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Seeking constitutional remedy for social phobia | From LisaX [Log on to view profile] | on 2008-09-15 |
| 387 replies | 18387 views |
I have social phobia so debilitating that it keeps me from being able to get a job or have a normal life. Here are some of the stranger symptoms: I am unable to make eye contact. If I force myself to do it I cannot sustain it; I automatically look away.
I have a strong inhibition about addressing people by their name. It is like I actually cannot do it, or I get so nervous from the effort that I appear more normal if I don't. I've had this all my life. It is worse with some people than others but I don't know the reasons.
When I have gone to a store enough times that people start to recognize me I will avoid the people that recognize me, to the point that I will try to learn their schedules and go when they're not there. I will always go to the cashier that I have seen the fewest times.
There are certain people who make me very uncomfortable for no good reason, I will just involuntarily shudder when they're around and try to avoid them, not because I think there's anything wrong with them or don't like them, it's like a physical reaction.
I feel very weak in the presence of people, as if their presence inhibits me from even being able to think. I always feel like other people have the upper hand and like they're out to judge me. I act so nervous that people always think there is something wrong with me. I generally don't say very much, because I don't know what are the right things to say.
I also have inhibitions about writing and drawing, even though I had talent for both of them when I was younger.
My symtoms are usually worse in the morning and get better toward the evening.
I am very senstitive to sunlight, and feel better in rainy or cool weather, or after dark.
Some foods that make me feel better are coffee with cream, eggs (sometimes), cheese, garlic, salt.
As for cheese: I love it and often crave it but certain cheeses disgust me and make me gag. Mostly American cheese or processed cheeses like Velveeta and Cheeze Whiz type stuff, but I can be put off by any cheese that happens to have the wrong texture.
I can't stand alchohol.
I tend toward low blood pressure, and often have dizziness with loss of vision upon standing.
I have low energy overall but with bursts of hyperactivity; when walking I often break into a run for a while, and when home alone I bounce off the walls.
I'm sensitive to light and sound in general, and have a specific aversion to the sound of paper napkins rubbing together. I have to cover my ears.
I have an aversion to the smell of cedar.
I can't think when there is a lot of noise and activity around me. I feel paralyzed by it.
I tend to be disorganized and absentminded.
I used to cry easily but after taking Ignatia it has gotten better. But it did nothing for the most distressing symptons.
My favorite color is dark red, like the color of carnelian, but most of my clothes are black.
I don't really know what else would help, but if anyone knows of anything please let me know. |
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| Re: Seeking constitutional remedy for social phobia | From sameervermani [Log on to view profile] | on 2008-09-16 |
Hello Lisa,
Tell me, can you correlate any life event to the start of these problems ? Any stressful situation, that you went through ?
Are you very sensitive to music ?
I look forward to your replies.
Sameer | | |
| Re: Seeking constitutional remedy for social phobia | From LisaX [Log on to view profile] | on 2008-09-16 |
Sameer,
Thank you for responding.
I first became aware of the basic problem around the time I started Kindergarten. I remember being alternately singled out and ignored and it messed with my sense of identity. What I learned from it is that I just wasn't one of them and that everybody could just tell. Experience only reinforced this feeling.
On the first day of Kindergarten, we played a game where everybody stands in a circle and throws a ball around, and I was the only person nobody threw the ball to. This may sound like a small thing but it was significant to me at the time because I immediately started questioning what it meant. I think it increased both my self-awareness and my sense of isolation.
I was painfully shy and was frequently put on the spot and reprimanded for being shy which only make it worse.
I was picked on all throughout school, all the way through high school, even though I changed schools several times.
The adults around me kept sending me to psychiatrists, because it seemed to obvious to them that there was just something wrong with me. This further exacerbated it because the sense that other people instinctively reacted to me as if there were something wrong with me kind of WAS what was wrong.
