Social Anxiety

[Odyne]

Hey lovelies
My anxiety is controlling me.
Whenever I'm in a shop, I gets dizzy and my heart beats so fast. I begin to sweet, and I just want to run out of the shop.
I've had anxiety for years, but this is so hard
The only way I get through it and buy what I want, is when there's someone with me.
But I think it's embarrassingly that I can't buy anything alone. I'm 22 years old. I just can't.

Anyone with good things to do?

Hugs from Lucy.

It's interesting you say your heart begins to race and you get dizzy whenever you're in a shop. This happens to me, even just at home, whenever I get excited about something good that's about to happen. It's anxiety, but in a positive sense; which makes no sense at all! When you are in the shop, I would suggest checking in with yourself, let yourself know that the purchase you're about to make will be useful to you in one way or another. Be sure you have a friend with you to reassure you that you're about to do something good for yourself instead of something harmful.

And always make sure you have the money to pay.

[Odyne]

Originally Posted by Butterfly.

It's interesting you say your heart begins to race and you get dizzy whenever you're in a shop. This happens to me, even just at home, whenever I get excited about something good that's about to happen. It's anxiety, but in a positive sense; which makes no sense at all! When you are in the shop, I would suggest checking in with yourself, let yourself know that the purchase you're about to make will be useful to you in one way or another. Be sure you have a friend with you to reassure you that you're about to do something good for yourself instead of something harmful.

And always make sure you have the money to pay.

I’ve getting panic attacks anywhere too, but atm it’s just so hard when there’s people

I’m trying to face the anxiety.

[Celyn]

Is there something in particular about other people that you feel causes you anxiety? A common worry for people who get anxious in social situations is that they worry other people are looking at them or judging them. If this is the case for you, then it's important to remember that most people aren't paying much attention to the other people around them- they may be more likely to be preoccupied with their own thoughts, perhaps thinking of things they have to do or buy that day. And if anyone was judging you, then you wouldn't know about it unless they told you, and they definitely shouldn't treat you any differently.

It is hard dealing with anxiety, especially when it feels like it gets in the way of your life. There's nothing wrong with having someone with you, however, you will have to find ways of going to the shops by yourself, as you may find it hard in the future if you can't get someone to go with you.

Would you feel comfortable to ask the person to wait outside while you go in on your own? With practice, you may realise that the anxiety will lessen when you realise that nothing bad is going to happen and that the person who accompanies you is not too far away. In time, you may realise you don't need the person to accompany you at all.

You've recognisd the physical feelings of anxiety, which is good, so perhaps next time you can remind yourself that these feelings are just anxiety, and that it doesn't mean anything bad will happen. In fact, as Serendipity said above, anxiety and excitement share the same physical feelings- the difference is how we view them. We tend to view anxiety as negative, which can make the feeling seem worse, whereas excitement is seen as positive. It's relatively the same feelings physically, but how we think about it, can change our outlook. If we think of it as excitement, we may have a more positive experience, than if we think of it as anxiety.

Try and stay in the situation for as long as you can. Perhaps do some breathing exercises or ground yourself, look around you and pay attention to the things you can see, hear, smell, touch etc. Remind yourself that you are safe and the person is only outside, so not too far away. If it feels too overwhelming to do all the shopping in one go with the person outside, perhaps split the shopping so that you only have to buy 1-2 items, so you'll only be in the shop for a short amount of time, and then slowly increase that. Also, be sure to reward yourself! It's hard work facing your fears and you deserve to recognise when you've achieved something difficult!

[DeletedAccount53]

Originally Posted by Odyne

Hey lovelies
My anxiety is controlling me.
Whenever I'm in a shop, I gets dizzy and my heart beats so fast. I begin to sweet, and I just want to run out of the shop.
I've had anxiety for years, but this is so hard
The only way I get through it and buy what I want, is when there's someone with me.
But I think it's embarrassingly that I can't buy anything alone. I'm 22 years old. I just can't.

Anyone with good things to do?

Hugs from Lucy.

Hello Lucy

One of the best ways of conquering my crippling anxiety was to make a start in developing a strong relationship with myself. This happened two years ago when I became 17 and in a month's time, I will have become fairly anxiety-free for the last two years. It hasn't been an easy walk and many times I failed, until I began praising myself for the small things.

A good place to start is to be aware of how you talk to yourself. Are you supporting yourself or maybe putting yourself down a bit? Maybe a lot, perhaps? Start the self-love journey by making a point of affirming to yourself with love and encouragement. Believe you me this may sound ridiculous, but praising oneself can gee us up a lot! Every little thing you accomplish, give yourself a pat on the shoulder and say out loud or in your mind, "Well done Lucy!"


This is interesting, but when we being praising ourselves, our bodies actually listen. What I often do is respond to every thought and word I say about yourself, like yesterday whne I was geeing up myself as I struggled a cast iron bath into my house with help from 3 blokes.

No negativ words from me, oh no! I was geeing up myself as I struggled a cast iron bath into my house with help from 3 blokes. No negativ words from me, oh no!" I was encouraging my guy friends as we lifted, pushed and grunted this cast iron enameled leviathan into position. WOW, did we feel good when the job was done! Mentally I praised myself, and immediately felt good. Every time I'm doing something physically hard, even pushing a supermarket trolley down the aisle, instead of anxiety, inside I'm telling myself "You can do this, Wendi. Just like you did it before. Go girl!

Anxiety melts away. It's not mind over matter', but self-praise is for the here and now, Lucy. But being negativ with yourself, and your body tenses up. Headaches come from negativ self-talk, too. But if you praise yourself over even the teenie little things, over time you will begin to feel good about yourself and your body will feel good, too.

I sneak a munchie bar into my pocketsies when out. If I do something, like keeping focused when driving my rattling old heap of a Land Rover, I'll get a want for the munchies, and out comes a flapjack just to reward myself.

It's true enough, it will take a while for this to happen, but these little steps now can steer you in the path of bigger things what you can do to heal yourself, doing it over time. It's not like anxiety is going to be forever, but we start with the small stuff now. It's a reverse of saying "Don't sweat the small stuff."

Start loving yourself a little bit each day. With time allowing, we eventually start becoming free of anxiety. Anxiety can be crippling, I know, as it's affected my tummy. I've been there and walked that journey for far too long! Until I decided to get tougher with myself and not allow this little beast to make me do as it wanted. Anxiety, I realised, may hvae started a long way back into our childhood, when it something our young minds suppressed, started by our brain that protected us as a young child.

That was occurred to me. Not what a one of the many therapists said. I realised that anxiety had started when I was very young, and it haunted me through my early teen years. But nowadays we don't need to let its roots go further down. This stops when we begin praising ourselves, even over the little things.

Learn to practice relaxation. In itself, relaxation is the key to finding peace inside ourselves. Partner it with self-praise and we begin feeling lots better about ourselves. And keep a journal or notebook recording the days.


When I looked back at the awful things my previous parents were doing to me, making me timid and causing self-doubt and making me very shy, two years ago was when that lightbulb went off, and so brightly that I had to sit down and cry away all my mistakes.

From that day onward I praised myself, and my body listened to make my mind believe. It was a two year slog getting rid of my anxiety, and it can be done. Rome wasn't built in a day and neither was I or any of us. But start laying the first blocks of self-praise, and keep building, day by day, by day.

All my best to you,
Hugs,
Wendi