Was I traumatically embarrassed?

Hi,

My name is Sophia and I suffer from anxiety and fear of judgement and embarrassment. I was assaulted when I was 14 and fear social situations due to the possibility of being hurt.

I also remember being highly sensitive to embarrassment as a young child, though. I remember distinctly as a very young child, possibly 6, doing a cartwheel in front of a large gathering of adult family and friends in a nightgown, my whole bottom being exposed, and everyone laughing. I remember it clearly being more than simply embarrassing and I believe it was in fact traumatically embarrassing for me. I left the room hot in the face, my heart raced, and I hid and cried until that crying subsided, which could have been 20 minutes or more. Then I came back out pretending as though nothing was wrong (I believe so as to avoid further examination of the situation and more embarrassing "eyes on me").

I haven't had a lot of help from doctors or psychologists yet and I haven't tried many medications. I am concerned about my unemployment and going back to school. I can't keep a job; it's near impossible for me to even make it to an interview. I am hoping you may have tips or ideas of what I could do to overcome this so that I don't grow worse. I also have mild panic attacks when I begin to feel the onset of rapidly encompassing anxiety. I am hoping you have any ideas about what I can do.

Thank you so much,

Sophia

This question was submitted by 'Sophia'

Mark says...

Hi Sophia,

I think you may have 'diagnosed' yourself pretty accurately. Whenever we have strong reactions to some situation, then we need to ask ourselves what kind of 'learning' produced that reaction and how we can 'unlearn' or re-learn a better response that allows us to live more happily.

Being assaulted when you were 14 and the embarrassing cartwheel incident could have certainly produced posttraumatic memories. Sometimes people imagine that just because a situation wasn't life-threatening (such as the cartwheel time), it can't be traumatic. But acute embarrassment can definitely produce PTSD symptoms; people even say things like: 'I died of embarrassment!'

Traumatic memories don't fade like other memories until they are properly processed in the brain. If recalling those memories still makes you feel emotional (even though they may have been a long time ago) and they 'feel recent', even current, when they come back to you, then certainly they need to be 'de-traumatized' or processed so that they feel past and no longer determine your response in your current life.

We are increasingly training people in the use of the Rewind Technique, which is a fast, effective, and comfortable way to reprocess traumatic memories (and lift phobias). If you contact us at the office, we may be able to help you find someone near you trained in this approach if indeed these memories are still 'active' and producing the effect. Some therapists even do Rewind via Skype and hopefully it wouldn't take more than one or, at the most, two sessions.

All best wishes,

Mark