Work Christmas "party" - just too much

I never bother going to work related social events. 
I couldn’t think of anything worse. 

It's not an easy thing to distinguish. Looking back so much of what I thought was anxiety was actually sensory overload. I'm not sure if I would have been able to identify that at the time, even if I had known then that I'm autistic. Sometimes you will just need to get out of there but not be able to pinpoint why.

We tend to experience everything all at once and cannot filter things. Therefore if there is background noise and multiple conversations happening it can be much harder to focus on what people are saying. If your brain is working so hard to try and focus, not only is it exhausting, you can't also focus on what you want to say.

Continuing to attend events in a quieter and less overwhelming environment sounds like a good plan. Plus the people there are probably less vulgar and homophobic than those you encountered at the office party.

You can congratulate yourself that you did it but you don't need to keep repeating the experiment to discover if it is right for you. Like if you put your hand under the hot tap and burn yourself you don't need to keep doing that in the hope that you will desensitise to it.

Autonomistic said:

Again wrongly believing my problems were due to social anxiety

This is the part I feel I'm struggling with right now. I can't seem to distinguish between what is social anxiety, and what is just a part who I am. A part that needs to be accepted and loved. 

I have in the past few months pushed myself out my comfort zone to group social things, but not "party" environments. I've tried board games nights and group wild swimming. I've surprised myself with how much less socially anxious I feel, or rather how less socially inhibited I feel when In environments that are not as loud, not as busy, and not as claustrophobic.

Autonomistic said:

It is so important that we understand ourselves and when it is not appropriate to 'push ourselves' into completely unsuitable environments that will almost certainly be too overwhelming.

I feel this is very much the stage I'm at in trying to explore and understand myself. It's so difficult to gauge when something will be overwhelming or not, but I suppose it comes with experience. 

Thank you for sharing this Autonomistic. 

Thank you so much for sharing this story with us. You have described so much of exactly what I felt last night.

I feel when I drink it can help, or at least makes me feel less immediately anxious. But I'm not a big drinker, when I get anxious when drunk I feel I cannot cope as well as when I feel anxious when sober, so try to stay in a state that I can cope. Either way, anxiety is there. 

I think you've helped me realise that maybe I need to better choose the situations/events I push myself to participate in. I desperately want to connect with people, but deep down I know the environments that will better allow me to do that, and party ones just aren't that.

Thank you again for sharing this Paper, it's really helped. 

I can identify with so much of what you have written. I too used to force myself to attend all the office social gatherings, wrongly believing that they would get easier the more I attended. They didn't.

Paper said:

It's almost like an out of body experience, seeing everyone around you, hearing the cacophony of loud unintelligible conversations, but not knowing how to be a part of it.

That's exactly what it was like.

Paper said:

I used to get drunk to try to cope with the social deficits and sensory issues, but still was unable to participate in the small talk or feel like I belonged.

Again wrongly believing my problems were due to social anxiety I used to drink copious amounts. It didn't help me to talk to anyone. It did help with my fear of eating in front of others and it made me disinhibited about making a fool of myself on the dance floor But talk to people, no still nothing. Looking back I can now see what was due to anxiety and what was due to being autistic and in a totally unsuitable environment.

It is so important that we understand ourselves and when it is not appropriate to 'push ourselves' into completely unsuitable environments that will almost certainly be too overwhelming. What happened to you after your last work party is a cautionary tale and I'm sorry that happened. When society expects attending such events as normal it can be so hard to hear your inner voice yelling that it isn't right for you.

Now that I no longer work I am so relieved I will never have to attend another office party again as long as I live.

Paper said:

Everyone is an actor and says what they think they are meant to say, rather than what they mean.

Absolutely!

Ben

Ben said:

If we don't attend, do they miss us?  Do all of them really want us to be there?

When I told people I wasn't going to the Christmas party this year they were shocked, and wanted to know why, so I had to invent excuses.

After the Christmas party it was never mentioned again. I doubt people really care, I think it's all another act - people pretending and lying etc. Everyone is an actor and says what they think they are meant to say, rather than what they mean.

I used to force myself to go to work Christmas parties. I always hated them and regretted going. I never felt so lonely as when I was surrounded by so many people but unable to connect with any of them. It's almost like an out of body experience, seeing everyone around you, hearing the cacophony of loud unintelligible conversations, but not knowing how to be a part of it.