It isn't as if I do anything to draw attention to myself or there is anything obviously weird about me. Since I'm quiet it usually starts before I say anything. I don't know WHAT it is, which makes it even more psychologically troublesome because it seems to operate on a deeper, more existential level, like I'm just marked somehow. I'm old enough to know better now but I've already internalized it and I carry the feeling with me wherever I go.
I think I am sensitive to music but with subjective stuff like that it's hard to know whether I'm more or less sensitive than other people. When music is playing it's hard for me to not listen to it. Therefore I can't use it just as background music because I can't listen to music and think about something unrelated at the same time.
Does that help?
Thanks. | | |
| Re: Seeking constitutional remedy for social phobia | From busymum [Log on to view profile] | on 2008-09-16 |
Lisa,
As well as homeopathic help, I really think you will benefit from self help hypnotherapy tapes by Glenn Harrold. There are many C.D.'s to choose from amazon.co.uk, such as 'self esteem', 'develop your self confidence', 'positive thinking' and others. This author is super & his tapes are world renowned. Take care, you need not suffer like you are doing.Please check them out. | | |
| Re: Seeking constitutional remedy for social phobia | From LisaX [Log on to view profile] | on 2008-09-16 |
Ok, thank you for the suggestion, I'll try and check them out.
More information:
It occurred to me that the family history might be relevant.
I have an identical twin sister. Our parents divorced when we were still very young, I don't know exactly what age but I don't have any clear memories of them being together, except that I remember them fighting. My dad disappeared and my mom was hospitalized for depression and for attempting suicide.
We ended up with our grandparents, my mother's parents. The parents would periodically get back in touch (my mother did a better job than my father but often for years at a time we didn't know where either of them were.
The grandparents ran them down to us, and they also would exaggerate our badness, and it was never for anything specific that we did but just in general. They kept threatening to send us to an orphanage.
Actually we did well in school and did not have any behavioral problems. When I was about 11 years old they singled me out as the bad one and I did not understand why because I wasn't doing anything that my sister wasn't doing. My mom had apparently started having problems with them at about that age and they would tell me I was just like her and derisively call me by her name. They told me I was a juvenile delinquent and kept implying that I was fooling around with boys. Actually I was not doing anything. My grades were still good although they had dropped a little from stress but I only made one C, the rest were mostly A's with a few B's. I had never committed a crime or done ANYTHING with a boy, I didn't lie or talk back or be openly disobedient. And they never pinned it on anything specific that I did. It was just me in general.
Also they would deliberately taunt me until I screamed, and then laugh at me.
My aunt offered to take me off their hands. I remember my grandfather telling me that he couldn't give me to her because she was too good of a person to deserve someone as bad as me. But I DID end up moving in with her, when I was 11 years old.
It was worse there. My uncle sexually abused me and also ran me down all the time and played weird psychological games, which he owned up to on several occasions as if to gloat about. They were obsessed with what was wrong with me and kept sending me to psychiatrists and counselors and they would say right in front of me that they tried to love me but I was just too hard to like.
They would make me have family discussions in which they would put me on the spot and tell me everything that was wrong with me.
They had a daughter of their own who was a little younger than me and they were clear on the fact that she was their child and I was not. They told me that I should not expect things to be equal between me and her.
There were very weird things they did but the list goes on and on.
I remember being constantly very stressed during this time. It wasn't a depressed, self-pitying feeling, although I did feel that way sometimes. I just was very conscious that the strain of it was destroying me and that my nerves couldn't take much more. Things were bad at school too so there was never any escape. By this time my grades were starting to drop.
After 3 years they decided that they didn't want me anymore either so they sent me to live with my mom, where her friend who kept hanging around kept molesting me and stalking me and driving my friends away and going through my stuff and writing abusive things on my walls but nobody cared or did anything about it and everybody blamed me.
I dropped out of school when I was 16 and my life never recovered from it.
