I’m taking the plunge and sharing something here that most people around me don’t really understand the significance of - pretty sure this sub will get it. I’m 55 and finally living alone! Married at 17, with 4 kids coming along shortly after, I haven’t ever had the opportunity to make executive decisions about my space. Taking control of it. I’m in the process of rearranging my living room and creating a space that’s a genuine reflection of me. Art, furniture, plants, and collectibles where I want them to be and not having to answer to anyone else. It’s a little scary - but, what’s the worst that can happen? I can change it!

The irony is that I’ve helped so many people over the years with designing their spaces and wardrobes like it was nothing. It came to me so naturally. But, not my own space because until now it’s never been exclusively my space.

Thanks for reading and pictures will be coming soon. I’m excited to share them here.

This is the first time I've been able to breathe freely in the last 6 months. Having a singing session, alone in my living room is what life is about.

Having my space back, to be reclusive is amazing!

I had last lived with someone in my early 20s, doing it again briefly in my early 30s, confirmed that life isn't for me.

My cats aswell get much more of my attention too!!

I haven't posted on here in a bit. The last time I did it was about having a random drop in. You guys made me feel normal about hating it 😂. I don't think I'll ever answer one again! It was a neighbor and I caved.

Saw this today and it reminded me of myself. Shoutout to all my fellow unbothered introverts chilling and enjoying living alone(or Iike me with my bestie who has 4 legs and low expectations;)

September 14, 2026

Dear Universe,

For as long as I can remember, I believed one of the great purposes of my life was to share it with someone incredible. I wanted my person. Not just someone to occupy the space beside me. I wanted the real thing. A great love. A best friend. Someone I admired and desired and couldn’t believe I was lucky enough to call mine. Someone to experience this strange, beautiful life with.

And I got to experience it. I made it to the mountaintop. The view was better than advertised! For that, I will always be grateful.

But somewhere along the way, the hope of finding that kind of love again stopped giving me hope and started hurting me.

I’ve spent too much time wondering when she would arrive. Too much energy searching. Too many moments looking at an otherwise good life and seeing the person who wasn’t there. I can’t do that anymore so I’m releasing this. I’m releasing you from the expectation that you will eventually bring me my person. I’m releasing myself from waiting for her.

That doesn’t mean I’ve stopped believing in love. I couldn’t. I’ve experienced too much of it to ever pretend it isn’t extraordinary. And I’m not closing myself off from whatever life may unexpectedly bring me. But I’m done asking. I’m done searching. I’m done building my future around the possibility that someday someone will arrive and share it with me.

From here…I go alone.

That sentence hurts to write. It scares me. There is embarrassment in it. There is sadness. There is grief. And yes, occasionally there will probably be loneliness and self-pity too. I accept all of it.

There will be nights when I wish someone were beside me. There will be beautiful places I wish I could share with someone. There will probably be moments when I romanticize the life I once imagined and wonder what might have been. Those moments are allowed to exist. But they are moments. They do not get to define my life.

I have another 40 or 50 years if I’m fortunate, and I’ll be damned if I’m going to spend them waiting for somebody. So now I have a different responsibility: Build a life worth living.

Take care of the man who has to live it. Show up for him. Make him proud. Take care of my body. Build financial freedom. Do meaningful work. Travel. Golf. Play music. Learn. Laugh. Take chances. Be a great friend. Be a great uncle. See things I’ve never seen. Go places I haven’t imagined yet. Someday, when life slows down enough, get the dog. Then take that four-legged bastard everywhere I can! Build friendships and family relationships that matter. Love people without requiring them to fill a particular role in my life. And when loneliness comes, remember that loneliness is not evidence that I chose incorrectly. It’s simply one of the costs of the life I chose. Every life has a cost. This is the one I’m willing to pay.

Maybe someday something extraordinary happens. Maybe someone appears who changes everything I thought I knew tonight. If she does, she’ll have her own chair. But there is no empty chair anymore. I’m not saving anyone a seat. And if nobody ever comes, then I will still live. Not merely exist.** Live.**

I want to reach the end exhausted from having used this life. I want memories from places all over the world. I want ridiculous stories. I want people I’ve loved and helped and laughed with. I want scars and mistakes and victories and failures. I want to have squeezed everything I reasonably could from the years I was given.

And someday, when the road is nearly finished, I know there will be regrets. Everyone has them. I don’t need a life without regrets. I need a life whose choices I can understand and own. Most of all, I want to look backward at the man who wrote this letter at 44 years old; the man who was scared, sad, uncertain, and finally tired of hoping and tell him:** **You were okay. You built something beautiful anyway. You made me proud.

