I don't feel an obligation to share this with anyone, but I need writing practice, so stuff. Okay?
For starters, I'd just like to let it be known, once again, that I have
Social Anxiety Disorder and
Depression. Okay, well because of this, I have difficulties with speaking, interacting with people, doing things out in public—
important things, such as renewing my driver's license (phew, glad I got that out of the way)—and making friends. To put up with this, I've come up with some
defense mechanisms and
coping habits to handle the world a little better, but my methods are actually kind of messed up.
One thing I do is put on an emotionless mask: there's literally NO sort of emotion on my face whatsoever. Just yesterday, some guy that works in the meat department at my job made note of this, simply because I wouldn't laugh at a joke he had just told; in fact, I NEVER do. I never express emotion to anything anyone says, bar a few rare occasions. That same coworker also made note of how I never talk and how "it pisses him off." Another thing I do is mentally belittle everyone around me. I mentioned in a thread a few months back that I've never looked down upon anyone. Well, this couldn't be further from the truth. The truth is, I think everyone around me is pathetic, stupid, and unworthy—I don't like to waste my time on them because they're scum. Thirdly, I've learned how to fake emotions when dealing with people. Almost immediately after I don the most facetious Disney smile ever, my face returns right back to having no affect.
It sucks having to use these coping mechanisms, and it seems I've being using them subconciously for gods know how long; it actually took me YEARS to figure out that I was doing this. But this is how I deal with people and life and general. My face is emotionless due to depression—it's actually called '
flat affect' (Yes, there's a name for this.) In order to interact with anyone without having a major anxiety attack, I have to mentally look down on them and view them as worse than myself to sort of 'lift myself up', simply because my self-esteem is dangerously low or even non-existent. In actuality, I know that they're tons better than I can ever hope to be in every possible way imaginable... (for years I've let everyone and their brother walk all over me and eff me over, thanks to having this mindset tucked away in the far reaches of my mind) ...but if I feel if I accept this notion, that I'll be incapable of functioning properly throughout the day, which tends to be true. Faking emotions is just that: FAKING. It's all a lie, but it's just something I do to try to look somewhat 'normal'. I often say I don't give a damn what anyone thinks about me—which I don't for the most part—but there are just some things you have to [at least pretend to] care about, you know? One of such things is my appearance at work. I work as a produce clerk at a grocery store; I HAVE to deal with coworkers and customers day in and day out. Smiling, no matter how fake, just comes with the territory.
Sometimes I wish I had
enabling parents, or simply a good relationship with the one parent that I have left, just so that I could move back home and lock myself away in my old bedroom again; that way, I don't have to deal with the world and people. Sadly, I don't have the luxury of parents. I am left alone in the world to fend for myself with depression and anxiety. My coping mechanisms are all I have. I KNOW they're effed up. I KNOW that they're poor ways of dealing. But the way I see it is that they're better alternatives to smoking, drinking, using drugs or self-medicating, sex addiction, etc., etc., and I've been using my habits unconciously for years. I've always wondered how I've been able to put up with my pathetic existence without resorting to the usual (drug abuse, sex, self-harm, etc.,, although, I've attempted suicide twice), and now I've realized that it's all thanks to my effed up antisocial copng mechanisms.
And don't worry... I like to think that I have my coping behaviors under control on the Internet, but as a safety precaution (just in case), whenever I'm feeling particularly 'off' about something, I do things such as lock my profile, etc. And here some of you thought I was just being a dooshface c*nt-bucket. DON'T ASSUME. Trust me, I do this for your OWN good (lol).
Lastly... my coping mechanisms are not totally effective; sometimes, they don't work at all. Back in high school, after putting up with constant anxiety all day, I'd go home feeling like absolute crap, thinking of all the things [that I imagined?] people were judging me about—my appearance, my work performance, my anxiety in and of itself, and so on. This same cycle continues, this time with work. Every night, when I'm walking home I often hope for the worst possible thing to happen to me. Oftentimes I imagine myself crossing the street and being struck by a bus. I actually want to die really badly, but I'm too weak to do it myself. And masochistically enough, I've grown to like the feeling of being extremely depressed or something—especially the chest pain and the numbness where it feels like there's this heavy cinderblock where my heart once was; good stuff (Wow, that sounds corny. Holy cow...). I need help...
Why did I do it? I went through this period in which I thought I might be bisexual, so I wanted to make sure. The result? Turned out I wasn't. I had an.. "attraction" of sorts towards a person of the male sex, but that was a rare occurrence, and only happened once. I know that I'm straight now, but it was... interesting, to say the least, to do a little bit of experimentation.