I find this an interesting conundrum as someone acquainted with a person who seems resistant to 'meeting the world halfway' to their own consistent detriment.

Yes, they're different in various ways, but they'll never find "their peeps" without some amount of compromise. A situation to which they appear to be completely blind.

I try to hint at such things, but part of their thing is that they're incredibly sensitive to criticism, and so it has to be very subtle, unfortunately seemingly to the point of ineffectual.

It's an odd combination of "I am deserving of better" and a "paralysing lack of self confidence".

This would have been a revelation in the 90s.