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Dr. Bob is Robert Hsiung, MD,
[email protected]Shown: posts 1 to 10 of 10. This is the beginning of the thread.
Posted by Shonyn on December 12, 2003, at 5:17:26
Hi, I've heard it said that people who suffer with SA have trouble with lasting relationships. I was wondering what the reasoning was behind this generalised statement.
I must admit, I have this problem with relationships. With me it's because I'm not happy in myself & if I find love I get insecure, I feel like everyone is more confident than me & that the girl will lose interest.
Posted by sarita0001 on December 12, 2003, at 12:00:30
In reply to people with SA have trouble with relationships?, posted by Shonyn on December 12, 2003, at 5:17:26
Hi,
I think you're right that it's a generalized statement and that it depends on the individual and how they came to be that way. I have SA but with me, I am shy and it take me a while to let people get to know me, even though I am friendly once I do talk to them. I can relate to the feeling about thinking everyone else is more confident than me, but then I try and tell myself that I don't know that for sure cuz I can't read their mind. But yeah, if I like someone I always hope they approach me. Rarely, will I approach someone I like, even if it is small talk or something.
Sara
Posted by cosis on December 12, 2003, at 16:54:02
In reply to people with SA have trouble with relationships?, posted by Shonyn on December 12, 2003, at 5:17:26
> Hi, I've heard it said that people who suffer with SA have trouble with lasting relationships. I was wondering what the reasoning was behind this generalised statement.
> I must admit, I have this problem with relationships. With me it's because I'm not happy in myself & if I find love I get insecure, I feel like everyone is more confident than me & that the girl will lose interest.
Definately I have a problem with relationships, I find it difficult to approach a girl and start a conversation. Unless the girl starts it first then I am okay. I guess we are more afraid of rejection then others......
Posted by Notalis on December 13, 2003, at 4:34:17
In reply to Re: people with SA have trouble with relationships?, posted by cosis on December 12, 2003, at 16:54:02
I don't think there really is anyone out there who isn't afraid of rejection or being judged.
Poeople who come across as super-confident can also be covering up feelings of insecurity.
I remember working as a hostess in a restaurant when I was 18-19. At that point in my life I couldn't be around people in a social type environment without drinking to calm my anxiety, but I was able to perform my job well because I ACTED. I turned into "hostess-girl" and was a totally different person. People said, wow you're really good with the customers, but that wasn't me.
The real me DOES NOT want to talk to strangers, DOES not want to be in groups of more than 3 or 4 people at a time.
I do translations on a computer for work in an office with 3 other people, I don't deal with the public, so it's ok, but for me, my ideal job would be completely away from people.
BUT, MY point IS, I cope.
I'm 33 now and I've gotten much better at using my coping mechanism over the past few years.
My husband says I don't have social phobia, that I'm just a social retard.
What he doesn't understand is that the 'retaded' things that come out of my mouth and the stupid things I do are attributed to the fact that I'm still panicked inside.
So, POINT IS, I might seem very confident to you, but it's false, and I don't know and have never met anyone who is absolutley confident.And that's ok, cause it's who we are.
Posted by Dr. Bob on December 13, 2003, at 12:05:10
In reply to people with SA have trouble with relationships?, posted by Shonyn on December 12, 2003, at 5:17:26
> Hi, I've heard it said that people who suffer with SA have trouble with lasting relationships...
Sorry to interrupt, but I'd like to redirect follow-ups that aren't about medication to Psycho-Social-Babble. Here's a link:
http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/social/20031207/msgs/289370.html
Thanks,
Bob
Posted by linkadge on December 14, 2003, at 20:09:48
In reply to Re: people with SA have trouble with relationships?, posted by Notalis on December 13, 2003, at 4:34:17
I think people with certain disorders tend to think that everybody feels the same way. One thing, that I *never* had was social anxiety. None whatsoever. My anxietys were always about things like disease, like I had cancer or being infected with something life threatening.
I found many times that social interaction helped me with my other anxieties.
The reason I post this is not to boast in any way, it is perhaps to let you know that
what you have may infact not be universal. I worked up the guts one time to mention to sombody that I was deathly afraid of developing cancer, and the guy said to me that he had never really thought about it, and that he was concerned more about what women would think of him !:)I wish you luck in getting over your fears, I certainly need help in getting over mine.
People who are socially anxious tend to have imballences in gaba transmission. That is why Nardil seems to be an amazing drug for them, because it increases gaba as well as other things. On the other hand people who are more
prone to psychic anxiety, overwhealmed with thoughts of disease and death tend to have primarily norepinephrine and serotonin imballences. (of course there is some overlap)This could be why beer does nothing for me. Socially, I am more outgoing off beer. Beer depresses my mood and tends to worsen my thoughs about death.
Good Luck
Linkadge
Posted by zeugma on December 14, 2003, at 20:39:35
In reply to Re: people with SA have trouble with relationships?, posted by linkadge on December 14, 2003, at 20:09:48
>
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> People who are socially anxious tend to have imballences in gaba transmission. That is why Nardil seems to be an amazing drug for them, because it increases gaba as well as other things. On the other hand people who are more
> prone to psychic anxiety, overwhealmed with thoughts of disease and death tend to have primarily norepinephrine and serotonin imballences. (of course there is some overlap)
>
> This could be why beer does nothing for me. Socially, I am more outgoing off beer. Beer depresses my mood and tends to worsen my thoughs about death.