I was always just on the outside, observing everybody having fun and wondering what I was supposed to do - if I was standing weirdly, or if my arms were in a weird position

I used to get drunk to try to cope with the social deficits and sensory issues, but still was unable to participate in the small talk or feel like I belonged. I often ended up sitting by myself looking at everyone having intense conversations with each other and wondering when I could leave and how to tell people I was leaving.

Also more than one person told me to smile, but I didn't realise I wasn't smiling. I don't have full knowledge of what my face is doing and I'm mainly trying to understand very hard what all the social cues mean when there's a lot going on.

After the last work Christmas party I went to I tried to kill myself. And then I never went to another one. I think I realised my limits, and that forcing myself into these situations wasn't necessarily the best thing for me.

Hi Euan I'm so very sorry to read you went through this.

I never attended the Christmas dos when I was working because my anxiety worried me in to a state that it would end up as you described.

You should be very proud that you went and stayed as long as you did.

I hope now you can put it behind you and will be feeling better soon. We're all thinking of you x

Hi George, thank you for sharing your story as well. It's nice to know other people understand. I already feel better after interacting on this forum. Thank you. 

Hi EuanF. I'm sorry about the Christmas office party, that sounds a complete nightmare and something which you could have done without!

Well done for going and actually getting through an hour of that. I would have left after ten minutes! That takes courage, you should be proud of yourself.

Try to put it behind you now and remember to give yourself a pat on the back for even going.

I attended the village Christmas party once, when and it was a similar affair. Loud music, drunk locals and people acting like they were ten year olds again with jokes which were just disgraceful being thrown around. I left after ten minutes and cried on the way home, and when I got to the car I was shaking so hard I had to wait to calm down before I could drive.

Christmas parties are never worth the hassle. I don't bother anymore.

Feel better soon.

Thank you for this Tulip. It's not so much I want to be like them, it's just I want to be a version of me I see in my minds eye. A version I know I am, but would like to be able to share with others more easily. But I suppose my expectations for myself have maybe been skewed by what I've wrongly seen in others as "normal". I want to embrace who I am, I just know it'll take time. Thank you again. 

Dont get me wrong i have done exactly the same thing. Im not doing it anymore x

EuanF said:

But God I just have this image of who I want to be, and when you have solid evidence that you aren't that person, or youve got so long to go to get to that person, it hurts. Not feeling very Christmas this year. I hope everyone is taking care of themselves. 

Do you really want to be like them? What about all your amazing qualities that they dont have? It will take a lot of masking and and be exhausting. Please try and embrace whobyou are and you will find your people x

EuanF said:

I just get so stuck inside myself in group conversation.

Nicely put Euan, I understand completely.  I stopped attending work parties many years ago as I just wasn't one of the 'herd'.

If we don't attend, do they miss us?  Do all of them really want us to be there?  Is there another, just like us, hiding behind the filing cabinet?  And was I the only one who sometimes 'phoned in sick on party days?

Oh, they joy of retirement.

Ben.

As an older gay man in the supermarkets for 30 years, I try to avoid Christmas parties after getting some advice to do not so, which I’ve nearly always followed most years - on the odd year that I have attended it has been a disaster and in other years, I’ve got to hear about how it was such a shambles etc - the Christmas Dinner is a somewhat more restrained affair as people are more preoccupied with eating and not drinking so much, plus they have to go back to work later in the day 

Honestly I've felt ever since I started at the place there's a sort of "lad" culture between some of the people there. Its not like their being abrasively and openly homophobic etc, but its the small "jokes" that are rooted in their own prejudice. It's really uncomfortable.

I'd say something to HR but I don't think it'd make a difference. Not two days ago I overheard one person say when talking to another colleague something along the lines of "I've had a hundred warnings from HR, it's just procedure for them, nothing to lose sleep about". Just makes me feel some of the people don't care about their comments or behaviour, they just brush it off and continue on. It's just frustrating. 

I was at a work Christmas do once and this one male colleague was going around being disgustingly sexist. He got reported and fired later - it's workplace harassment/discrimination.

If your colleagues can't control their natural bigotry after a few drinks they really shouldn't be working there. You've got to be really stupid to be in work and mouthing off petty prejudices. Depends what the boss is like, though, and if they're a progressive company. Some won't take it seriously, unfortunately. 

I usually push myself to go to work doors, stay for 1/2 hours, then leave. Just do the box ticking exercise and eat the free food.