I felt exactly that for some time, I remember, although maybe not as strong. The worst was at parties with many people and many small groups talking together. I could come and say hello when I arrived, say nothing for the whole night and then say goodbye when I left. I just felt I had nothing to say. When I talked to some friends about this, in a much more private setting, most of the time people would tell me "but just say whatever you want, be natural". And that was exactly what I could not do. Being natural for me at the time was to just say silent. It was really annoying to not be able to communicate that. For regular people they had to do nothing special to be in a conversation naturally, and they thought it should be the same for me, but it wasn't. So even trying to explain that to people created some distance, because it felt like they thought I was just stupid for not understanding how life works, or they would think I am so different from them. The truth is that this distance was not so big, they didn't care this much, but it was really annoying at the time. I don't know if it is the same for you, but at the time I worried that people would give up on the relationship if I didn't react enough or if I was too "weird". People who never had that happen to them don't even know how things work, you only need to know how a car works when it's broken, otherwise you just use it blindly. When I was trying to have a conversation at those parties, it felt like that natural conversation sphere would not create itself, I was not interacting with the other person, absolutely nothing was coming to my mind except inner thoughts that nobody would ever share publicly, like "how am I going to solve this problem", "I feel so lonely, is this going to get worse?", "I want to kill myself", "those people speak so naturally and they don't even see my distress", "nobody is ever going to love me if I can't communicate, I am so far from this now, I am not even a person anymore". This is what was going through my mind. So when people told me "just say anything that is on your mind", should I say these things? Of course not. Not everything that comes naturally on your mind can fit a conversation with most people. There needs to be some kind of exchange, but if it always happens naturally to people, they never learn what to do when it doesn't happen naturally. Most people probably don't even know that this natural thing can actually be dysfunctional.
What I did back then was to just try to accept that I won't say anything this time. I practiced trying to be comfortable with my own silence, and just watching people around me. I tried to be happy for them, I tried to enjoy their jokes. I tried to get comfortable leaving when I needed to and not feel guilty or imagine that people are not going to like me anymore if I don't spend enough time with them, or comfortable leaving to take a break before coming back, or comfortable not . Not because I thought this would help me, but because it was almost the only thing I could work on at the time. I tried also to force myself to speak with people, and I had quite uncomfortable experiences (without good nor bad consequences thought), but I am glad I had the courage to try that too. But I don't know about the right thing to do for other people. For sure, now I would say that worrying about what others would think about how I was was probably making it worse, but I am not sure I had a choice. I think I could only make baby steps to try to feel more comfortable. Thinking that "I don't talk, ok, it's my style for now, if anyone doesn't like it whatever". In fact I was more sociable in very small settings, but I was still uncomfortable all the time.
I don't know what did the trick, but I feel much much more comfortable now and I hope the same will happen to you soon. I definitely still have a lack of contact with most people but I have almost no problem engaging in conversation again even in large groups (except when it's too noisy or when people talk over each other, but that's a different thing). I am also more comfortable with spacing out and not being with others, just staying with my own obsessive thoughts for a time, because it's my right, or looking at my phone and not pay attention to anything else.
What I did back then was to just try to accept that I won't say anything this time. I practiced trying to be comfortable with my own silence, and just watching people around me. I tried to be happy for them, I tried to enjoy their jokes. I tried to get comfortable leaving when I needed to and not feel guilty or imagine that people are not going to like me anymore if I don't spend enough time with them, or comfortable leaving to take a break before coming back, or comfortable not . Not because I thought this would help me, but because it was almost the only thing I could work on at the time. I tried also to force myself to speak with people, and I had quite uncomfortable experiences (without good nor bad consequences thought), but I am glad I had the courage to try that too. But I don't know about the right thing to do for other people. For sure, now I would say that worrying about what others would think about how I was was probably making it worse, but I am not sure I had a choice. I think I could only make baby steps to try to feel more comfortable. Thinking that "I don't talk, ok, it's my style for now, if anyone doesn't like it whatever". In fact I was more sociable in very small settings, but I was still uncomfortable all the time.
I don't know what did the trick, but I feel much much more comfortable now and I hope the same will happen to you soon. I definitely still have a lack of contact with most people but I have almost no problem engaging in conversation again even in large groups (except when it's too noisy or when people talk over each other, but that's a different thing). I am also more comfortable with spacing out and not being with others, just staying with my own obsessive thoughts for a time, because it's my right, or looking at my phone and not pay attention to anything else.