I don't really care about any of that. I'm angry but the thing that bothers me the most is that I let them win. They kept telling me I would fail and then I did. I used to be good at a lot of things and my biggest dream was always to figure out what kind of work I could best apply my talents to and to get a job doing it. And my biggest regret is that I have let my life derail so badly that it gets harder and harder to see how it will ever happen. I can't even get a job at Taco Bell. They won't hire me. I'm not really depressed, it's more of a sense of rage and frustration. I'm 33 and it seems unrealistic to expect a fresh start at this point but if I don't overcome this stuff before I die I know that it will torment me eternally.
This probably isn't relevant to homeopathy but I thought I should mention it just in case.
But I don't think the psychological dimension is the whole story. I think that I probably do have a neurological disorder that causes the oddness that people are reacting to in the first place. Nobody has ever successfully diagnosed it. I have ADD but I don't see how that can account for it. | This thread continues beneath the following ad.
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| Re: Seeking constitutional remedy for social phobia | From sameervermani [Log on to view profile] | on 2008-09-16 |
Lisa,
I am keeping really busy.
I will come back to your case as soon as possible (should be in next 2-3 days).
Sameer | | |
| Re: Seeking constitutional remedy for social phobia | From LisaX [Log on to view profile] | on 2008-09-16 |
Thanks.
Here are some more general symptoms:
I have ADD and I'm always misplacing things and forgetting what I was doing. I burn stuff on the stove every few days. (I just did that, is why I thought of it.) This obviously needs treatment too, because if I get a job I will probably lose it over something like that, but the social phobia is the larger issue.
I just took a shower and it occurred to me that when I take a shower my skin itches, and when I scratch it red spots appear. I had noticed that before but it's not particularly distressing so I never paid much attention.
I have also been told that I scratch my scalp, but if so I do it unconsciously.
I often feel ill for no good reason. Just a headache/nausea/fatigue kind of thing. This has been going on for so long that I'm used to it. Coffee seems to help more than anything else does.
Also, cheese-flavored snack foods (crackers, popcorn, etc.) seem to have a medicinal effect for me.
All of my symptoms are worse during my period. I also get weepy and crave chocolate and coffee.
I have a lot of tension in my jaw. It used to hurt really bad but it seems to have improved somewhat. I have a lot of tension in general. It's worse on the right side. I also have weak vision in my right eye.
I daydream a lot, and very elaborately and vividly. I enjoy it but it has occurred to me that I indulge too much in escapism instead of making the changes I need to make in my life.
I seem to be prone to various forms of Candida infection. Like, every so often I will observe that I have thrush but I will deliberately ignore it because I'm not EVER going on that diet again and it will just go away after a while.
My body temperature tends to run low.
I am not very tolerant of heat and will start to feel uncomfortable when the temperature outside reaches 75 degrees. I feel best when it's about 59 degrees.
I tend to feel emotional pain in my abdomen, just below my navel.
That's about all I can think of right now. | | |
| Re: Seeking constitutional remedy for social phobia | From LisaX [Log on to view profile] | on 2008-09-17 |
I should probably mention that I have taken Sulphur before and it didn't seem to do anything at all, even for the itching. I mention this because I looked over the list of indications again and the minor physical symptoms seem to fit more often than most of the things I've looked at.
It doesn't address the social phobia or some other important things so it obviously wouldn't be what I'm looking for anyway.
And yet it seems like there must be some kind of affinity, plus I read somewhere that most people can benefit from it, because it brings diseases to the surface or something. Is it possible that I just took the wrong potency or did something else wrong?
Should I try it again at a different potency or should I just assume that if it didn't do anything then it isn't going to do anything?
I think what I took was 30C, but I can't remember for sure. | | |
| Re: Seeking constitutional remedy for social phobia | From sameervermani [Log on to view profile] | on 2008-09-17 |
Lisa,
There is a lot of information you have posted above, and it will take me some time to analyze this.
I will do this soon(in this week itself).
