Thank you everyone!!! It's so true that knowing there are others who understand makes me feel so much better. It takes the pressure off being weird (which is I guess the whole point of SA to begin with) and then I find I can deal with the actual problem instead. I can't tell you how fantastic I feel right now having received these replies. I am rereading every single one, just to get that feeling of support. I mean, not yet so fantastic to go out -- I'm going to need a little more assurance for that -- but it's so great not to feel alone (I know I said that already) and also be able to work out some of the problem somewhere with others who understand instead of just feeling weird and miserable (I said that too). The support might even be enough to allow me to face it eventually -- like, hey, I might be alone out there but there are others "with" me who understand -- that would give me a lot of courage I think.
Lemur, what's nvm?
I have GAD too (Generalized Anxiety Disorder) so it's tough for me to do anything goal oriented even alone, around the house. I'm getting better slowly through exposure, I guess you'd call it, using timers. I find it kind of tough to do exposure on agoraphobia though. I've only had it a few years, though SA on and off most of my life, and I had actually licked it for a while. Then I got this new job end of last year and I just couldn't go. I had a great month last month, but now it's back. I basically got over it the first time by just reporting my victories and defeats on a board similar to this, where people just accepted me and didn't push. That board is now defunct though. I didn't know if I'd find another, so I'm extremely grateful for the replies.
Anyway, I realized that I could do exposure if I didn't actually make plans. This would break my heart, as it always does when I am fighting it and fail, but it might also allow me to practice taking smaller steps on things I'm nervous about instead of a mighty battle I have currently been losing. My plan is, I started today, I had to miss a dance class I wanted to go to, but in the long run maybe it will help, I'm going to build up to getting out the door and coming back. Like, today I put on my socks. Next time I'll put on my clothes, or maybe just change into my pants out of my sweats that I wear around the house. This sounds like such a stupid idea but this is how I built up to actually cleaning my house on a regular basis (many parts of which I still have some trouble with) -- I started with just doing the dishes every day at a set time. I do actually go out, it's just that when it's bad like now I only do what I absolutely have to (and which I read others do too). So it's not like I've been indoors in my pyjamas for months or years. But this exposure is on the things I don't absolutely have to do. I do feel rotten about missing the dance class and I didn't even try -- but I just feel like this might help me even more than actually white knuckling it and making it that way, conditioning my nervous system to not get so nervous and expect a big conflict and confrontation.
Meanwhile though, yeah, I feel rotten I didn't go. I don't know if that helps or defeats the purpose of stopping the fight with myself. On the one hand, what's the difference? I've missed so many things. If this doesn't work, I can go back to the old fight. On the other hand I feel like, wow, maybe I would have made this one, and since I have missed so many things, it's a big loss to miss another.