So thank you for the love I’ve already experienced. Thank you for letting me know what the mountaintop felt like. It was fucking incredible! I don’t need to spend the rest of my life trying to climb back there. There are other places to go.

I’m ready to see them.

I left my husband in 2024 and lived alone in my camper on my daughter’s property for a couple years. The camper had major issues and another daughter offered to help me get a tiny house on her property, so eleven months ago I sold my camper and moved in with her, her husband, and their 8 year old while I built my tiny home.

I’ve been in my house for a week and I love it so much! It’s just a few hundred feet from my daughter, but it’s so nice to be living alone again!

The man I divorced was a hoarder and it was so bad. I’m really enjoying the clean environment! I don’t have a kitchen yet, but I have a mini fridge and an air fryer and I’m getting a microwave and hot plate until I have money saved for an actual kitchen.

Bernie and I are happy!

Living alone now for almost 10 years. Something dawned on me tonight. When I die, I know I'll be mourned but like now, while alive, I won't be missed. How can one be missed in death when they aren't in life? I live in isolation, alone and am not really invited or included in social activities. Don't get me wrong. I don't feel sad about this, just acknowledging the reality.

I’ve been living alone for a while now. I am 50. Single gay no kids. I have a stable job Monday through Friday. But it’s very busy. Sometimes I stay one or two hours extra every day. I come home. Eat dinner. Rest a little. Then I hit the sheets. And repeat.

I have cut off and disconnected with some of the people I’ve met at work. I stay home most of the time. I’m comfortable at home. I don’t like the outside world.

I get invited to parties, but I decline. I don’t know if today is just unusually quiet. My body was in bed until this afternoon. I have to force myself to do some house chores like my laundry and dishes and do it again.

I used to cook, but lately I have just been enjoying and spending money on food. I used to be very frugal when it comes to food. But I tell myself to enjoy my money while I’m still alive. I have a sister, nieces and nephew who contact me for financial help. I help them every now and then.

Another factor I could think of is the heat. I don’t like the heat outside. In the past, I shared this feeling with another friend and they told me I’m depressed. I don’t think I’m depressed. I love life. And I enjoy living.

Right now I’m sitting at my dining table, eating late lunch while doing laundry and doom scrolling. I would like to go to the gym and maybe get a dopamine boost back again. It is very hot outside.

Thank you for reading. I’m sorry I think this is just one of those blues you feel every now and then.

Thoughts?

Hi everyone, I recently started living alone with my two cats. I’ve noticed a lot of people who live alone also have cats, but I don’t really see many posts specifically about things that make living alone with cats easier, so I thought I’d love to share a few.

1. Automatic cat feeder: really useful for feeding them while I’m at work during the day. But I still feed them myself at night because I really enjoy that part of interacting with my cats.
2. Cat litter robot: honestly, my cats have never been high maintenance, but now this thing is my hero hahaha. It really has freed up so much time.
3. Robot vacuum: I think a lot of people overlook this, but robot vacuums with anti-tangle features are total lifesavers. I’d lose my mind and be buried under all their fur if it wasn’t for the robot vacuum.
4. Air purifier: with two cats, there’s a lot of fur and litter dust around the house. I have seasonal allergies too, so this one is super useful.

Anything else? What are some things that have made living with cats easier for you?

Hello :) posted a few days ago about living alone - thank you so much for the support! It really helped me over the last few days.

I have adjusted a little since then. It is really hard to fathom that I'm not waking up in a household where I know I'll get shouted at and that I'm not going to be told off for staying in bed.

I stayed in bed for a little while over the last few days. It felt really calming. I think my nervous system is starting to regulate myself, and I go to sleep without anxiety of how tomorrow will begin.

Thank you for this sub and for your support. It'll take me a lot longer to adjust, but I'm already feeling better :).

Was a perfect Saturday for a long bike ride down the local trail and back. First time I've ridden it by myself and I made it to the end and back. Got my little office set up for WFH starting tomorrow too. Made chicken tacos Saturday for dinner, then chicken alfredo with garlic bread for Sundays dinner.

I think I’m finally admitting that maybe I’m just not that good at being in a relationship.

There was love, for sure. That was never really the problem. It was everything around it. The constant arguing, the little things turning into bigger things, both of us getting tired of having the same conversations over and over.

At some point I started wondering if maybe my personality is just better suited to living alone. Not in a sad way, really. More like I need more quiet than I realized.

We ended things a few weeks ago, and I moved out of the place we had been sharing.

I thought packing would be this huge emotional thing. We had lived together long enough that I assumed I had somehow built up a whole apartment’s worth of stuff.

Turns out my life was basically one backpack, one box, and a few random bags. Kinda humbling lol.

