Archy offers an insider’s perspective on how an anxiety disorder can overtake a man’s life.
What is life like with social anxiety disorder? Imagine being 6’6, 300lbs, appear to be quite intimidating and most likely able to handle most one on one fights with ease… but still being afraid of certain people, certain experiences, even being very nervous around women who are ½ your size! This is just a taste of my experience in life and hope it helps illustrate mental illness for others:
I grew up being bullied on a daily basis at school because I was bigger than everyone else. I enjoyed running around and being a typical outdoors kid, loved soccer/football (FIFA not NRL/NFL/etc) yet I gained weight and kids loved to tease me about it.
Being quite an emotionally sensitive kid, I could hear the disgust, the dislike, the “eww you’re gross” in just the tone of voice, so when that tone came along with the very negative words, it had quite a lot of impact on my young mind.
Being overweight made me slower on the field, and because of that, I copped quite a lot of verbal abuse from my teammates. It got to the point where soccer was no longer fun, and this was probably the start of my anxiety around other people. I didn’t want to change to another team, as I feared it would happen there too.
My fear of others was especially true of the popular “jock” or sporty type who seemed to be so cool, and for them to hate me was quite crushing to my self-esteem. At age 10 I was already quite shy, and I didn’t feel safe at all away from family. I got homesick quite a bit on sleepovers and even had to go home from a school camp.
One day at primary school, I did something wrong, and one of my teachers physically assaulted me, whilst screaming at the top of his lungs. This left the entire classroom of kids crying, and from that moment on I had a lot of fear hearing any adult male yell. Because of that experience, as well as two other teachers assaulting me, my trust with adults in authority was broken heavily.
In high school the bullying continued daily, I’d get teased for answering questions and being too smart, and teased over my weight. I was also starting to get the “nipple cripples”, being tripped (which led to a broken wrist) and the intensity of the verbal abuse increased. In turn, my weight had climbed up as I was comfort eating more, avoiding sports because of fear of the other people in the teams and all of this was leading me to become more anxious.
In high school my graduating class had quite a lot of mean girls, more so than normal in other classes. I received quite a lot of teasing from them. Some even asked me out as a joke, or used me AS a joke: the girls would tease the other girls that I was their boyfriend, as the idea of that was so offensive to them.
By my senior year of high school I was probably obese, I had a suicidal depression, was self-mutilating to feel a pain that wasn’t emotional as an escape, and skipping school to avoid the bullying and abuse. I escaped into computer games, staying up quite late just to feel any sense of happiness. This sent me from straight As to Cs, Ds and total Fs, and eventually I completely shut down and gave up on schoolwork nearly altogether.
I listened to music to try tune out the world and all of the pain. I never had a girlfriend in school, and I was rejected whenever I asked out a girl. This was all summed up when I was one of the very few people at the prom without a date…even though there were more females than males and a few females actually went together.
♦◊♦
After high school, I moved away for college and was living on my own away from friends and family, leaving me quite isolated. My health suffered so badly that I had to move back to the family home as I was unable to focus nor had the energy for college. My father died soon after moving back home, leaving me feeling extremely lonely. That was when my depression hit the big time. I pretty much locked myself away in my room at home for a few years, only seeing a few people occasionally and my remaining family at night.
One night I tried going out to the clubs. Some guy asked me for a drink, and when I refused he decided to punch me a few times in the stomach. He only stopped when I tensed my stomach. He left me alone and started throwing chairs and stormed out. I was totally paralyzed in fear, yet my body has enough strength that I could have put him in hospital.
All of these events basically caused my unconscious mind to treat humans as a threat. My fight-or-flight responses being triggered quite easily causes me to avoid a lot of social situations. I would feel hesitation and find any excuse to not go to the shops if I had to, and avoided going to parties and seeing people I didn’t know very well.
