When I was a kid, I had selective mutism.
While this sounds like an awesome X-Men superpower, it was quite the opposite.
In certain situations, I didn’t speak — I was mute.
This happened every time I entered a social situation alone without my parents.
School was always the place I dreaded the most.
I’d get paralyzed with fear.
I’d look like this…
My parents had no idea I was selectively mute because at home I was a chatterbox.
My teachers didn’t think I had a problem - they just thought I was shy.
This happens a lot with anxious kids — since they usually don’t cause problems, their
struggles can go unnoticed.
Why did this happened to me?
Anxiety runs in my family, so I was wired to feel it more intensely than other kids.
I also remember feeling weird being one of the only brown kids in my school, so I tried
everything I could not to stick out more than I already did.
I also learned if I kept my mouth shut someone else would feel bad and speak up for me.
As I got older, I learned to speak up when I had to, but it still terrified me.
Our brains are association machines, they make connections between situations and emotions.
Mine connected people with anxiety.
In middle school, I started worrying there was something wrong with me, that I was weird.
That’s when my selective mutism turned into social anxiety.
I panicked whenever a teacher called on me, kept thinking I had made a fool out of myself
in front of other kids at school, and avoided everyone except my family and a few close
friends.
As other kids started developing crushes, I started to believe that no one would ever
want be interested in me.
In high school my friend convinced me to enroll in public speaking.
I thought it was a class about listening to famous speeches.
I HAD NO IDEA IT WAS GOING TO BE A SEMESTER OF SPEAKING IN FRONT OF OTHER PEOPLE!!
I was terrified and wanted to drop the class…but that would have meant I had to speak to the
teacher and get her permission to drop out.
Since I was too afraid to speak to any authority figure, I was stuck in the class.
My teacher, Georgianna Hayes, started the course with each person practicing short speeches
in front of 1 other person.
I was anxious, but it wasn’t as bad as speaking in front of the whole class.
Then we’d repeat the speech with a different parter.
Things were a little bit easier the 2nd time.
We kept repeating this exercise until everyone got bored of the task.
Later, we shared what it what was going on in our heads during each speech.
To my surprise, I learned EVERYONE was worried about coming across as weird, dumb, or strange.
My deepest fear, people thinking I was different, turned out to be a common fear shared my everyone
in that situation.
We moved on to short speeches in front of a small group, then medium sized groups, and
pretty soon we were speaking in front of the whole class.
Here’s the first big speech I gave in that class — it was all about getting rid of
bad breath.
It was my passive aggressive way of telling the person I sat next to that their breath
really stank.
They didn’t get the message.
I learned years later that Ms. Hayes was doing exposure therapy.
Avoiding social situations, trying to eliminate anxiety, that was the cause of all my problems.
But when I faced my fears in incremental steps, I got used to them.
My thoughts began to change — they became more realistic.
It was like riding a wave — my anxiety would start, rise, and then eventually fizzle out.
Learning I could ride out my emotions became my superpower.
I sought out every opportunity I could to expose myself to anxiety.
I joined the speech and debate team, became a Rally Board commissioner, and started wrestling.
By the time I graduated high school social anxiety wasn’t something that bothered me
anymore.
It’s not that I’ve eliminated anxiety from my life.
That’s impossible — I still experience it, especially when I’m speaking in front
of my mentors, the first day I teach a class, when I talk in front of famous psychologists,
or when I present at comic con.
I also developed a brief case of panic disorder after my brother died…but that’s a different
story.
Now, I know we’re SUPPOSED to feel emotions.
They communicate important information.
Fear warns us of potential danger.
Sadness tells us a loss or setback has occurred and helps us to reflect on what’s happened.
Anxiety reminds us to prepare for something in the future.
Anger tells us we’ve been wronged.
When we avoid our emotions, that’s when the problems begin.
That’s how we fall into thinking traps.
That’s how we isolate ourselves.
This isn’t just true for anxiety, it’s also the case for depression, tics, body focused
repetitive behaviors, eating disorders, personality disorders, substance and addiction disorders,
and may more mental health problems.
This is why I became a clinical psychologist — I want to help others face their fears,
ride out their emotions, and change their lives.
What are your fears and how have you overcome them?
Let me know in the comments below.
I’m Ali Mattu on Twitter, Instagram, and Snapchat.
Be sure to Like The Psych Show on Facebook and subscribe on YouTube.