Posted by HyperFocus on March 8, 2009, at 11:08:56
In reply to Treat Social Anxiety w/ Muscle Relaxers instead?, posted by becksFLA on March 6, 2009, at 9:47:47
In addition to meds you might benefit from CBT. I have SA as well and this hyper-awareness of facial expressions - smiling and blushing and so on - is a secondary symptom of anxiety. We think that people are scrutinizing our facial expressions which causes us to become more nervous and so develops the cycle. In the tape CBT series I listen to (http://www.social-anxiety-network.com/audioseries.html,) I learn to
enforce the reality that people are not focusing on us exclusively and our facial expressions are under everybody else's scrutiny. It's not something that we don't already know and having knowledge of it does it doesn't really change your subconscious thoughts and feelings. The goal is to consciously embed this rational idea in the brain until it replaces the subconscious anxiety and gives a more realistic appraisal of the situation. Ultimately you want to get to a state-of-mind where you're not really concerned with what your face is doing. This isn't easy and usually requires meds in conjunction.
poster:HyperFocus
thread:884056
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20090304/msgs/884407.html