That would be an understatement. I remember how at my grandfather’s funeral, over half of the attendees refused to acknowledge and greet/shake hands with my mother, and some with me. Kind of messed up to attend the funeral of a man and refuse to greet his daughter and grandson.

Well, he made his fortune also because his father was extremely rich and had given him millions for doing absolutely nothing. Yet, just the numerical value of money makes such people think that they are better than others. The housing crisis here has forced all of my school-age acquaintances and friends to move out. And some people here tell me how poor people deserve to be pushed out, so that tech people and finance people can take their place in those same living quarters. No empathy at all.

I see. Maybe I could feel better being around more empathetic people there in the campaign than at meetups. When I went to a rally last year, people just seemed nice to complete strangers. Genuinely nice, not faking it. Some guy even gave me a couple of campaign signs for free because he saw that I had none.

I had not considered that before. Perhaps I have PTSD. I usually think of PTSD as people who had come back from war, so perhaps my case would be completely different. The extended bullying probably did affect my self-esteem, in addition to the physical scars on my body from the bullying.

I actually talked to my mother a couple hours ago. Of course when my father was not present. It was an uncomfortable, awkward conversation given the topic, like it usually is. She basically told me that there is no timeline whereby I have to accomplish certain things. I told her how I felt old at 30 to be in such a situation, and she said that sometimes things happen for a reason, but that it does not mean that things never happen. When I said how I would only feel normal if I had had sex at around 17 or 18 for example. She said, well say that I had done that and then messed up, had gotten a girl pregnant by mistake when I was in university, and/or even had worse caught a terrible VD like syphilis or AIDS and had ruined my life. I thought about that for a bit. Perhaps with my clumsiness back then that could be a risk. I still wished that I had had sex and had a girlfriend back then, but she said that I just have to look the future, and that if any woman berates me or makes fun of me, then I should forget about her because she is not worth dating. I asked her but she had lost her virginity at 27, and I am 30 and still have not, and why is it like this. She said that it just happened by chance and that she never had a rule that she had to accomplish it before a certain age, then told me to follow suit and not put goals by time that I feel pressured to accomplish. What she said was logical, it just emotionally hurts a lot even though there really is no timeline whereby I must abide.

That is true that timelines are not necessary and that no one has to follow some other person’s arbitrary timeline. Again, it is logical to state this. It is just emotionally difficult to accept what has happened (or not happened, in my case) that I wish had happened. The emotional, illogical side to this is what causes ruminations, because I often find myself compelled to compare myself to other people whom I meet or read about, then I think, I have not done X by age __.

Perhaps I end up seeing evidence because I have somehow encountered quite a lot of women who have berated or criticised me for never having had a girlfriend or sex before and this is used as counterevidence to advice. But perhaps I fail to realise that this is also evidence that where I live here contains people that are very mean-spirited and not empathetic. My mother told me towards the end of the conversation, “You will find a girlfriend someday. Perhaps not here. You need to get out of here. This place is toxic. But somewhere else, I am sure that you will find someone.” It kind of reassured me a bit.