“It’s too late…”
NO NO NO NO NO. Stop it. It is absolutely not “too late”. You have this completely backwards. You can go and have those experiences you’ve been missing out on RIGHT NOW. I mean it. If you’ve been wallowing at the low end of life for 20 - 40 years, then you have a whole world of happy and exciting new shit you can go do.
Put down your phone, get a physical sheet of paper and a marker, and start writing a list of all the things you WANT to do. Doesn’t matter how easy or impossible any of them seem. “First kiss”, “eat an alligator”, “go to a party”, “fly an airplane”, go camping with a friend”, “win a dance competition”, whatever. Write them ALL down.
Then pin that list (hopefully more than one sheet of paper) to the wall where you will see it constantly. Not on your phone in a notes app, on the wall in your face every damn day. Then hone in on whatever one is easiest and speaks to you the most, and spend as much time and energy as you possibly can making it happen, starting from whatever the smallest possible first step is.
Getting started is always the hardest thing, so don’t try to go it alone. Ask people on Reddit, ask ChatGPT, google it. People will not only be happy to give you advice, but sometimes they will even be able to physically help you.
I was basically in family cult as a child, and never went to school or did anything outside my home till I was 18. I used to lament that everyone else had a “real” life while I was destined to be bored and alone forever. But all it really took was leaving my house and doing stuff around other people to change all that. Someone will inevitably talk to you, join you in your interests, and introduce you to other people and their interests.
I know it’s terrifying, I have avpd so bad that I’m on disability for it, but that doesn’t mean I have to let it control my entire life. I started vtubing in 2021 and in just one year I went from not having had friends for a literal decade to having 5 or so close friends and dozens more people I can connect with whenever I liked.
You have no friends? Fuck that, yes you do. Come by my twitch streams and talk about stuff you like. You’re MY friend now. Other people in my chat will talk to you. You’re their friend now too.
If that seems superficial, that’s because it is, but it’s at least a first small step. You can’t achieve a goal by starting at the end. If your goal is “go out on a date”, then your first goal is actually “go somewhere that people are and do a thing they’re also doing”, then “talk to those people about that thing”, then “learn about those people and what they like to do that isn’t that thing”, etc etc.
I’m fuckin 43 and my wife of 20 years just left me and I almost don’t know how to function without her, but no way in hell I’m gonna tell myself it’s “too late” now, or that I can’t heal and learn to love and trust again.
I’m going to start over, find love, and go have all the experiences I missed out on, or at the very least I’m going to try. You should go do the same.