CW: vent, gender dysphoria, social isolation

Normally I don't really do a vent post like this, but I guess I just had to get a few things off my chest. (I'm not really asking for advice though. Also there's also a nice Valentine's Day drawing at the end of this post or in my gallery!)

As you probably already noticed from this site, I'm pretty weird. I'm trans, very likely autistic (obviously never got an official diagnosis for this), INFJ (one of the rarest types, where people also want deeper friendships), and I have niche interests, which normally are celebrated in this community, but for me they make my life hell. I don't have a real social life, which means no friends IRL and rare interactions online. And of course I also have to fight with gender dysphoria, and no of course I don't have HRT (since for whatever reason it's very hard for me to get?). Oh and don't forget to add childhood trauma to that list (which I won't really get into).

And of course I'm also stuck in a small town. It's weird how generally people who visit my town mention how nice it looks. But for me it feels like being stuck in a prison. There's obviously nothing here related to my interests, no conventions or clubs in my area, and it's also much harder to get medical support for being trans (I often have to travel over an hour for it).
I guess the closest I could get to similar people would be university though. Actually I was in a study course before that had many queer people in it (and also was related to CS), but for various reasons I dropped out of it and switched to just CS. But of course I was also very much isolated there, and felt very painful seeing other people who are in more difficult situations (like a plural who moved to this town without knowing anyone here) easily make friends, while I live here for my whole life...
But my university also has an LGBTQ+ club, and you'd think that in a "safe space" like that you'd get accepted and treated better, right? Except I didn't... Even there I felt very much isolated. I went to a handful of meetings there, and they usually started with everyone playing together, which was nice. But after that everyone just went into their own little groups, and I was just standing in the middle of the room, not knowing what to do... So yeah, that was also awful (especially that one time where I also had to lie to the organizer that I had fun in a meeting, and almost started to cry).

So I guess online things could be better, right? Except that due to the childhood trauma I also have a bit of social anxiety, so approaching other people online also makes me scared >_<. Things have gotten much better though once I started this site a bit over a year ago. I mean having a creative expression is really nice, and people liking my stuff and even doing fanart is something I never expected. But I still have the issues from IRL, not knowing how to talk to people or being scared to approach others (or not knowing what to talk about) make having friends online still feel like a dream. (Although it has gotten a bit easier for me to leave messages to other sites, like in their Guestbooks, something that was really hard for me at first.)
But then there's also this weird phenomenon where with my interests I kind of feel like a "jack of all trades"? Like most people if they're into something know a lot about this. Like if it's a show they're really into they know many things about it and also have many theories and such. But I don't feel like I know about things well enough to actually talk about them? Which is also why I couldn't just jump into a conversation if it was about that topic?

And I can't actually know how other people see me, but I remember one time hearing from an IRL "friend" from high school (who only saw me as a "backup option") how I "probably don't want any friends". To this day I still don't know if they meant this as a joke or not, but it's something that has stuck with me. Like what if I'm also struggling like this because people see me like that? Of course this could also come from being trans and having the wrong body, but it's something I currently have to survive with.

In general it feels hard to constantly have to carry all of these things. I mean just gender dysphoria alone is hard (especially when you know you're trans for two years already, yet still don't have access to HRT for some reason, and also get misgendered a lot), but with the other things combined it sometimes makes surviving hard. And I guess they already drain so much energy from me that also trying to socialize is sometimes too draining for me.
Of course I tried going the therapy route to get help. While my old general therapist did help me a bit with social and legal transition, they never helped me with socializing. (In fact they always pushed me to go to the LGBTQ+ club meetings, and never understood why they made me feel bad afterwards)

Sometimes it does feel like I'm "too special", "too weird" for this world. I mean having a purple foxgirl is very nice to have, and I'm really proud of her. In fact I do love being different here online. But being "so special" is something that has made my life really awful, where I'm currently stuck trying to survive. But at least I have some energy left doing this fun hobby of creating and being creative, which currently is the only thing in my life that gives it a purpose. So I'll continue doing this for as long as possible!

Anyways, today is also Valentine's Day (I didn't plan to do this post today until last night), so I prepared this nice drawing for people who don't have anyone for Valentine's Day like me!

Here have some cute chocolate from Sophia! And keep having a good day or night!! ☆