I call my brain the ghost house because sometimes it's completely void of life and all you can feel is a cold, desolate emptiness. Other times it’s full of life and confidence; normal fluctuations I would think everyone experiences once in a while.

But summer's coming, and I’m anticipating a larger void of life going on in the ghost house than usual. It's funny that Seasonal Affective Disorder specifies winter as the season people get depression. Summer is my dreaded season. In a town where the sun shines hot in the sky through the afternoon and the ocean breeze compensates for the heat, you can practically feel the rumble of tourists stomping their way from the valley, from the north, and from the hills into our overpriced hotels and vacation rentals. They crowd the beaches like ants! So I shut my blinds, lock my door, and curl in the fetal position on my bed waiting for night to fall, the only safe time to walk through my front door.

I used to say I hated people, but that just isn't the case. Social Anxiety isn't about hatred or being callous or rude, it's about being uncomfortable around your own species. It's about hypersensitivity to criticisms, to people's vocal tones, to people's expressions, and to your own emotions. It's about physical tremors, shortened breath, reddened cheeks, and unsatisfied social lives. Asking questions for clarification unleashes mental warfare in your mind--what if the question is stupid? What if someone laughs? No, they're definitely going to laugh; they're going to think I'm stupid, they already do anyway--and by the time the argument between you and the anxiety stalemates, the opportunity to ask the question is lost. So Social Anxiety is also about lost opportunities.

Mental health issues diminish the quality of life in such ways. It's hard to get understanding, support, and help for things unseen. A pill could subdue the physical reactions--your General Physician will be sure to convince you of that--but it doesn't always stop the cycling, near uncontrollable thoughts of people's opinions of you, of that one time in class last week you tripped on your shoe lace and slammed into the professor's table, or that one time in the street last month you ran across the road and your shoe fell off in front of that busy restaurant, or that time last semester you answered a question wrong in class and there were a few giggles. If you have friends, they won't always understand and may get annoyed back your lack of enthusiasm to leave your house. Significant others, even, may give you a cold shoulder.

The problem is, everyone experiences anxiety and of those who experience it in an average amount get over it fairly quickly, dismiss it as a factor of life. And indeed they are correct; it is a factor of life. But just as a minor cut may get infected and grow into a malignant wound or what was perceived as a benign cancer cell could sprout a venomous twin, normal psychopathology like anxiety can morph into a hideous, near uncontrollable evil. Others can't be in your head when you're experiencing the cycling thoughts or when your mind blanks, or when you struggle to start a conversation, to hold a conversation, or to be part of a conversation, or to accept any of it is happening to you.

This is where I tend to grow envious of other disorders. I would never DARE of wishing for Bipolar disorder or a Schizophrenia Spectrum disorder, but it is a true fact those suffering with such disorders have visible symptoms much more prominent and obvious than those of us suffering through something like Social Anxiety disorder. It doesn't make anyone's pain less or more significant, and because their symptoms are more visible they face some pretty heartbreaking stigma. It certainly is true the other disorders can be harder to treat than an anxiety disorder but most with severe social anxiety disorder don't have nearly enough confidence to ask for help. We aren't going to end up in a mental health hospital spouting disorganized words in an episode of psychosis. We’re also much less at risk of ending up on the street, hungry, amid infinite demons in our head. No, we're just going to be quiet in our houses, beating ourselves down, waiting for someone to recognize and tell us how to stop.

I've done therapy, I've done medication, and I'm proud to say . . . I'm worse off. I didn't do well with medication and Therapy wasn't what I hoped it would be, partly because I couldn't open up to the extent I needed to. But regardless of every negative listed in this post, I am hopeful only because I've chosen to accept myself and to recognize I don’t need to convince anyone else that what I experience is real. I'm unemployed, I'm a completely and utterly broke college student, and every time I apply for medical insurance at the county welfare office, I walk in for an appointment and they tell me I'm no longer eligible. Sometimes it feels as if someone is purposefully putting road blocks at every turn I make. But I do wish to get back into therapy and become someone I can be a little more satisfied with. I refuse to be a statistic and drop out of college because of Social Anxiety; I refuse to let it be an excuse for why I can't have the same quality of life as others.

My mother believes me to be exaggerating, my boyfriend states "I don't understand and I never will understand" and that I'm just "weird" and that what I describe as my symptoms are “stupid”. Most of the time it hurts to know I have no support by the only two people I talk to openly, but it just reminds me this problem is something I need to deal with doing what I do best: working alone.