Published on 12, July, 2020
Hi. I'm new and I'm looking for some opinions and advice from some other people like myself.
I'm 22 years old and I've been completely reliant on everyone my entire life. I cannot step outside the house alone, make phone calls to people I don't know and pretty much any social situation, involves me getting close to having a breakdown.
In the last few weeks, I have started having intensive therapy to help me with my anxiety that has ruled my life.
For as long as I can remember (I was diagnosed at 12 and have been under therapy for years), I have been taught safety behaviours. Things such as, planning before a situation, rehearsing what to do or say, having someone with me for support and now, I've been told that these aren't good for me. I've been told to push through the anxiety and deal with it without my safety behaviours, because apparently, this will reduce my anxiety overall, naturally.
When I was 12, it was confirmed by a highly thought of psychiatrist that having Asperger's, lead to the fight or flight section of my brain, to basically overwork itself, causing me to feel fear at even the smallest of things.
The thought of pushing myself through anxiety, scares the hell out of me. I'm terrified from the moment I wake up, so making myself do things in order to face the anxiety and deal with it, makes me physically shake.
Is my therapist right? Should I force myself through the anxiety, or will it make me worse?
I'd say from my experience this can help but be careful with it. As original prankster says I also think that the key is to take it slowly so you don't overwhelm yourself and cause a meltdown, burnout which is counterproductive. Does the therapist have experience working with autistics? I'd say make sure they do as i think theres a difference between a safety behaviour and a strategy and also a difference between what works for NTs and autistics. Eg for me wearing noise cancelling head phones in noisy/busy places is a strategy not a safety behaviour. If i don't use them my overload/overwhelm INCREASES over time, rather than decreases, because its sensory hypersensitivity causing overload not anxiety. Im not actually scared/anxious of the place just overwhelmed by it because there is too much going on. Big difference.