Online community

With my health as it is now, I have come to the realisation (perhaps a little later than I should have), that I am unlikely to ever be able to build relationships in person. 

This is down to several factors:

1. I am disabled and need a carer to enable me to go out

2. I am too unwell to sit up long enough to go out 

3. I am autistic and find making conversation extremely challenging

4. I am autistic and cannot keep a conversation going unless it is about a small number of topics

5. I am an introvert and will never fill a room when I enter it, therefore being able to be in a group without anyone noticing me. I frequently have left group knowing lots about other people who wouldnt even know my name.

6. I have panic attacks in busy places

And

7. I can never guarantee my health will be good enough for me to go anywhere or do anything on any given day

So all in all you can see my issue.

I decided to look at this differently and seek community online

First I started posting on social media after hearing this is a way people make connections. It didn't really work for me.

I am in a social group on social media but don't spend long enough inline to build anything meaningful. 

I started searching for free online meetings and signed up to a various selection.

Thee brought differing levels of success. 

An online art based session was great for getting me back to being arty and doing something practical but I felt like an outsider and as if everyone there knew eachother.

A creative writing group was so serious that the person running it critiqued perples work publicly- no thank you

A second creative writing group was so pretentious I lasted less than 5 minutes and left

I haven't been brave enough to join in any tiktok lives yet ajd am not entirely sure what you do there 

A support group session became awkward when it was run by someone I had been in contact with previously - so I didn't return

Then I tried an autism call group and the topics ajd viewpoints were so similar to my own ways of thinking it was almost spooky. I intend to return there.

I also tried the paid for communities with subscriptions. 

One I am in feels smaller than the other, is less expensive and less active. Tgat is OK for me because I am not on there every day and don't want thousands of messages to catch up on when I can be there.

The other is friendlier, busier but we'll organised with lots of activities to join in with. 

I think, so far, that these are my way forward. 

It is early days though but I hope that by joining a subscription community aimed at people with chronic illnesses and disabilities I will find people with enough in common with me to eventually, maybe, perhaps meet people. 

Watch this space.

#disability #chronicillness #spoonie #community