Sameer | | |
| Re: Seeking constitutional remedy for social phobia | From sameervermani [Log on to view profile] | on 2008-09-17 |
Do not take any homeopathic medicines in the meanwhile as it will muddle your case further. | | |
| Re: Seeking constitutional remedy for social phobia | From LisaX [Log on to view profile] | on 2008-09-17 |
Ok, thanks. Is there anything else you need to know?
I have been in a difficult marriage for 7 years, and I have a 4-year-old son.
I have dark hair, fair skin with freckles, and brown eyes. My height is 5'3", and my weight is around 125 lbs. | | |
| Re: Seeking constitutional remedy for social phobia | From LisaX [Log on to view profile] | on 2008-09-18 |
The sensitivity to sound is sometimes very intense. I've had the sensitivity to the paper sound all my life, my sister has it too so it's apparently genetic, and the way it feels is that I get a chill and goosebumps all over my body and a feeling of agony in my brain, and I have to cover my ears and rub them with my hands to drown it out. I have goosebumps right now just from thinking about it.
Another one that has developed more recently is that I can't stand the sound of ripping aluminum foil. It feels about the way I imagine it would feel to have my brain sawed open with a sharp blade.
Strangely, the well-known example of fingernails on a chalkboard never bothered me all that much. But the sound of the eraser rubbing against the board bothered me very much.
Also I could never stand to touch chalk.
Or wooden popsicle sticks. | | |
| Re: Seeking constitutional remedy for social phobia | From LisaX [Log on to view profile] | on 2008-09-18 |
The social stuff is worse from my marriage. When I met my husband I was living alone and going to school and I had a social life and hobbies that I did with other people. The basic symptoms where still there, I still got nervous talking to people and had trouble with things like names and eye contact, but I just carried on and hoped people wouldn't notice.
I think the absentmindedness is worse too. Domestic stress seems to be very bad for me. I seem to do better when I'm living either alone or with people who are nice to me, and worse when I'm living with people who yell at me and run me down. It's just very hard for me to shake it off. It's like a heavy weight on me that I carry around wherever I go, and it feels like it's bigger than me. It also feels like something I have to fight off before I have the strength to do all the other stuff I need to do. Like when you're drowning you have to save yourself from drowning first, before you can do anything else.
There are several reasons I can't leave.
1. We have a wonderful 4-year-old son that we both adore, and neither of us wants to walk out on him. He has heard us fight, and he has heard me threaten to leave, and he begged me not to and I promised.
2. I have no job and no money. Even if I got a job it would probably be low-paying and it would be hard for me to make it on my own, and I'm not confident in my ability to hang onto a job because I was fired from the last few that I had. For the last 4 years I have been home taking care of my son, and that works against me, too. No recent experience.
3. When we got married I meant it at the time. I thought we were making a promise to stick with each other through everything. I feel very strongly that my husband broke his promise and there's nothing I can do about that, you can't control other people, but I know that I would not be capable of that level of trust and idealism again. It just would be a very big deal, like I'm throwing away the whole idea of love and commitment, which I feel like he has already done and I know there's no future with him but it's like there's no future either way.
Even if I do decide to leave I have to get myself in a more financially independent position first and hold it for long enough that it seems stable, and I have to do all of that from where I am so I'm stuck here for a while so I don't have the option of gaining strength by leaving, I have to somehow gain it WITHOUT leaving. | | |
| Re: Seeking constitutional remedy for social phobia | From aijaz343 [Log on to view profile] | on 2008-09-18 |
I would like all experts to give special attention to this very well eloborated case,with so much in depth history.... | | |
| Re: Seeking constitutional remedy for social phobia | From aijaz343 [Log on to view profile] | on 2008-09-18 |
I've summerized the case according to my own sequence of consideration as follows; The experts may also take help from the SEQUENCE of these points:
1):- Our parents divorced when we were still very young, I don't know exactly what age but I don't have any clear memories of them being together, except that I remember them fighting. My dad disappeared and my mom was hospitalized for depression and for attempting suicide.
