Re: My Fecal BO Cure!

I think the anxiety and paranoia post-cure faded over time. There was nothing I could really do except reassure myself. I knew I was cured and the comments and reactions stopped altogether, so there wasn't much to be worried about. Sometimes I'd write down quotes and stuff that I'd remember throughout the day. Like anxiety and paranoia can be worsened by your own thoughts and you must tell your brain to stop sending itself anxiety signals. Or I would sneak away and close my eyes (and lay down if I could) for a few minutes to meditate and gather my thoughts, which I highly recommend. After those few minutes, I'd come out into the world with worries seeming so much smaller and feeling very calm, with a new clarity of a situation. Once you get good at meditation, that place of calmness gets much easier to reach. You can go from needing ten minutes, to five, to one minute, and then 20 seconds.

I went to a family doctor and she prescribed me a tiny amount of xanax to help me get through work for a few days (I was out of school by then). It sort of taught me how an anxiety-free, paranoia-free person feels and thinks, or at least how I imagined. Before, my thoughts would echo a lot in my head and I'd be too conscious and in my head, but with xanax I kind of learned a new skill to stop the echoing and just calm down. I've only taken it like three times because it's a controversial and addictive drug, if you take it too much consecutively. I haven't ever gone back to it though. I don't wanna depend on drugs or do them.

I work as a pizza delivery driver and deliver to strangers and interact with people at the restaurant a lot. So that definitely helped me out of my social anxiety comfort zone once I cured myself. In customer service you have to learn composure, and once you have that down, you kind of start to believe you're composed and calm and friendly.

So yeah: meditation, a short stint with xanax, and my job helped me regain my non-anxiousness. The paranoia and anxiety was intertwined so they both got better as I worked on either. Going through that mental journey will help you grow a lot but it takes time. Always remind yourself of logic: If no one has said any "stinky" comment in so long, then there is nothing to worry about. Even further, for big crowds, I find it easier if you're not at a social gathering. Try being by yourself or with people you trust, go eat at a busy restaurant, or a recreational area, or a fair, or a gym or anywhere crowded where you can be anonymous. It'll be uncomfortable at first but having confirmation that no stranger reacts is very reassuring. And then move up to social gatherings and higher pressure situations and eventually your paranoia and anxiety tolerance will heighten. Tweet