[Lisa_K]

Jemini, on Dec 9 2005, 11:52 PM, said:

movin' right along...

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

da da da da da da....and you cant forget the jam in the church... I have to stop this...<smacking forhead>

[Jemini]

I know Big Bird's son. Or I knew him, briefly.

[Lisa_K]

Jemini, on Dec 10 2005, 12:27 AM, said:

I know Big Bird's son. Or I knew him, briefly.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Big Bird has a son? Like the guy who plays big Bird, or were you a guest as a kid(j/k)...totally off topic, which this thread has become way off topic...do you remeber when Mr. Snufflupicus (sp?) was a figment of Big Bird's imagination...?

[Jemini]

I'm ceasing the off-topic stuff. But yeah I can't believe Snuffy is real. That's wrong. Big Bird was always a delusional psychotic when I was growing up.

[Evalin]

I've come to the realization in the past year that paranoia often runs my life.

When I was in junior high I was teased mercilessly because I was in a wheelchair. I managed to make some friends, but the teasing and taunts still made me feel like a complete loser (especially because none of my friends were ever teased and bullied the way I was). To make it worse my mother was bipolar, my father was gone, and my family was the "poor" and "dysfunctional" family in town. I remember feeling depressed and completely alone. I managed to turn things around in college and had a great group of friends and was involved in activities. I was very social, felt like I was "better" than everyone else, and used my sexuality to make me feel powerful. I know that sounds terrible, but that's the truth. I began to think that my problems with depression were in the past, and felt like I was on the top of the world.

At my new job after graduating, my world came crashing around me. I felt like I was having problems communicating with others, and like everything I did was stupid (and that they were all talking about me). This was probably compounded by problems with my boss and some co-workers who expressed open dislike for me. Everyday I dreaded having to talk to anyone (even the worker at McDonalds!), because I knew that they could see the real and "ugly" me on the outside and the inside. The paranoid feelings have only gotten worse with my new job.

On the outside, I appear to be a social butterfly and to have everything together. But... everytime I interact with someone else, I begin to worry for hours or days about what he/she thinks about me. I know it is irrational, but I can't stop being anxious that they are talking about me, thinking bad things about me, and disliking me. Most of the time I don't even care if they like me or not, but that doesn't stop the intense worry that I am a disappointment, a loser, behind everyone else in accomplishments, inadequate, ackward, or wierd. I often feel ashamed of my shortcomings and severly depressed following anxious feelings like these. I try to tell myself that it really doesn't matter what they think and that rationally this is not happening and is only me being paranoid. It doesn't help. I also have a hard time going out in public at all (in my head-- on the outside I'm smiling and putting on the facade of normalcy), because I know that every person I pass is looking at me, judging how ugly old and terrible I look, or realizing what a freak I am.

Even writing this post was difficult for me. I started and erased many times, because I know (even though everyone on this forum is really helpful and nice) that all of you are going to judge me, see me for what I am, think badly about me (spend hours thinking about me in fact!!), and hate me. Even though that is irrational, I feel certain that it will happen and I can't shake this feeling.

Not sure if this is the same for anyone else or not, but I'm hopeful that I've continued going to work and trudging through each day even though it is difficult.

[Xelathecure]

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What's it like for me? It's like there is an invisible wall separating me from everyone else. In the center there is me. Outside this wall are over six billion of these things. They move and talk and think and all the other stuff I do, but I am not one of them, and in a way I know that they sense it.

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To top it off they feel the need to constantly discuss the most meaningless crap such as the weather, what's on TV, and the like. So not only do I feel alienated, but also aggravated at the superficial nature of them.

I know exactly how this stuff feels. It's like you live inside yourself and inside the sphere that is your mind. you see and understand what's going on, usually a lot more than most people, and while others are talking about the latest social "oh my god" or discussing things in the same way one would talk about the weather... or even just joking around you're sitting there thinking about the big picture, contemplating bigger things then what we can see, what we are told and what we are brought up on.

(Maybe the last bit’s just me… I do not know.)

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SP has robbed me from so many experiences and the enrichment of life. I was certainly college material, but never obtained a degree. I have been passionate and interested in certain things... and end up not fully experiencing and growing because im too anxious and uncomfortable to interact with others. It is a prison... one with thick glass walls... i can see out and view the normal world... the humor, the closeness, the majority of people who never have to think twice before interacting with people. Inside there i am all alone...

