I used to suffer from a lot of anxiety as a teenager which improved as I grew older but now seems to have returned. It's presenting itself very differently than before.
At the moment I have no friends, only my DH, an 8 month old DS and my immediate family like parents and siblings etc.
Every single time I interact with someone I am hyper aware of what I am saying as I speak, worrying that I am making a fool of myself, speaking too much or too little, saying the "wrong" thing etc.
After every interaction I sit and replay it in my head, convince myself that they don't like me or think I'm weird or that I didn't do a "good job" at the interaction.
Last week I sold something on Facebook for very cheap. I wanted to sell it for free but past experience has shown me that often when something is free people can be a bit choosing beggar-ish. I'd seen someone online say that to counteract this they offer it for cheap but give it for free when the person arrives.
Well they arrived with the money and I tried to explain they don't need to pay and I didn't actually want anything - I was just happy to not have to chuck it. But the lady seemingly became really uncomfortable and insisted I take the money. I did and that was the end of that very short interaction, but ever since I've been obsessing about whether I offended her. Maybe she thought I thought she looked poor or maybe she didn't want to feel like a charity case or maybe it was just a really stupid thing of me to offer.
It's gotten to the point where I'm even doing it with family which I've never experienced before. If my brother comes for a cup of tea I worry that I didn't make enough conversation or wasn't a good enough hostess etc.
Tonight I really tried to make an effort to make friends by sticking behind after an evening class I was doing to chat to two of the people there. The logical side of my brain is trying to tell me that we had a good time and they said they enjoyed chatting before we left.
The anxious part of me is insisting that they don't like me and were just humouring me and they hope I don't stay to chat again next time.
It's making me feel like I don't even want to bother socialising because it's not worth having these feelings for sometimes literally weeks afterwards.
I know that mental health help is probably needed but CBT is often the go-to treatment and while I know it sounds like exactly what CBT is made for, I've found it really ineffective the twice I've tried it in the past.
Truthfully, I simply do believe the "irrational" thoughts and no matter how much I learn about cognitive distortions they don't feel irrational to me. I can identify these "irrational" thoughts and I can think a different thought instead but I simply don't believe it. It has no effect on how I actually feel. I'm just thinking a lie in my head. No amount of practice is making it sink in.
When I've explained this to a past CBT therapist I was told I want trying hard enough which is really the opposite of true - I genuinely was but it's like I couldn't "trick" my brain into believing the "rational" thought.
Has anyone ever experienced anything similar and did you find anything that worked? My anxiety did improve when I had it in the past but I don't really know how. At the time I assumed it was just me getting older but clearly now it's back that wasn't the case.