friend group, but it feels superficial, and I always feel apart from other people, like I’ve built this wall to protect myself from ever being betrayed again. I realize how much it’s hurting me, but I don’t know where to even begin to tear it down.