SOCIAL ANXIETY "MY STORY"

Have you ever feel worried before sitting for an exam? Or feel anxious when having a medical test or job interview? That feeling of uneasy such as worry or fear is actually known as anxiety and it can be mild or severe. Everyone has experienced this feelings before but not when it comes to a chronic anxiety disorder such as social anxiety disorder. Social anxiety disorder or also knows as social phobia is a long lasting and overwhelming fear of social situations. One of the reasons I chose this topic is because it is quite interesting and I sometimes felt this feeling in a certain ways that make me uncomfortable. 

Based on my own experience, this disorder often occur during my teenage years and I always find difficulties to communicate and cope with situations. While people says that feeling anxious can be perfectly normal, however I find it is so hard to control my worries and shyness. The feelings of anxiety are more constant and can often affect my daily lives and I know there are lot of people out there who faced the same things as I felt.

Other than that, I often heard people says that anxiety is normal and it gets better as we get older probably because they thought the anxiety we faced are simply like the feeling of nervous or shyness that would go away. Little did they know, there are huge differences between the feeling of nervous or shyness and social anxiety disorder and I aspire to do research on this topic and let people know about this.

I remembered the quote saying “Don’t you think a person with social anxiety would stop worrying if they could?”  This gets to the core of social anxiety which is irrational thinking, doubts and worry.  Social anxiety is all-consuming and it can affect nearly all parts of a person’s life.  It limits a person’s world and it  becomes a part of every decision, every thought.

To relate with my story, I never really enjoyed outside activities conducted whenever inside or outside my school. I got really nervous and cannot avoid by the thought of being stares or being watched so I keep away from making any eye contacts with other people. Meanwhile in special events such as family reunion, dinner conducted by school or on parties which I cannot avoid from attending them, I bear in mind of fighting these feelings and go through my anxious but never actually enjoyed one of them. People know me well as a quiet and shy student because I was afraid to open up due to people’s opinion and judgement thinking. Shy people would not even bother by their shyness but people with this disorder gets anxious and hard to breath even when there is no one looking at them.

Rejection is one of the actions I fear the most in my life where I could not even speak my own opinions and thinking, or saying “hi” to people I recognized and worst most of the time I feel like giving up whenever I cannot handle a situation. Other than that, shy people would not always faced the excessive worry phase meanwhile people with this disorder do all the time. There are lot of times I spent being overthinking and keep questioning myself which one looks way more normal, to be just quiet and mind my own business or trying to blend with others although it might seems awkward. I keep wondering on how other people easily have that out-going vibes meanwhile I cannot even feel like being true to myself. It is not easy to be quiet because you would have the feeling of being left out and afraid of people staring at you all the time for walking, eating and doing your stuff alone but it is also hard when you trying to blend with others because you will be at the stages where you think that you are not good enough to be around them and started to isolate yourself. 

In conclusion, I have been in this two situations and although people might not aware of this but it is not something to be proud of and very devastating.

BUT THERE ARE WAYS TO DEAL WITH THIS SITUATIONS,

Although people might see some with this disorder calm or in a handled situation, but they do not know the struggle this people had to deal internally, well “happy face do not represent a happy soul”.  Although avoiding situations that produce anxiety may make they feel better in the short term, their anxiety is likely to continue over the long term if the person involved do not get treatment. There are few steps to reduce symptoms occurred which is by keeping a journal. Keeping track of their personal life can help them and their mental health professional identify what is causing them stress and what seems to help them feel better. The emotional symptoms can be known through the writings whether the person feel nervous, feel down, fear or angry.

            Next, know the symptoms you or people surrounding you might have because a person with this disorder need to get help early. Anxiety, like many other mental health conditions can be harder to treat if you wait. Starting with the obvious symptoms such as fear of situations in which they may be judged or worrying too much about embarrassing or humiliating themselves. They probably have intense fear of interacting or talking with strangers and avoiding doing things or speaking to people out of fear of embarrassment.  It will be much easier to help and understand them if we know what they feel internally and sometimes their feelings can be shown on their face or the way they acted. Imagine if the person is your beloved family or your very close friends which we supposed there by their side and know them well but we chose not or are not aware of the challenges they might deal with, we might lose them forever because mental illness are not a joke and could be the reason those angels of death take their lives.

            Lastly, bring them or yourself to seek for help as soon as possible from a doctor or treatment programs such as cognitive-behavioral therapy, also known as a system of treatment involving a focus on thinking and its influence on both behavior and feelings. It helps a person to change the way of thinking, for example when “you are invited to a party but you are scared of attending it due to fear of being stares”. This therapy will help induced the thought to change the cycle which is “ the thought of everyone stares at me is not rational anyway, I would be glad I came to this party when it is over”. As a result, it helps to reduce the anxiety in social situations. This therapy helps those who struggling social anxiety by changing irrational thinking into rational thinking and help to induce habitual and appropriate behavioral responses. Some medicines prescribed by doctors are also useful such as anti-anxiety medications and certain selective reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs). However, medication alone has no long-term benefits for people with social anxiety.

None of us could deny that mental health is routinely treated differently than physical health but sometimes it is difficult to understand how or why this affects us. If we do not recognize mental illnesses as physical health issues, then we will never get people the treatment that they need. Mental illness is one of the important issues needed to be taken seriously and they deserve just as much support as people with physical health condition.