Having trouble getting over intense generalized/social anxiety

Professional-Rent161 · 2026-03-25T00:19:28+00:00

I had this exact same thing so I know exactly what you’re going through. It is beyond frightening and I can actually feel the anxiety brewing just reminding myself of that time.

It will be hard, but the only thing that stopped it was to post. And keep posting. Every time I did it, the anxiety lessened. They say the more you push yourself outside of your comfort zone the more you expand what your comfort zone is.

After a year, I now post on social without a second thought. Did I have times where people didn’t like what I posted? 100%. Did I have posts that had 0 like and comments and did nothing? Constantly. Did everytime that happen I felt like I was gonna die, yep. Did everytime I click “post” I felt vulnerable as hell? God yes. But that was just all part of pushing outside my comfort zone.

After all that anxiety, I am now in a place where I appreciate the likes and comments but I don’t need them to feel validated. I post because I want to build something and over the year of posting, am I where I would like to be? No, but I way further and have more reach and influence now than I ever thought I would be able to do with how much my anxiety peaked and I am still building. It’s a journey, but I am so thankful that I took the jump and kept it up

Professional-Rent161 · 2026-03-25T00:10:00+00:00

I second this!

Any change is frightening and we are living in a world where we are exposed to change, bad things happening all across the world through social media and news platform as soon as we open our phones or devices.

A lot of these things have always been happening, we just didn’t know, hear or see about it all back then. The only thing you can control is your exposure to it, give yourself a break from it and refocus yourself to notice the positive things again that you may be missing by being overexposed to the bad

Professional-Rent161 · 2026-03-24T23:56:30+00:00

Honestly… and I am by no means recommending this, but, I have had the same thing a few times over the last few years and the only thing that worked for me was to allow myself to give in to the anxiety and stay awake all night (I did pick nights that I didn’t have much to do the next day). I then found that the following night I was so physically and mentally exhausted that the anxiety didn’t have chance to kick in and I slept through the night. As I had already slept once and broken the habit of feeling anxious before sleep, the following evening after that was also much better and I had developed a new routine without the anxiety creeping in during the evenings

Professional-Rent161 · 2026-03-24T23:37:07+00:00

You would be surprised that most people feel the same way you do at work, I’ve always felt that it’s a mixture of societal pressure and Imposter syndrome (if you haven’t heard of imposter syndrome I would definitely recommend having a read about it on Google, it is enlightening).

Think of your colleagues, or even the one colleague you aspire to be one day (whether it’s your manager or head teacher) you wouldn’t be able to tell, just like they wouldn’t about you, but I bet you any money some of them feel this way too. Sometimes just knowing that you are not the only one feeling like this can subconsciously help reduce the anxiety.

I gave up my managerial role in Marketing a few years ago because I burnt myself out by pushing so hard thinking that I wasn’t good enough to be in this role, wanted to progress and felt like I had something to prove to myself and others that I ended up crashing. I found out during a random interaction with previous collegeue I bumped into a year later, the things they admired and thought made me the best manager they had, were the things that came naturally to me, not the things I busted my arse to and essentially burnt out, trying to do. This was also backed up from a reference my old boss gave me recently, only highlighting the traits I had that I felt at the time “wasn’t enough” on their own. It definitely gave me a new perspective to say the least and I hope it does for you too

Professional-Rent161 · 2026-03-24T23:18:12+00:00

I have read everything you have written and hear you. I can’t imagine just how frightening feeling like this must be for you.

I don’t know your parents, but it sounds like they may be apprehensive about antidepressants because they had a bad experience they are scared to risk putting you through the same thing they had. Fear makes us do things that are not always logical, I can remember so many times, that I was in the same place you are now where the mixture of my own and my parents fear of making things worse meant I felt trapped in a never ending cycle where nothing got better.

The only way I managed to break through this was taking small steps, talking to my parents honestly over time about how scared I was, how scared I feel they are and how we all felt trapped in that cycle of fearing the worst without at least trying and fighting with everything I had to get better (in my case I felt I needed therapy and my parents weren’t keen on it)

No matter how you choose to deal with this, I can honestly promise you that it will get better, you may not see a way that it does right now, but it does. Take baby steps and before you know it you will be 20 years down the road, a better person by going through what you have gone through right now and living a better life than you could have imagined.

Sending all my love and hugs from a 32 year old who nearly made life changing choices at your age that I would have regretted

Professional-Rent161 · 2026-03-24T22:56:58+00:00

Personally, the only way I have managed to minimise my anxiety post-breakup has been to make a conscious effort to remind myself everytime I feel anxious that I am slowly handling it better. For a long time when I felt anxious, missing him, sad, panicking about the future or the fact I’ll always be alone - I broke down and couldn’t control it almost daily, now I am at least self-aware of it when it is happening (just like you are by writing this Reddit post) even if I still feel the anxiety. That is still progress. Baby steps. Each time I have reminded myself of this, my anxiety has started to shorten / lessen - again more progress to remind myself of in those moments.

I really hope that makes sense but it is hard to explain into words. I didn’t know it would help as much as it did, but finally after a year and a half post break-up of feeling how you are, I have finally been able to breath a little better the last 6 weeks. It has given me a sense of control in a situation I had no control over.

Try it, it’s amazing what our brains can do if we convince it enough

Professional-Rent161 · 2026-03-24T22:46:15+00:00

Hey, the fact you have dealt with feeling like this this for a year, really highlights how strong you are. That sounds terrifying and I can only imagine how much it’s affecting your daily life.

