How did school impact your social anxiety?

[op22]

Was there anything in particular? Being singled out, busy corridors, types of people?

I know it affects different people in different ways

Think all of them had an impact on me personally at different times

[anxiouslondoner]

I was really quite attention-seeking at school, but I got bullied a lot. I think it started my anxiety because I ended up crawling back into my shell and avoiding people.
I was younger than most of my classmates as I was moved ahead a year. I was academically talented and did very well at maths especially but school bored me and a few kids really didn't like me. I got picked on for standing out. I hated it. Especially sport, which I felt was humiliating. I was never any good in PE and never got picked for any teams. In the end I just didn't bother.
I'm sure it had a big impact on my SA but it waa a long time ago and I don't remember it all that well.

[biscuits]

During secondary school, I remember being pulled out of class every now and then to sit in a circle with the other misfits. We had to discuss different topics and go round the circle talking about whatever the topic was.

I remember in Year 10/11 being a youth counsellor for younger children at school. They'd come to my little office and I'd help them sort out disagreements etc. It was busy! There was also an offensive smelling air freshener that was on a really high shelf.

I don't think school impacted my social anxiety at all, to be honest. I was never bullied or anything like that. I just found it hard to function there but tried my best.

[Jam do Bronx]

The rejection I suffered at secondary school has had long lasting a/effects on me, and that damage is permanent, no matter how well I think I'm doing.

[limey123]

I changed school for 6th form and was almost universally disliked then. By then my SA and (as of yet unknown) autism were in full flow. Mind you, I wasn't exactly Mr Popularity at my previous school
I suspect school years, especially teenage years, suck for many people. It must be even worse for kids in these days of social media.

[Percy]

I was badly bullied so that had a major impact on my social anxiety. I was always a shy kid but bullying amplified it by quite a bit.

[op22]

In general I think school just made me feel vulnerable

[cymruambyth26]

I just think my school wasn't the right environment for me. It was a small site with over 1,000 kids.

As a result, I had all of these issues such as crowded corridors, bullying, persistent teasing. didn't have a lot of space to go to or to escape to. If I was on my own, then that it was very noticeable amongst my peers.

It felt like a rejection of me as an individual. I didn't feel valued/respected. I didn't feel embraced by my community.

[Tembo]

It was a school where I was severely bullied, with lessons constantly disrupted by the many thugs that went there. A group from my school were responsible for stabbing a kid from another school to death. I thought this was normal for schools, until I shared stories at uni and people were really shocked.
While there were a few lovely teachers and support staff there, a lot of them were utter bastards who ignored or even encouraged bullying.
It upsets me that the ‘best years of my life’ were wasted in that dump. I shouldn’t dwell on it really, but I blame it for a lot of my social problems. The school also made me realise what horrible people there are in the world and probably explains a lot of my cynicism today.

[Percy]

Sounds like you and i are kindred spirits Tembo

[Aelwyn]

Some of your experiences sound horrific.

My problem was slightly different. My family moved to a different part of the country when I was 5, and I was sent off on a bus to a new school (wearing a repulsive brown uniform which I hated). Previously I had just walked to the local school 5 minutes from home. I felt extremely anxious, and my mother unknowingly made things worse by anxiously telling me what to do if I lost my return ticket. I completely shut down at school, with what is now called selective mutism. Thankfully after a ghastly term at that school, we then moved again and I got to go to a small local school, where I was very quiet but not completely mute. I gradually got over all that, but I think the feelings kicked in again when I went to uni, because within a couple of days I was hit with the SA.

[Mr. Nobody]

the violence in my high school scared me, it was a bit of a shock to see first-hand.
I had to travel really far to get to my high school due to my parent's religion etc.
so, I was mixing with people I didn't know before and wouldn't really meet again in later life,

I used to try and find places to sneak off to and just be alone as I just found it all quite a rough and uncaring environment,
it was never a welcoming nurturing environment in my high school,

thankfully things are much better now and there seems to be a lot of support available for children on the fringes of things social or developmental.

[ryan2032]

My social anxiety started when I went to secondary school and I believe due to blushing. I know most people blush to different degrees but I blushed all over my face and bright red. This was pounced on as a weakness and I probably had the p*** taken out of me every single day. Everyone can be nervous to answer questions in front of the class or speaking to the opposite sex but it can be hard to see in other people, but for me it was a bright red face everytime. It didn't take long to crush my confidence, to have anxiety and depression and everyday be a living hell. Its lived with me for my whole life and my social anxiety has always been pretty bad.

[biscuits]

^ chronic blushing was awful for me, but people found it cute. I did not. That’s what lead to avoidance for me. That heat and feeling mortified. No one ever said anything cruel about it, it was more about how awkward it made me feel. I can’t imagine what it was like for a guy that blushed. It shouldn’t be different, but that’s not the reality.

How do you find the blushing now? I rarely blush. I remember getting cans of drink from the vending machine at school and rolling them over my cheeks before anything sociable!

[Amara 94]

I think it helped nurture anxiety and suppressed my interests as I was bullied in primary school, Year 1 to 4. I had teachers that didn’t understand me.

I didn’t really get bullied again but learnt to avoid it by becoming really quiet or withdrawn. Then high school was rough but I avoided fights by being quiet or becoming invisible. Hiding, avoiding coming across as a loner or anything that stood out.

[ryan2032]

Originally Posted by biscuits

^ chronic blushing was awful for me, but people found it cute. I did not. That’s what lead to avoidance for me. That heat and feeling mortified. No one ever said anything cruel about it, it was more about how awkward it made me feel. I can’t imagine what it was like for a guy that blushed. It shouldn’t be different, but that’s not the reality.

