Signs of Social Anxiety and How to Overcome It

Sometimes the signs of social anxiety aren’t so blatantly obvious. When I started having panic attacks in social places, I had no clue it was social anxiety. Never heard of it before. All I knew was that I was freaking out over nothing and embarrassed.

I did some research on my symptoms and found out that I have social anxiety disorder or a social phobia. That’s how my dealings with anxiety started. I started to isolate myself and not go out in public. Eventually, I learned to set a time limit when I went into stores.

The social anxiety disorder meaning is a mental health condition that involves a strong and ongoing fear of social situations where someone might feel judged or watched by others.

What causes social phobia?

Social phobia, also known as social anxiety disorder, is a complex condition with multiple potential causes. These include:

Genetic Factors:

Certain genes may predispose individuals to social anxiety.
Family history of anxiety disorders increases the risk.

Environmental Factors:

Traumatic or embarrassing social experiences, such as bullying or rejection.
Negative social interactions, such as criticism or overprotective parenting.
Witnessing anxious behavior in others.

Neurochemical Factors:

An imbalance in neurotransmitters, such as serotonin and dopamine, may contribute to social anxiety.
An overactive amygdala, the brain’s fear center, can lead to excessive anxiety responses.

Psychological Factors:

Negative self-beliefs and low self-esteem.
Catastrophizing thoughts about social situations.
Avoidance of social situations due to fear.

Other Factors:

Substance use, such as alcohol or drugs.
Medical conditions, such as certain neurological disorders.

Sometimes the signs of social anxiety reflect the fisk factors.

Social anxiety disorder risk factors

The following factors have been identified as potential risk factors for developing SAD:

Psychological Factors: Low self-esteem, Negative thoughts and beliefs about social situations, Sensitivity to social cues, and Difficulty coping with stress.

Other Factors: Basically, female gender, chronic health conditions, substance use disorders, and low socioeconomic status.

Specific Subgroups at Higher Risk:

Individuals with a history of other anxiety disorders
People with certain medical conditions, such as chronic pain or facial disfigurement
Individuals with a shy or timid temperament
People who experience frequent social transitions, such as moving or changing jobs

Social anxiety from childhood

I remember the exact grade, the teacher, and each classmate that bullied me in first grade. I was only a child, but remember the torture I went through. It’s engraved into my memory. As I grew up, different mental illnesses started showing up.

Social anxiety was one of them. But, I did overcome it for the most part. I still have bouts every now and then. The first thing I did was establish a time limit to be in the store, before feeling a panic attack coming on.

I also always shop at the same store, so I know the layout. I would only buy a few items at a time. It made me do several trips until I became acclimated to it. Then I would increase the time. Now, for the most part, I don’t have any problems.

Physical signs of social anxiety

Blushing anxiety

Blushing anxiety, also known as erythrophobia, is the fear of blushing in social situations—often fueled by the worry of being judged or embarrassed. Linked to social anxiety, this fear can feel overwhelming and even disrupt daily life.

Individuals worry about being negatively judged in social situations. The fear of blushing can quickly become a vicious cycle. The more you worry about blushing, the more anxious you get—and that anxiety makes blushing even more likely, keeping the cycle going.

In general, many may avoid social situations where they anticipate, leading to isolation (like me). The fear of blushing can cause significant emotional distress, anxiety, and low self-esteem.

Sweating social anxiety

Sweating is one of the signs of social anxiety. When you’re anxious, the sweating factor goes up. When I would have a panic attack, I would start to sweat profusely. I always carried around with me a stick of men’s deodorant (it was that bad).

Excessive sweating, particularly in the palms, underarms, and face, is a characteristic symptom of SAD. Other symptoms may include:

Rapid heartbeat, Trembling, Nausea, Difficulty concentrating, and Avoidance of social situations.

Social anxiety shaking

Shaking or tremors are a common physical sign of social anxiety disorder (SAD), and they often happen when your body’s fight-or-flight response kicks in. It’s your system reacting to what it sees as a social threat, even if you don’t realize it.

Once the bout of anxiety is over, you feel like a rung out towel. It’s especially difficult on hot days during the summer. The shaking would continue until I completely calmed down.

For me, shaking was the worst part. I felt like I had no control over my body. Nowadays, that doesn’t hold true. I’ve learned to breathe deeply and exhale slowly. I remain in control of the anxiety, not the anxiety having control over me.

Emotional Signs of Social Anxiety

Social anxiety can appear as intense fear in social situations, constant worry about being judged, and feeling overly self-conscious or awkward. It often leads to avoiding social interactions, but recognizing these feelings is the first step to overcoming them.

