I can feel lonelier in company than in solitude

Dear Delyara, When I’m physically alone, the loneliness is clean. It is what it is. But when I am sitting at a table with people I love, answering, smiling, joining in, and still feeling emotionally untouched, the loneliness becomes much harder to bear because it starts to feel ungrateful on top of everything else. And yet it’s true. There are evenings when I move through a whole family dinner and feel myself growing more alone with every ordinary exchange because none of it reaches the place in me that actually needs warmth. I am useful. I am present. I am involved. I am not met. That difference hurts more with age, not less.