Agoraphobia

[BaiseEQ]

Wow, never even heard of this, and after reading these post !realize how Agoraphobic I am. I hate going outside, going out to the mall or to eat is even worse. Just thinking about it causes me to get all worked up. It's a bad situation cause here I am, 19 years old, and unable to go out and look for a Job because of it. I didn't know what was wrong with me, and my parents just always told me I was lazy and didn't want to do anything with my life, even after seeing me breakdown in public.

Want to thank the poster for making this, who knows how long I would of gone not knowing what was going on. Going to look into Agoraphobia and Paxil and other options now. If anyone has any advice where to start, would be greatly appreciated.

[Iannis]

Originally posted by aychamo_aycono
Every once in a while I'll get talked into going to a bar with my friends, but I hate being there. I feel like everyone is looking at me and laughing at me.
i hate clubs more.

I hate to go into the mall by myself. I feel as soon as I walk in everyone is looking at me and laughing at me, and I just want to turn around and run out.
Only if they point at you while laughing. I used to be like that (THOSE SONS OF BITCHES ARE LAUGHING AT ME!)..but now I only think that if it's blatant i am the subject of ridicule. and if so, you point right back and burst into maniac laughter. They get scared and run away. If it's a big burly skinhead you might have something to worry about. Usuaully it's a better idea to let them laugh, unless they give you more shit. Or if you could take him.

I hate going to parties, cause I hate talking to people that I am not extremely familiar with. I hate meeting new people, are being in weird situations where you are forced to talk with someone you don't know that well.
parties make for poor social interaction in my experience. I either can't hear shit over the band, or everyone is already in the process of getting fucked up somehow so it's mildly pointless to bother making conversation. I had a drawn-out conversation with a guy who couldn't remember who the hell I was in the morning after consuming a large quantity of cheap vodka. <-not a drinker, which makes parties even less fun. I had a baaad experience with way too much rum when I was 14, and swore that shit off. Meeting new people is teh fun though...normally I do that in the daytime around my spawn(re: cup a joe or used book stores) at the area around campus. I've met some wierd, wierd bastards at my time at technical college and university. Outside people are just as twisted as us trolls!

I wonder how common this infliction is? And how big of a "chance" do you really think that is, that probably a bit of us have it, and we all end up playing a social computer game?

it's actually a fairly common affliction if I remember my psych textbook right, but most people don't have it to an extreme degree.

[medalinor]

Originally posted by BaiseEQ
If anyone has any advice where to start, would be greatly appreciated.

As a physician, I'd recommend that your first step should be to make an appointment with your general practitioner. After describing your symptoms, he or she can explain your options to you and recommend a course of treatment.

Paxil is an excellent drug, but as others have already pointed out, there are potential side effects. When going off Paxil it is important to decrease the dose gradually in order to reduce the chances of such side effects.

Paxil, along with most other anti-depressants, usually takes 4 to 6 weeks before individuals notice a significant difference in mood or behavior. If Paxil doesn't help you, there are many other medications that you can try. While drugs alone have been helpful to many people, studies have shown that people have better results when they speak to a psychiatrist in addition to taking medication.

Good luck.

[aychamo_aycono]

Originally posted by medalinor


As a physician, I'd recommend that your first step should be to make an appointment with your general practitioner. After describing your symptoms, he or she can explain your options to you and recommend a course of treatment.

Paxil is an excellent drug, but as others have already pointed out, there are potential side effects. When going off Paxil it is important to decrease the dose gradually in order to reduce the chances of such side effects.

Paxil, along with most other anti-depressants, usually takes 4 to 6 weeks before individuals notice a significant difference in mood or behavior. If Paxil doesn't help you, there are many other medications that you can try. While drugs alone have been helpful to many people, studies have shown that people have better results when they speak to a psychiatrist in addition to taking medication.

Good luck.

Why would you recommend seeing a general practitioner? It's obviously a mental illness, so why would you not firstly see a psychiatrist? You wouldn't recommend seeing a psychiatrist if you were having kidney problems, would you? What kind of physician are you? ....

[Iannis]

i think this is one filed under "head or body problem depending on who you ask'..doc could refer you to where you need to go?

or might've just meant go to a general therapist type joint. I'm sure there is a specialized field for phobias you get referred to if the phobia is bad enough...kinda like there are different doctors for any part of the body you can name(or not name.)

[Schatze]

Aychamo often GPs will refer you to a psychiatrist, as a lot of psychiatrists require referrals to get an appointment...

