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No friends, social anxiety.
Okay. I'm fifteen. I have trouble making friends, I've always been around adults so I adjust and talk better with them rather than people my age.
I have four (people who I would consider) friends... N, B, L, A.
N- Seventeen, different school,can talk to on facebook (rarely) only see at church.
B- had a falling out. Has depression and wont come over anymore despite my massive attempts to help.
L- Different school, always busy, strict parents.
R- only see at church, except when r comes over. (once in a blue moon.)
Me: Major social anxiety, suffer from panic attacks.. And I'm going into college next year.
How can I make friends, and get out of the house, and overall just be happy? I need help.
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Congrats on getting into college next year, hope that goes well for you. I dealt with quite a bit of social anxiety growing up, and my best advice is to never be afraid to be yourself, even if your feelings, dreams, etc. differ from the norm. Focus less on friends and focus on developing yourself through hobbies. Unfortunately, people can be fickle, but if you develop a hobby or interest you love, that can translate into an enjoyable career, and you can feel proud of yourself for what you have accomplished. Having 1,000 "friends" on facebook isn't an accomplishment, so don't compare yourself to others and their cliques, if you've ever felt as I had around that age. Live life, go to museums, go to concerts, go for a run in a park, paint flowers, whatever makes you happy. You don't have to wait for someone to invite you out to go do things. You can enrich yourself even if you're alone, even if you're the only one with a particular interest. Good luck
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I know personally what social anxiety is from my past growing up. I was only comfortable with my immediate family, parents and siblings. I had anxiety over ALL other people, no matter their age.
What you shared, the words you choose led my to believe that you are quite comfortable with and have no issues with talking to adults. Being slow to warm up to a person, lets say an adult in conversation, is more of a type of personality trait rather than social anxiety.
When I was your age, that's what I discovered, if someone else approached me first and befriended me, it took me a little time to warm up and get used to them, but once comfortable with them, I opened up and could be myself.
In your case, there may be something other than social anxiety as an the contributing factor. You did say you were 15 and that you would enter college next year. If your almost 16, then you're on schedule but if u just turned 15, this means you're a bit more advanced than your peers.
So if not meaning next school year bbeing this coming fall, you're still talking fall 2016 when you would be 16 going into college. this means you may be mentally and intellectually far ahead of your peers, in some advanced program too. If this is the case, it explains easily enough to me why you'd have trouble finding friends your age and finding it easier to relate to adults. and that is not called social anxiety. Your peers won't catch when scientists have found the frontal lobe of the brain finishes growing or by 30 at the least.
Unless you've been diagnosed by a doctor to have social anxiety and panic attacks, then you should have been put on medication for that which should have alleviated those issues. If on meds, obviously they are the wrong ones for you, go back to the Dr. get a new prescription.
What I don't know is if you're being home schooled or in public or private school. School is where we meet and make friends usually as kids and teens, that's how it went for me as there really weren't but two in my neighborhood but they moved far away when I was your age.This made it hard for me to find friends regionally, I had to make them at school. Being shy until I turned 17 and worked on changing myself, I had a hard time making friends but had them even so. If the only people you know if from church, this leads me to believe its highly possible you're home schooled which contributes to your issues and problems. Until you get your social anxiety taken care of, college isn't going to work for you cus the kids going for the most part won't have changed much from high school and did be immature and people you don't feel you can relate to if relating and connecting to by something in common is the issue.
Do the parents have any idea what you are struggling with? THEY need to know so they can have your medically checked out. If they are against medication or your are, I can't guarantee you'll fully take control of your issues but you can try what i did to over come my social anxiety.
I was afraid to even look at people and smile at them. So I had it pretty bad.
This is not guaranteed to work as each person is different. If it helps it may help ease your problem somewhat but no guarantee that you totally over come it and may still need to see a Dr.
Using only strangers, to get over anxiety, start with smiling at adults and peers you do not know. Do that until you're comfortable with it, not feeling any fear or panic. I would shake as I feared a smile might encourage a person to talk to me and I couldn't handle that. But I was sick and tired of being this way. you have to reach that point to be ready to do what it takes to get better, even if it ends up beings meds.
Once comfortable with the smiles. Progress to greeting strangers you pass with a Hi. Dont try to overthink what they will think, if odd or what. Just do it. Once you can do that without a concern of anyones reactions, positive or negative, move on to the next which is paying a genuine compliment to strangers. Example, the grocery clerks earrings, a teacher you dont have--their shoes, stick with females if guys seem a bit too much. Once comfortable with that the next would be a step of engaging a person you don't know in conversation. My alway example on that was the produce section of the store. Wanting to pick out a good cantalope. Another woman was there tapping the watermelons so I asked what she was doing and she explained how she ws testing for ripeness by the sound. I thanked her for that info and then asked if she knew a good way to pick out the best cantalope and she answered that. I had just traded sentences back and forth with a stranger though she did the most talking but what was amazing is that it felt 'natural' and the reason, because i choose to converse with someone on a topic related to where I was, or what they or I were doing. If you do so with peers, you will find yourself becoming more comfortable in time. I did all of these religiously several times a day, progressing thru each stage in about a weeks time so that in just about a month or a little more, I was no longer gripped with social anxeity anymore. A month is about the time most people need to establish a new habit and get rid of a bad one. Of course it can differ but this is about usuall if you're working hard on it. If no improvement, or not enough improvement, you still need to go see your Dr. good luck dear.
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Well this is a tricky question. Truthfully, picking friends is not as easy as you may think. First you need to know what you want in a friend (honesty, loyalty, stability, etc.) to find them. Usually you can find friends at school, at summer camps, and other experiences that forces you to socialize with people for a longer period of time than just a few minutes. Either way, the best friends usually just sort of fall into your lap. How about volunteering somewhere? Helping others is a great way to distract yourself, and you can focus your energy on that. You'll meet new people and I'm sure you'll find people with common interests.
Best of luck!
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