I still haven't figured myself out since I have become independent of medication, which has been almost a year now probably.

I started taking meds at age 14 because of depression/anxiety and throughout the span of seven years, I was on over a dozen different medications because I kept having to switch meds and psycs since nothing was working.

I was misdiagnosed as having bipolar disorder and I was being overmedicated, which ultimately caused me to go off the deep end and
I overdosed on my medication.

So, after I got out of the hospital, I saw a new doc and just took 2 different meds, one anti-depressent and one for anxiety. Instead of taking like five different ones, including mood stabilizer crap that I didn't need. Anyway, I was doing so well that one day I just quit meds alltogether 'cause I didn't feel like I needed them anymore, which I didn't.

Now it's been a while and I've been emotionally stable, never depressed these days. Ever since I got out of the hospital, I saw everything through renewed eyes and I couldn't fathom how screwed up I'd gotten. It was a very eye-opening experience.

BUT now all I ever do is distract my mind. I have like this mental block of facing myself or anything negative that I feel in the back of my mind.
I don't acknowledge it. My self-awareness is just not there. It's like I don't really know who I am now because I haven't been myself all the years that I was on meds and I'm afraid to find out. I think I'm afraid
I'll get in too deep and start drowning again. A big issue that I had when
I was depressed was that I would overthink everything, overanalyze, and every thought in my mind would be negative. I was completely delusional.


Anyway, sorry about all that ramble, I was just wondering... for those who have overcome Social Anxiety, do you ever feel like you have an identity crisis?

If you go through so much of your life being one way, then you change,
I would think it would be confusing and difficult to find who you really are. Although, I think friendships really help people find themselves.

Okay nobody wanted to read through all that, lol...understandable, but I'll make this brief and rephrase it so it's more to my point. Does anyone feel that if you recovered from Social Anxiety, you wouldn't know who you were...or you'd have to find yourself, independent of the disorder? Because I think that's why I'm having issues now, I don't know what to make of my stability after being all depressed for so long. I don't know how to function normally yet. I wonder if it's the same way once you overcome SA. I dunno how to explain it, I just think that people's disorders can effect them and their life so much that it becomes part of them...it changes your personality when you recover. So, it makes me wonder if SA is just naturally part of a person's personality. How can you tell, if you've lived with it your whole life? If you overcome it, are you becoming somebody else?

No, sa isnt naturally part of a persons personality. You could have taken as your identity, let it become who you are, consume your personality in a way, but your own unique (albiet undiscovered) self is still waiting there to come out and shine. You need to get out into the world. Once you find yourself, everything will find into place.

A lot of people find experiment to find their identities in High school. If you do have SA and Depression and all that you may be too worried about that to really take some time out to find yourself.

I myself am still striving to find out exactly what I want to do in life. It can be frustrating. But when you do find and sculpt the Identity you want and eventually become exactly what you want to be happiness will follow =)

When who you are
How people percieve you
Who you want to be
And How you WANT people to percieve you

All line up
You will have a solid identity.

Good point. I guess SA is kinda like a mask of sorts and one's true self is hidden until they can "come out and shine", as you say.

Yep, I was too much of a mess in high school to find myself. Now I gotta work on it now 'cause I'm relatively stable lol, no more depression at least. SA doesn't make it easy at all either

I'm a little late to the party, but for me, identity was HUGE, huge, a big breakthrough.

My theory on sa for some people (maybe not everybody) but some...

As a kid you go along in life, you're never far from the norm.

Almost every kid I knew back in the 80's did pretty much the same thing. Play outside with toys, go to birthday parties, act silly, do silly things, collected the same toys, watched the same cartoons. No one was on the internet questioning their identity, who am I, in any kind of fog.

Some are outgoing, some aren't. Some are popular. Some are picked last for handball or basketball. Some are Bart Simpson types getting into trouble. Some never get into trouble. You go along until 10, 11, 12, 13, 14.

Then I think *alot* changes. More than you realize. You put away the toys. Some people are left behind....bullying, picked on, poor self esteem, poor self image, you moved, friends moved away, didnt fit into a clique in school, scared of girls, didn't get a date.

The "normal people" go in one direction...getting a car, a job, a girlfriend, more independence.

You're going in another direction....very, very hard to get motivated, inconsistent job, no job, no gf, no dates, little if any independence and it becomes this self re-inforcing cycle. You find yourself at 22, 23, 24 *waaay* behind the ball. Other people might be getting married and you havent done anything.

And suffice to say, your identity gets completely messed up, foggy during this time.

Something that helped me get a clearer identity was going back to when I was 8, 9, 10, 11, 12. When things were "normal" or more normal than when I was 19 or 20.

And figure out what do you identify with, what do you like, where would you be if you didn't go in another direction?

For me, I identify with alot of movies from the 80's, sports, and "real stuff", down to earth. And positive things you've done. I think it shows up in alot of places, your house/bedroom, your avatar, user name, momentos, your clothes, lots of things.

It doesn't have to be a perfect definition, like a large painting, where every square inch is covered. Mine is still a work in progress. But its much, much better than holding onto the negative days of middle school, high school and living in that kind of fog.

Another question to ask yourself...what would you want to get into if you could go back in time? Maybe things you missed out on, didnt have time for, didnt have the confidence for. That gave me some things to think about.