Re: Does Anyone have Trouble Saying Certain Words
This is clearly a phobia of sorts. It's helpful to know you're not the only one because feeling like a weirdo makes these things even worse. But this is a very small community, so because no one shares it, doesn't mean you're the only one who has it. I don't know what age you are, but the more open you can be about this the better. The trouble is that sort of thing gets a lot easier as you age. When you're young, the idea of being outside the norm is much harder to deal with. I for instance have suffered with paruresis for a long time. It's an inability to urinate in public lavatories, or anywhere that isn't completely private. It first happened when I started going to pubs at about 15. I felt like a child among men, and I'm sure this was the start of it. It's one of those things that is easy to reinforce, and very difficult to unlearn, so it becomes a downward spiral very fast. I'm 46 now, and last year went on holiday for the first time in over 20 years. The idea of being stuck on a plane for hours and not be able to escape to somewhere more private to use a lavatory was too hellish so I just didn't go on holiday. I wanted to go on holiday with my family last year because my parents are getting old and we rarely spend much time all together as a family anymore, so I didn't want to be absent yet again. The first thing I did was tell everyone what I'd been suffering from all these years. Just that one thing made things a lot easier. I started going to public lavatories with my dad, starting with quieter ones, then gradually working up to busier places. I went to the doctor and got some chill pills too just in case they helped, and everything went better than I could have hoped. I'm far from over it though, and if it wasn't for having bluetooth headphones and a phone so I could play music to drown out the sound of public noise, I would still have struggled. Anyway, the point of all this seemingly irrelevant waffle is that the first step is to start opening up about what you're going through. You should really think about telling your teachers at least. Admitting I couldn't piss in public because of shyness and insecurity was not easy, and the fact that none of my family had ever heard of this thing made it even harder, but it had to be done. Don't suffer in silence, tell people. You've made a start coming on here, so keep moving in that direction.
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