I can relate to you. Choosing to be alone when there were many opportunities to date, drove me batty. Marriage can be terribly lonely, too. Becoming friends with people who have a large capacity to accept and care for me just as I am, relieves my loneliness significantly. I have not experienced much of that kind of interaction with others except on rare occasions. In the meantime, as much as I dread lonely times, I am becoming better friends with me, largely through others who share and appreciate my frailties.

Having spent the bulk of my life hating my guts (unbeknownst to me most of the time, in order to force myself to become what others expected of me and which I failed to do) I am on the verge of loving me, which gives me more love and kindness for others, which is just what I've always wanted, which makes me more appealing.