Intense Fear of Social Situations: People with social anxiety experience a strong and persistent fear of being in situations where they might be exposed to scrutiny or potential negative evaluation from others.
Worry About Being Judged or Humiliated: In addition, a core feature of social anxiety is the excessive worry about potentially embarrassing oneself or being seen as inadequate in social settings.
Feeling Self-Conscious or Awkward: Individuals with social anxiety often feel self-conscious and awkward in social situations, leading to difficulty engaging comfortably with others.
Fear of Negative Evaluation: Also, there’s a persistent fear that others will notice their anxiety or perceive them negatively, leading to a reluctance to participate in social interactions.
Avoidance of Social Situations: To cope with the fear and anxiety, individuals with social anxiety may actively avoid social situations or limit their participation in them.
Anxiety in Anticipation of Social Situations: The anticipation of social interactions can trigger significant anxiety, even before the situation occurs.
Feeling Overwhelmed or Distressed: During social situations, individuals may feel overwhelmed, distressed, or even experience panic attacks.
Replaying Social Situations: After social interactions, individuals may repeatedly replay the event in their minds, focusing on perceived flaws or mistakes.
Difficulty Making Eye Contact: Avoiding eye contact can be a common behavior in individuals with social anxiety, as they fear being scrutinized or judged.
Difficulty Talking or Expressing Themselves: Some individuals find it difficult to speak or express themselves in social situations, fearing judgment or ridicule.
Low Self-Esteem: People with social anxiety often have low self-esteem, believing they are unworthy or incapable of interacting positively with others.
Hypersensitivity to Criticism: Individuals with social anxiety can be highly sensitive to criticism or perceived negative feedback, interpreting it as a reflection of their worth.
Negative Self-Talk: Additionally, individuals with social anxiety may engage in negative self-talk, focusing on their perceived flaws and shortcomings.

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Stages of social anxiety

Social anxiety shows up in different ways, from mild shyness to a more severe, overwhelming disorder. It often unfolds in three stages: the nervous buildup before an event, the anxiety during the situation itself, and the overthinking that comes afterward. Each stage brings its own set of challenges and symptoms, making it a unique experience for everyone.

The Different Stages of Social Anxiety:

Anticipatory Anxiety

This stage involves intense worry and fear about an upcoming social event or situation, often days or weeks in advance.

The symptoms may include excessive worry, difficulty concentrating, restlessness, and avoidance of the social situation.

Exposure to the Social Situation

During the actual social interaction, individuals with social anxiety may experience a range of physical and emotional symptoms.

The symptoms may include rapid heartbeat, sweating, trembling, nausea, blushing, difficulty speaking, and fear of being judged negatively.

Post-Event Processing

After the social interaction, individuals may ruminate on how they believe they performed, leading to self-criticism and further anxiety.

The symptoms may include increased feelings of embarrassment, shame, and anxiety, and a further urge to avoid social situations.

What does social anxiety look like?

What does social anxiety look like? Um, good question. To someone who has never experienced social anxiety, it may look like a person freaking out over an unforeseen source. They may show no interest in going to parties that they once loved to do.

They tend to stay to themselves or isolate. A person may show no interest in things they loved to do, like hanging out with friends, going out to eat, or going to concerts to see their favorite bands.

Social anxiety has many faces, but the one you’ll see the most is depression. Depression can lead you to wanting something so bad, but it’s just out of reach. Then, it turns into self-hatred, because you’ve lost interest in wanting anything anymore.

Social phobia and depression

Depression can leave you full of regret with the social phobia. You want to do the social scene, but you hold back. You’re afraid of people’s comments about you. This becomes the focal point in social phobia.

Depression hops on aboard to make you have low self-esteem in yourself. Why can’t I do the things I loved to do? Why am I such a failure? All relatable questions. You just can’t seem to get your life the way it used to be.

The depression comes from not understanding what happened. Suddenly, you’re all alone and don’t understand why. When you finally get the diagnosis of social anxiety, you start to understand what you have to do to fight it.

Social anxiety attacks

Social anxiety attacks are the worst, especially when you haven’t been diagnosed with social anxiety yet. You get these attacks, and you don’t understand why or what they are. All you know is you’re flipping out over nothing.

Once you understand the why, you can start to work on having less or none anymore. For me, it was unfortunately a slow process. I still get them, but they’re few and far between. That’s because I worked hard to curtail them.

I didn’t want them to run my life anymore, so I took it back from the anxiety. I now live life on my terms. But, I still have bouts of anxiety without attacks, but if I can’t reel it in myself with the tools I’ve learned, I take my med.

