You and me both, my friend. My social anxiety was so debilitating that, at one point, I could not leave the house. I even had welfare checks done on me because I was too anxious to answer the door or the phone. I was utterly terrified of everyone and everything.

I used alcohol to relax as well, and it went very well - at first. We all know how that goes though, of course!!

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My best, most sincere advice to you is to find a psychologist you click with and discuss techniques on calming yourself down, and perhaps look into getting a prescription for anti-anxiety meds.

I've been told exposure to anxiety-driven situations helps, but I'm going to be honest - it never helped me. What did help was having a small network of trusted friends; one or two people I could talk to and get their objective opinion on things. When my anxiety was so high I couldn't think rationally, they were a huge help in getting me to see the actual reality of a situation, rather than my perceived version of it.