How do you find the blushing now? I rarely blush. I remember getting cans of drink from the vending machine at school and rolling them over my cheeks before anything sociable!

I can relate to the heat, and even though I could never see the blushing myself it must have been noticeable for other kids to use it as a weakness and make every day a living hell. I actually think the blushing was the start of everything, then came panic attacks, anxiety and depression.

I can't remember the last time I blushed so I guess I rarely do now like yourself.

[girlinterrupted]

I was bullied in various ways and to various degrees 'til it got really dodgy at the start of high school. It wasn't the root cause of my SA but it certainly consolidated it very unhelpfully.

[Sarah124]

I was emotionally bullied at both primary and secondary school. I think it was because I was so shy and therefore an easy target. I feel it really affected my self esteem and confidence, which has led to where I am now. Scared of even my own shadow. It made me feel as if I was a lesser person, who doesn't deserve friends. I am very much a loner now.

[choirgirl]

Reading this thread I'm just thinking it could have been so much worse, thank God my parents moved out of London. I managed to get through by keeping my head down and some light clowning.

[Hayman]

It's funny a thread like this has come up because I have been thinking quite a lot about my high school days recently. It's been a while since I've thought about it. I had a reasonable time at Primary School with some okay memories. I knew I was 'different' to others even back then to an extent, but I seemed to be largely accepted. So, I'll focus this post on High School.

I didn't have a particularly 'bad' time there. Year 7 was reasonable enough. It seemed to get progressively more mentally challenging for me the more I moved towards my GCSE year. On an academic level I was fine in the majority of lessons. I also got on with many teachers there who saw me as more mature than others. My biggest problem, by quite some margin, was fellow pupils. I wasn't 'bullied' as such. I've said this in the past, but I'd describe it as being 'one stage under' bullying. A stage where I was seen by others as a walking joke. Someone to be mocked. Someone quickly seen by the more 'alpha' types as too weak enough to argue back when others were wrong about me. Perhaps you could argue it really was bullying, but I didn’t quite see it like that at the time. I don't know...

One major event that I don't want to go into too much depth into (believe me when I say there’s more to this than meets the eye... It's one of those situations I could literally create it’s own thread to discuss) but towards the end of my time there, lets just say there was a collaboration of teachers against me. Yes, you did read that correctly. They were wanting to make an example out of me over a period of time, over a misunderstanding to do with an arrangement I had over lessons due to my arthritis which they themselves allowed me to do...and then back-tracked on - using me as the scapegoat. One of the teachers involved was one I never got along with from day one and to be honest, she had a poor reputation with most pupils who had lessons with her. That one didn’t surprise me. There were a few who had taught me in lessons in the past, who I had no issue with. There were two other teachers who I knew of but had no dealings/lessons with throughout my time there at all. The most upsetting thing about it all is that there were also two other teachers involved who I got on really well with, enjoyed their lessons and I genuinely thought they respected me. One of which had even taught my brother before me and was respected by the family. Even the school librarian was involved in this charade - someone else who I thought was a friend after many conversations we shared. Anyway, it got to the point where my parents could see what was going on, had at least two meetings with the school (that I can remember, anyway) and threatened to take me out of school and move me elsewhere if they didn't all cease what they were doing. I'll leave it at that, but lets just say I was beyond furious with it all, but I managed to just keep my head down for my own sake, kept myself to myself, didn't involve myself with any pleasantries with them any more, got my GCSE's and got out of there. I didn't even return to school to collect my results. My mother went on my behalf simply because I had absolutely no desire to return though those school gates ever again.

Several of the problems I thought the school had when I left in 2001 at the age of sixteen, were finally highlighted in it's 2019 Ofsted Report (easily found online) which I read the other evening out of morbid curiosity and the officers concluding that it's status is 'Requires Improvement'. It's highlighted problems? Bullying, pupil intimidation and teachers only really interacting with those who do well in order to further their knowledge.

At this point I actually went a little deeper and found some sort of 'school review forum' of sorts for the school. Mostly from parents, but a surprising amount from recent school-leavers from there too. It's something very much up to date with multiple posts made within the last three months alone. There's comments on teachers who seem to stick up for the perpetrators of the bullying and blaming the victims, teachers who are more interested in students final grades than actually teaching the subject clearly...

It sounds all too familiar, sadly.

These days it sounds as though the school also has a rather uninterested headteacher who's main concern is having an almost militant-like attitude over school uniform code over any other issues. That was kind-of going on during my time too, but it seems to have got significantly worse over the last 20 years.

Heaven knows why this happens but whenever I feel down, I look back on my High School years. It's like a default mindset position of mine. I didn't feel that way for quite a number of years after I left. It was more of a relief but I think once I got to my very late twenties, I began to accept that it's a period of my life which both did shape/develop my Social Anxiety very much for the worse and has emotionally scarred me.

There are numerous events from there which I've long since forgotten about, but there are notable exceptions which I still remember clearly to this day. Certain events I do consider to be 'injustices' for which I'll never forgive the perpetrators for. I can’t think of many people from that time in my life who I'd happily meet up with now, including my former best friend of whom I've discussed at length about in other posts in the past. Even the very few who I'd be 'okay' with, would no doubt remember the embarrassing 'teacher-gate', which I'd rather they not remember me for. With that in mind, it's probably for the best I'm not in contact with anyone from my school years.