This is social phobia summed up (generally) for me. There's more to it of course but generally as I said... this is the outcome. I dropped out of highschool after having a break down... I couldn't leave my house for weeks on end and then was diagnosed with depression and Social Phobia. I got gradually better over the course of a year and a half and now I can leave... it's still hard and often I want to come straight back home...but I can do it. I tried going back to school with no success... I couldn't manage a full day but I kept at it for a month or two... my main goal was to make friends... this goal remains unforfilled. I look at all the insignificant yet ever so important things i've missed out on as a child and a teenager... Things I could have done but was too afraid as a kid and as a teen... the average idiotic teen things such as boys, partys, popularity. I detest the people who's lives revolve around these things, the average meaningless life that at the end of the day counts for shit... but at the same time I want it so bad just to know i have the choice. There are so many things I want to do in life...I want to go to uni (I live in New zealand. Uni is our college equivilent) I wish to study philosophy, sociology, psychiatry, art and politcal science but since I havn't passed anything in high school... I cannot do this. I can't get a job that I could live off unless I planned to live in a trashed out flat with teens the rest of my life which isn't what I quite had in mind. I want to travel the world... I want to work in orphanages in India, Mexico, and Ghana. I would love to get a medical degree and work at camps or hospitals where they need help. I want to make documenteries about life, about people while traveling. I've told my mum and dad all this but they half laugh because I don't even want to go and pay for things at counters. I can...but I don't like it. I've been thinking about that alot lately and I've come to the conclusion that the reason I don't do these things that I know I can do is because I have the choice not to do them...avoiding is so much easier as you all know... so when Mum or Dad are around that's what I do. They do these things for me... sometimes Mum makes me, but rarely. I figure if I leave I'll have to do these things, HAVE to be independant..and there for get use to it... I've half accepted I won't get out of this so called glass box or break through the glass walls that contain me but I do hope like hell someone else will find their way inside my mind. Nothing that I have experienced so far has led me to think this is possible though... I mean psychiatrists can't even get in there. Wow sorry for the rambling guys But yeah...my mind has room for 2 if anyone can find the key to get inside

[theycallmeblue]

xelathecure said:

I know exactly how this stuff feels. It's like you live inside yourself and inside the sphere that is your mind. you see and understand what's going on, usually a lot more than most people, and while others are talking about the latest social "oh my god" or discussing things in the same way one would talk about the weather... or even just joking around you're sitting there thinking about the big picture, contemplating bigger things then what we can see, what we are told and what we are brought up on.

(Maybe the last bit’s just me… I do not know.)

I have the same sort of thing...I am always inside my head, analyzing every moment, present, past, and future. I think highly intelligent people develop social disorders because they don't latch onto mundane, pointless shit like the average Joe. At least in my case; I am horrified by small talk, the pointless drivel that says nothing, goes nowhere...because it produces such anxiety! I am working on realizing where my anxiety stems from, and am working on regaining control.

With that said I tried to go downtown to a friend of a friend's party last night. (He rented out a bar so only chill people would be there, and hot college chicks getting off for Christmas break) Parties and social events of that nature are huge triggers for my anxiety. I ended up walking downtown alone in a panic, hyperventilating until I drove myself home and berated me mentally.

Its almost like I have painted myself into an idealistic corner. In which I think about 'bigger' issues, and mostly my endlessly depressing journey through life...To the point where im obsessive. So now I feel that I cannot just 'be' anymore.

Its as if I know what I am capable of (anything), yet at the moment I can't even get a job or support myself?!? Ugh. Finding a job with a social phobia?!

Help?

[Xelathecure]

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I have the same sort of thing...I am always inside my head, analyzing every moment, present, past, and future. I think highly intelligent people develop social disorders because they don't latch onto mundane, pointless shit like the average Joe. At least in my case; I am horrified by small talk, the pointless drivel that says nothing, goes nowhere...because it produces such anxiety! I am working on realizing where my anxiety stems from, and am working on regaining control.

Exactly how it is for me.

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Its as if I know what I am capable of (anything), yet at the moment I can't even get a job or support myself?!?

I know right... Irony is a bitch.