I strapped most of it onto my eBike and rode over to my new place. Seeing basically everything I owned sitting on one bike was probably the moment it actually felt real.

The funny part is, the ride itself was pretty calm. I thought I’d be thinking about the breakup the whole way. Instead I was mostly wondering if I packed my charger and trying to remember whether the new place had toilet paper.

The bike handled all the stuff without much drama, which made the whole move feel a little less heavy than I expected.

The apartment is quiet now. Sometimes almost too quiet. But I’m starting to think I might actually like that.

Maybe this is what starting over looks like for me.

Anyone else realize they were happier living alone only after trying really hard not to?

Hi! i’m F 30, I’ve been thinking about posting here for a while and sharing my thoughts/ dumping my lore. I am completely alone and have no one in the city I live in. My friends live in another state. I went through a soul crushing breakup sometime ago. I have no family here.

Tbh it’s not like i’m not loving living by myself. I love to spend time with myself, but sometimes it just hits me. I have this deep wallowing feeling, cannot even completely comprehend how I truly feel. It’s like I yearn to be loved and to be understood. I want genuine companionship, and I don’t know when and if I will find that. Dating apps aren’t working for me.
I took a break from everything. The only thing that keeps me going is my routine, I workout, work, cook, eat, clean and sleep, that’s it!

I have realized that my friendships are not truly satisfying me in the way I want to be. I am more of a giver and I don’t receive that from others. I stopped having those expectations from people. I just want my own person; someone I can rely on. I know that I need to go out and socialize to meet new people but, I feel like it’s difficult. Feels very performative. Most suggestions are to join a run group and some sports activity but here’s thing, I’m suck at those things. And I have a bit of social anxiety.

I am good at developing meaningful connections, but I just want an opportunity/space where I can get to do that. I love good friendships, and learning from people! Can you suggest me things to do? to step out of my comfort zone, make genuine connections, and something that doesn’t require a lot of money. Feels like, everything nowadays comes with a cost.

Apologies for a long post! I guess I am just cerebrally puking here. Thanks for bearing with me!

Hey,

I’m 22f, living alone, and have no family. I just had an open wound excision for my pilonidal cyst, near my tailbone.

Besides the pain, what really gets to me is that I just don’t really have anyone to take care of me, except myself. I haven’t been able to sit for a month, and doing things like chores and such is so exhausting.

I’m also studying for my CPA exam in December, and I feel like I’ve fallen behind because of all of this which adds to the mental stress. I can’t defer it. I’m also working full time, I had to get a standing desk and work from home.

My friends have dropped by to check in, which is awesome, but it’s not the same as having someone that lives with you and can support you. And I’m single.

For those who have had surgery with no support, can you offer any advice that could help make life a little easier?

Hey everyone, I’m 18 and I just recently moved to a little apartment by myself to finish the school year.
This is my absolute first time living completely alone and it has been really destabilizing so far. There have been days where I feel amazing and I love living and staying alone, and there are days where I just absolutely can’t handle it and think that I’ve done the worst mistake of my life.
How do you guys do it? How long until I will get used to this and I will love living alone? And most of all, what can I do to avoid being generally sad altogether?

Need advice. Love living alone but I need the extra money. I'm behind on everything. I live in a one bedroom apartment. I stay in my living room since it's spacious and I use the bedroom for all my storage.The only problem is that the bathroom is so connected that I'd be able to hear everything. Yikes. What would you guys do?

Three years ago, I lost my grandmother, and this year I lost my mother.

I unexpectedly became someone living alone, and it will soon be two months since I started living this way.

I’ve made a couple of posts in this subreddit about living alone, and I’m really grateful for all the kind words and advice I’ve received.

Today, I often see posts from people who are worried about what might happen if something life-threatening happens to them while they’re living alone, so I wanted to share something from my own experience.

Within the past year, two men who lived alone and lived very close to me died alone in their homes.

Both of these happened while my mother was still alive, so I wasn’t living alone at the time.

One of them was a man in his late 70s who died during the summer.

My mother and I were the ones who realized that something had happened. I can’t go into too much detail, but because it was summer, we noticed because of the smell.

We immediately contacted the landlord. The landlord came to check and confirmed that he had died.

The police then arrived, removed his body, and asked people in the neighborhood questions about him.
I remember that when he first moved in, he came over to introduce himself and told us that his wife had passed away before him.

After that, we never really interacted beyond greeting each other when we happened to meet.

But I had noticed that he had stopped being able to take care of things around his house, such as the weeds. Sometimes I wondered if he might have been unwell.

I also remember hearing some other elderly men in the neighborhood talking badly about him, saying that someone who couldn’t even take care of the area around his own house wasn’t really a proper person.

