I spent a year without going outside as a teen when my anxiety was at its worst. Mentions of going outside made me have panic attacks, even going to my backyard was impossible without having panic attacks. I literally spent all my time inside my house without even seeing the sun for months on end. I had several panic attacks, some times more than ten a day, and they usually lasted more than 30 minutes so there were days I'd spent the whole fucking day having panic attack after panic attack.

I started going to the therapist and psychiatrists twice a week each (my mom drove me, and I'd have panic attacks along the way and also at the doctors' offices). I was put on a lot of medication, supervised constantly and did a whole lot of therapy.

It took me some time to get over it, I spent many years medicated and I'm still in therapy at 21. At about 17 I was finally able to take a bus by myself without panicking, for example (my agoraphobia started when I was about 13). I skipped school a lot over the years, and was held back a year when I was 15 because I didn't go to school.

But now you'd never guess I ever had social anxiety. I still struggle with going to some gatherings, especially if I believe people there don't like me for some reason (which is almost never true). But I usually power through (with the help of family or my significant other, sometimes) and attend anyway. I go to therapy once a week and I'm no longer medicated except for klonopin if I'm very anxious or panicky but that's never because of other people. I can take the bus just fine, I can attend class, making friends is hard because I'm shy, but I'm a completely normal person as far as the eye can see :)