Increased heart rate, sweaty palms, racing thoughts, inability to look people in the eyes, an overall nervousness, a feeling of paranoia for unknown reasons, an unidentified and usually irrational fear that can cause panic but you dont always know exactly what type of fear it is or what exactly is causing it.
It just makes you want to vacate the area immediately. Basically it is simply being nervous around people. It can stem from self esteem issues which causes paranoia that people are constantly judging you and you dont want to do or say something stupid, so you start feeling weird or just shut down and you dont want to interact with anyone around you. Some have a fear that someone will hurt them. Theres a huge list of reasons why people get social anxiety.
For me, I was picked on a lot as a child and my self esteem was affected. As i age, it affects me less and less but i still have bouts of it here and there. I have paranoid tendencies where i think people are staring at me and judging me, but i totally know thats not what is going on. Im a human being in public and human beings have eyes and they use them to view their surroundings and i just so haoppen to be in their field of view. This is how ive rationalized it in my own mind. If I do see someone blatantly staring at me now, i simply walk up to them and ask them if everything is ok.
But Its just scary at times when my brain floats away from reality and i think people are talking shit behind my back. When in reality they are just looking around. I forget that i have very big blue eyes and ive noticed people tend to stare at them, so that as well can be a reason people like to look at me but its irrational as fuck because WHY AM I WORRIED IF PEOPLE LOOK AT ME? LOL. This is the struggle, and its very real.
This is the worst form of social anxiety imo because it makes you paranoid as fuck and for no good reason. I usually just want to leave wherever it is I am when this happens. But its crazy because i can be home alone and have an episode come on very strongly as well. I get anxious out of nowhere and get confused because there was nothing that necessarily triggered it.
Ive learned to acknowledge what it is and what has helped me is to do breathing exercises and sort of meditate. Im not sure why my brain goes off the deep end sometimes but i think for most of us that have this, we can all agree its a pain in the ass to deal with.
And i dont even suffer from it that much. I cant imagine people who have it so bad they go into full on panic attacks. And I refuse to take medication for it as i have it under control. For others, i can see why they need meds. It can be scary as fuck if you cant control it as it just seems to get worse and worse.
Its uncomfortable and it sucks the life out of us. If you ever see anyone having a panic attack please do not laugh.
Many people have to deal with this stupid fucking phenomenon every day and it is not easy to deal with so please be kind to these people and help them in any way that you can.
We are not crazy!