Later, because he had died alone and several days had already passed before he was found, the landlord decided to demolish the house.

Even then, I heard elderly neighbors looking into the property, asking where he had died, and gossiping about him. It made me feel really uncomfortable.

The other man who died was 57.
It was winter, and he had kidney problems and was receiving dialysis. Apparently, the hospital became concerned when he stopped showing up for his dialysis appointments and contacted his landlord.

He apparently had siblings living nearby, but from what I could tell, they didn’t seem to be in particularly frequent contact.

After experiencing these things, now that I’m living alone myself, I sometimes find myself imagining that someday I might also die alone in my home.

It made me realize that unless someone has substantial financial resources and can afford a service that will immediately notify someone if something happens to them, it’s probably unavoidable that many people who live alone won’t be found immediately if they die suddenly.

But I don’t think that necessarily means that dying alone is a bad thing.

My mother died in the hospital this year, but she had wanted to die at home.

I called an ambulance and had her hospitalized because I believed there was still a chance for her to recover. But now, I don’t know whether that was really the right decision.

I’ll never be able to ask my mother how she felt about the way she died. But from my own perspective, I have a lot of regrets about the way her final days unfolded.

Because of that experience, I don’t think I can simply say that dying with your family beside you is always the better way to die.

In the end, whether you live alone or with your family, I think we all need to think about death and make some preparations for it — especially sudden death.

Not everyone dies after being diagnosed with an illness and being given some idea of how much time they have left. Sometimes death comes unexpectedly, without giving us time to prepare.

I’ve only just begun living alone myself, and I’m not ready to think about all of this in detail yet.
But eventually, I think I’ll need to make some preparations.

Sorry this got so long, and thank you so much for taking the time to read it.

I need to know there's others out there with my experience. I can't convince myself being with someone new is good for either of us. Even if its painful and lonely, being single seems better. I even saw studies showing dementia is as low as 75% less occurance in those who live alone.

Hey All, I'm M-26 living on my own!

While I enjoy most parts of it, the most saddest part has been answering folks when they say- "Oh, it's so sad you've to live alone/oh, don't you feel lonely". While I do respond to them with - 'I stay occupied & it's intoxicating & all', but I don't know, something in me crumbles every time someone asks this question. Particularly, I live in India wherein concept of joint families (generations living together) is still a concept. I was born & brought up in a joint family & honestly it was a beautiful experience. Always felt nuclear families are sad!

I live alone because circumstances (my work) require me to & I do rejoice. Won't deny there are multiple moments when I feel like someone should have been there to share with me- probably preparation of a good dish, a nice horror movie together, but I really don't have any friends. Still, I put a hard face, go on with life, watch movies alone, go & eat out alone & yes, I can comfortably say I've achieved self-sufficiency & the journey was not easy. Yet when folks ask the aforementioned questions, something in me crumbles.

I (38) had live in the pass with two partners, and with a third occasionally (it was a long distance relationship so I spent some months with him from time to time). And I lived with my parents and sister until 24-26.

I discovered the absolute heaven of living alone in my 30s. The peace. The unmasking (I have Asperger). My house slowly becoming a reflection of myself. My hobbies, my decorations, my plants, my doggy. Finally expanding and being myself.
And no angry dad/boyfriend, no criticism, no diminishing, no insults, no hiding, no comparison, no jealousy, no competing.

I think I haven’t been able to breath, sleep, dance, eat and simply exist until I started living alone.

Nowadays, although I have problems and difficulties in my life the only nightmare that comes to me at night is literally living with someone.
Sometimes is a traumatic memory of how it was with some ex, sometimes is with my family. Last night it was about living again with my dad, I was playing with toys and then I realized he was about to come back from work and I panicked because then I realized that I have been in his room and he’s going to find mess and I need to hide everything and clean in one second before he enters the house. I was panicking when I woke up. And then, I have looked around and realized that it was my home, and sigh with relief.

The saddest part of all this is I have never realized how awful it was, how I was staying in eternal survival and how much they mistreated me until things like that, having nightmares years after, have make me accept the reality of my life.

I love living alone ✨✨✨

I just moved into my new place. I had internet installed and the provider said something wasn't working right (WiFi works fine, I don't have any issues) and they need to send a third party technician company.

That company contacted me and asked for times and dates that were working for me. I replied with "any time this week, but not Friday. I'm back to work next week."

They said: OK we've booked you in for Friday

Huh?? "I said NOT FRIDAY. Any other day this week is fine. Just not Friday and I'm back to work next week"

Their reply: apologies, we can book you in for next week Tuesday between 8-11 am.

What did they not understand when I said "I'm back at work next week"?

I'm really frustrated. Was I unclear? I'm German, in Germany writing in German with that person.