How Low Self-Esteem Heightens Anxiety
/I’ve always been an introvert. Hiding in the background and doing whatever I could to blend in was my MO for the majority of my life. At first, being the shy girl was ‘cute’ and didn’t raise any flags. It wasnt until I started school that I realized how fearful I was of many common, everyday scenarios. Being called on in class, walking into the cafeteria to find an open seat, presenting assignments…situations that others may have found uncomfortable or embarrassing felt, for lack of a better word, LIFE threatening to me. There was truly nothing I wouldn’t have done to avoid being seen.
This fear would continue to show up in many different ways as I got older, yet the level of panic it created remained the same. Receiving constructive criticism at work, dealing with confrontation in my personal life, having to give a speech or introduce myself to a group of strangers, the list goes on and on. Every single time, my entire body would respond as if my literal life was on the line. My breathing would slow down, my heart rate would rise, I’d get super nauseous and the desperate need to avoid the situation at hand would kick into high gear. Despite these intense physical and visceral reactions to these small, insignificant events, I continued to attribute it to being shy (?????) It wasn’t until a version of this story came up in one of my many therapy sessions that I realized how fragile my self-esteem was and how much I cared about what others thought of me. If I couldn’t be perfect, I wanted to be invisible.
Which brought me to my next realization: if I wasn’t comfortable having people ‘judge’ me for getting the answer to a quiz wrong in class how was I going to handle people seeing me when I was in a state of panic and deep anxiety? (spoiler: I wasn’t and I didn’t lol) And so began a decades long journey of feeling the need to continuously show up in a certain way 24/7, which did nothing but contribute to my already debilitating anxiety.
As a result of the shame and embarrassment I associated my anxiety (and all my imperfections for that matter) with, I was in a constant state of fight or flight. I was never able to let my guard down or show the real me - I bottled up my personality, thoughts and emotions and reserved them for the times when I was alone in my room. I spent many hours in that room decompressing, crying and letting my real self peek out once I felt safe in my body again. It was an exhausting, lonely and isolating life that was chosen but none other than… me. Not to mention, it was also the start of my body associating the confines of my home with safety (and when the agoraphobia seeds were first planted yay 🌱)
Being afraid of anxiety is one level of suffering. Being afraid of others witnessing you feeling anxious (or anything other than ‘perfect’) is a whole different level of suffering. I truly don’t know how I managed to hide so much of myself from the world for so long but I do know that my mask slipping off when I hit rock bottom was the best thing that’s ever happened to me. Letting people truly see me, although terrifying at first, taught me so many beautiful lessons.
My 2 favorites being:
You dont have to suffer alone. There are people who will love you unconditionally, regardless of how you show up. Keep those people close, those are your people.
You’re not going to be everyones cup of tea and that is OK. You can handle criticism, rejection, shame and even hate - others opinions of you have no effect on the opinion you have of yourself. You are always safe in your body, regardless of what’s going on externally.
As soon as you start allowing yourself to be seen, you will begin rebuilding your self-worth and proving to yourself that regardless of what may be going on around you, you will always be OK. You will no longer fear or avoid social interactions or situations where you’re at risk of being judged. You’ll just show up. You will no longer worry about what you look like when you are anxious or if others notice when you’re feeling off. You’ll just show up. And overtime, the anxiety that previously ALWAYS attended these situations with you will began to fade away into the background. Your sweet little body will finally begin to rest. Your nervous system will settle down. Your relationships will improve. You’ll be able to BREATHE. Removing the pressure you put on yourself to be liked and accepted by everyone from the equation will be LIFE CHANGING. I can’t say it enough - you’ve just got to believe me and start the work.
My hope in sharing these learnings is that others who may be dealing with something similar can bridge the gap sooner than I did and begin taking the necessary steps to heal. Dealing with an anxiety disorder is already tough enough, cut yourself some slack. And may I remind you, what people think about you is none of your business. PLUS, if I’m being honest, most of the time they’re not paying attention to you at all. But regardless, we’ve got to do a better job at backing, caring for and unconditionally loving ourselves. We’re all we’ve got and we deserve it 💖
