Why do I shut out everyone who cares for me?

DEAR BEL

I AM incredibly shy. I have zero selfesteem, zero self-confidence. I hate meeting new people and get very uncomfortable i n any social occasion, even something simple such as shopping.

I hate the phone — it scares me witless, so I ignore it if it rings. I hate asking for anything in a shop or restaurant. Even with close friends and family I can get tongue-tied, embarrassed, talk over people or say nothing at all. I know I appear rude or stand-offish, which isn’t my intention at all.

I have few true friends as I find it very hard to open up and trust. Those I have, I love dearly. Clearly I have big issues that I should address and get help for, but I need to be brave enough to make that step.

I think I may have social anxiety, but the treatment for that seems to be counselling, which I would definitely not feel comfortable with. Just telling a doctor is too daunting.

But I know I need to do something. In the past 12 months two friends have decided they no longer want me in their lives. They just stopped answering messages, cancelled arrangements at the last minute and stopped talking to me.

When they were going through difficult times, I was there for them as much as I could be. They were friends I could open up to — something I find so hard to do.

My initial reaction was to feel used and think they were in the wrong, but clearly that is not the case and the problem is me.

I look back and try to think what I did or said wrong, but can’t find anything. I wish they would tell me what I did or didn’t do. I tried asking when things started getting funny between us, but was fobbed off.

So I guess I just have to get on with life without them. But my already low self-esteem is even worse. I feel totally unlovable and am obviously a truly awful friend.

Trust is a huge thing and I feel as if I want to shut myself away with my little family and never go out, drive away the few close friends I have (and probably my boyfriend and the children, too, as I clearly am not a nice person to be around) and fester in my own horrid company. What shall I do?

SUE

When I read your email, naturally I felt huge compassion for your unhappiness and yet at the very end I had to smother my feelings of exasperation.

At first you sound like a desperately solitary person who could even be agoraphobic or suffering f rom depression. But then it becomes clear that you have loving friends, as well as a boyfriend and children. (I wish you knew how many lonely readers would be giving heartfelt thanks for such blessings).

So, though those relationships do not rule out my first fears, they do widen the horizons of your life.

The normal advice about seeking counselling (oh, how easy it is to suggest that — though I really do believe it can help) will be a waste of time as you have ruled it out at this stage. So, let’s try to pick through what you have said.

First, being dumped by two friends has clearly triggered a pernicious lowering of an already low mood, and so I am wondering if you can enlist the help of one of the good friends you value so much to help you work out what happened.

You can’t do this on your own. Your friend can also help you start a necessary process of contradicting

all those negative thoughts, starting with: ‘The problem is me.’

Do you know that for sure? Of course you don’t, because it is impossible to know such a thing. Who’s to say that the friends didn’t have problems of their own, which meant they had to withdraw from

your company? It might well be their ‘fault’. Or (more likely) nobody’s — just one of those shifts that happen within relationships.

You’ve clearly been looking online, which is why you have given your mental state a name. Was it a relief?

Whether or not you are right, I’d l i ke you to l ook at this useful American website: www.helpguide. org/articles/anxiety/social-anxietydisorder-and-social-phobia.htm

Read the section very clearly, working through every single one of the suggestions, including the slow, deep breathing. This is your quest: to discover more about the truth of why you feel as you do, and so do something about it — all by yourself.

Do you need therapy? Yes, I think so — because you need to trace your zero self-esteem right back and learn new ways of changing your mindset. But you will need to teach yourself how to seek help.

You really do need challenging on the damaging self-pity that makes you call yourself ‘horrid’ and visualise your boyfriend packing his bags and taking the children away. Have you ever talked to him about that scenario? Do you think he would be wounded by your negative perception of who he is and how he would behave? Never mind your selfesteem, what about his?

I’d like you to do a little exercise, which is to ‘ flip’ every negative thought which places you at centre stage and make a conscious effort to come up with a different view of each of the situations you mention.

So, ‘the phone scares me witless’ becomes ‘the phone is a nuisance sometimes so I choose not to pick up’. ‘I come across as rude and stand-offish’ becomes ‘other people must feel intimidated by me, so I must put them at their ease’.

‘I’m nervous of shops’ becomes ‘shop assistants are often treated rudely, so my task is to be friendly and treat them well’.

Starting with your letter to me, write down the negatives, then come up with positive thoughts instead. You can do this. ‘Shut myself away’? No — open up the door of your own prison and set yourself free.