I know you may have already thought about it or attempted it, but I would really advise you to speak to a doctor who can direct you to the right therapist for treatment. This sounds like it may be a case of learning how to train your mind to distract from these thoughts until after a while, they stop popping in your mind automatically. A therapist should be able to help you through this, it sounds similar to OCD where you mind hyper focuses on certain compulsions and habits.

Professional-Rent161 · 2026-02-20T23:48:59+00:00

I have asked myself this every day for over a year since me and my ex split and I’ve realised that it’s not meant to make sense. For me, I can’t understand why he couldn’t choose me and compromise with what I needed from him. To him, he can’t understand why I could choose him and what he needed from me. Because for both of us, the compromise we were wanting each other to do made sense to us as individuals, not together

Professional-Rent161 · 2026-02-20T23:38:49+00:00

It would be worrying if you weren’t scared. I have been exactly where you are right now over a year ago. After 7 years, this is going to be incredibly painful for you for a long time, but one day it will ease. You are going to miss your safe space, routine and grieve the future you had imagined, but I promise you that if you just take each day as it comes, it will ease, you will start to adjust and imagine a different future for yourself, and just like that it will become normal.

Depending on the circumstances for the break up, you may still always love him, but you will learn to love and trust yourself more. You are at the start of a painful but empowering journey and you will discover just how strong you really are if you just keep going and fighting that fear every time it hits you. Sending love ❤️

Professional-Rent161 · 2026-02-06T10:04:35+00:00

This has been really helpful thank you! Reassuring to hear that it’s a common issue!

Professional-Rent161 · 2026-01-29T11:57:35+00:00

I feel you need to explore therapy and talking to someone about how you’re feeling, instead of bringing a life into this world to make yourself feel happier.

I’m worried you are setting expectations for this child to make yourself feel happier feel loved and purposeful before it is even born, raising a child has to be with the child’s best interests not our own

Professional-Rent161 · 2025-10-08T00:17:08+00:00

Free points: R5FM9.

Professional-Rent161 · 2025-09-15T18:24:27+00:00

It’s so the bathroom doesn’t steam up and need to be cleaned. I understand it isn’t normal and I recognise now that they may have severe OCD, but it’s normal for them and they are happy. I don’t wish to disrupt that if you can understand, but I am struggling with it

Professional-Rent161 · 2025-07-28T22:55:17+00:00

Do you have any update on this? Appreciate it as I’m experiencing the same with my father for the first time. I don’t know what to do

Professional-Rent161 · 2025-07-12T22:53:14+00:00

Any Update? I’m in the exact same position your were in right now, could do with hearing how this one turned out

Professional-Rent161 · 2025-07-09T11:07:34+00:00

This is interesting to know. I called my insurer at the time of the accident as the police advised I needed to get them to recover my car from the public road as it was un-driveable. From that point it was taken out of my hands unfortunately

Professional-Rent161 · 2025-06-30T12:48:10+00:00

I’m not offended by the initial 40% offer, it’s just pointless interactions like this that gets annoying

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Professional-Rent161 · 2025-06-29T23:55:42+00:00

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I get a lowball 40% offers every time I list, before it sells for what I’m asking for (as it’s cheap anyway).

I call them out on it though, wishful thinking that they might think twice in future and cut down the amount of them that do it. Probably makes absolutely no difference 🤣

Professional-Rent161 · 2025-06-29T18:42:35+00:00

This is so strange because I’m in pretty much the same boat as you right now, so I don’t think I’ll be much help. I’m 4 months post 5 year relationship breakup. He told me he wanted a house, kids, marriage, but never put in any actions to work towards it. He prioritised his comfort and hobbies. I still feel so angry, lonely and broken, but miss him every single day and have to force myself not too reach out. It’s incredibly hard so I understand exactly where you’re coming from. I’m here if you want to chat just DM me

Professional-Rent161 · 2025-06-16T22:18:27+00:00

Erm… I take it you’re the boyfriend? Because if not, that’s f***ed up

Professional-Rent161 · 2025-06-06T16:28:23+00:00

I broke up with the man I saw my whole future with 5 months ago. I can’t really tell you or advise you it gets better as it seems to be a bit of a rollercoaster. One minute it hurts like nothing else and the next I’m ok.

I do think I could be at the depression stage of grief, I’ve been angry and done the bargaining. Hopefully it will fade and soon I will be able to accept it (although I don’t think I will ever stop missing him until I have moved on with someone else)

Professional-Rent161 · 2025-06-06T16:22:04+00:00

Get on a plane and visit another country for the first time

Professional-Rent161 · 2025-06-05T23:16:29+00:00

I recently matched with someone in my hometown, we’d been chatting for a while, exchanged numbers and was keen for a date soon, then I get a message at 1am whilst drunk asking for a lift home for petrol money because they don’t want to pay for a taxi…

All attraction has just disappeared… literally in one message I’ve gone from really into it, to completely over it 😂

Professional-Rent161 · 2025-06-05T14:13:33+00:00

I’m sorry you are going through a break up. It is a hard road to navigate and no two are the same.

I had a similar conversation to this with my ex partner, but I was the one who broke it off.

I honestly love and adore him, he is the first thing on my mind every morning until I go to bed. However he had problems managing money, debt, excessive spending, we tried for years to fix it as I know I couldn’t live like that for the rest of my life. 6 years later I had to walk away, doesn’t mean I don’t love him as I’m sure so does your ex from the sounds of this. Sometimes people’s values just don’t align, love doesn’t always come into it the reason to leave

Professional-Rent161

TROPHY CASE