Fix me

[ArtFart]

Hello,this is going to be long and messy.For quick reading,the problems are numbered,so you can comment on any number,if you dont want to read the whole thing

The reason I started this thread is not self-pity or attention seeking.There are people whose lives are a lot more messed up than mine,and objectively speaking i should be fine.I am not.

I am just looking for someone that has the same problems,and somebody that can give me concrete advice. There are basically a couple problems that I have:

1)I am ho-riffed of human contact.Its not that I cant touch anybody,its that I feels extremely awkward. Hugging people doesn't come naturally to me,even close friends. The problem goes away slightly when i drink(a topic i will cover later) but even then theres a voice in the back of my head that's just saying,this is not right. Don't even get me started on intercourse,the thought of having sex with somebody is downright impossible to me. Ok actually ignore that,sex that means something with a person i care for and know is horrifying to me,somehow i don't have a problem with physical contact with people i don't know or barely know.

2)The second problem,I suspect,is closely tied to the first one.I cannot open up to people.I am writing this anonymously on a internet forum,because I would never in a million years tell all of this to a person I know.I have been best friends with the same person for nearly 20 years now,since we spent so much time together we both know the other ones brain,but we never had an open discussion about it.

Again,there's the same voice in my head,not literal,i am not that crazy,that just pulls the brakes and tries to sabotage anybody who tries to get close. A good example would be when recently a friend of mine tried to set me up with her friend.

Now I knew the person that she was talking about,and actually liked her,but told her that i am not interested and that she shouldent do anything.The friend that tried to set me up with her,has known me since grade school,and yet i still cannot open up.

3)Panic attacks.They suck. A couple of night ago i was in my bed,it was about two in the morning,and I realized I will die.Not at that exact moment,just that I am mortal.I literally couldn't breath and started sweating and panicking that one day i will die and thats it.The stupid thing is that a person would expect a change after having that episode,but the next morning i was fine and ignored everything,and I know that I will have the same episode,maybe over a different thing,in the next 10 days.

4)I am constantly miserable.At first I just ignored is as teen angst,but i am in college now,my teenage years are behind me this s**t needs to stop.I had a normal childhood,my family isn't rich bur isn't poor either.I have friends,go to a respected university,i should be happy dam**t. Its just that i wake up every day with a weight on my chest,that is occasionally moved by some event,but that only affects it for a couple of hours,and then i am back to being miserable again.

5)I am constantly worried what people think of me, and heres one you dont hear everyday,but since I am already doing this I might as well go all the way.I talk to myself a lot when nobody is around,and I mean a lot,basically when i am alone I just start voicing my thoughts.

That is all of it.I tried smoking pot a couple of times,didn't have a large effect on me.tried drinking,which works perfectly when i am outside with friends,i am more open and social that normal,but on the other hand it makes the panic attacks much much worse,and makes me even more miserable when i come home.

Any advice,even just to grow up and stop being a wus is fine,Thank you.

[Adrough]

Sounds like maybe social anxiety disorder? Do you ever feel like everyone is watching you?

[tommyf]

Hello and well done for writing down how you feel, that took some courage.
Firstly everyone has a voice in their heads whether they admit to it or not. To some it is just thoughts but really it is a voice, it has an opinion on everything. We call it "the script" - its all the beliefs you have about yourself, the world, everything based on your experiences and influences from your parents, teachers, friends, the media etc. Its a reference point for you to go to, to see how you "should" act in every situation. The problem as you can see so often is that it doesnt make us feel good, to put it lightly.

The way out for me, after years of feeling anxious and having been given labels such as OCD, was when I learned that I didnt have to listen to this script, that it wasnt who I am, all it is a scared program that I "picked up" over the years and that all it is trying to do is keep me safe. The problem is that by trying to keep me safe it made me feel awful as it made everything out to be a massive threat when it wasnt.

You can see it in action here, when you talk about not wanting to get close to or open up to people. For some reason that programming is trying to stop you from getting close because it thinks you will get hurt, so as soon as you get in to any sort of situation where it feels threatened, it gets you to back off. The problem is that, in trying to protect you, it is cutting you off from all the good things you want to feel. Even if something good does come up, the fearful programming will come in, often with out you being aware, and you will feel down again.

Here is the catch: On the other side of the fear is all the things you want to feel - security, contentment, happiness, fun, love, the list goes on. In order to feel these things you need to make a choice, a decision that you really want to feel good. If you do then you have to be prepared to face what is holding you back. That means facing your fears and standing fast when that program kicks in and tries to stop you from feeling bad.

For me to get over my OCD, instead of reassuring myself about my anxieties, I was taught to sit with it and feel the anxiety. Our scripts dont like this as it is their job to STOP us feeling bad. I wont lie, this is hard, but think of it this way, every time you sit and face a part of the anxiety without trying to make it go away, a part of it is released forever. If you can keep your awareness up and see that all the negativity is not who you really are, you start to separate from it. And guess what, you start to feel how you always wanted to feel. I can say that after feeling so low that I wanted to end it (less than a year ago), I now feel better than I ever have in my life. Yes I still have challenges and they can bring me down but now I know that it is just my script and I dont have to listen to it. Then I bounce back in a fraction of the time that I used to.

Practice practice practice.

You dont need fixing, just an increase in awareness. Happiness comes from inside, not outside.

:-)