Do you have this, and if so, do you know why or when it started? Do people comment on it a lot?
I think it set in when I was about 12. It was like a switch flipped and I could never relax in the same room as another person ever since, not once, not even if I’m drop dead drunk. The tension inside just builds and builds until I have to find some excuse to get away. To relax completely I can’t even be in the same building as another person if I can hear them talk or move around.
Every muscle in my body tenses up and I can’t keep a natural posture (sometimes I think I do, but often people comment that I don’t). In the last couple years I practiced facial expressions, so I’ve gotten better at that and it’s become somewhat automatic, but it still feels like an act. Except when I smile, that’s more like a nervous habit, maybe because smiles are supposed to relax people.
I have had social anxiety since childhood. I can feel comfortable around people I trust, but around people I don’t know or trust, I get strong feelings of anxiety. Yes, others can tell that you aren’t comfortable around them, even if you try to relax.
What thoughts go through your mind to make you feel so anxious? Do you feel that way around everyone, even family?
I feel really bad that you suffer such strong anxiety. That must put a huge dent in your social life.
I have a certain amount of anxiety in social settings when I’m tired, but not like you’ve described. I was kind of a tortured soul for many years, though. Talk to your pdoc about it.
I get BAD anxiety around authority figure or people who I feel the need to impress. Whenever the professor whose lab I work in comes to talk to me I freeze with this flipping dumb smile on my face and can’t think of anything to say. I couldn’t even answer a simple question of his a while back because my freaky brain wouldn’t process it under stress.
Normal people I’m generally fine with, unless my anxiety is acting up real bad that day or something.
I’ve always had social anxiety with strangers, but I could relax with friends until I was maybe 10, and then since 12 or so I’ve never been able to relax around anyone including close family that I see every day. It’s weird and I don’t know why it happened. I’m not usually thinking about anything bad, it’s just a physical reaction. Being in public around strangers isn’t as bad, because I know they’ll be gone in a minute and I’ll probably never see them again (if I do see them again I get a bit stressed).
When I was fifteen I started to get these crushing anxiety attacks at school. Since then there are very few settings where I feel comfortable around people. I isolate a lot. The severity of the anxiety fluctuates, but for the most part I don’t like being around people.
That’s terrible that it occurs around family too:( If I were you, I would definitely talk to a therapist about it. Maybe they can help you come up with ways to tame the anxiety and help you figure out why it happens around people that you are close to. Most social anxieties stem from low self-esteem, but you said that you don’t really have any negative thoughts when it occurs. I’m so sorry you are going through this:(