Social phobia statistics

Here are 7 key statistics about social phobia (social anxiety disorder):

Prevalence in Adults: Approximately 7.1% of U.S. adults experience social anxiety disorder in a given year, with women (8.0%) being more affected than men (6.1%)1 2.
Lifetime Prevalence: Around 12.1% of U.S. adults will experience social anxiety disorder at some point in their lives1.
Adolescents Affected: An estimated 9.1% of U.S. adolescents aged 13-18 have experienced social anxiety disorder, with 1.3% experiencing severe impairment1 2.
Onset Age: Over 75% of individuals with social anxiety disorder report experiencing symptoms during childhood or adolescence2.
Severity Levels: Among adults with social anxiety disorder, 29.9% experience serious impairment, 38.8% moderate impairment, and 31.3% mild impairment1.
Gender Differences: Women are more likely to have lifetime social anxiety disorder (13.5%) compared to men (10.9%)2.
Comorbidities: Between 20% and 70% of individuals with social anxiety disorder also experience depression, and around 20% meet the criteria for eating disorders

How to deal with social phobia

Be Self-Observant

Know what usually triggers your anxiety. If you can, avoid them. If you can’t, be armed with your toolbox full of breathing exercises, tricks that you’ve learned from your therapist, and just knowing that you are being triggered is helpful. Add anything to your toolbox that you know will help you.

THOUGHTS TO KEEP IN MIND

Don’t overthink it
It’s okay to cry. Don’t be embarrassed of crying.
People aren’t really looking and caring as much as you think they are
Always look for the good in people – And remember it.
You don’t have to make huge changes in your life to go places. Just one decision. One choice each day. You’ll get closer to where you want to be.

Self-Discipline

Self-discipline is helpful when you are being triggered. Try not to panic. Recognize what is happening, but keep your cool. When the anxiety consumes you is when your’re in trouble.

Know that it shall pass if you’re having a panic attack. Self-discipline also helps you reframe from making a spectacle of yourself when you’re in a public space. People will stare if they don’t know what you’re going through.

I’ve had that plenty of times before I could control the attacks. You also need to build up your self-confidence. I believe that is the key to overcoming anxiety and all its little quirks. That’s how I wrangled in my social anxiety.

Want to Improve

You have to want to improve, and not just sit on the sidelines and let life pass you by. I won’t lie to you, it’s hard work. At times, you’re going to want to give up, but don’t. I know you can do this.

As pessimistic as I was, I made it to the other side. You have to have a strong will to survive social anxiety. You will come to recognize the signs of social anxiety, and you will win.

My willingness to do whatever it took fueled my need to overcome the anxiety. I’m still not totally free from it, but my life is a whole lot better because I fought it. And I’m still continuing to fight.

Be Transparent to Others

Being transparent to others doesn’t mean you tell them your life story. If you want to make friends with someone, and you feel like you can trust them, let them know you have social anxiety.

If they ask what that is, just explain it to them. You’re taking a big step in just talking to them about it. Besides, most people would rather have you be honest with them, then lie to them.

If you have any friends left that you haven’t pushed away, tell them what is happening, why you’ve been so distant. If they’re a true friend, I’m sure they would understand. Don’t feel like it’s some major secret that you have to keep to yourself.

Journaling

Journaling is an excellent idea. It helps you keep track of your moods and triggers. Actually, you can put anything in there that you want to. Here are some suggestions:

JOURNAL ENTRY IDEAS:

Quotes You Want to Remember Forever
Books You Read
Important/Memorable Events that Happened During the Day
Stream of Consciousness
Song Lyrics
Feelings
Analysis of Yourself
Progress in Your Life

Sum It All Up

The signs of social anxiety aren’t always as transparent at first. You may not even know you have social anxiety. All you know is that you don’t enjoy being around others anymore, and you begin to isolate.

Life hits you with a slap in the face. Once you find out you have social anxiety, at least you can put a name to it. Then you begin to rebuild your life again. Keep your toolbox handy for those times when you need it.

You have your arsenal, and soon the anxiety will be under control. You can live again without being afraid of everyone. It took me a while to get to that point, but I’m sure glad I hung in there so I can be the person I am today. Peace and love. Until next time…

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Have a Good One,

Cindee Murphy
“One Voice Dealing With Social Anxiety”

“Slow breathing is like an anchor in the midst of an emotional storm: the anchor won’t make the storm go away, but it will hold you steady until it passes.” — Russ Harris

“I’ve spent most of my life and most of my friendships holding my breath and hoping that when people get close enough they won’t leave.” — Shauna Niequist

“You are not weak. People like us, we’re brave. We’re the ones who get up and face our worst fears every day. We keep fighting.” — Jen Wilde

“Today I escaped anxiety. Or no, I discarded it, because it was within me, in my perceptions—not outside.” — Marcus Aurelius

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