CYEAT: Chapter 5

This chapter talks about the social anxiety component of emetophobia. It goes into what social anxiety is, how it manifests, why everyone has social anxiety to a degree, how the amount of social anxiety your parents have influences how much you will have, etc.

There is a quiz to measure how high your social anxiety is. I got an 85 out of 100, although I felt it was kind of unnecessary to take it. I already know I have terrible social anxiety. There are times I think my social anxiety has a worse effect on my life than my emetophobia. And I know they are connected, because as terrified as I am at the thought of getting sick in general, I am way more terrified by the thought of getting sick in front of other people. This includes my wife. I've never been able to decide how I would handle getting sick at home if she was around, because the emetophobic part of me would want her to stay, but the socially anxious part would want her to leave and go far, far away. I feel like the socially anxious part would probably win.

This is why I'm much more likely to have an emetophobia-related anxiety attack when I'm out in public. There is that added component of it feeling like the wrong / inappropriate place and fearing everyone will judge me or hate me.

So I agree, I definitely think the two issues are strongly linked. But this chapter was a let down for me. It's a lot of information I already knew, and the only advice given on how to deal with social anxiety is to notice when you are feeling it and challenge the thoughts - tell yourself you don't need to feel anxious and that you can handle the situation. I know it's good to challenge your thoughts and tell yourself positive things, but to me, this is presented way too simplistically in this case. It sounds like it boils down to "Feeling socially anxious? Well, don't. You don't need to, so tell yourself that and stop!" When I am out walking alone and feeling terrified at the thought of the cars driving by and the people inside them looking at me, I am well aware this is irrational and I can handle the situation. Reminding myself of this doesn't stop the pattern of feeling anxious, hating it, and avoiding walking alone.

The author hints you will get better at challenging negative thoughts by the end of the book, so I'm hoping there is more to come that will help in this area. In the meantime, there are a lot of helpful tips for coping with social anxiety online. Helpguide.org is one of my favorite sites. I feel like they always do a great job covering issues and various treatments - this is their page on social anxiety.