To think that this phobia means the end of my career?

[RoboticSealpup]

I've had this phobia since I was about eleven, when I was pushed out onto the stage to fill a gap in our school play. I hadn't prepared anything, but I think I might have told some jokes. The next day, I was told by a friend that the whole class felt that I had ruined the whole evening. Since then, I have something close to a panic attack when I am asked to speak in front of others in a formal setting.

At university I used beta blockers, as they lower my heart rate and that works OK, but only when I know in advance that I will have to speak. There are also some side effects, like a severe headache.

I'm looking for a new job now after maternity leave, and "oral communication skills" always comes up as a 'desirable' or 'essential' competency. I am starting to think that this is a shortcoming that's severe enough to render me almost useless to an employer. I feel like my career has ended before it's even begun.
I'm a social researcher, so not someone who needs to talk in public a lot, but even then you need to be 'excellent' at this according to practically all job adverts I've seen. I can't lie because I had to turn down a speaking event in my previous job as I was pregnant and couldn't take my medication. My old boss won't lie on my reference.

All "cures" I've seen advertised seem like scams. I once went to a hypnotist / cbt practitioner in Harley street who charged me ??60/ hour to tell me that my fear was irrational. Needless to say, I know this, but I still panic.

I feel so pathetic and like I'm letting my DH and DD down.

By the way, I once had a session with Stephanie Hughes about presenting - she was amazing and very good at practical ideas of how to overcome blocks. Might be worth finding a practical presentation coach as they teach practical things like what to do with your hands.

Secondly I attended a public event where the ex chief exec of Saatchi Saatchi was speaking. He sounded really nervous and yet he'd been chief exec of a communications company where he had to do public presentations.

I had severe anxiety and had nhs cbt.
Im having it again soon as i suffer from ocd.
I wasn't and am not suicidal.

What an absolutely horrible and spiteful thing for your so-called 'friend' to say to you, and I'm sure it wasn't true at all.

I wouldn't necessarily worry about references unless some reason he / she doesn't like you? You can't control an 'informal' reference in that circumstance, but a formal reference really just needs to say 'Robotic worked as an X at level Y for company Z from A to B'. I left my previous employer with an above average rating, but my official reference, requested from HR would've said something similar to the previous sentence. Of course I gave character references, but none were taken.

Also, oral communication skills are not public speaking. It's engaging with colleagues, customers and suppliers on a daily basis. It's one to one conversion and performance in meetings. For many jobs this is far more important than public speaking. Is there are reasons you think this is about public speaking specifically? I ask because my job calls for exceptional interpersonal & communication skills, but it's highly skewed towards 1:1 negotiation and less so on presentation (sadly - I'd merrily talk to an auditorium, but I hate, hate, hate, haggling with suppliers).

There's no problem at all with my ex boss, she would give me a glowing reference. She would not say that I am good at oral presentation, however.

I messed up my OP a bit, Buggers - it usually says something like "excellent written and oral presentation skills", not just "communication".

Just to clarify something - when I say that I panic in formal speaking situations, that includes small meetings with just a few people. Not just big presentations. I even had a really hard time recording a podcast with just me and my ex boss reading a script in front of one other person! I absolutely hate reading out loud. I can't breathe when I do it.

Your boss' reference will almost certainly be quite generic, rather than have to address every single point on the job description, so there's no need to let that prevent you applying for jobs. And job descriptions are notoriously bullshitty - pages and pages of "essential" skills that you almost certainly won't need day to day.

I once did a really brilliant one day course on presentation skills. It was run by a professional singer, so there were lots of voice and breathing exercises, but it was really good fun and I felt so much more confident afterwards. Maybe something like that might help?

I've found that public speaking and giving presentations is the number one 'argh!' Thing for almost everyone who works for me. It is pretty scary for most people, so don't feel you're alone in this.

