Advice on Loneliness & Making Friends Please?

[ShellTurtlstein]

These past few months I haven't been able to go to school because of fear and I'm being homeschooled now. It's done really well to help stop my panic attacks, but it's only amplified my loneliness and depression. I have one friend and she's great, but she lives far away and I don't have a lot that I can say to her because of a, let's just say difference of opinion when it comes to certain political ideas. How can I make more friends when I'm so socially anxious that I'm afraid to even reply to responses on social media? (I'll reply here though.) Anybody have some ideas?

 

[Rinka]

Welcome to the community, lovely to have you here

It must be hard for you to go through this. Are you getting therapy and meds? This should be able to ease it a bit.

To make new friends and to find people you can relate to, it’s always good to go to activities that interest you. Or maybe even a group therapy session. Maybe have a look if you can find groups in your area that are specific for social anxiety sufferers. I know that the website https://www.meetup.com/ has groups like that.

Its good really that you made the first step, getting online and finding us. That is a big step to start reaching out. Share your fear and frustrations and you will see that it will get easier.

 

[ShellTurtlstein]

Welcome to the community, lovely to have you here

It must be hard for you to go through this. Are you getting therapy and meds? This should be able to ease it a bit.

To make new friends and to find people you can relate to, it’s always good to go to activities that interest you. Or maybe even a group therapy session. Maybe have a look if you can find groups in your area that are specific for social anxiety sufferers. I know that the website https://www.meetup.com/ has groups like that.

Its good really that you made the first step, getting online and finding us. That is a big step to start reaching out. Share your fear and frustrations and you will see that it will get easier.

Thanks for the reply. I have been on medication, but instead of trying new ones when the first couple didn't work my parents (who aren't trusting of psychiatric medication) took me off of them. I'm not currently in therapy because, I live too far away from therapists for my parents to take me to one. Thanks for the idea to use MeetUp though. I'll continue trying to find support anyway I can. Including here.

 

[MasterRoshi]

Thanks for the reply. I have been on medication, but instead of trying new ones when the first couple didn't work my parents (who aren't trusting of psychiatric medication) took me off of them. I'm not currently in therapy because, I live too far away from therapists for my parents to take me to one. Thanks for the idea to use MeetUp though. I'll continue trying to find support anyway I can. Including here.

Hi! Sorry to hear you’re struggling. I know the feeling. I couldn’t even go into target by myself, and if I was with someone I couldn’t stay long before having to quickly run to the car, many times ending in tears.

I would really recommend therapy. I know you said it’s too far to drive, but there might be some video chat online therapist you could research or even phone call therapists.

Not sure how old you are but eventually with phone therapy, you might be able to take a bus and meet in person??

My therapist is doing CBT with me and it’s been slowly helping. She had my buy this workbook and I am learning a lot about myself and my negative thoughts.

I have also started exercising outside every day, meditating daily, hand written journaling daily, and discussing my anxiety and thoughts with my parents daily.

This combination of things (along wit a few other thugs I didn’t mention) have helped me finally break the cycle and I am SLOWLY healing.

 

[ShellTurtlstein]

Hi! Sorry to hear you’re struggling. I know the feeling. I couldn’t even go into target by myself, and if I was with someone I couldn’t stay long before having to quickly run to the car, many times ending in tears.

I would really recommend therapy. I know you said it’s too far to drive, but there might be some video chat online therapist you could research or even phone call therapists.

Not sure how old you are but eventually with phone therapy, you might be able to take a bus and meet in person??

My therapist is doing CBT with me and it’s been slowly helping. She had my buy this workbook and I am learning a lot about myself and my negative thoughts.

I have also started exercising outside every day, meditating daily, hand written journaling daily, and discussing my anxiety and thoughts with my parents daily.

This combination of things (along wit a few other thugs I didn’t mention) have helped me finally break the cycle and I am SLOWLY healing.

It sounds like you're making great progress! I managed to find a therapist, but I haven't been to an appointment yet, so we'll see... (It turns out that there was a therapist in my town, they just didn't advertise and are based only on doctor referrals) I've tried CBT with a school counselor, but against my best efforts it didn't seem to help, so I think I'll just try talk therapy and see where it takes me. My ADHD makes it hard for me to journal personally, especially because if I don't do it consistently it makes me feel like I'm a failure. I'm super glad those things work for you though. I am also happy to hear that you can discuss these things with your parents, (Some of my anxiety stems from my parents, so no talking there.) I will keep in mind exercise though. I have to bike to the therapy place anyways because it's still a few kilometers away from me and my dad has a punching bag in our backyard that I can use. Thanks for your suggestions. It truly is very kind.

 

[MasterRoshi]

It sounds like you're making great progress! I managed to find a therapist, but I haven't been to an appointment yet, so we'll see... (It turns out that there was a therapist in my town, they just didn't advertise and are based only on doctor referrals) I've tried CBT with a school counselor, but against my best efforts it didn't seem to help, so I think I'll just try talk therapy and see where it takes me. My ADHD makes it hard for me to journal personally, especially because if I don't do it consistently it makes me feel like I'm a failure. I'm super glad those things work for you though. I am also happy to hear that you can discuss these things with your parents, (Some of my anxiety stems from my parents, so no talking there.) I will keep in mind exercise though. I have to bike to the therapy place anyways because it's still a few kilometers away from me and my dad has a punching bag in our backyard that I can use. Thanks for your suggestions. It truly is very kind.

I know the feeling about failure when notndoing what we set out to do. I was just writing about it actually. CBT has started to help me gain new relationships with those activities and my reaction to them. Yes sometimes I’ll fail, but also sometimes I don’t. First time I’m probably 25 years that I’ve been able to have a glimpse at what that feels like!!

What I’ve realized for me is there’s no magic pill solution. I’m guessing this is a 2-4 year recovery process with regular daily work. We have created a dialogue in our mind that is strongly engrained over many years. To change this will take work and my herbalist keeps reminding me that for me to expect I can erase 25 years of this in only 5 months is unrealistic.

So the journey is long, but also, it’s not like it’s the same intensity of pain for 2-4 years then one day you wake up and it’s shddenly removed and we’re happy. It’s a gradual change so we do start to see benefits slowly.

I equate it to working out like a body builder. To go from skinny to buff doesn’t happen overnight, it takes regular work over a long period of time and the before and after picture will be insane but the day to day transformation is slow and we live with ourselves so it won’t seem dramatic. It’s that reflection back on the old us that shows how we’re growing. But only time and comsitent work can heal.

And as for talk therapy, I basically do that with my therapist weekly, it really helps ground me, the. Throughout the week I do CBT exercises. So it’s a great combination of both. And I’ve needed talk therapy at times (it helped me get through a suicidal period recently), so I’m all for talk therapy as well!

Best of luck and stay in touch!