At this point, my work life is nearly non-existent, I had a few months’ work but depression really took its toll on me and I had a large breakdown. The fear of talking to new people, let alone women, has made it very hard to make new friends and I haven’t asked anyone out in many years. The few female friends I’ve had, I’ve been the typical “nice guy” to, too afraid to show my intentions, so they’ve led to very little romantic interest.
♦◊♦
Social anxiety is basically living with an intense fear of social situations, chronic fear of being judged, and feeling embarrassed or humiliated by your actions. It can cripple your life, can withdraw you from society itself and it’s been strangling me for too long. The loneliness I’ve felt is extreme and has actually worsened my depression. I am someone that actually loves being around people I feel safe with.
Sadly, the automatic fear I have has truly limited my ability to socialize or even be employed: the fear that something bad will happen, the fear that someone will abuse me, fear I won’t measure up to expectations, even the fear of the fear itself!
I’ve made a lot of progress though over the years, I’ve finally killed the depression and the social anxiety is lowering a lot. Cognitive Behavioral Therapy plus Acceptance and Commitment Therapy has helped tremendously in removing the negative thoughts. Slowly getting out into the world, taking courses to learn new skills and meeting people with a trusted friend or family member is exposing and reprogramming my mind to see that not all humans are going to hurt me. It’s a slow progress but it’s making me stronger every day.
Photo by meemal/Flickr
About Archy
Archy,
Thank you so much for sharing your story. I was beginning to think, as I’m sure you did as well, that I was the only one like me out there. I’m 6’7″, 325 pounds, and I’ve also struggled with mental illness and social anxiety disorder through much of my life. There are a lot of discussions devoted to how women are stigmatized by their physical appearance, but not very many about men. Men who are our size that don’t go around yelling “Hulk smash!” are almost always on the fringe of “normal society.” My size always seems to be the first thing people want to talk to me about, and at times, I’m so disgusted by it that I’d rather just stay at home than have to go out and deal with some drunk asshole incessantly asking me why (with two Masters’ degrees, a published thesis, and a job in the field that I love) I don’t throw it all away to become a professional wrestler. And then there are the times I approach a woman when I can instantly tell she’s a little afraid of me, or worse yet, completely offended that someone that looks like me would even have the gaul to talk to her.
That’s when I remind myself that most people are inherently good and working through their own neurosis. I also have to remind myself that most people are also idiots, and that this combination can be incredibly lethal, but that I shouldn’t take it so much to heart. The ironic thing about social anxiety disorder is that so much of the psychosis comes from external factors: worrying about what others think about you. Yet the only reason you’re worrying so much is because you ARE thinking so much about YOU. You’ve internalized their negativity. Once I figured out that I am not even a flicker in the mind of the drunk asshole that only wants to talk about how big I am or the woman who ungracefully rejects me, it became much easier to put myself out there. Unfortunately, adopting that mindset takes a lot of time and practice, and like most of other coping mechanisms, some days it just flat out won’t work. But that’s why sharing our stories is so important: so we can be reminded that there are people all over the world going through the same struggle. Thanks for that.
Yeah one of the most important things I learned was that people are generally too busy in their own lives to notice you, or notice the negatives of you. I would walk down the street before thinking they were looking at me, judging me, if I heard laughter I assumed they made a joke at me but with CBT I learned to stop those negative thoughts and found my confidence rose and I can walk the streets at far more ease.
I was an early bloomer in size so I towered over people in highschool, I later found out that just the height n size intimidated the girls quite a bit and I remember feeling so shocked, so bad about it because I never ever wanted to hurt them…If anything I wanted to be the knight in shining armor! I tower over most people but these days I’ve got a happier face, I had to relearn how to socialize and that puts people at ease as before I was the shy silent type which looking back could look quite scary. If the women knew that I was afraid of them and quite nervous it might have been different though, I don’t think many women realize just how nervous some men get around them and it can have nothing to do with physical size.
I’m glad the article helped, I am sure there are many of us gentle giants out there who feel alone and hope they find comfort in their lives.
