Why would that make you fearful? If only i knew. It wasn’t as if anything truly terrible was likely to happen, and I was aware of that. Nevertheless, I felt afraid, or, at best, acutely anxious; so anxious that last night I felt physically sick. Part of the anxiety lay in my indecision. Would I go, or would I be better avoiding the stress and having another quiet day at home? I worked out the timing of the journey and was all prepared, but still the worry wormed around inside me.
This is a truth about me about which I have not spoken before. I find it embarrassing. I know people won’t comprehend what it is about, so I hide it beneath all manner of subterfuge. I have been fearful for as long as I can remember. As a child I used to look out of my window many times before I went to sleep because I thought the house was on fire. I have never been a social sort of person. Part of my make up is that I feel an outsider. In my teens, I was more than happy to have a very confident friend who would dive in to social situations, enabling me to hang back. Mind you, she did once “blackmail” me into going to a dance, much against my better judgement and had to apologise when she realised how miserable I was while there.
The first time, however, that I remember being overcome by the sort of social phobia
from which I suffer today, and which caused this recent crisis, was when I was 30 and taking a course training me to be a Child Care Officer. The academic work was great but I had not reckoned with how I would cope with the practical placements. I was sent to visit a family and I froze. I took the train to the where the family lived and I felt complete paralysis. When I went back into college, I told my tutor I couldn’t find the address. That was the beginning of the end for what I thought would be my new career.
By the grace of God, things have improved more than I could ever have hoped at that time. Those who know me have no idea what I goes on in the parts of me they can not see. I cope with life fairly well, but events keep popping up which still reduce me to being like a frightened child. Today I was due to go somewhere which, objectively, was completely unthreatening. Yet, for some reason, it became threatening to me and I could not face it.
I decided to write about a matter I have previously shared only with God in the hope that, bringing it out into the light, I may see it more clearly. I am fearful of publishing this blog because of how it may be received but feel I need to be honest
about this part of who I am.
mariaevans1 
This is amazing! I had coffee with a classmate the other day and debated sharing the reason I didn’t get to the 50th reunion a month ago. I decided not to, but I well may with others whom I know better as adults. I too freeze before perfectly lovely things which I just don’t feel I can get through. So I not only miss out, I add the pain of feeling sorry for myself for days afterwards. Thanks for sharing, Maria.
Maria, I love your honesty. What a risk to write this, yet you took it. I think that it is a marvelous post, because it is so very real. To be who we really are, with all of those bits we typically hide, exposed, is grace. Blessings to you my friend, and gratitude. And I am so deeply grateful for having had the gift of meeting you.