Living alone for the first time ever in 67 years - it’s interesting and lovely, but wow scary too. I was always somebody’s daughter, wife, mother, grandma so I lived with other people for my entire life until…divorce & kids move on. I’m alone but not lonely (usually) and also in Oregon. Welcome.
Just saw this quote. It’s not just us pondering the question.
When nobody wakes you up in the morning, and when nobody waits for you at night, and when you can do whatever you want. what do you call it, freedom or loneliness? ~Milan Kundera
Sounds fascinating, and yes, I think any kind of aloneness brings us face to face with ourselves, our unresolved stuff, our grief, our regrets. The stuff we endlessly distract from. I'm intrigued to watch the show now 😃
This one really got to me. I enjoy alone, but I do miss the support of family in celebrations, sickness, or sadness. Yes, I have friends, but still. I've lived alone for 40 years and loved it. Never imagined myself as a married lady with kids. But these last years of caring for my own Mom, really highlight my aloneness. I will get old alone. With friends, but still, alone. Interestingly enough, my plans for after mom paces is driving around the continent visiting places and people and the thought of anyone being there in the car with me, just ruins the whole vision, kills the delightful solitude of driving.
That show sounds gruesome. And not one I could watch.
I very much appreciate your viewpoint, and the questions you are asking yourself. Both you and I are “alone”, and have friends, are within driving distance of a town and various amenities, both own our own places… and? For me, sometimes I wish I had someone to come home to. There are days I long for a hug, or someone to be glad I came home, yet for the most part I enjoy solitude. I know so many people all over the world, and I’m very blessed in that regard. Yet, there are days, for sure.
I live alone and ponder the concept of loneliness too. It’s a roller coaster of emotions. Some days I revel in the freedom of ‘free choice’ , other days have less purpose. A very honest piece of writing.
If you get a chance watch Alone Australia season 1 set in my home of Tasmania. Won by a most inspiring, but very different, contestant. No more clues!
Well, these contestants are dropped into an alien environment without the history of a clan of their own to rely on, so the scenario is somewhat artificial. I read somewhere that, apparently, (at least some) tribes used to send elderly and frail members into the wilderness so they wouldn't slow down or hamper the survival of the rest of the clan.
On a different note, I attended my mum's celebration of life yesterday. It was a beautiful ceremony. Afterwards, at the wake, I felt very lonely and isolated among the other family members who were far too jovial for my liking given the solemnity of the occasion. I've been the outlier living in England for a long time now, and I felt very distinctly that I didn't belong. Now that both of my parents have passed this year within months of each other, it's the end of an era and I shall be glad to return to England.
Great read! I have watched Alone (it actually gets more gruesome in other seasons IMO but also more exciting as women and/or couples enter the fray). It got to a point where I couldn't handle the constant slaughter of animals, and many really contestants struggled with this too. But to your point, I almost always have felt more alone in crowds than by myself. I like my company, and I have things I enjoy doing and take pride in accomplishing. The only times I feel truly alone is when "big" things are happening that I would like to share...ie watching election results come in! Loneliest in a crowd is so much harder. You certainly gave us good thinking material, thank you!
Forgot to add that in four weeks, I am leaving everything behind to move to another state ALONE. I know no one there, and in fact I've never been there. I know loneliness will try to have its way with me!!
Thank you for your kind words, Beth. You are brave. I have thought about moving to another part of THIS state, and that scares me bigtime. But I know you can do it.
Fairly new reader here. I am alone just as you are. For me your thoughts have taken a bit of the "sting" out of being and living alone. On one hand I welcome the rest and happiness I live with every day. The other side of the coin is about going forward with no one to care for me physically as I age. And who do I trust with my financial matters, etc.?
For now it is one step in front of the other, do the next thing, and enjoy this season of independence and solitude I so deeply cherish.
Hi, Elizabeth. Those are big concerns. We will be talking about them here at the substack. Meanwhile, yes, enjoy that independence. It is a gift. Thanks for joining us.