I've found that it's really something that the more you do the better you are, so with members of my team who are really nervous I'd pick a slow progression that might go something like this:

*Pick something they've done really well recently, and let them know that I think it's great and I'm going to tell the team in our weekly team meeting and I'll be asking them to just say a couple of sentences. These meetings are on the phone, and really informal so very little stress. It might go something like "so this week we had a situation with x, and Sarah coped with it really well by... Sarah, anything you want to add? Any questions from anyone?"

• next step is to get them to give regular, quick updates on internal calls.

• then when comfy with that, ask them to give a quick update on an external calls.

• when they can do this, then I might ask them to whip up a couple of slides for an internal seminar.

I progress through this, with LOTS of repetition until finally people are ready to do the big stuff (external talks in front of several hundred scientists/doctors etc.)

I've certainly met a few people who are genuinely phobic about public speaking and I've managed to get them all doing it. They are still nervous, that's normal, but they can do it and feel good afterwards.

Good luck!

I agree with the posters who say that PResentation Skills will be listed separately on a Person Spec and will not be expected with the term Communication SKills. You can overcome this phobia, it's just a case of finding the right help and support. I'm a confident presenter, but it is a skill I have learnt, my personality is naturally introverted so it has been a huge learning experience and it has taken a lot of time and effort on my part.I now step into my presenter role and leave my shy self behind, when I watch myself back, I can not actually believe it is me up there. If I can do it, anyone can.

I suffered with severe panic attacks for a different reason a few years ago ( think having to pull over on the motorway on the way to work on numerous occasions) I had CBT and it did nothing to help. I was hugely cynical about a private session of EFT but the lady said I didn't need to believe in it for it to work and she was right. The fear will never completely go away but I have def learnt how to deal with it. I only needed one session and I can't recommend it enough best ??50 I've spent.

Skipton you sound like a great manager!

monsters Do you mean that you just practiced until you got good at it? Did you used to have a phobia / panic attacks?

RoboticSealpup I know exactly where you are coming from. I'm prone to anxiety and had a huge flare-up due to my mum getting diagnosed with cancer and then dying right at the time we had to have a series of meetings and workshops with a big bunch of external clients. Had a terrible panic attack in the first meeting and that was me. I was okay in small meetings with people I knew well, and dial-ins, but anything else was torture. Public speaking? I would panic even one-on-one if I didn't know the person.
I'm not sure what the answer is. We were all made redundant and I'm now abroad with DH work so don't need to worry about it for a couple of years but at some point I'm going to have to have another job interview and I'd rather stick my face in a wasp's nest.
I tried CBT, which was patronising crap, hypotherapy which didn't do much and two days on Citalopram which was truly horrific. Always makes me feel worse when people say how treatable it is.

You sound very similar to me, I used to take sertraline (which was prescribed long term for social anxiety), plus use propranolol liberally! This really helped. My husband has long term CBT which has transformed his career with regards to doing presentations, but he has private medical insurance that covers this. NHS waiting lists are long, but maybe you get get referred and at least you would be on the waiting list?

I also tried hypnotherapy, which was useless. I also tried NLP therapy, which was useless. In honesty medication has been more effective for me, but obviously this is not great long term!!

I really sympathise, its a horrible phobia to have .

OP it doesn't sound like you are afraid of the actual "presentation" but are still reacting to the nasty comments from your peers. You actually stood up and did the job at the time, which is probably more than they would or could have done ad hoc and I suspect their comments were more a verbalisation of their own fear at being put in a similar situation.
As you know, the thing about giving presentations these days is all around knowing when you are going to do it, what the topic is and having enough time to prepare and practice. You are in control and you will generally have an audience that wants to hear what you are saying.
Give it a go! You can always highlight this skill as something that could do with further development as there are courses etc. you can attend. I feel sure you will be amongst the more articulate of the participants.

Slaggy I don't like CBT either. It's just so much "try it, it doesn't matter if you fail!"

