u/AdditionalFlan4999

7 year shut in finally taking my life seriously and wanting to change. going to college next year at the ripe old age of 25! i currently have no friends, never dated, basically no social life. I also didn't really have friends in grade school, middle school or high school so I'm undersocialized. live in a third world country where no one knows about neurodivergence or mental health so I never got diagnosed, but i think i have something. Hoping to get a scholarship abroad but i know it's difficult. want to finally make friends and build community but i feel like it's too late. can i change things now? most people don't wanna make friends at the age i am and don't wanna befriend the weird neurodivergent older classmate in college. will moving to a new country be the reset i need or am i cooked beyond comprehension and should just give up? (I'm also a woman and i feel like that somehow makes things worse for me)

I'm so scared to start dating and I don't even know where to begin. At this rate, I'm genuinely going to die alone and I kind of always had a feeling but I hever imagined it would be a reality. I'm in my mid 20s now and I'm scared of my looks declining and men not being interested anymore (they aren't even now) and never finding love. I just saw that post about dating being less magical and 100s upon 100s of comments agreeing. I fear I've missed my window already. I'm already reaching that stage where people are getting jaded and I may never get to experience that innocent pure love. I'm genuinely starting to get desperate. Should I just ask someone out or just put myself out there to the MAX? How do I start dating and what do I do?

I'm in my mid 20s now and i feel too old to be a virgin. Most women I've seen lost it in their late teens/early 20s. All the women I know irl have lost it too. It's a very weird and isolating space to be in. Are there any other women 23+ here that haven't been in any romantic or sexual relationship? Sometimes I feel like it's only me and I feel so isolated

I hate the misconception that women who are virgins are still wanted by men. That's just something manosphere losers tell each other. The truth is, past a certain age, virginity isn't desirable at all. I've seen so many discussions online of men talking about how they don't want virgins. It may be ok in your late teens and early 20s, but it starts getting weird in your mid 20s.

The only men that want virgin women are those that fetishize it or they're religious men who want to take advantage of a less experienced women. I've seen so many people say they don't want to teach anyone. I'm getting into the age where it's starting to be weird and I'm so scared. I feel like I have to do something soon just so that I can get it out of the way. There's so much pressure on women to not be slutty but also not too prudish.

There's so many conflicting messages on what women should do with their bodies. Even other women pity or infantilize older female virgins. Even in media, most older virgins are men and rarely do you see representation for older virgin women. Only recently have men started to receive mockery for being unable to find partners. Throughout history, you can find examples of women mocked for being spinsters or not having kids and the countless cat lady jokes. Yet even here, we're always erased from the conversation.

There's probably many more adult virgin women than we think but they never talk about because, surprise surprise, it's just as stigmatised for us as it is for men. And if you're unattractive, you receive double the mockery. People just assume that no one wants or will ever want you. Also the pressure of giving birth and raising kids is much higher for women. The point I'm trying to make is, after a certain age, most people expect you to have experience and you're looked at as weird if you don't. That applies to both men and women.