Extreme social anxiety in Microsoft Teams meetings

[willowz]

I have really bad social anxiety when it comes to Teams meetings. I've been at my company for nearly a year and I still get hideously anxious before and during Teams meetings. I'm so fed up with it and I don't know what to do about it.

I was signed off sick for 2 months due to really bad anxiety, partly due to this issue. I was tearful constantly if I had meetings with clients coming up and I just wasn't in a fit state to work. I've since started sertraline and I'm having talking therapy, regular appointments with a mental health nurse, weekly phone calls with a vocational rehabilitation consultant, weekly meetings with HR and weekly meetings with my manager. Even my senior manager/head of department at work is aware of my anxiety/social anxiety.

I've definitely improved a lot (the sertraline has really helped), in that after nearly 12 months at my company I can finally have a 1:1 meeting with my manager and not be in complete fight and flight mode. But it's the team meetings I struggle with the most, especially the morning stand up meetings where everyone has to say what they are working on that week. It's literally 10 seconds of speaking in front of around 10 people, yet I get so anxious that I have to prepare a little script for myself that I have typed up on my screen to read off of during the meeting. I get in such a state I would forget otherwise. I get a nervous stomach all morning leading up to the meeting and struggle to concentrate on my work. It's awful.

I've opened up to my manager about finding some meetings nerve-wracking and I was allowed to sit these meetings out at first when I returned to work, but after around a month of that I felt like I needed to just get on with it and start attending again. I don't know what it is. I sit there and journal through all my thoughts and try and remind myself that the point of the meeting is just a quick meeting to hear what others are working on, it inspires collaboration and discussion and it's a way to get to know what goes on outside of my immediate team.

I'm so fed up with feeling like this :(

See if you can get Propranolol. Its a beta blocker which helps enormously.

Try to practice talking about yourself, out loud, at home or in the garden. Have a few bullet points on a pad, then just talk around them. You'll feel ridiculous but you'll get better over time.

Hiding away never helps but exposure does.

Good luck.

How are you in face to face meetings? Do you guys have to have cameras on for teams meetings?

I have social anxiety at work and I also use propranolol to manage it. I was surprised, after lockdown first happened, to find that my anxiety extended to meetings on a screen, but it does! I don’t know why I’m so anxious at work, there’s no good reason for it. I just hate speaking in public.

Can you reduce the screen so you don't have to see their faces when talking?

Is it the video element that's worrying you the most or the talking bit (or both)?

Having a script is absolutely fine. In fact it's good.

It will sound counter intuitive but... prepare. Dedicate 30 minutes of your morning to preparing your 10 seconds, then you know - I don't have to worry because I have the time. As PP says, practise. Not just your script but, if Steve asks if he can get involved, what will I say (answer: yes, I'll phone you later). If Mary sounds, oh that sounds interesting, what's my small-talk comment (oh yes I'm really enjoying it/ah let's talk about it offline). Stand in front of the mirror & say it out loud. Personally I'd build in little "connections" - Steve this is something I'd like you input on / Mary the client will be in touch with you directly - to remind me, these are people not anything scary.

Prepare some questions for others in advance... so if you do have an awkward silence or get called on, you an deflect. "WIllowz what do you think about x" "Actually I was really interested in what Steve was saying about y and wondering if there's an overlap".

For 1:1s, ask your manager to alternate - this week Teams, next week phone (or Teams with video off, if that's possible).

Is it just Teams, do you all work remotely? Have you met anyone in person, would that make it worse or better?

Came on here to suggest propranolol too. It's seriously brilliant. Doesn't help with the fear but stops all the outwards signs. I use it before anything nerve wracking and when I don't turn into a shaky unconfident mess, my anxiety starts to die down naturally.

It is mainly Teams. I'm still quite shy in person but I'm not anxious. Where possible I try and arrange 1:1 meetings in person as I'm more relaxed and chatty, but the Monday morning stand-ups are online only and we have to be cameras on. I have the Teams window hidden so I can't see myself but I still feel overly self-conscious. I practice constantly what I'm going to say, I find myself repeating the same one sentence summary of my work in my head constantly over the weekend whenever I have a spare moment. It helps, as does the script, in that I am able to succinctly summarise what I'm saying rather than just go blank but it sounds so rehearsed and formal. My colleagues are all much more natural and relaxed in their answers. However I literally become drenched in sweat afterwards and my throat starts hurting like I'm going to cry. It's really bizarre. It's supposed be a chatty 'fun' kind of meeting

I'm on 100mg sertraline already but had to go back down to 50mg due to side effects. I might ask my GP about propranolol.

Ahh teams. I always hate the awkward end of 1-1 chats where you're both staring up at the leave button at the corner of the page saying goodbye.

I came on to suggest CBT therapy (I'm one) but can see you already are having therapy which is positive. Is your therapist doing any sort of behavioural experiments to specifically tackle your social anxiety on teams? If you're having therapy by the end this should be something you've worked on :)