Have you tried using exercise to combat anxiety? Meditation? These are some additional tools that might also work well for you. I had depression and they helped.
Meditation is apart of ACT, or how I was taught. Keeping myself busy, avoiding caffeine, keeping more active helped a lot with my anxiety. Also understanding WHY I felt anxious, I was able to know when it was just adrenaline saying hello which I usually get when I wake-up fully in the morning. Getting the adrenaline increase from caffeine also made me anxious, then I’d worry about that anxiety and thus boost it so learning to identify my body’s responses better was really important and now I can feel the adrenaline but not worry about it, be less anxious and realize it usually means I need to get moving and do something.
Being productive, instead of dwelling I would find something to do like clean the yard, fix up the shed, I spent 1000′s of hours in the year getting the family home back into shape as it was neglected after dad died. Doing “nothing”, just lazing about would make it all worse I found.
Thank you so much for this. You are so brave. Very few people can relate and some days I’m fine & others I can’t even carry on a conversation
can you give any advice? What has got u through? Sometimes in conversation I panic & freeze up, especially in groups. Other times I’m just so terrified thinking everyone is judging me. Every one thinks I’m weird or doesn’t want me there. I feel like such an idiot even for having those feelings. It’s so bad. I’m so glad that you are getting better it gives the rest of us hope 
. Thank you again.
I found the CBT AND ACT helped tremendously, it taught me to stop giving power to negative thoughts and to stop them before repeating it in my mind. I use to walk around similar to you expecting others to be thinking of me but I kept telling myself that people are too busy in their own minds and probably don’t even notice me, which is actually true. Pretty much everyone walks down the street thinking things like “Did I do this activity”, “Did I leave the stove on?”, “I need to pickup the kids at 3pm”, “Milk, eggs, damn what did I forget?” n so on.
It’s important to stop telling yourself “everyone” because everyone is unique, we all think differently, believe different things, follow different politics, sports teams, etc. Some may not want you there but who cares about them, you may not want them there either. We don’t have to like every single person, nor do we need to be liked by everyone. The “I don’t give a fuck” attitude comes in handy here, because IDGAF if this person dislikes me because I know others will love me and I don’t like everyone either.
If you find yourself freeze, try to clear your mind. You might be thinking Omg omg omg they will notice I’ve frozen up, worry about something which will in turn spiral up as I say, by that I mean you worry about x, it causes your body to get nervous which in turn empowers the worrying so your heartbeat rises, breath goes shallow, adrenaline rises, thoughts become hectic n cluttered. This is when you need to take a nice deep breath and think of something relaxing like an ocean, breath in with the wave crashing against the beach and out with the wave receding back to the ocean. 5 seconds in, 5 seconds out, do this 2-3 times and then breath normally for about 10 breaths. If your thoughts try to come back into your mind just acknowledge them being there, n focus back to the waves. It’s helpful to practice this when you are calm and you’ll find yourself using it more n more.
A good therapist will be able to teach you the CBT and ACT (Cognitive Behavioral Therapy + Acceptance and Commitment Therapy). It takes a while, you have to work at it but it really does help so much. Another thing is to try Exposure, make a list of places that make you nervous and rate them 1-10. Try goto the low anxiety areas and stay there until you feel anxious, take notice of that anxiety but don’t try to force it out, just accept it is there (basically don’t worry yourself more over it). You can do the breathing techniques as well but don’t become frustrated if you don’t notice it lowering the anxiety, just continue on with it and you’ll most likely find you will calm down naturally. Over time this slow exposure should help lower that anxiety and teach you that Hey, I won’t get attacked in this situation, I am safe and calmer, people are going about their business and living their own lives.