Just from guessing what you said, it's either depression and or social anxiety... They're not laughing at you, but it feels that way, even though you know they're not. And you'll misinterpret things negatively in a social context, etc. etc.

To what everyone else has said... Yea a lot of people who play EQ suffer from mental illnesses that tend to make real life socializing less appealing then socializing over EQ.

Many are undiagnosed and just gravitate to these games to gain the social interaction that they have a hard time dealing with irl.

I'd wager a good amount that the population of people in eq with depression/agoraphobia/anxiety disorders is large, and I can guarantee everyone who plays EQ has people in any guild that suffer from these.

If someone wanted to do a doctoral thesis, well, this thread provides you with many ideas :P

This is why the "EQ killed my kid/stole my daddy/my wife" stories are generally false... Most of these people are mentally ill in the first place, and EQ offers them a way to connect with people, yet in a manner in which they feel more comfortable.

Unfortunately, it also tends to disconnect people even more from the world, such that they have a harder time making the break back to RL from EQ. Which is, in my opinion, why "EQ" is so addictive.

[PsykloneStrykz]

i'd just like to applaud everyone on this thread, it's one of the first serious, ALMOST flamefree threads i've seen here, gratz all! and yes, Agoraphobia is a major struggle. i don't personally suffer from this condition, but my brother-in-law does, and just seeing the rut he's in, i want to find a way to help him, but not sure what i can do *sigh*

i personally suffer from IED, Intermitent Explosive Disorder, caused by a chemical imbalance in my cerebrum, in turn causing me to lash out violently at anyone, anywhere, over anything, and this has been handled via doses of Zoloft and Percaset (Percaset selfprescribed) but hey, it chills me out and mellows me down! and kills the pain from the shit i hit/break before i go nuts =)

hope this helps in some way, but Z&P both took a good 2 weeks to notice anything, have a great night and once again, congratulations on this great post !

[Schatze]

watch out for the percs, called "hillbilly heroin" out here for a reason... addictive as fuck.

but i'm not one to talk heh...

[userr0101]

at first i thought i was agoraphobic, but im really not. i play eq for..18 hours a day and barely if ever go out, but i think im lazy more than anything. i used to smoke weed, get really drunk and fuck random women i met while "out with teh boys"..looking back on it i dont really think it was too fun. fucking around online is way more fun, at least atm it is. whatever passes the time i guess.

[Plan9]

and fuck random women i met while "out with teh boys

I agree...I mean...who DOESN'T love a good hooker now and then??

[Jukax]

Why would you recommend seeing a general practitioner? It's obviously a mental illness, so why would you not firstly see a psychiatrist? You wouldn't recommend seeing a psychiatrist if you were having kidney problems, would you? What kind of physician are you? ....

Just because a person suffers from anxiety or depression does not mean it is a purely mental disorder. A lot of the time it can be caused by trauma or illness like a tumour or something, and it is initially manifested as anxiety / depression. I've been coping for about 4 years now with social anxiety disorder and panic attacks, and the very first thing my doctors did when it began was to get a head CT scan to rule out any injury - a definite possibility for me, at least, since I was playing varsity rugby for my university at the time.

I'm currently on Paxil 40mg, Zyprexa 5mg and Topamax 200mg daily, and take Clonezapam 2mg as needed. As stated above, everyone experiences different side effects. For me, the worst side effect is the dopiness (is that even a word?) from the Zyprexa and Topamax - I've gone from sleeping about 6 hours a night on average to around 10 hours a night and still feeling exhausted in the daytime. My doctor told me this is pretty common, a lot of his patients actually refer to Topamax as "Dopamax" because it makes you so sleepy. Zyprexa was rough initially because it can cause massive weight gain; I was lucky and only put on about 20 pounds over a year or so - some patients can put on 20 pounds in a month on it.

As for the idiot who said that medication is everything and therapists will only tell you what you already know - that's bullshit. I do agree that the things they tell you to do are often repetitive, and the books they want you to read seem to be about 30 chapters of the same paragraph written over and over, but that isn't the whole picture - there's a lot more to it than that. Therapy as a sole method for treating psychological disorders has a higher success and prevention of relapse rate (somewhere around 50-70%) than does medication as a sole method (somewhere around 30-50%). A combination of therapy and medication is the best bet, it can often achieve 80-90% success rate.

[medalinor]

Originally posted by aychamo_aycono

Why would you recommend seeing a general practitioner? It's obviously a mental illness, so why would you not firstly see a psychiatrist? You wouldn't recommend seeing a psychiatrist if you were having kidney problems, would you? What kind of physician are you? ....

