Having no friends for 8+ years has damaged me.

I had friends until the end of high school and then experienced the onset of severe mental illness that made me subconsciously push away my loved ones. At the time I didn't know what was happening to me and could barely express how I felt, so I mostly said nothing. I wish I had handled it differently but I was too young and stupid, and in the end my friends got the wrong idea from my complete lack of explanation for my distant behavior and reconnecting with them became impossible. I simply did not have the social skillset to save that friendship.

Eight years later I reconnected with one friend who then became my husband. Aside from him I have no friends, just acquaintances and housemates. Which I value, don't get me wrong, but I've never had a healthy platonic friendship with someone I can talk to about anything.

It's been so long without friendship that I don't remember how to interact with people in that way anymore. I've had opportunities in recent years with new people our age and I am either so uncomfortable that I barely speak until I get the dreaded "..are you okay?" or I get too anxious and uncontrollably word-vomit at them until they find me weird. Seems like there's no in between. And all the while I struggle to enjoy social interaction.

At home I find myself having an internal conflict. A part of me is desperately lonely and wants a 'best friend' type in my life. The other part of me recognizes that finding that friend will involve speaking to hundreds of strangers, which sounds daunting and is something I've never enjoyed doing. I have never been good in conversation. I don't even know how I got those first friends to begin with, they kind of just materialized around me at that age. Whereas making friends as an adult seems almost impossible.

Another part of me also wonders if I actually want a best friend or if societal pressures and the understanding that humans are inherently social creatures just made me THINK I need a best friend lest I be abnormal or something. I honestly don't know the answer.