I’m adjusting to life alone after the loss of my mum, and finding it horribly, bracingly lonely. There’s a sense of being abandoned and unwanted, a second-class citizen, and I don’t know how to cope as it goes on and on forever. But there is a part of me that imagines it turning me into some kind of tough, rugged outdoorswoman, even though I live in the suburbs.
Thank you Sue for your beautiful essay. I relate in so many ways. I started this morning with the goal of just typing out few lines to acknowledge how your essay touched me. I end up writing a miny-essay probably belongs in my own stack of essays, which I have not yet started. So please forgive my indulgence here. But I do like that my following thoughts are associated with yours and others who are commenting. Thank you Sue for kickstart!: ..... "I'm a 60 year old man who is childless due to not finding a life partner. I am almost all the way through grieving not realizing fatherhood. But I am now in a second phase of grief: trying to swallow the bitter pill of not realizing the dream/hope of partnership. It is hard to put words the grief, the sadness of not realizing life partnership. The line in your essay about not having a partner and kids who eagerly await your return, returning instead to a beautiful but empty home, really captures the heartache and the loss: coming home to no one; not being someone else's "top person;" not mattering ultimately to someone; not having someone to share life with, to root with; to watch over you. These are of course the things I project on to a life partner and children. I say "project" because, as a Filipino, I actually have a large family that tenaciously clings to each other. On the surface, we matter to each other, ultimately. Growing up, my Caucasian friends often said they were jealous of how "warm" my big Filipino family felt. They were projecting something as well. The reality is that Filipino family come with a cost, and in my case, the cost was and continues to be the repudiation of the core of me, the "real me," so to speak. National culture, i.e. being "Filipino" or being "American" is not really organic. It is a culture re-organized around the trauma of occupation and colonization. It is a culture of survival, of freezing and fawning and bullying, of trying to stay safe by aligning with those who control, who own, who make the rules. The word "Filipino" is short for the Spanish ruler, King Philip. Our national identity speaks to four centuries of Spanish colonial rule, as does our marriages, the way we parent, family and love itself. Patriarchy is of course at the heart of all of it, and women especially pay a high price to have that partner and children to come home to. My mother just celebrated her 60th anniversary. She aways says she came out ahead. "You know, I have my children," she always says." But I know she is deeply lonely in her marriage and with the exception of children, she lost most of herself. Men also pay a price for following patriarchal scripts, for aligning with power and status. They bruise and over time lose the core of themselves. In exchange for power, we repudiate those parts that enable us to connect, to feel, to love. The ancients called this part of our selves, Psyche, the knower, the one that lets go of Cupid in order to find Eros. And I have come to see my prolonged singles, and by association, childlessness, and by association aloneness as an unconscious preserving of the core of myself, of Psyche, the knower that patriarchy (which both men and women internalize) repudiate in order to preserve power, in order to stay safe. In my late 30s I began therapy for the first time and trusted in therapy's faith: that if I work hard enough on myself, I will find love. I'm a marriage and family therapist now and I agree with Gabor Mata: trauma is real and defining of our modern culture. The festering unprocessed trauma makes both politics and intimacy so hard, if not impossible, despite our best efforts. And for myself, the chase for romantic love and children has been a lifelong bypass to healing the deeper source of my aloneness: the abandonment of my voice; the repudiation of Psyche; the divorce within." .... Thank you So much Sue for helping find a bit of my voice today!
Wow, Don. Thank you for sharing all of this. Although I have Filipino friends, there's a lot I didn't know. I hope you continue to find comfort here at the Can I Do It Alone Substack, and yes, think about starting one of your own. You clearly have a lot to say.
Living alone for the first time ever in 67 years - it’s interesting and lovely, but wow scary too. I was always somebody’s daughter, wife, mother, grandma so I lived with other people for my entire life until…divorce & kids move on. I’m alone but not lonely (usually) and also in Oregon. Welcome.
Just saw this quote. It’s not just us pondering the question.
