Seeking advice on breaking isolation

I’m sorry to hear that, depression is a bitch.

Find an activity you love. Sports, reading, knitting, praying, playing, campaigning, helping, … and find a local association/group/party/church which does what you like. You then will meet people who have at least one common interest with you; reconstruct your social web from there. It’s hard, and even harder on the beginning, but after a little trial and error, it works well.

My best advice is to find an activity you enjoy or think you might enjoy, one that at least puts you in company of others if not requires actual collaboration. E.g. a sport, some sort of class, a club for a hobby you already have… Just something that will get you in public and in regular contact with some people.

For me my rescue was volunteering, I went for Norwegian peoples aid (a la Red Cross) where I took a first aid course and “simply” started taking shifts at anything from sports events to concerts. After a while I got familiar with a few people, branched out and got my SAR (Search and Rescue)-certification and started responding to lost person callouts. In the time after I have also decided I liked it so much that I also took a certificate in River rescue and squad leadership. Unfortunately I had to stop due to cancer.

Except that I spend a lot of time home labbing, learning about self hosting through Proxmox (audiobookshelf, Plex, IPTV, qbittorent, Authelia, Nginx etc), smart home (Home Assistant), networking (OpenWRT). In addition playing games that take a long time with the right mods(i.e. Civ 6, Cities Skylines etc.)

Good luck!

Do you have any hobbies? You could join a club and that mutual interest is a good way to make new friends.

Like others have said, it sounds like you need to get out there and do stuff with other people.

If you want to look for these things online, I’d recommend looking at your kommun’s website. They generally have a collection of clubs and events. You’ll typically find the category for it somewhere on the frontpage, under a title like “Se och göra”, “Kultur och fritid”, “Evenemang”, or “Uppleva och göra.”

In the five different kommuner I’ve lived, every single one has had a detailed website with events. Highly recommend browsing it in general to get a good feel for things.

I’d personally recommend Folkhögskolor. If there is one locally I’d definitely recommend checking up on them. I did some gymnasium completion at a Folkhögskola, and in addition to allmäna kurser (gymnasie), they also have särskilda kurser. My local one has leatherworking, music, and mending, among others. Folkhögskolor also tend to be cultural hotspots; we had a recurring “culture cafe” at ours, with stand up, concerts, theatre, and various other things going on.

Generally a course at a folkhögskola is just for materials.

If you’re a more outdoorsy/sporty person, check the local sporthall or friluftsområden. I’ve an exercise trail nearby I bring my dog by every day, and there’s a bulletin board with various outdoor activities and events. My local arena has various classes, and they often have free trials. I did kung-fu for a while, and that was great fun.

I’m an atheist with very bad PTSD from spending 6 months in ICU and having a near death experience while getting a double lung transplant. I dont necessarily struggle with depression the way you do but my PTSD tells me to isolate and I fell in deep. I ended up joining a universalist Unitarian church, again, I’m an atheist but UU isn’t about religion, its about community and service and everyone there is default nice and practices “radical hospitality” - it’s not necessarily a place to ask people out but just a way to dip your toes back into life safely, I think jumping to asking people out is probably part of the issue for you, that’s HUGE and small social steps are what’s needed.

Joining a positive real life community has done wonders for my isolation and UU churches are global, it’s historical covenant is “Love is the spirit of this church, and service is its law. This is our great covenant: to dwell together in peace, to seek the truth in freedom, and to help one another.” might be worth looking into

Might seem generic, so feel free to reject or criticize my opinion.

You do something. Carpentry, pottery, gardening, birdwatching, jogging in the park, fishing, fix electronics etc and so on. If it’s something you like or think you could do it, start doing it.

And then you ask questions when you’re stumped, you help others when they’re stuck and you trade barbs about it with one another. The point is that you don’t go out seeking connections, but you go out because what you do finds connections for you.

So find something you like doing. I can assure you there are others who like doing that as well. You’ll have something in common. And that’s the start of your connections.

I’m in a similar situation. In November 2024, my wife left me. (We were together for twelve years), and with her, all of my local found family were stripped away. I’ve since tried to get involved in activism against the current regime (in the United States), but most fronts want me to be able to organize and host events and insist I should bring my friends. Well, I don’t have any friends.

(Off topic, I’m getting the sneaking suspicion political organization is essentially salesmanship, but for social causes or candidates for public office rather than products.)

I’m spectrum AF and suffer from major depression and tend to want to not engage someone if I suspect they’re busy or disinterested. I’m also super awkward in activity groups unless I understand the protocol already and know what I’m doing.

As such, I’m isolated in Midtown, Sacramento and am unbearably lonely much of the time. I’ve resorted to virtual support groups (via Zoom) but those are not the same.

Making friends is hard!

I know what it’s like to feel completely alone. It’s hell. I don’t have much to offer in the ways of advice but If you just feel like talking about it I’m here if you want.

Do you have days where your mental health is better than the norm? What do you do on those days, and is it possible that you could integrate a social element into it? Even something as simple as reading can be a social thing if you were to join a book club or something fairly laid back like that.

In your shoes, where I’d start, is looking up your neighborhood group on NextDoor or Facebook or something like that (not sure what the facsimile would be in Sweden, but I’m guessing there’s something like that online where your neighbors gather to share information.) and just asking your neighbors if there are any groups, or events, or clubs and finding out what’s in the area. Another option is your local library, which probably has a number of activities and clubs.

Another exercise you can try is just taking a regular walk around your neighborhood, two, three, or four times a day, and challenge yourself to speak to someone you don’t know every time. It can be as simple as a greeting or asking for the time, or you can tell them they have a cool hat or outfit, or just a brief exchange about the weather, but those little tiny gestures can help you to open back up and develop a better comfort level with personal interactions. And that can help you become more comfortable being social again.