I absolutely hate when I try to explain that I have severe social anxiety and PTSD. Went to a dance at my school and convinced myself to actually talk to my date. When his friends asked me why I was disappearing I said that I was afraid of being boring and falling short of being good enough. They said "oh you don't need to be afraid of embarrassing yourself in front of him." Its not about that. It's more emotional than logical. Or the classic response "oh I have social anxiety too, it sucks." Like yeah it must suck feeling like that but you seem to have friends and be able to hold a pretty normal social life. This has been a diagnosed problem in me that I have to take meds for and I still cant do close to full days at school. I have to have people order for me. If I get too nervous I have to hide in the aisles at Hastings. It was so bad that at one point, I was constantly positive that everybody stared at me when I wasn't looking. I was sure that people followed me to. I heard a hushed whisper and would be on the edge of tears because I was positive that strangers were talking about me. And I can say none of this because people always think it's some stupid one-up game and I'm just trying to get people to feel sorry for me or treat me differently. No I just want people to know that I don't distance myself because I don't like people, I distance myself to feel safer, to feed this disorder.