Lived Experience Forum

[MyOwnBestFriend]

What do I do if I’m recently getting over an anxiety attack due to relationship insecurity which left me feeling embarrassed, doubting myself and as if I had failed myself again by ‘being positive’.

I know it wasn’t just my insecurity and I had real reasons to be insecure but the way I handled it and the way that I couldn’t control the way I acted, made me feel like an idiot and mostly embarrassed.

I’m trying my best to be optimistic about everything however have a fear that I’m vulnerable and may be putting myself at more risk speaking to people about how I feel.

You know when you try get in the right mind set to trust, be positive & have faith in people again but when there are new people you meet & speak to that you don’t know at all, and while I’m trying to get over this feeling am I almost ignorant to any red flags because Im telling myself I need to remain optimistic towards ‘life’.
I find that things always fall into place for me, the number of times someone has said ‘I was just about you call you’ or ‘I was just thinking about you’ is frequent. I just don’t want to make the wrong decision because I don’t know if I’ll be able to handle a consequence of putting myself in another situation to be hurt or lose trust in myself.

This is just the recovery phase for me right now, it’s not me and who I am.

What do I do?
Do I stop talking to new people and seem even more of an unstable person/make them wonder why I’ve stopped speaking to them?
Do I be completely honest and tell them what I’m going through which is exposing myself more and putting myself in harm of the wrong man who likes a vulnerable woman?
Do I hold my wall up and not be open to love, and end up in the same trap of just having sexual relations and feeling like that’s what ‘love’ is?
Or stand the risk of feeling sad/lonely one night and then having a huge chat and then being stand offish/inconsistent which will give them the wrong impression?

I don’t know what I need to do to figure this out. Can anyone else relate or have anything they’ve experienced similar that could help?

This is the first time I’ve posted here, hopefully it makes sense.
Thanks

[Appleblossom]

Hi @MyOwnBestFriend

I thought your post was deeply aware and sensitive and sensible and I can relate a lot to the way you think as I adopted a deliberate optimism in order to remain open to life.

I think an approach between stopping talking or putting up walls ... AND ... being completely open and honest is the wisest way to go. How that plays out in meeting people and conversations is ...

the journey of life.

I dont get that balance right and tend to over share ...

no matter how hard I try not too!

I hope others on the forum can respond too.

Take care.

[Chamomile]

Hi @MyOwnBestFriend,
Thanks for sharing your experience here. Its certainly can be hard to find the balance between vulnerability and self protection. The social world and how to handle it can be particularly daunting while on the recovery path too. I hope you find some good support here in your thread and maybe in some other threads too...