Ranting from a social phobic

[pathomeon]

After reading many of the posts on forums about SP, as well as anylizing the SP in me after the many years of loneliness, I realize that some people were never meant to be. As horrible as that sounds, it's the god awful truth. I look for demographics when I read forums, and a lot of what I have read are married women. Well i'm a 26 year old male. The first problem is that the majority of women are MARRIED. How the hell are you talking about SP when you are married. I cringe any time I think of the possibility of asking a girl to marry me, little own have a wedding. Go to a forum about shyness (cause SP is a bit more hardcore then shyness) or how you married the wrong person...cause if your husband is so outgoing and great in social settings, you married an opposite. Maybe opposites attract, but they sure as hell can't live together for long. For the .001% of people who have married an opposite and made their marriage work, don't post to this thread, cause this aint about you.
Ok, got that out of my system. I have heard of positive attitudes to cure SP. Well if I could summon a possitive attitude that would make others see me in a completely different light and start loving me for a whole day, then the next day I would enroll myself in the most expensive acting school in the states, cause that would be such impressive acting that it would rival the best actor to date. Sure I see the glass as half empty, but for all the time I've had to contemplate my dreary situation I have yet to see a light at the end of the tunnel. Maybe I was born with a lazy gene? I find myself so tired mentally that I physically find it difficult to even go out and try to over come this mental disease. I think in every social phobic there is an ego maniac trying to escape. As much as I am afraid to be the center of attention, at the same time I yearn for it, but only for witty reasons. This has gone on long enough, I'll end this with a quote from a book about SP that says volumes about me.
"His soul is full of love and song, but the world knows it not; the iron mask of shyness is riveted before his face and the man beneath is never seen. Genial words and greetings are ever rising to his lips but they die away in unheard whispers before the steel clamps." --Harry Campbell

 

[triceratops]

I don't agree with the marriage bit but I can't be bothered to argue..

 

[beetle]

I'm sure that you can still have social phobia even if you are married; from what I've seen on this site, everyone experiences social phobia in a different way and to a different degree, but no one's experience is necessarily less valid than others, and there is no one true version of sp.

 

[spikefan777]

Yeah, the marriage probably wouldn't last long if you married someone who was really loud and you were really... not. I mean imagine your spouse constantly questioning you about your shyness. 8O

I don't really think it would last long if you were married to someone who was quiet too, either though.

 

[legin]

8)

 

[magda74]

Hey there Pathomeon,

I was lucky enough to meet someone who doesn't judge me or see me like I see myself thank goodness. What are unforgivable, unloveable traits to me are just traits to him.

I've been in a common-law relationship for almost 8 years and he's never once criticised my for my anxieties. Just the opposite in fact. He's talkative, friendly jokester, one of those people others feel as though they've known for years. I admire and envy that.

SA for me has never been a constant, it's been complex. Sometimes I'm able to force myself through something, other times not so much. Having it doesn't automatically mean being alone your entire life. It does take time to meet the right person if that's what you want. SA makes relationships a challenge for sure, but not impossible and that doesn't mean that we're unlovable.

edit - I noticed you referred to yourself as feeling lazy. Is there a chance that you've been depressed? That might explain the lack of energy.

 

[ignisfatuus]

The first problem is that the majority of women are MARRIED. How the hell are you talking about SP when you are married.

Perhaps people wouldn't take such offence if the statement was recontextualized. How about, no one with severe generalised social anxiety could possibly be married?(except, in some instances, women, the details of which I won't get into, though my reasoning is different than the opinions in the endless threads started about the subject. Ok, I'll expand this digression a little further; shyness and lack of confidence in men is about as attractive to women as a mustachioed woman is to men

t I'll leave it at that for now).

I'm sure that you can still have social phobia even if you are married; from what I've seen on this site, everyone experiences social phobia in a different way and to a different degree, but no one's experience is necessarily less valid than others, and there is no one true version of sp.

Degrees of severity necessarily produce different experiences. For those who live in the utmost solitude, without friends, employment, etc., to have their condition dismissed as the "same" as those who are married, go out, and engage in the odd social activity (albeit with a twinge of stress), is to have their situation diminished. It is tantamount to saying they are lazy, etc., and that is simply not the case.