Another thing to be careful of is “Mind reading”. Eg, See a person and you start reading their mind, I use to think “They think I am fat, I am worthless, ugly, etc” but that was my own insecurity talking, not their mind. No one can read minds (prove me wrong science!) so we have NO idea what they are thinking, they might see you and think I love that shirt, maybe they’re too busy in their own mind and feel nervous around you because they too have social anxiety.
Don’t feel like an idiot though, it’s actually very common and many people have self-esteem issues in today’s world. There is hope for all and I promise with practice it does get easier, and do realize that there are a lot of people out there who feel the same, who live in fear, insecurity dominates their life. One of the biggest shocks I found was when I learned more about the realllly beautiful women, I thought they had a great life, were perfect, had it made but I got to know some and found out *drumroll* They are human! Many of them were actually quite insecure over their looks! Models who felt too thin, too fat here, too this, too that, because a lot of people in our society are trying to compare themselves to perfection….a perfection that doesn’t exist, we cannot photoshop ourselves and be flaw-free gods and goddesses, we need to accept and be at peace with our “flaws” and just enjoy living.
Hope that helps!
interesting reading
best wishes to you in your recovery archy
Thank-you, I hope my experience can help others in some way as it’s given quite an interesting perspective on life.
Archy, thank you for sharing your experience. It’s so important to speak up. There are so many out there suffering in silence. I applaud your courage and hard work.
My son will be 13 in September. He’s 6’2″ 225lbs. It’s brutal, having conversations with school staff and even family who expect things from him they expect from no other 12 year old. It’s brutal. I’ll be sharing your story with them.
They wanted me to join football but in the older grades as I was 6foot at 13, but I was still a 13 year old in my mind as it didn’t magically mature faster. I was passing for an adult at 14-15 and offered beer at functions. They need to remember that the body can outgrow the brain and not to treat him as different from his peers.
Yes! The adult beverage thing – that happens. A lot. Or we’re out and grown women flirt with him. Poor kid looks like he’s going to have a heart attack. Sometimes his dad and I (we’re divorced) end up fighting because even he needs reminding, Charlie’s only 12.
It’s hard. I wish I could change the rest of the world, but all I can do is shield him as much as I can and try and give him the tools he needs to cope with his reality. Humour helps.
Any advice, Archy? Things that would have helped you?
Friends, Friends, Friends. Find hobbies which can build the self-esteem n praise him for the little things, if he’s great at electronics then support him in it. Encourage him to do group activities, hopefully he’ll find a great group of people to be with. Basically to ensure he’s getting adequate social time with people, I can see in my past that when I hid away the lack of positive socializing was making it worse but this can be hard to encourage especially if someone has depression, an anxiety disorder, etc. Martial arts for discipline and self-esteem would probably help a lot.
I am a sensitive person, which is why I am a good judge of character as I was reading body language more than others from what I hear people say, I get triggered off the tone of voice quite a bit too and I’ve called people up quite a bit when they sound bitchy/negative when they don’t mean to. This sensitivity I use to hate because it left me quite open and raw to bullying, verbal bullying did the most damage to me but these days I see my sensitivity as a gift because it gives me a rare insight into others. The best advice I can give for sensitive people is to setup a shield for yourself, only open up that shield for people who are positive and good. The negative people stay outside that shield, pay less attention to what they say because they will just suck you dry of all that positive energy.
Resilience is a great trait, if you can teach that to him or find someone who can pass it along then he will be able to protect himself far better. In his teenage years I’d also teach him how to be independent, learn how to cook, clean, manage bills, and really instill a good work ethic into him if possible along with boosting the self esteem.
Remind him that you WILL get knocked down in life, but to get up and keep fighting for what you want. If plan a fails, have plan b prepared, if you make something and it doesn’t work? Try again, you will learn something even if you fail 20 times and it’s important to use what you learn for good later. I only got to this stage after failing A LOT, but now I am succeeding and life is getting better n better.
Humor is excellent, I can’t recommend it enough because it saved my life quite a few times!
Archy, this is all good! So good. Thank you. From the bottom of my heart, thank you. I can’t fight what I don’t know to watch out for.