2)- The grandparents ran them down to us, and they also would exaggerate our badness, and it was never for anything specific that we did but just in general. They kept threatening to send us to an orphanage
3:- On the first day of Kindergarten, we played a game where everybody stands in a circle and throws a ball around, and I was the only person nobody threw the ball to...
4):-I daydream a lot, and very elaborately and vividly. I enjoy it but it has occurred to me that I indulge too much in escapism instead of making the changes I need to make in my life.
5):-I seem to do better when I'm living either alone or with people who are nice to me, and worse when I'm living with people who yell at me and run me down.
6:- My aunt offered to take me off their hands. I remember my grandfather telling me that he couldn't give me to her because she was too good of a person to deserve someone as bad as me. But I DID end up moving in with her, when I was 11 years old.
7):-It was worse there. My uncle sexually abused me and also ran me down all the time and played weird psychological games, which he owned up to on several occasions as if to gloat about.
8):-After 3 years they decided that they didn't want me anymore either so they sent me to live with my mom, where her friend who kept hanging around kept molesting me
9:)-When we got married I meant it at the time. I thought we were making a promise to stick with each other through everything. I feel very strongly that my husband broke his promise and there's nothing I can do about that, you can't control other people, but I know that I would not be capable of that level of trust and idealism again. It just would be a very big deal, like I'm throwing away the whole idea of love and commitment, which I feel like he has already done and I know there's no future with him but it's like there's no future either way. | | |
| Re: Seeking constitutional remedy for social phobia | From LisaX [Log on to view profile] | on 2008-09-19 |
Thank you, Aijaz. I'm touched that you paid so much attention.
I think I see where you're going with this, and you're obviously onto something.
However, a very important component that doesn't seem to be addressed here is the expectation of negative judgement from strangers.
All my life people have been speculating, within hearing distance of me, about what is wrong with me, as if it were a given that something is fundamentally wrong. When you're a small child you don't have a fully formed identity so you pay attention to things like that for clues as to who you are and what your role is.
As I stated before, I believe that the expectation of that kind of reaction from people IS what's fundamentally wrong. I was a philosophical child and would ponder what things meant, and when given a puzzle like that it became a constant irritation to my sense of identity. I mean, I was actually conscious of it in that way when I was 5 years old.
That stuff is still going on.
A thing that my husband throws at me whenever we are fighting is that people are always asking him what the hell is wrong with me and that it's humiliating to him. Often these are people I've never met.
We have no car so we walk everywhere, and we live in a neighborhood where it's easy to get around on foot. My husband is very sociable and talks to people in the neighborhood. One specific example that he gave is that someone who works at the corner bar that he goes to asked him, "So what's the deal with your wife? Why is she like that?" This is a person I have never met or had a conversation with. He has apparently just seen me walking around, and jumped to the conclusion that there is some kind of "deal" with me or that I'm "like that" without bothering to even have a conversation with me. It's hard for me to express how angry that stuff makes me.
I have never been inside that bar and I don't know who that guy is, so now whenever I'm walking near there I will think that anybody I see around there might be him or might be someone else who feels the same way and I will hate them.
I also hate my husband for sharing that information with me because it was the last thing in the world I needed to hear.
That is the reason for the social phobia. | This thread continues beneath the following ad.
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| Re: Seeking constitutional remedy for social phobia | From sameervermani [Log on to view profile] | on 2008-09-19 |
Lisa, it is now reaching a a point where the more you keep on adding to this thread, the more difficult it will get to sift out the relevant information. I think you have mentioned everything in great detail. I will go over this tonight, and ask you further questions if needed.
