Dear Abbey, here are some potential ways to soothe social anxieties

Today, we're talking a little bit about social anxiety.

That's the main topic of today's episode.

I wanna talk about the fear of being seen, and having people perceive you, and judge you, and being misunderstood.

But also, even if they're not doing all of those things, how sometimes we can fabricate, or our brain can fabricate these assumptions of what other people think about us, and why we care so much sometimes.

Different aspects of having social anxiety.

Not a therapist.

I'm not a professional at all in any of these fields.

I- it...

I'm just talk from lived experience.

I've, I've struggled my whole life to feel normal in social situations.

I'm not sure exactly what it is, but I want to connect with people, and I feel like I do connect with people sometimes, but I, I genuinely think it's just from some, my situations in the past with being rejected by friends, by an ex-husband.

There are certain times where I've been pretty vulnerable, and I've felt free in a relationship, and open, and then you just get really, really hurt and really rejected or betrayed in some way or, you know, people text behind your back and they accidentally text you, that type of stuff.

And that's just never a fun thing to experience, and so because of those experiences, sometimes that can be why it's harder to open yourself up to people and to be open and excited for a friendship or for s- a relationship.

It's also socially doesn't just mean, like, becoming best friends.

I think just in general, having social anxiety, for me, has felt and looked like I obsess over...

Like, if I have something coming up, I'm really anxious about it if I know people are gonna be there that I'm not already really, really close to and really, really comfortable with.

I am thinking in my head constantly what I'm gonna say, how I'm make sure I don't say anything weird, make sure I don't do anything weird, make sure I'm really friendly, don't be, don't have, like, a mean face on.

Like, I am already trying to dissect what I'm gonna do wrong and try to prevent it, and that obviously is go- going to create the best experience for probably anybody, especially the person who's obsessing and who is anxious over it.

Because then it's not a very enjoyable experience.

It's just, like, stressful before, stressful during, stressful after.

More like shameful after, um, and feel embarrassed after.

So there's, like, anticipatory anxiety that can come with the social aspect, but also it can be during being really aware that you're carrying a conversation, and it, ugh, being hard for it to flow because you're in your head, and then feeling self-doubt because of that or self-conscious that you are anxious in the moment.

And if you're not, if they're new people, you don't wanna, like, say that because, like, you don't wanna be weird.

So there's a lot of m- there's a million ways that that shows up for people.

Um, it looks different.