# Everyday is a struggle



## Greytiger (May 2, 2011)

Hello everyone,

I read rachelynn's thread about feeling disconnected and like a "little kid" and that really struck me as something that I have been feeling on and off in my life time. This is my first post on the forum and I guess I will start by introducing myself. You can call me Grey. I like that name a lot. I'm in my mid 20s and I've been battling with social anxiety for a long time.

Although I have been dealing with it for a long time, I wasn't always like this. My parents always told me that when I was much much younger I was a very happy kid who capable of walking up total strangers. It first arose after we moved when I was younger. I had to change my life, meet new friends, and it felt like I had to reconnect with who I was. I became very self conscious and every step that I took brought me further and further away from people. It made me more nervous and less comfortable. I felt like I was in a haze. I began seeing a counselor in high school, and now that I look back at, it seemed like she was my only real connection. I have little to no connection to my middle school or highschool days. I didn't really make friends in those years. I began applying for colleges back in the state that i originally came from, hoping that it would solve a lot of my problems., but my journey took me somewhere else altogether. I started fresh and after 6 months, I found myself the same situation, i was trying to get away from. 

Finally, after getting frustrated with my parents, my poor choices in companionship and my life, I just withdrew from everything. I gave up. I stayed away from people altogether. I wasn't happy. I wasn't happy for a very long time, but i became alright with the fact that i was by myself. I functioned better that way.

I got back into college and majored in communication which ironically helped me get better at communicating with others and functioning in social situations. It gave me some control over the situations that I feared so much. One of my professors and mentors had said that I was highly intelligent and his greatest student, and given his prior communication apprehension problems that leads me to believe maybe I have some similar problem. 

Recently, I met a girl and this girl with in 6 months drove deep into the core of who I am and is dragging me out. I never even knew that the person that I am around her even existed. She makes me feel comfortable being me!...but there is a catch. I don't know which one is real, and it seems like i flipflop back and forth between being inept with my words and negative and being super talkative, positive, and happy. I'm finding that its a lot of work to be happy....and I have no idea why. I struggle with it, every single day. I just wish that I didn't have to. 


Well, anyway thank you for reading. I hope to connect with some of you around the forum.


----------

