The only women I attract are in relationships

Well, I am a loner and in engineering school and in my early 30's. I admittedly don't have much time for socializing which is making my loneliness worse these last few years. Anyway, Over these last few years, making friends has been kind of troublesome.

I'll start with the guys I've befriended. The few "friends" I've made male wise have turned out to be really neurotic and frankly abusive. For example, I would get calls at 3am from some guy in a class I've known for only 3 weeks and the typical scenario would be something along the lines of asking, "what do you think about X?" Problem is, it really was a set up to down my idea and run on for 30 minutes about ridiculousness... at 3am.
I would end up having to confront, avoid, and cut people off completely until they found someone else. The irony is, a lot of times my ideas weren't wrong very often. Even if they were, I kind of didn't care that much. I do when I am being attacked for them though.

So that's a bunch of negative and I hate that it happens, especially during a semester. School is stressful enough without some nut trying to walk all over me emotionally for an A. I kind of don't fit into engineering anyway, we just don't have the same interests so I just don't really "fit" period. A lot of the time, people just never seem to ever be available or are too young.

Thats the guys. Now the girls.
Well, I kind of divide the engineering girls into 2 groups that I generalize. Even then, I don't really talk to the super young girls (19-23 from experience) unless I have to. We have nothing in common and they are in their phones constantly. In a school setting, I haven't had good experiences.

Group 1 are so competitive that it can be really uncomfortable trying to find out anything about them. The conversations can be really awkward for me because I am asking them about themselves, and they are kind of not avoiding, but just no wired to really connect like that. For them as a generalization, answers to those questions seem utilitarian and intrusive.
So basically, I stop trying. The conversation will literally be on 2 separate planes.
Group 2 are super awkward, but for lack of a better word, stubborn. Working in a group with them can be really hard because if they are wrong or aren't getting something, they shut down. Talking to a person in that state gets nowhere and if they are behind so to speak, they are not interested in chit chat. I get that part I guess. We do have things to do.

The guys and the girls for the most part are cordial, but no friendships ever develop.

My big question is about the women I do meet.

There has been 4 so far, and they have all turned out to be attached to someone already. I don't always know this going into it.
Sometimes I do, but a relationship or anything more was not my intent. When they figure out I won't go there, they say they understand, but never do. I think we are working on group work, or just hanging out. Underhanded remarks ensue and I just get to the point where I have to cut them off too.

For example, one just today said to me "I received an email from an old contact I made through OKCupid. I agreed to go out with him (she's with someone) but later cancelled. It concerns me (her, not me) because like this person who contacted me, I really feel attracted to you and your honesty and am afraid my feelings could get complicated." I say, "well, your with someone and if something is lacking should really think about that. What's going on with all that? I like you, but we are friends. You have a boyfriend." She says, "Your right, you're one of my 'strays' and it would never work anyway. I don't need to take care of anyone."

I'm not sure when I've ever needed to be "taken care of." I go to school full time, I pay my bills. It seemed random, and the stray thing, I don't really get either.
Sure I'm a loner, and that's exacerbated by the program I'm in and my personality, but I don't think that's what she meant.

We talked about her unhappiness for like 15 minutes. Her relationship is unexciting basically. I had to leave for a class.
A few hours ago I get an email thanking me for for the talk, and how she is settling for her boyfriend/fiancé, but she is just going to stay with him. She thinks that she should be able to prove to herself that she can have a platonic friendship and in the end she writes, "Thank you again for your insight. It really did help me, if not in the way you may have expected it to."

I'm not sure how I feel about this exchange frankly.

Now I hate this aspect of myself where I attract these negative people into my life. My therapist says I do it subconsciously and by habit. To go with that, some people are just predators.
I hate being a victim and don't want to be. I hold back, and people say "man, it can be hard to get to know you." I open up and it's like I go too venerable or something and get it used against me.

