Social Anxiety problems, anyone had therapy for this?

koneko

Ever since I was a child I have been what I would call 'shy', but during secondary school bullying and the general atmosphere of a private girls school seemed to worsen this and my social anxiety has been part of my life ever since. I have never seen a GP or anyone for this, or in fact really mentioned it to anyone until recently, mainly because I just thought I was still shy/had low confidence, but now that I am starting to make note of the things I am feeling, I am considering seeing my GP with regard to seeking therapy as it is starting to affect my everyday life and elements of it are starting to seem wierd even to me.

Some of the things I have noted are below:
- Fear of any kind of presenting/public speaking to the point that I will try to avoid such situations. If I actually have to speak in public, usually my hands will shake and I will have problems speaking coherantly.
- Fear of calling anyone on the phone, this has got so bad that I am actually nervous about calling my parents/grandparents in case I'm not sure what to say. I'm particularly bad at ending calls. I will actively try to avoid calling people.
- Inability to deal with any kind of criticism/confrontation, usually results in me crying (although its more leaking eyes than real crying, my throat tightens, my body temp increases and my eyes water to the extent that tears roll down my cheeks), which is extremely embarrassing as I'm generally not actually upset, its just the way my body chooses to deal with it.
- Problems talking 1 to 1 with people, eye contact feels like I am staring at the person and feels very un-natural.
- Inability to perform simple tasks when being watched or giving demonstrations.
- Blushing and getting sweaty palms all the time for no real reason when talking to people.
- Uncomfortable feelings that everyone is watching me when doing anything on my own and there are other people nearby, ranges from walking down the street to eating, shopping, pretty much anything.

In particular these problems are starting to affect my work, as I am required to make a lot of calls, both 1 to 1 and conference and attend 1 to 1 meetings detailing how I can improve my work and productivity for personal development/career development (in itself not bad things at all but my body and mind just seem to have an automatic reaction to it). Letting my emotions leak out at work just seems to be increasing my anxiety as now I worry that it will happen more frequently or I will be fired because of it.

Sorry this is such a long post, but basicly I was wondering if anyone has ever had theapy for this sort of thing and whether it helped?

Thanks

rachhh

Wow, I do all of those things you listed and just thought they were 'quirks' and me being a bit odd, not symptoms of social anxiety... interested to see what advice people can give here, thank you in advance!

meece

I found that cognitive behavioural therapy (cbt) is very good. I also found out about "human givens".

It basically says humans need physical and emotional needs to be met, see below.
http://www.hgi.org.uk/archive/human-givens.htm

I hope this helps

xoxo_2

I have. I had counselling and then CBT

MoodGym https://moodgym.anu.edu.au/welcome and Living Life To The Full http://www.llttf.com/ are good websites that were both recommended by my GP and CPN.

Go see your GP, they can help. But it may take a few appointments to get them to refer you

koneko

Thanks everyone,
I will make an appointment with my gp, luckily he is generally very helpful so I will mention the cbt and see if there is any local help available.

The idea of talking about it in person is a bit scary but hopefully the fact I'd been writing things down well help me when I'm there. I'll probably end up getting emotional when I'm the but I guess doctors are used to that, more so than bosses anyway!

Someone has also mentioned rescue remedy as a short term help for work meetings and times when I am feeling anxious. I've never tried it before but willing to give it a go. I know gp appointments and referrals can take time so maybe it will improve the things that I am worrying about in the next few weeks.

Scrapaholic

I've never had therapy or even thought about it but lots of the things you write about , my friend and I were like that when we were young . I'm thinking you'll be a younger person and if you feel you need help then you're doing the right thing to ask . I read you have a job , a career with opportunities to develop . That's good . Good luck for the future .

beachbeth

I think a lot of people feel like this in social situations. I think its quite normal to feel anxious about public speaking and I myself absolutely hate the phone. I have a phone which shows the number of whoever is calling and so I know whether to answer or not and this helps a lot. Perhaps you could do this?

I really think you are beating yourself up about this and theres nothing strange about what you are describing. We're not all extroverts who love the sound of their own voice! I was always very shy myself and found that embarrassment became a self fulfilling prophecy - you go to a situation thinking "this is going to be terrible and Im going to go bright red and not know what to say/do" and then this is what happens. I would thoroughly recommend Paul McKennas book (just look up his name on Amazon) and he has good techniques for re-thinking situations before they happen so that you're not expecting failure or embarrassment.

I would definitely ask to be referred to a councellor (sp?) too so that you can talk this through with someone.

In the meantime, be kinder to yourself and ignore that evil subconscious voice who tells you that you're no good! Lol.