When nobody wakes you up in the morning, and when nobody waits for you at night, and when you can do whatever you want. what do you call it, freedom or loneliness? ~Milan Kundera
(Book: The Unbearable Lightness of Being https://amzn.to/4goOXMg [ad])
Fabulous quote. Thank you.
Sounds fascinating, and yes, I think any kind of aloneness brings us face to face with ourselves, our unresolved stuff, our grief, our regrets. The stuff we endlessly distract from. I'm intrigued to watch the show now 😃
This one really got to me. I enjoy alone, but I do miss the support of family in celebrations, sickness, or sadness. Yes, I have friends, but still. I've lived alone for 40 years and loved it. Never imagined myself as a married lady with kids. But these last years of caring for my own Mom, really highlight my aloneness. I will get old alone. With friends, but still, alone. Interestingly enough, my plans for after mom paces is driving around the continent visiting places and people and the thought of anyone being there in the car with me, just ruins the whole vision, kills the delightful solitude of driving.
That show sounds gruesome. And not one I could watch.
I very much appreciate your viewpoint, and the questions you are asking yourself. Both you and I are “alone”, and have friends, are within driving distance of a town and various amenities, both own our own places… and? For me, sometimes I wish I had someone to come home to. There are days I long for a hug, or someone to be glad I came home, yet for the most part I enjoy solitude. I know so many people all over the world, and I’m very blessed in that regard. Yet, there are days, for sure.
I live alone and ponder the concept of loneliness too. It’s a roller coaster of emotions. Some days I revel in the freedom of ‘free choice’ , other days have less purpose. A very honest piece of writing.
If you get a chance watch Alone Australia season 1 set in my home of Tasmania. Won by a most inspiring, but very different, contestant. No more clues!
Living alone is definitely a roller coaster. I will look at the Australia season. It will probably be very different from Season 1.
The Aussie one also features one of our irregular NomoCrones Suzy Muir as a contestant — I’d love to watch it but not possible In Ireland!
Well, these contestants are dropped into an alien environment without the history of a clan of their own to rely on, so the scenario is somewhat artificial. I read somewhere that, apparently, (at least some) tribes used to send elderly and frail members into the wilderness so they wouldn't slow down or hamper the survival of the rest of the clan.
On a different note, I attended my mum's celebration of life yesterday. It was a beautiful ceremony. Afterwards, at the wake, I felt very lonely and isolated among the other family members who were far too jovial for my liking given the solemnity of the occasion. I've been the outlier living in England for a long time now, and I felt very distinctly that I didn't belong. Now that both of my parents have passed this year within months of each other, it's the end of an era and I shall be glad to return to England.
Great read! I have watched Alone (it actually gets more gruesome in other seasons IMO but also more exciting as women and/or couples enter the fray). It got to a point where I couldn't handle the constant slaughter of animals, and many really contestants struggled with this too. But to your point, I almost always have felt more alone in crowds than by myself. I like my company, and I have things I enjoy doing and take pride in accomplishing. The only times I feel truly alone is when "big" things are happening that I would like to share...ie watching election results come in! Loneliest in a crowd is so much harder. You certainly gave us good thinking material, thank you!
Forgot to add that in four weeks, I am leaving everything behind to move to another state ALONE. I know no one there, and in fact I've never been there. I know loneliness will try to have its way with me!!
Thank you for your kind words, Beth. You are brave. I have thought about moving to another part of THIS state, and that scares me bigtime. But I know you can do it.
Fairly new reader here. I am alone just as you are. For me your thoughts have taken a bit of the "sting" out of being and living alone. On one hand I welcome the rest and happiness I live with every day. The other side of the coin is about going forward with no one to care for me physically as I age. And who do I trust with my financial matters, etc.?
For now it is one step in front of the other, do the next thing, and enjoy this season of independence and solitude I so deeply cherish.
Hi, Elizabeth. Those are big concerns. We will be talking about them here at the substack. Meanwhile, yes, enjoy that independence. It is a gift. Thanks for joining us.
