This is a brilliant blog, @kittygirl. Really heartfelt and honest. There can be a real catharsis in writing stuff like this. This internet communicating can be a double-edged sword, but it can allow us to express stuff that it is difficult to express elsewhere.
As I was typing, I thought, I wonder if she is on the autistic spectrum. My son is (I am, a little), and he gets very overwhelmed in a crowd. It's a sensory overload type thing. As I have got older, crowds are far more difficult for me to deal with too.
I would be careful with the Xanax. I have taken it on occasion, and I do not like it at all. It is very numbing. Okay for an emergency, but it changes a person.
Please keep posting like this.
Thank you for the wonderful comment! Interesting, that you wondered about the autistic spectrum, too, and you are coming from a place of personal experience with it. I appreciate your lovely words and understanding! 😊 So, do you have any coping techniques for crowds and unfamiliar situations, or do you simply try to avoid them, as i am doing?
I tend to avoid them for the most part! Sometimes you can't though, and I have two children and to avoid crowds all the time would see them miss out. I am better if I am with them - they keep me grounded - and when I am in a crowd, I tend to stay near the fringes. With my son being on the spectrum, he isn't a big fan of them either, so my wife and my daughter often go off and do things together, which is fine by all of us.
I think it's important that a person doesn't avoid them altogether. There are times when you have to be in one, and if you have avoiding them for too long, it will give rise to a lot of anxiety. It's hard, though.