Wednesday, May 5, 2004

Shy, Quiet, Girl?

When I was about 4 or 5 and entering my first Sunday school class, I was taken there by my dad and was wearing one of the many fluffy dresses I had back then. I clearly remember what happened. My dad and I entered the room and he greeted the teacher the two of them had a little talk for a few minutes; I don’t remember what I was doing in that few minutes, most likely just listening to them talk, but I know that when I was led to one of the five tables that other children were sitting I suddenly had this very uncomfortable feeling inside me and I started to cry. Not only was I crying, but refused to sit at any of the tables the other children were sitting. I know I wanted to leave with my dad and not stay in that room at that point, but the teacher placed a desk aside from the other tables by the door of the room. I sat there and stopped crying after a while. To me it seemed that as long as I sat there, I was fine, but my teacher wouldn’t allow me to for long so after a few Sundays of sitting by myself by the door, she said I had to sit with the other children and I did and the feeling I had at first wasn’t so great and I felt ok from then on.
There’s another occasion where the same thing occurred: the very uncomfortable feeling and my starting to cry. Would you believe it was during an Eater egg hunt?!

Anyways, for all of my period of being, I’ve always been described as shy and quiet whether one or the other or both at least one of those words has been used in describing me. I thought the very uncomfortable feeling I get was just something unique to me, but apparently it isn’t. I was reading what someone was saying about how their heart rate rises and they get all nervous when speaking to people and especially those of which they don’t know previously. While reading what they were saying I was saying to myself “Yes! I know exactly how you feel” and “I can completely relate to that”. I understood exactly what that person was saying and then another person mentions that what they are saying happens to them are signs of Social Anxiety Disorder. This surprised me for two reasons. One, is this the case for me? And two, that feeling I get isn’t natural being that the description of it is called a disorder?! Being the curious person I am, I looked for information on this and a lot of what I read about it, I can relate to. But what I’m still pondering is, is this the reason in my case?

Besides what I feel even today, what makes me believe so are those two events that happened years ago and others similar to them.

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