Ironically, my son plays football (american style, not british footie). But he’s really good and loves it. I got him in with some older kids who are kind and happy to have “The Kid” around.
Thank you again!
No problems, it’s what more of us humans need to do..pass down lessons learned and help people find positive outlets in their life. I’ve seen so many that were ignored and hence turned to crime or their health suffered more when it could have been avoided earlier on. I’m extremely glad he has those friends because friends are one of the best things in life.
This really made me want to cry…thank you for revealing your troubled adolescent self…that cannot be easy….One of my karate partners is a big teddy bear kind of guy (who started out with multiple medical problems which contributed to his size), who at age 26 is trying to work towards his brown belt in karate and trying to lose weight and work out over the past 3 years (and yes, it is a long and difficult struggle, but we’re all trying to help him in the process,….but yeah, the impetus for change has to come from deep within himself first)….
Thank you for sharing….that’s a lot of pain and agony to carry so many years….
Sure is quite a lot of pain, which is probably why it took a long time to get past and I still work every day to get past it. It took over a decade to happen, and has been just as long to get to a stage where I am getting out in to the world and starting to find peace with myself, enjoyment, happiness.
I hope the best for the teddy bear, it can take a while and even a few attempts before the person helps kick-start the change within themselves but it is amazing the difference when it happens!
Dear Archy,
Was there abuse in your family? I remember a mentor in my past (we all had a love-hate relationship with him…we tortured him and he tortured us!!) who would give a talk about the physical signs of child abuse/non-accidental trauma…it wasn’t until much later that I thought maybe the reason he could talk about it in such depth and detail was that perhaps he was a victim of child abuse himself….He was a big guy and quite brilliant but abrasive in personality (the abrasiveness got in the way of the teaching-learning relationship)….towards the end of our 3 year work relationship he made steps to change: working out on the Nordic Trak, walking his boisterous dog, and eating a more balanced, low-fat diet….
Please excuse me if these questions are too personal….sometimes I meet people and the ones who rub me the wrong way and make me angry are the ones you really wonder about…like how did they get that way? Was it something I said or did?
No abuse in the family towards me, extended family had a history where abuse was passed down parent to child, to their child but I was free from all of that. All of my abuse came from non-family members, majority was verbal, some physical and a lil bit of sexual abuse in the form of being groped on my “manboobs” over n over at school by girls n guys (a teacher even called the police in because of it :S).
The best therapists I’ve known have been through terrible stuff themselves, it gives them quite an understanding of the issues which allows them to relate so easily and build a good rapport with the client. I saw the effects of abuse in others though and my own experienced helped me understand it a bit more, which allows me to get I guess a better than average understanding of the problem than those who haven’t been through it. I am no expert though and I am ALWAYS learning!
I know the feeling, Archy. Does it really count as social anxiety when the rest of the world really ARE assholes?
Haha, well it does make it hard but I have met some absolutely wonderful people. It’s also helpful to try understand why they are assholes, my guess is many may have been through some terrible experiences but instead of shy away they just do their best to push people away and thus are assholes. I myself use to be a real asshole, it’s a struggle when you have a lot of pain, bitterness, n feeling like you want to lash out but to let go of that anger really helped me a lot. Now I feel more compassion than I have ever felt, even for some of the assholes…
As someone who blogs about my struggle with depression and anxiety, I can totally relate. Thanks for sharing your story.
Thank-you, I agree on the music with helping the mood (from your blog). Sometimes when I want to cry, do an emotional cleanse I guess I will find movie scores like dragonheart, I will remember my father and just let the tears do their thing. Afterwards I actually feel a sense of calm, I guess it is nice to just let the emotions out freely without trying to control them, to allow them to just BE there and it’s quite freeing.
