For those of you in college....

[blindstar]

How do you think your college/university positively or negatively contributes to those with social phobia in general?

I am in school and work at a college and am wondering what schools across the U.S. do or don't do.


What changes would you like to see the college/university make?
What are aspects/services your college/university offers that you are glad are there?

 

[dottie]

well, they have counseling centers which are very understanding. they provide help for people with disabilities (this included). i think they are more lenient and provide notes for disabled people who missed class (i'm sure sa is included). at my school they pay people to take notes for each class and turn them in to the counseling center.

i've never used any of those services but i'm aware they are available. the college i attend seems very eager to help the students succeed so i am not sure what else you could ask for.

 

[bleach]

If you're in college, best thing I think you can do to break out of SA is to go away to school and live on campus. That step alone will force you to confront more people, take more responsibility, and develop better social skills very rapidly. It doesn't always work, but I would wager that it has a greater success rate than any specialized program out there.

 

[slicenrice]

for me, when I came to college my SA was really bad, and I couldn't even initiate conversations with most people. I eventually just gave up and befriended non intimidating people. i mean, i've made some good friends that way, but sometimes it is not what i am looking for, and they are not the most sociable people themselves. I wish I could just go back in time and talk to more people the first week, and then I would not have such a big issue. Just try and suck it up for the first couple days if you can and see what happens!

 

[blindstar]

do you think it's more of a personal responsibility to deal with it no matter what the school has or doesn't have?

 

[bleach]

Yeah, the school can only do so much really. They can't force you out of your shell, and neither can anyone else for that matter.

 

[IWouldPreferNotTo]

College made my SA much worse because I had to make friends on my own and had a very hard time doing that. The only friends I really made were from people who pushed for it. I was living in the dorms as a Junior (3rd year student) and the people in the rooms next to mine were very outgoing so they'd always stop by and hang out, but if it weren't for that, I probably wouldn't have hung out with anyone. I also hung out with stoners- which is actually where most of my friends came from, but even still it was only because they insisted on 'smoking-out', not because of anything I did. My last year of college was pretty bad, I was very depressed because a lot of the 'friends' I made were just mean people. I couldn't wait to graduate.

Also, I would go to class and almost never talk to anyone the entire time. I was very shy in general. Even if someone tried to talk to me, I was nice, but couldn't really add anything to the conversation.

 

[autumn_82]

College has been a long haul for me. It'll take me 9 years to get through it, I'm on year 8 right now. It's taken so long because over the years I've dropped many classes that required group work or presentations. I can do them now, but I'm still awful at it.

Another side effect of SA in college is that I racked up more student loans than I should have, because I was terrified of living in a dorm, so I chose to live off-campus in an expensive city. A couple years later the fear of incurring any more student loans was greater than that of having a roommate, so I moved into the dorms which has turned out fine. I haven't had any crazy roommates yet, and in fact made friends (casual ones) with most of them.

I've also had to really force myself to talk to people. Just a little at a time. It's coming slightly easier with practice, yet it usually leads to nothing. I have acquaintances, yet no friends to hang out with regularly. I still felt excruciatingly alone most of last year, spending many nights in my room just hating those four walls. I felt so alone I'd go do my homework in the dorm lobby just to be in the presence of people.

College can be a real project for anyone who has SA, but don't give up, keep plugging away even if it takes you twice as long as everyone else.