Social anxiety

[forgotten_aria]

I cherish those friends where I don't have to worry what I say is stupid enough that they'll stop liking me. I have a handful of such friends, and for someone who suffers with replaying social situations over and over, their presence is some of the few places I can relax and be happy.

I don't know if I'm getting worse at social interactions, or it just feels worse because I've been hiding from them such that I know life can be anxiety free in my little house-cave.

FB has definitely made me feel like there are certain subjects that I just need to avoid, even in real life. I'm really tired of trying to be a good, open minded person, but still ending up feeling like the bad guy. I hope I am not actually the bad guy (and please, if I am, someone I trust tell me.)

I do need to remind myself that if I don't open my mouth, I can't say something stupid.

Comments

[sauergeek]

I dropped off FB — deleted everything I'd posted, deleted all my likes, and then deleted my account — for several reasons, but one of the lesser ones was the stress.

However, before that, I'd managed to offend at least two people into unfriending me. One, so far as I can tell, by me being a liberal who wouldn't keep quiet; the other by being insulting to the Confederacy. My first reaction was surprise. Next was "don't let the door hit you on the way out".

Stupid is often a matter of perception. When the brouhaha about the Confederate flag was going on, I had a number of people posting stuff in favor of the flag. I'd call them on their garbage. I do not think that me doing so was saying something stupid, but one of them did to the point of unfriending me.