I’m a neurosurgeon. Just kidding, I’m a radiologist.

There are a variety of reasons why I would recommend that an individual first consult his or her general practitioner. First, as Jukax stated, there are other possible causes of depression and anxiety besides what is normally considered to be mental illness. It is a good idea to rule out all such possibilities, no matter how “obvious” a diagnosis may appear.

I would also recommend that people first go to their GP because the majority of people probably do not already have a psychiatrist. Instead of randomly picking a name out of a phone book, a GP can refer individuals to someone who excels in treating that person’s specific problem.

Depending on the particular health care plan that someone might have, his or her health care provider might require that he or she see a GP before seeing a specialist. Your regular physician can refer you to a psychiatrist who will be covered under your current plan.

[Buzze]

In Theme Hospital, the patients always talk to the G.P. first.

Sorry for the essay.

Anyway, I too used to be mildly agoraphobic (I think). I didn't like going into heavily populated places and / or meeting new people. Looking back, I realize that my self-esteem was virtually nonexistent . I'm not trying to say that I am Mr. Perfect now, but knowing (or at least thinking) that I feel and look* better than a lot of people make it a more comforting experience. I am still a very quiet and shy person when I first meet someone, but later on the sarcasm sets in and I warm up .
*I get my hair cut regularly, I wash my face, brush my teeth, shave, and make myself as presentable as I can, which is arguably a lot more than most people do.

Maybe it was hormones that finally started setting in (lol) but after quitting EQ and getting a job that forced me to be seen by many people, I have much better luck with the females . I'm not saying to quit EQ. Hell, I got back into it (and I now play again), but I only play around 1 hour a night . School, work, play, and the ever-changing internet (forums) will do that for you, I guess.

There is my story, sorry it ended up being so long .

[Khylen]

I guess after reading this post I'm one of the few who's played EQ and doesn't suffer from some sort of social anxiety disorder, I guess I should really consider myself a lucky person.

I do, however, have a friend from Texas who does suffer from this sort of thing. I've known him for like 6 years, we met in the first graphic MMORPG, The Realm. He's always been anti-social when it comes to real life, but I never considered him having any kind of social disorder...

I remember in The Realm he had falled in love online with this girl, and they were planning on getting married. I was the best man ( ) and was ready for this wedding to happen and everything. However, his new 'bride' to be never showed, and my friend nearly took his life over it...

At the time I was like 14, and at the time I was like "wtf what a stupid broad, oh well man " (but after I found out how distraught he was), and I felt soooo fucking retarded. My friend could have killed himself that night and all I could do was say "wtf.." After that he confessed his anti-social feelings to me, and then soon went to see a doctor about it. Now hes on Prozac and he seems to be doing better.

He does, however, have a real problem kicking EQ. Just out of curiousity do others with this sort of disorder have the same problem?

And also, I feel really bad for you guys. Even though I know sympathy means nothing, I just wanted to let you guys know that people do care, even if you think they don't.

[doharg]

As for the idiot who said that medication is everything and therapists will only tell you what you already know - that's bullshit. I do agree that the things they tell you to do are often repetitive, and the books they want you to read seem to be about 30 chapters of the same paragraph written over and over, but that isn't the whole picture - there's a lot more to it than that. Therapy as a sole method for treating psychological disorders has a higher success and prevention of relapse rate (somewhere around 50-70%) than does medication as a sole method (somewhere around 30-50%). A combination of therapy and medication is the best bet, it can often achieve 80-90% success rate.

Ouch! I suppose I could explain my point of view better. Many therapist (or at least, the ones I went to) will avoid putting people on medication as they feel the problem is purely psychological. I would strongly recommend you not fall into this line of thinking. Of course, much of the problem is a learned behavior, but don't avoid being treated for the physical aspect of the disorder which medication can help. No mater how you look at it, no mater how much you want otherwise, the solution is the obvious; “face your fears.” You will remain a phobic for as long as you can avoid what scares you.

Also, I personally have found that some people “hide” in therapy. They use therapy as a way to say to the world, “I’m getting help, you (friends/family) don’t need to help me (push me into uncomfortable situations) any more.” This can also turn into an avoidance mechanism. Therapist can be a huge help, but you must realize that they are tools for you to use in your recovery, they cannot fight your battle for you. There is no easy way out, but there is a path to recovery providing YOU are willing to travel it.