Social Anxiety

I've always suffered from some degree of social anxiety. I don't think I can trace it back to some humiliating experience or what...all I know is sometimes I can't handle being around people.

Now before you start making any assumptions that I'm some sort of socially awkward hermit, I have to explain that while I have social anxieties, I don't ALWAYS have social anxieties. I'm actually a pretty social person...when I'm not drowning in my insecurities. My mother would often tell me as a child that I had a high E.Q. = Emotional Quotiant. It was her way of trying to help me compensate for being insecure about my intelligence. My older brother is one of those super smart, computer programming techs and my sister was also a straight A, high ACT scoring student. Me...not so much. I was blessed with an annoyingly overactive mind that led me to pursuing unreachable dreams like being a pro athlete or rock star instead of pursuing an education.

My mother told me I had a high E.Q. because I was socially capable of conversing on the same level of adults from an early age...and I was a deeply interested friend. WAS being the operative word there. Since those young times, I have lost a lot of innocence and gained a lot of baggage. Now my E.Q. would probably be considered in the "special-needs" range.

So why am I bringing all of this up? Because today was my youngest brothers farewell. If you're reading this and wondering what a farewell is...well, in mormon culture males between the ages of 19-26 generally go on two-year missions. Most of the time, they leave when they're 19. For example, I went on a mission only four days after I turned 19. I spent two years in Oregon. My brother's spending two years in Hong Kong; I have to admit that I'm jealous that I didn't get to learn a language and get those sweet sweet sweet 18 language credits. But thats beside the point...on the final sunday before they leave, they'll usually speak in church and then return the home of the missionary for a social open house.

So this is where the social anxiety comes in. I'm not an active mormon, haven't been for several years. However, I felt I should support my brother and go to church and hear him talk. When I got there, I immediately started having a panic attack. The last time I saw most of the people that were in attendance was at my wedding six months ago. I couldn't handle the thought that they might ask me where my wife is or how married life is going or some other question I didn't want to hear, much less answer. Then I started having thoughts about all my extended family that would be in attendance and how, for most of them, the last time I saw them was also at the wedding. They would surely know that my wife and I had split...which only made things worse because now they will already have premeditated pity ready to splash on me like two teenagers in a pool ganging up on a nine year-old.

So as soon as my brother was finished with his talk, I bolted for the door. Because I knew that there would be kids and family over at the house following church, I decided to spend the entire day on the lamb. I walked around parks, writing in my notebook, saw The Soloist (which I might add wasn't as good as I thought it would be, got slow in parts, but was overall pretty good). I spent almost five hours just walking around UVU trying to write some poetry but really just trying to avoid going home.

And when I finally do go home once I felt it was reasonably safe to go home and avoid any social circumstances, my brother comes home with all of his friends and camps out right in front of my bedroom door. That was 7:30 and now its 12:30 a.m. and they're still there...just talking away like I'm not in my room at all, like I can't understand every goddamn thing they're saying. I don't know why but my social anxiety is so bad I can't muster enough confidence to leave my room. I'm trapped and dammit, I have to pee.