I’m adjusting to life alone after the loss of my mum, and finding it horribly, bracingly lonely. There’s a sense of being abandoned and unwanted, a second-class citizen, and I don’t know how to cope as it goes on and on forever. But there is a part of me that imagines it turning me into some kind of tough, rugged outdoorswoman, even though I live in the suburbs.
I'm sorry about your mum. I think that's the hardest loss for most of us. But you can that tough woman in the suburbs or wherever you are.
Thank you ❤️ Here’s hoping!
Thank you Sue for your beautiful essay. I relate in so many ways. I started this morning with the goal of just typing out few lines to acknowledge how your essay touched me. I end up writing a miny-essay probably belongs in my own stack of essays, which I have not yet started. So please forgive my indulgence here. But I do like that my following thoughts are associated with yours and others who are commenting. Thank you Sue for kickstart!: ..... "I'm a 60 year old man who is childless due to not finding a life partner. I am almost all the way through grieving not realizing fatherhood. But I am now in a second phase of grief: trying to swallow the bitter pill of not realizing the dream/hope of partnership. It is hard to put words the grief, the sadness of not realizing life partnership. The line in your essay about not having a partner and kids who eagerly await your return, returning instead to a beautiful but empty home, really captures the heartache and the loss: coming home to no one; not being someone else's "top person;" not mattering ultimately to someone; not having someone to share life with, to root with; to watch over you. These are of course the things I project on to a life partner and children. I say "project" because, as a Filipino, I actually have a large family that tenaciously clings to each other. On the surface, we matter to each other, ultimately. Growing up, my Caucasian friends often said they were jealous of how "warm" my big Filipino family felt. They were projecting something as well. The reality is that Filipino family come with a cost, and in my case, the cost was and continues to be the repudiation of the core of me, the "real me," so to speak. National culture, i.e. being "Filipino" or being "American" is not really organic. It is a culture re-organized around the trauma of occupation and colonization. It is a culture of survival, of freezing and fawning and bullying, of trying to stay safe by aligning with those who control, who own, who make the rules. The word "Filipino" is short for the Spanish ruler, King Philip. Our national identity speaks to four centuries of Spanish colonial rule, as does our marriages, the way we parent, family and love itself. Patriarchy is of course at the heart of all of it, and women especially pay a high price to have that partner and children to come home to. My mother just celebrated her 60th anniversary. She aways says she came out ahead. "You know, I have my children," she always says." But I know she is deeply lonely in her marriage and with the exception of children, she lost most of herself. Men also pay a price for following patriarchal scripts, for aligning with power and status. They bruise and over time lose the core of themselves. In exchange for power, we repudiate those parts that enable us to connect, to feel, to love. The ancients called this part of our selves, Psyche, the knower, the one that lets go of Cupid in order to find Eros. And I have come to see my prolonged singles, and by association, childlessness, and by association aloneness as an unconscious preserving of the core of myself, of Psyche, the knower that patriarchy (which both men and women internalize) repudiate in order to preserve power, in order to stay safe. In my late 30s I began therapy for the first time and trusted in therapy's faith: that if I work hard enough on myself, I will find love. I'm a marriage and family therapist now and I agree with Gabor Mata: trauma is real and defining of our modern culture. The festering unprocessed trauma makes both politics and intimacy so hard, if not impossible, despite our best efforts. And for myself, the chase for romantic love and children has been a lifelong bypass to healing the deeper source of my aloneness: the abandonment of my voice; the repudiation of Psyche; the divorce within." .... Thank you So much Sue for helping find a bit of my voice today!
Wow, Don. Thank you for sharing all of this. Although I have Filipino friends, there's a lot I didn't know. I hope you continue to find comfort here at the Can I Do It Alone Substack, and yes, think about starting one of your own. You clearly have a lot to say.
Thank you, Sue. I do find quite a bit of comfort in your essays. And yes, I should start my own. Thanks again for your kickstart.!
Feel free to share my essay or my “comment” with your Filipino friends. Imagine it would start interesting conversation.😌