Don’t have any friends

I'm the same. There are people I know (acquaintances) and colleagues, but on the rare occasions when I got the chance to get a friend, they wanted the friendship to be full of social activities that make me feel mentally choked and suffocated, or the masking needed to spend time with them was just exhausting, because they wanted me to meet their other friends.  I got terrified and pushed them away, I can't let people get too close and I can't accept invitations or hang out without knowing exactly what's going to happen.  Then there are the awkward silences. 

There were 2 chances in the last 10 years to make a close friend this way. 

On weekdays I don't mind being isolated, but it's lonely at the weekends sometimes. Sometimes I go all day without speaking out loud. 

I went to a mental health support group once and was friendly with the only other person who turned up. We swapped phone numbers and it seemed like I had make a friend. She invited me to the pub for a drink a few days later. I went and then to my horror when we got there people called out to her from two different tables, and she started chatting with them across from our table. So there were kind of three conversations going on at once: her and me, her and another table, her and yet another table. And the confusion of it all, not knowing who I should speak to, or what to say to these strangers, made me terrified. 

That traumatised me and made me more cautious about meeting new people. I've had some other experiences like that. Different but similar too, where getting to know someone leads to very quickly being pulled into a massive social circle, and you don't know if you're part of it or not, or liked by the people or not, or what makes them tick. 

I went to a mental health support group once and was friendly with the only other person who turned up. We swapped phone numbers and it seemed like I had make a friend. She invited me to the pub for a drink a few days later. I went and then to my horror when we got there people called out to her from two different tables, and she started chatting with them across from our table. So there were kind of three conversations going on at once: her and me, her and another table, her and yet another table. And the confusion of it all, not knowing who I should speak to, or what to say to these strangers, made me terrified. 

That traumatised me and made me more cautious about meeting new people. I've had some other experiences like that. Different but similar too, where getting to know someone leads to very quickly being pulled into a massive social circle, and you don't know if you're part of it or not, or liked by the people or not, or what makes them tick.