I think everyone has experienced anxiety. There is normal anxiety like before a test, waiting to hear back from an interview, and the cause of unknown illness. For normal anxiety to turn into an anxiety disorder, you need to be experiencing intrusive thoughts or concerns, and you may avoid everyday situations.
My kids and I have various levels of social anxiety. Theirs stems from their years of neglect and abuse. Mine was rather conditioned. My mother also had social anxiety conditioned in her. Her family very much kept to themselves and were very self sufficient and family oriented. My family was just pretty much isolated from my mom’s anxiety and our own poverty. Both my mother and I grew up in very small, insular communities that really did not like outsiders. In my case, everyone knew everyone. You could not get away with anything because gossip was the only pastime. To give you an idea of how small; my high school graduating class was considered very large and it was under forty students.
I can typically manage my anxiety, but it requires a lot of preparation on my part. I try not to let my anxiety get the best of me, but some days it is really difficult. Especially with all the new anxiety provoking situations the kids put me in. They do not have good filters, so they constantly tell other people my business. This has led to some very awkward moments and a few panic attacks on my part. I struggle to hold it together in front of them, but during the worst times I just cannot sleep at night because of my brain replaying all the embarrassing scenes of my life.
Many therapists have tried to help me with dealing with my anxiety and subsequent insomnia. They teach you grounding techniques, which do help with panic attacks. However, most of my anxieties are how I am afraid I will be perceived about things I need to do. Then therapy becomes just a laundry list of tasks I need to accomplish in order to lower my stress levels. When I am less stressed, I have less anxiety.
I am so afraid of people thinking poorly of me. This fear is so crippling that it becomes compounded when I am paralyzed by the amount of things I wish I had done and what I can feasibly accomplish. Everything in the world begins to feel daunting. Spiraling out of control I just have to wait until I find my center. For me, things tend to calm down once I start again. I pick one task to complete. Once that is completed, I pick another. Then another. One thing at a time until I can start to see and feel my progress.
Everything begins with one task. Progress is just one step. Anxiety will come back and when it does I will start again.
Mother of Trauma 
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