Other Emotional Health Issues / Question
Published: October 30, 2009
Dear TeenHealthFX,
I think i've got paranoia. I don't like making eye contact with people and anytime i walk past people (especially in school) and they laugh, i think that its me that they're laughing at or talking about. When i go into a restaraunt or anything similar i insist on sitting with my back to the wall. I always feel like I'm being watched, and when people, usually family or friends look at me for no reason, i automactcally ask why they are looking at me. I have recently begun to suspect my friends, and i think they are meeting up without me and bitching about me, I always ask myself why they are friends with me, and if they are just being nice. I am not a very confident person and have very low self worth. I am afraid to confide in anyone because they my just think me stupid. Please reply as it is starting to affect my social life and my relationship with my family and friends.
Signed: I Think I've Got Paranoia
Dear I Think I've Got Paranoia,
What you are describing sounds like a pattern of paranoid thinking partially connected to a poor sense of self. People who are not very confident and have low self worth, as you state you do, can often worry about how people perceive them and how they feel about them. It sounds like you have lots of concerns about how people view you – are they laughing at you, talking about you, or thinking negative things? If you look them in the eye, they are looking at you, or they find out personal information about you – will they think poorly of you or use it in some negative way? From what you have said, it is obviously hard for you to imagine people would be loving and caring towards you and think positively about you – and it sounds like this difficulty has risen to the point of some real paranoid thinking. People who become this paranoid in their thinking often do find that their relationships and social life are affected – they begin to isolate themselves more and keep distances in relationships with others because of the fear of what people might think, do, or say – and it can be a difficult way to live.
Luckily, there are treatments available to address the issues you have described above. Therapy can be very beneficial for you in terms of helping you work through your feelings of low self-worth, assisting you in altering your thinking in a way that is more positive and helpful to you when it comes to interpersonal relationships, and helping you cope with any anxieties about what others think and feel. Know that it can be very common for the concerns you experience with others to come up in your working relationship with your therapist – you may be worried about sharing things with your therapist, or be concerned with how your therapist views you or feels towards you. This is very normal and is extremely helpful to discuss as an important part of the therapy in situations like this. In addition to therapy, there are certain psychotropic medications that, when taken in small doses, can significantly help to relieve some of this anxiety and paranoid thinking. Your treatment provider can help determine the best course of treatment for you based on the severity of the issues, contributing factors, and reactions to any past therapeutic treatments.
FX appreciates that pursuing therapy can feel very scary for someone prone to paranoid thinking. But know that even though the therapy may feel hard at times, it can be extremely helpful to you in the end.
If you live in northern
Signed: TeenHealthFX
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