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Over the weekend I was playing modded Minecraft with some friends. I've been apart of this friend group for about 2 months now, while the others have known each other for multiple years. There is one person who I've known for about 3-4 years now, although we only interacted through Twitter and TikTok.
I've been playing on this server for about a month now (not consistently, I've been really busy with school work), and I have iron armor. This mod pack has a bunch of magic elements and stuff like that, and everyone in the server has that stuff but me. Its whatever. At least I'm having fun. Multiple times I've asked people for a guide, and I've never gotten anything except just "kill this enemy which only spawns when I don't want it to."
On this weekend a new friend decides to start playing on the server for the first time. So we welcome them. But the annoying thing is that after about an hour, I hear that they're going somewhere looking for diamonds. I don't know where they're going, so I ask them. And they just say that its a secret. Obviously, I'm a little sad. I've been on this server for 3 weeks, and they're letting someone who's been on it for 2 hours do something. Finally, I say "Look, I'm always in the background here, and I want to actually start doing things. I feel the whole time I'm here I just die and work on my house while everyone else is fighting demons and whatnot."
So, finally I'm able to go down to this new area and get diamonds. After that, I hear one of the members tell the new member that they need to construct an item that will help a lot. This was insane to me, because I never knew you needed to make this item. So I say "I didn't know that, nobody told me this" and I start talking about how multiple times I've asked if there's a guide, and finally I'm sent a link to one.
Now, I don't want to say that I've been entirely alone on the server. One member did give me a rare item (which although I would rather of gotten it myself, I'm still happy), and I kept getting stuck at world spawn, so another member used portal spells to help me escape spawn (why does running use so much hunger now). But for the most part, I've still felt alone.
More of the Same
For the example I gave, this could be attributed to being a new member of a friend group. These people have all known each other for years, have interests and memories with each other, while I don't even know what I enjoy doing for fun. But this isn't a new thing, I've felt like this for every friend group I've been apart of, real and online. And this extends to more than just video games.
This is how I see most friend groups I've been apart of:
The red node is myself, and the yellow node is the friend who introduced me to the friend group. Usually there will be one or two other people in the group who maybe like you, but not much. And there is everyone else in the group who talks to each other and does activities with each other. Maybe they're playing games with each other, or sending Tweets that remind them of each other. They still talk to you if you're conversating, but never outside of that.
These people aren't intentionally trying to ignore you, in fact they aren't really ignoring you at all. They just don't know anything about you, and as a result, they just don't have anything to say to you when you're not talking. You may do things with this friend group, but you're rarely invited, instead you're asking to join something already happening. Its either that or you were invited by the one friend you knew before.
Overtime this starts to get exhausting and you start feeling isolated from everyone. Now, normally you would just keep on doing things and get to know everyone better. But as someone who's apart of the autism spectrum, this is really hard for me. I don't even know what I like doing. So I start feeling less and less confident about my abilities to properly integrate myself with the friend group. And don't even get me started about when people start talking about more personal things, how alienating it feels having nowhere to talk, and being ignored when you do chime in during these conversations.
i wish i was alone
I can't lie, these moments of feeling isolated start taking tolls on you. During these moments I start wishing that I never tried making friends and that I remained in isolation. If I need to talk to someone I can talk over social media posts, I don't need a chat. Maybe I can have one person that I keep going back to, but never a friend group. I might feel bad now, but I would feel worse with a group.
But at the same time, I want to talk to people. I want to have friends, I want to be able to do things. I love all my friends, why should I abandon them?
In the end, I feel replaceable. If I was gone, anybody could take my place. The only person who would notice is the person who introduced me to the friend group. The best way to describe it is being the fifth person in the Fortnite Lobby. Yes, you're there, but there are already 4 people playing Battle Royale.
I just hope that one day, someone has something to show me. I hope one day I can finally feel included in something. But for the time being, I'm stuck here.