Today I finally realized that I cannot just keep avoiding social contact forever. Eventually it will backfire on me. Here's what happened.
I go on walks to get exercise but due to extreme social anxiety, running into people or even just passing them when I go on walks is a miserable, nerve-wrecking experience for me. Because of this I take them in the early morning (3-5 am) so no one will see me. (Pathetic, I know.) Anyway, today I was going on my walk and I saw headlights coming up behind me. And the thing is, this is the first time this has ever happened. This is a fairly quiet neighborhood during the day so there's almost no one at night. But as the car approaches me it starts slowing down and I start getting terrified, wondering if I'm about to get kidnapped or something... I have my cell phone in hand and I start wondering if maybe the car is slowing down to turn into the next driveway or something so I stop and I turn and imagine my shock/horror when I discover it's a POLICE car, completely stopped!
So now I'm thinking, Oh my God, can you imagine how this looks? I'm out here walking at 3 am!! He probably thinks I'm a criminal or something so I get all terrified and the thing is, I get anxious talking to anyone, even people I've known for years, so talking to this man who not only have I never met before but is a police officer was very frightening for me.
Anyway, he asked, "How are things going for you?" And I manage to stutter out in a loud, high pitch voice (thinking, Oh God, now I'm waking up the neighbors and just feeling so embarrassed), "Fine... how, how are they going for you?" "Good... so where do you live?" "Um, over that way," I say kind of pointing. At this point my heart is racing and I know I'm coming off badly but I don't know what to say or how to say it, and afterwards I always know how I SHOULD have handled the situation but when I feel startled I just can never think of what to say.
So the police officer sort of scoffs and goes, "What's 'over that way?'" And of course all I can manage to do is repeat what I just said, "Over that way... [street name]."
And he goes, "So what are you doing out here?" And I mean, what am I supposed to say? The truth is "Just going for a walk" but my God how suspicious does that sound, and I really need to say something to account for the fact that it's 3 in the morning, and I can't tell him about the social anxiety - I mean I just met him and I'm expected to reveal this huge part of my life to him? But I have to say something so I'm scrambling to come up with an answer. After a long pause and a bunch of mumbling I finally manage to stutter, "Um, um, I can't sleep and this... uh... this sometimes helps."
So after what feels like hours (even though it couldn't have been more than a few minutes) he finally drives off and I'm just left completely shaken up. And I'm realizing that if I don't fix myself soon my social ineptness is likely to backfire a lot worse than that. And the thing is, I've tried to copy the personalities of people I see on TV or celebrities or people I know and just always ask myself, "What would ____ do" but I can never keep it going for more than about 30 seconds before I forget and end up drifting back to my old self.
All I can do is keep thinking about the situation and how I wish I'd handled it and what I should have done differently and how all of those people I sometimes try to copy would have each handled the situation.
Has anyone else ever had an experience like this? What's the best way to get over it? I always spend so long thinking about the tiniest thing. I mean earlier today I was playing in my head over and over a particular situation that happened YEARS ago!! Now this is just one more being added to my memory for all eternity.
And I mean now I'm scared to go on walks at all, no matter what time it is...
I go on walks to get exercise but due to extreme social anxiety, running into people or even just passing them when I go on walks is a miserable, nerve-wrecking experience for me. Because of this I take them in the early morning (3-5 am) so no one will see me. (Pathetic, I know.) Anyway, today I was going on my walk and I saw headlights coming up behind me. And the thing is, this is the first time this has ever happened. This is a fairly quiet neighborhood during the day so there's almost no one at night. But as the car approaches me it starts slowing down and I start getting terrified, wondering if I'm about to get kidnapped or something... I have my cell phone in hand and I start wondering if maybe the car is slowing down to turn into the next driveway or something so I stop and I turn and imagine my shock/horror when I discover it's a POLICE car, completely stopped!
So now I'm thinking, Oh my God, can you imagine how this looks? I'm out here walking at 3 am!! He probably thinks I'm a criminal or something so I get all terrified and the thing is, I get anxious talking to anyone, even people I've known for years, so talking to this man who not only have I never met before but is a police officer was very frightening for me.
Anyway, he asked, "How are things going for you?" And I manage to stutter out in a loud, high pitch voice (thinking, Oh God, now I'm waking up the neighbors and just feeling so embarrassed), "Fine... how, how are they going for you?" "Good... so where do you live?" "Um, over that way," I say kind of pointing. At this point my heart is racing and I know I'm coming off badly but I don't know what to say or how to say it, and afterwards I always know how I SHOULD have handled the situation but when I feel startled I just can never think of what to say.
So the police officer sort of scoffs and goes, "What's 'over that way?'" And of course all I can manage to do is repeat what I just said, "Over that way... [street name]."
And he goes, "So what are you doing out here?" And I mean, what am I supposed to say? The truth is "Just going for a walk" but my God how suspicious does that sound, and I really need to say something to account for the fact that it's 3 in the morning, and I can't tell him about the social anxiety - I mean I just met him and I'm expected to reveal this huge part of my life to him? But I have to say something so I'm scrambling to come up with an answer. After a long pause and a bunch of mumbling I finally manage to stutter, "Um, um, I can't sleep and this... uh... this sometimes helps."
So after what feels like hours (even though it couldn't have been more than a few minutes) he finally drives off and I'm just left completely shaken up. And I'm realizing that if I don't fix myself soon my social ineptness is likely to backfire a lot worse than that. And the thing is, I've tried to copy the personalities of people I see on TV or celebrities or people I know and just always ask myself, "What would ____ do" but I can never keep it going for more than about 30 seconds before I forget and end up drifting back to my old self.
All I can do is keep thinking about the situation and how I wish I'd handled it and what I should have done differently and how all of those people I sometimes try to copy would have each handled the situation.
Has anyone else ever had an experience like this? What's the best way to get over it? I always spend so long thinking about the tiniest thing. I mean earlier today I was playing in my head over and over a particular situation that happened YEARS ago!! Now this is just one more being added to my memory for all eternity.
And I mean now I'm scared to go on walks at all, no matter what time it is...