I've been trying to write this for a week now, but have really had a hard time trying to find the words to say what I want to say. Maybe cause I over-think things like I always do.

Maybe also cause I guess I feel so far removed from these feelings any more that I'm not really sure that I feel the same way any more.

But this is a topic that means a lot to me, and has a long history, and I guess I just want to get this down somewhere.

I've spent a great deal of time the last many months pondering relationships, and where I'm at in all of that, and I guess trying to process a lot of feelings, too.

God, and this is so frustrating too, cause once again writer's block is coming in hard as I'm trying to write this.

Maybe it's cause I have such a hard time opening up to people.

I guess I just feel like this is not something I really want any more. It doesn't really matter to me any more. I used to be a very lonely person, and would like anybody that liked me.

I have been rejected my whole life. People always end up leaving eventually, and rejection has been like my biggest issue ever.

And I feel like I've come to a place where it just doesn't matter to me any more.

I'm a person who can spend weeks and months at home without ever going out. And I did that for 15 years. I have no friends but one in real life, and don't really feel a need for them.

I used to be so lonely. I looked for my soul mate for 12 years and never found her. I wanted to so badly that it really hurt not having her, waking up every day alone, going to bed every night alone.

I'm not really sure what's changed. Except that I see so many people having such difficulties in their relationships and marriages. And I look at myself, and how hard it is for me to even talk to people let alone go out on dates. I feel so ackward and so much pressure to be liked, all these thoughts race through my head, of saying something stupid, or not being liked, not being good enough, or just struggling with keeping conversation going. I feel intolerable anxiety in those situations. It's so hard for me to open up to people. I just shut down.

My walls are nearly impenetrable. I just can't take them down with people any more.

But besides all of that, I just don't think I really have anything to give. I don't want sex, I feel so cold to it. I feel like what is left but just having a relationship of convenience, just to have someone there? I feel like I need so much alone time, that I'm honestly afraid that without it I'd start feeling really tired of them and disinterested in them after awhile. Especially when I feel a lot of pressure to give more than I am able. It's something that drains me really fast.

I've come to a place of finally realizing and accepting how I am, and how much I struggle in relationships. I just feel like they aren't worth the trouble. That the cons far outweigh the pros when I consider it all together.

And I just find it so ironic that I've come to this point in my life. It meant such a great deal to me before to meet my soulmate. I was so lonely without her. I wanted it so badly that for many years I had the same reoccuring dream of meeting her. The dream was always the same but her face was always different. And feeling such intense love in my dreams, feelings so intense that I never felt in real life. Just feeling so in love with each other that nothing else mattered. I wanted so badly to find something like that in real life.

To now, in my 40's, accepting the fact that I likely will be alone for the rest of my life, and actually feeling pretty okay with it. Despite that I feel lonely still at times.

I just feel like there is this invisible barrier between me and everyone else that I could never cross. I could never really connect with people on a deep level.

And for the first time in my life, I think I'm okay with it. Really ok. And oddly enough, I feel like I'm not really missing much.

Sorry this got long, I just wanted to get this out.