I’ve done all three, plus living with nonfriends. Living alone versus living with friends feels like a trade-off. Currently I live alone, and it’s nice not to have to coordinate with anyone about cooking, cleaning, etc., or to ever have people around when I’d rather they not be, that sort of thing. When I was living with friends, if I’d been living alone I would have had almost no social interaction, and that would probably have made me unhappy-without-realising-it, but that’s not currently a problem. On the other hand, living with friends means I get to spend more time with them; and sometimes I need a hug or a shoulder to cry on or advice that I don’t want overheard, and that’s much harder to get when I live alone.
Living with nonfriends or family combines the bad parts of both of those. Family is worse for reasons that I can’t express very well and don’t feel like going into. (Not that I have a bad relationship with them; I just don’t have a particularly good one, either.)
Somewhat introverted, living in London, 23 M.
I’ve done all three, plus living with nonfriends. Living alone versus living with friends feels like a trade-off. Currently I live alone, and it’s nice not to have to coordinate with anyone about cooking, cleaning, etc., or to ever have people around when I’d rather they not be, that sort of thing. When I was living with friends, if I’d been living alone I would have had almost no social interaction, and that would probably have made me unhappy-without-realising-it, but that’s not currently a problem. On the other hand, living with friends means I get to spend more time with them; and sometimes I need a hug or a shoulder to cry on or advice that I don’t want overheard, and that’s much harder to get when I live alone.
Living with nonfriends or family combines the bad parts of both of those. Family is worse for reasons that I can’t express very well and don’t feel like going into. (Not that I have a bad relationship with them; I just don’t have a particularly good one, either.)