If things do go bad, I do what I think is the right thing and walk away, but in the end, I end up alone.
I have a few old and close friends and I'm cool with that. They are great friends. However we are scattered across the country at this point.

I could ask something like, "why does saying hello to 'normal' women always feel like I am intruding and forced?" However, what is "normal" supposed to be? So that's a weird question.
I'm surprisingly fine just saying "hi" most days, or maybe ask "do you know about this or that," or "how's your day going," but a lot of the time I get this look like "why are you talking to me, or ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh?"
Same with the guys too. "Why are you casually talking to me?" If it's really weird, I just say "hey, just making conversation. That's all" and do something else.

I am an introvert. I am not a motor mouth. I just try to be friendly. Why do I attract unavailable women and not available?

Sorry I didn't read it all but... It sounds like maybe those girls are just using you to talk and vent about their lives? You might be "friends" but if you don't share much about yourself they will go ahead and talk about themselves.

To be honest I think it's more difficult to make friends with the opposite sex. People are so self absorbed and busy these days, interaction with the opposite sex is either attraction and being hit on, or using someone for venting. If you can find someone to have an honest friendship with, that's great, but you will need some common ground like hobbies or befriending coworkers.

If you say these "predators" always use something against you, maybe you're only talking to really loud outgoing girls. A nice girl is going to know better than to be rude and say something offensive.

"what is "normal" supposed to be? So that's a weird question"

A weird question? Then I guess I'm weird for thinking this as well.

These are both good points and I appreciate the perspective.

I just have difficulty finding friends I guess. Looking around on here, it seems like I am not alone.

My school program is constantly throwing us together into groups and they just never seem to be helpful for the work, networking, or anything else really.
I was just hoping for a different perspective because it's so frustrating and I feel at fault when I shouldn't

First I want to touch on the "take care of" part. Usually what that means is that you have some sort of insecurity about yourself, lack of confidence, or some kind of paranoia. It's the things that require someone else to [compliment/praise] you on so you feel good about yourself. It has nothing to do with living on your own or being financially stable. Why do you attract these unavailable women? It's not that you attract them, it's that unavailable women are more open. It's just like how you think (and women think it too) when guys are nice to women, women think the guys are hitting on them. If the women starts to talk to the guy then it sends the guy wrong signals. Keep in mind, the guys are at fault too, this is a two-directional social expectation problem. If a girl is nice to you and talks to you, you would think that she likes you - unless of course they're unavailable. Unavailable women talk to other guys easily because the women know that nothing will happen - that there are no false signals.

So that girl that spoke to you about her fiance and thanked you for your insight. She said "if not in the way you may have expected it to." So what? That's her problem and her projecting what she thought other guys are looking for. You know for yourself that you had no other intention, leave it at that. I don't see how you are a victim either. You did a good deed. You helped give someone some useful insight to help them with their decisions in life. Feel good about it. I personally think you're overthinking some situations and making those imaginary problems into reality. My suggestion is to just talk to whoever wants to talk to you. 19? talk. 40? talk. married? talk. As long as they aren't super negative, unwilling to help themselves, talk to them and share what you have. So what if you got nothing in return? You did something good! Feel good about it! Start a movement where people start thinking "Hey, he actually spoke to me like a human being with no expectations of anything in return." Change the thoughts of "I bet he wants something from me."

I have the same problem finding friends too and I'm a girl, not overweight or ugly looking. The only few "friends" I've made in my school program are the ones I've met during clinicals or sat by in class. We went on a school trip event for a few days and I made a couple more friends just by spending time with them or being forced to. Nobody else approaches me otherwise.

Point is it's hard and everyone is either already taken by significant others, or they have their own friends. We live in a more distracted world now where people are busy with their phones, FB, instagram, twitter... They don't want to meet strangers.

You just have to get in there and start initiating things with people if you want to try to make new friends. But beware of the ones who constantly go on about themselves and don't ask anything about you. Energy vampires...they just want to vent about their lives.