>
> Good Luck
>
> Linkadge
>I've always had alcohol-responsive social anxiety. The problem i always had with alcohol, besides its devastating side effects, was its treacherously short duration of action: I would be drunk, happy, and interacting with others unself-consciously, only to become aware that the effect was fading, and the anxieties were returning, as the interactions went on. I literally would have to drink to the point of falling down in order to maintain the freedom from self-consciousness that alcohol offered me. Needless to say lying on the floor, or on the sidewalk, usually brought any social interaction to an embarrassing and premature end :)
I am convinced that I have serious GABA problems. But KLONOPIN has been remarkable. People's faces actually look less threatening to me, and so saying hello to someone in the elevator isn't the emotionally draining experience it always was in the past, where I had to practically scream at myself that nothing terrible had happened. During CBT I learned a great deal about how to analyze an interaction into its component parts, and the dogma of CBT is that you have a certain expectation, say, that things will turn out badly, and then you interact in a way that makes this a self-fulfilling prophecy. I noticed however that my discomfort with interactions had NO relation to whether they turned out well or badly. I still felt that people were suffering my presence even when their words or actions indicated otherwise, and until i started klonopin I had no idea why this was.
Now i can look at people's faces and not freak out. Even my own reflection in the mirror causes less distress. I remember being obsessed with the idea that I was ugly when a child, and i remember my first therapist (at age twelve)asking me why i thought this, and I had no answer. It makes sense now!
As I've said elsewhere, my pdoc does not like this med, and and I literally had to exhaust every other option in order to get him to let me try it. He was convinced that my problems with anxiety were 'psychological', as he put it, and he thought CBT was the appropriate treatment for me. No doubt my therapist when i was a child believed i just had 'psychological' problems: i.e. I was 'poorly adjusted' or something. As for myself;
I am glad I dumped my CBT therapist;
I know I have had a GABA system dysfunction since early childhood at the latest.
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Posted by linkadge on December 15, 2003, at 13:20:40
In reply to a remarkable effect of Klonopin, posted by zeugma on December 14, 2003, at 20:39:35
You're probably right. Gaba neurotransmission has not been studied enough in my opinion (at least findings not as publicies as with serotonin research). Anyhow, Green tea has a fairly potent effect on increasing Gaba, as well as increasing norepinephrine. A few of my friends with social phobia have found great sucess with using the extracts. (By no means stop taking clonazepam if it is working).
The main thing I am trying to help others understand is that feelings of insecurity about taking to people are not universal. Sometimes when people think that "oh everybody feels this way" it creates a barrier to their improvement.
Different anxieties must be processed in entirely different areas of the brain.
Good Luck
Linkadge
Posted by Shonyn on December 16, 2003, at 12:21:21
In reply to a remarkable effect of Klonopin, posted by zeugma on December 14, 2003, at 20:39:35
To be honest, I'm not sure where this SA has come from or how it's come about. I've got some thoughts but I could be off target.
I've always been shy & quiet even when I was 4.
There's stuff that happened in my childhood that could have made it worse. Being shy, I didn't make friends very easily & as a result, I ended up hanging around with this couple of lads who I suspect used to see me as someone they could humiliate & have fun with. I was very naieve and they did a good job of humiliating me & I guess that even to this day I feel mad at them and to some degree myself for putting up with it.I don't think that the SA is all due to life experiences though to be honest because my brothers and my mother are all shy & suffer SA but not to the same degree as me though.
This Gaba thing might be worth looking into, thanks for that.
Shonyn
Posted by scott-d-o on December 16, 2003, at 21:39:21
In reply to Re: a remarkable effect of Klonopin, posted by linkadge on December 15, 2003, at 13:20:40
> You're probably right. Gaba neurotransmission has not been studied enough in my opinion (at least findings not as publicies as with serotonin research). Anyhow, Green tea has a fairly potent effect on increasing Gaba, as well as increasing norepinephrine. A few of my friends with social phobia have found great sucess with using the extracts. (By no means stop taking clonazepam if it is working).
>
> The main thing I am trying to help others understand is that feelings of insecurity about taking to people are not universal. Sometimes when people think that "oh everybody feels this way" it creates a barrier to their improvement.
>
> Different anxieties must be processed in entirely different areas of the brain.
>
> Good Luck
>
> Linkadge
>
>Be careful with the tea extracts. The study below shows that these extracts have been shown to have a proconvulsive effect in mice and don't increase GABA. The one ingredient in green tea that might actually increase GABA is called L-Theanine, however, it is under patent in the US and is *expensive*.
Proconvulsive effect of tea (Camellia sinensis) in mice.
Gomes A, Das M, Vedasiromoni JR, Ganguly DK.
Division of Pharmacology and Experimental Therapeutics, Indian Institute of Chemical Biology, 4, Raja S. C. Mullick Road, Calcutta - 700032, India.
Investigations were carried out to evaluate the effect of acute and chronic administration of both black and green tea on three models of experimentally induced convulsions in mice. Tea extract (both black and green) significantly accelerated the onset of convulsion, increased the duration of convulsion and mortality in mice. Since both the extracts failed to alter the GABA level in brain, based on the earlier report that both black and green tea might act on Ca(2+) channels, it can be suggested that the observed proconvulsive effect of tea is not mediated through GABA but through Ca(2+) channels. Copyright-Copyright 1999 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
PMID: 10441775 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]
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Dr. Bob is Robert Hsiung, MD,
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