I hope you understand that although, detail is needed for homeopathic diagnosis, but at times too much of it can be confusing as well. | | |
| Re: Seeking constitutional remedy for social phobia | From aijaz343 [Log on to view profile] | on 2008-09-20 |
Lisa, sameervermani is right.STOP adding further details,,untill the experts asks you specifically.Let them work on the already available stuff.. | | |
| Re: Seeking constitutional remedy for social phobia | From sameervermani [Log on to view profile] | on 2008-09-20 |
Okay Lisa, I have gone through the case in detail and have to chose from 2 remedies, Lycopodium and Staphysagria
Can you please go to this link, and read the 2 remedies, especially the introductory, mind and "general" section and tell me which remedy is closest to your personality type?
http://homepage.ntlworld.com/homeopathy_advice/Remedies/POLY...
The pane on the left on the link has links to both remedies. | | |
| Re: Seeking constitutional remedy for social phobia | From LisaX [Log on to view profile] | on 2008-09-20 |
Ok, you're right, I'm sorry I was venting.
I have taken Staphysagria before and I liked it a lot.
It was self-prescribed, and I just followed the instructions on the bottle. The remedies I have taken before are Staphysagria, Ignatia, Sulphur, Arnica, Gelsemium and one other that I can't remember but it didn't do anyting anyway. The only ones that I could feel working in a positive way were the Staphysagria and the Ignatia.
Between the Staphysagria and the Lycopodium, I relate very strongly to almost every part of the Staphysagria and don't particularly relate to the Lycopodium. But, since I have taken it before, I assumed it had already done everything it was going to. So, please advise me. I took it in 30C the first time, and then at a later time I took it in 200C. | | |
| Re: Seeking constitutional remedy for social phobia | From sameervermani [Log on to view profile] | on 2008-09-20 |
How many doses were taken of each potency and at what gap between each ? | | |
| Re: Seeking constitutional remedy for social phobia | From sameervermani [Log on to view profile] | on 2008-09-20 |
For Staphysagria I mean. | | |
| Re: Seeking constitutional remedy for social phobia | From LisaX [Log on to view profile] | on 2008-09-21 |
It was the little bottles from Boiron and I did whatever it said on the bottle. 5 pellets however many times daily until they were gone, which took about 4 or 5 days.
The second time I took it, in the higher dose, was several months after the first time.
The first time was about 2 years ago. | | |
| Re: Seeking constitutional remedy for social phobia | From sameervermani [Log on to view profile] | on 2008-09-21 |
Just for future reference , there is no need, and infact it is incorrect prescribing to take so many consecutive doses of the same potency.
A total of just 2-3 doses on the same day are enough to kick start the curative response .
The waiting you did for several months was indeed the correct way, and you were also correct in raising the potency the next time you took it.
So, do you feel you have a lot of supressed anger and resentment inside of you now ?
Do you have a strong sense of honour ?
Do you find it difficult to ask for help ? | | |
| Re: Seeking constitutional remedy for social phobia | From aijaz343 [Log on to view profile] | on 2008-09-21 |
Lisa,Since I'm not an expert of homeopathy ,and can't comment on any priscription of homeopathy..
But I'll like to talk on the psychological side of your case,,
Your case is around HIM & HER(blaming others) but did you ever come to "ME"
Confessions make even the heaviest psychological things very lighter(as in christianity)
Did u ever asked your self to what extent you could be responsble for a disturbing event in your life...
I hope you understand my point,,and don,t take in the negative sense | | |
| Re: Seeking constitutional remedy for social phobia | From LisaX [Log on to view profile] | on 2008-09-21 |
Suppressed anger and resentment:
Lots
Sense of honor:
I have a sense of honor but I have no idea whether it's stronger than average or not. There are a lot of grey areas so I suspect it's somewhere in the middle.
Difficult to ask for help:
No, I don't think so. |
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Important
Information given in this forum is given by way of exchange of views only, and those views are not necessarily those of ABC Homeopathy. It is not to be treated as a medical diagnosis or prescription, and should not be used as a substitute for a consultation with a qualified homeopath or physician. It is possible that advice given here may be dangerous, and you should make your own checks that it is safe. If symptoms persist, seek professional medical attention. Bear in mind that even minor symptoms can be a sign of a more serious underlying condition, and a timely diagnosis by your doctor could save your life.