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Learning to Connect With Friends — Without Alcohol (www.nytimes.com)
submitted 6 days ago by Aatube@kbin.melroy.org to c/longreads@sh.itjust.works
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By the time the entrees came, we’d reached the end of these “so what else is new” updates. I recognized that we were at a threshold — one I had been unable to cross so far without booze.

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[-] Endymion_Mallorn@kbin.melroy.org 1 points 3 hours ago

I've run into similar issues because frankly, the lockdowns of 2020-2023 also shut down my socialization almost completely. I don't share verbally, but only in pseudonymous settings like social media. In real life, I'm either task-focused (up until last month I was going to board games once a week - I've since shut down), taciturn and focused inward, or drunk. I don't share inner thoughts or opinions. I don't care much about what others around me say. The biggest problem for me of sober socializing is mostly that I don't have anyone I'd particularly like to be with, when I'm sober.

Now that I'm in that spiral, I don't see a way back.

this post was submitted on 10 Nov 2024
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