Archy, thanks for’ baring your soul’ and sharing with us. As you san tell by the responses, there are a lot of people pulling for you. Congradts for ‘Taking Charge’ of your dilema and doing something about it. Hey, if I could suggest one thing, you might want to try fitness training/bodybuilding. This isn’t some competitive sport but something you do for yourself. Find a ‘Musclehead’ type gym (NOT one of these metrosexual ‘Fitness Centers’) One thing I found is that most bodybuilders started out as social ‘outcasts themselves and are more than willing to help you out. You’ll feel better about yourself both physically and emotionally. Think about it, OK?
Yeah I need to work on my fitness more, after being obese and sedentary my back is probably the weakest part and get back problems. In the last few months I have worked on moving around more, working the muscles n building the strength just with housework and home repairs that were put off, next step is probably gym to really get the back sorted and overall strength up. The one thing that is interesting is my calves are 19 inches, one of my more toned areas without much fat but I guess carrying such a heavy load all day is naturally going to keep your legs strong.
Thank you Archy. Great piece.
Thanks for the support!
It must have been so hard sharing this story. Thank you for doing so.
It’s easier as it’s anonymous, a few years ago it would have been hard but I’ve come to accept what has happened now. I am actually glad I got the chance to if only to help one other person, I found some positivity in the negative experience as it’s let me help others quite a lot recently. It is nice to look back even a year ago and see immense progress!
Archy, thank you for sharing your story. As I mentioned in the other thread, I have been bullied by my mother, and once I left for college, was bullied by an equal number of men and women. Parts of our stories overlap, but there are parts that I will never understand, owing to my size and gender. I’m very sorry that you were treated like trash – it’s clear to me already in our brief interactions on TGMP that you are a kind and thoughtful person who did not deserve this. I wish you all the best in your journey to recovery.
In my case, I’m around average height with a slight build and a young face – and I also take things VERY literally and don’t understand nuance – so I’m treated like a stupid, naive teenager who can be taken advantage of. The two most recent occasions were a) being shoehorned into a very uncomfortable situation by a married male friend 20 years my senior who wanted to use me for an affair so he could “get revenge” on his now ex-wife (the marriage ended, but our friendship was damaged beyond repair), and b) being bullied out of my job by a woman around my age who felt threatened by my professional accomplishments and began calling me a “just a little baby,” imposing on my physical and personal space, and telling me in so many words that I’d “better not try to be her boss.”
It’s hard. It just sucks when you go out into the world with the faith that your fellow humans will treat you as an equal, and you keep getting the same result – being treated as a target. I know all too well how repeatedly negative social experiences make you withdrawn, isolated, angry, and depressed. Like you, I’m not working right now, and I spend most of my time when I’m not with my husband alone, either taking solitary long walks, or staring at the Internet. It sounds like you’ve made much better progress in therapy than I have, so I’ll need to look into A&C Therapy. CBT didn’t work for me, but hopefully the other type will. If you have any resources on Acceptance and Commitment Therapy, I’d love to see them.
Thanks again for having the courage to tell it like it is.
There is a book called “The Happiness Trap” which is pretty good on A.C.T.
ht tp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acceptance_and_Commitment_Therapy – This explains it also. A good therapist who can teach A.C.T would also be a great start.
One important thing is to find people who are nice, positive, and get rid of the negative ones if you can. Just as negative experiences can mold our minds into being afraid, positive experiences can undo so much of that damage and give us the belief that there are some humans who are very nice, caring, etc.
I hope it works out well for you and wish you all the best!
Thanks for this! I never knew about ACT. I also think your article is really great.
Thank-you, I’ve had quite a few therapists but only one has told me about A.C.T. I think it is fairly new, and seen as similar to CBT but it may help in a different way and I think it could be good for those who CBT doesn’t work as well for.
Archy, wonderful article. I love reading what you say on here, and this allows me to understand even more where you’re coming from. Birdie, thank you for sharing your own story as well.
Thank-you. Understanding was the key as others could only guess and many got it wrong.