Thing is, it does matter a great deal. If I faint during a job interview, I won't get the job. If I babble incoherently during a work meeting, I will be seen as less competent. It's silly to pretend these things don't matter. They would affect my confidence and self image a great deal.

wine propranolol is such a life-saver. Unfortunately it makes me a bit sluggish and impairs my ability to think on my feet. I presented my dissertation like a seasoned pro, but struggled a bit with the questions afterwards!

*pedant "give it a go" is likely to mean failure, as my mind goes blank and I might pass out. I guess I should find a safe forum like toastmasters in which I can fail as much as I need to. Unfortunately, the idea of joining a public speaking group to cure my phobia sounds like the equivalent of climbing into a tarantula tank to cure a spider phobia

Its like climbing into a tank of toy stuffed tarantulas ;) Then you can move onto the knocked-out unconscious ones...
Youve got to work your way up to these things!

Ohh I see. More of a social phobia? You won't faint BTW, CBT should have taught you that.

Alice How do you mean, CBT should have taught me that I won't faint? And even if I don't, there are pretty of other embarrassing things that can happen when my system is flooded with adrenaline. I once had to stop reading something out loud in class because I couldn't breathe. I pretended to have a sore throat but I'm pretty sure nobody believed that.

Sorry to sound so negative. I'd love to just say "Screw this fear, what's the worst that can happen?". Trouble is, I can think of so many things, most of which involve massive social embarrassment and my credibility at work being damaged.

The NHS doesn't even give suicidal people access to talking therapies

I appreciate it may be a postcode lottery and you are saying that this doesn't happen in your area but I had NHS therapy when I was suicidally depressed and it saved my life.

I can't recommend CBT enough, I thought it would be rubbish but it really worked for me. I was only thinking about this morning actually and how beneficial it was.

I really hope you can get over this phobia OP and I think CBT would be a great start.

But you wouldn't practise in work, at first. You would do it step by step - first reading aloud alone, then reading to a friend, then prepping a small presentation to present to yourself in a mirror, then presenting to a friend, then a small group of friends etc. I think you're setting yourself up to fail if you think goal No1 is presenting at work - that's goal No101.

I find public speaking highly stressful too, although I've ended up doing a job which means I do it a lot (not a great plan - in fact I am contemplating changing jobs partly because of this).

I think it is extremely common. I often don't admit to it because it makes it worse and I have become good at faking calm - I suspect a lot of other people do the same, so it's likely a lot of people are sympathetic to your situation even they seem very collected.

Anyway, what helped for me was repetition, as skipton suggests. I did a job for a while where I had to do the same speech over and over again, and gradually it got easier, and I went from sticking to a word for word script to ad libbing and making things up etc. I'm not sure I was ever quite at the level where I'd call it a phobia, but I certainly used to get (and still do sometimes) clam-y my hands, adrenalin rush, throwing up etc, but now I can manage it despite that. I find it's almost like an out of body experience - I can hear my voice talking fluently, saying (sometimes) intelligent things, but it doesn't seem quite real.

I find it is much much easier if there are other people you like and trust in the group you are speaking to - or ideally a tag team kind of double presentation, where they can take over if you don't know what to say. But this only works if they are someone you actually find calming.

I find how stressed I am in the rest of my life impacts on how stressful I find it - it might be worth thinking about wider relaxation, exercise etc.

The worst bit (for me) is just before speaking - I guess this is why people find being in seminars / meetings stressful. I sometimes find it helpful to play upbeat music just beforehand. Also I make myself say something early in a meeting, so that I feel part of it - then it gets easier.

Basically I think if you have a sympathetic employer you should be able to work with it. The problem may be getting through the interview process to this point.

Sorry for the epic post - this is something I have thought about a lot, clearly.

I also think that 'excellent presentation skills' is a bit of a generic filler - you know the field so you'll know whether the job really involves a lot of public speaking or not. I certainly wouldn't be put off applying for that reason.

simonetta you're amazing for doing that despite your fear. I'm really inspired by that! Thank you for sharing.