Social Anxiety: Episode 3

My social anxiety is self diagnosed. I have not been to a doctor to be formally diagnosed because doctors are expensive, and I already know that social situations make me anxious. My hope is that by sharing my experiences, I can help others in similar situations feel less alone.

This is the last episode for the week, though I plan to update in the future when I have something relevant to add.

Tonight saw a little bit of success. M has been sleeping since around 4:30p. I think she will sleep until tomorrow morning, because she woke up in the middle of the night with nightmares. That means G didn't have a playmate. The first hour was fine; he played with some toys. Then the restlessness broke in. Boyfriend read a couple books with him, then I read a couple books with him. We cuddled on my bed, reading our respective books (I had been napping when the restlessness began). By 7p, he was fidgety which was making me fidgety. I decided to do something we haven't done since we moved - go for a walk.

We got our shoes on and walked out the door. I could see a group of 10ish adults clustered near the mail boxes, but luckily they were dispersing by the time we got to the end of the street. I exchanged a few words with the neighbors from two doors down, but G and I kept walking. It wasn't a long walk; I let G decide which direction we should go, and after 10 minutes he said we should go home.

On our way back to the house, we saw our next door neighbor doing upkeep on his oldest son's dirt bike. The son is 17, and races the dirt bike almost every weekend, so there is a lot of necessary maintenance to keep it in proper working order. G is obsessed with the dirt bike. The younger son (he's in 8th grade) has a dirt bike that he rides in their backyard, and one of the kids down the street brings his quad over. Gabriel stands on the fence in our back yard, watching them the entire time they ride.

At the foot of the neighbor's driveway, Gabriel asked if we could go see the bike. We did, and I ended up having a half hour conversation with my neighbor. It is the first real conversation I have had on the street. I mean, I have talked to the other moms a little bit, but not much beyond the pleasantries.

Although I didn't talk to the large group of people, I did have real conversation with one neighbor, so I will count today as a success, and do my best tomorrow.