People with anxiety who have trouble making calls, appointments, reading mail or emails, how has it affected your life and how do you deal with it?

I have social anxiety and generalized anxiety and been dealing with it for years. I have missed out on a lot of thing’s especially dating. I’m worried about how I look, what to say, what the person is going to think and say, etc., to the point that I have a prepared script. For generalized anxiety its miscellaneous, covering work, school, health, family, the future and so on. Also, for a long time I would engage in short term relief at the expensive of long term relief. Here’s an example: thinking of dating would make me anxious and to get relief I would postpone dating (short term relief) but, while postponing dating would lower the intensity of the anxiety, the issue (dating) and the anxiety would still be there. To help address these issues, I see a therapist and engage in cognitive behavioral therapy (cbt) and Acceptance commitment therapy (act). Both of these treatments have helped me a lot.

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