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Anxiety from constantly thinking I'm dumb

User Profile: Tillyangelli
Tillyangelli May 6th, 2016

I can barely get out of bed let alone leave my house. I probably walk out my front door maybe once a week. This anxiety is preventing me from seeking a therapist (that would require me to interact with people) let alone hold a job, have a social like and go to school.

Usually seeing actual slow people triggers the anxiety. For example if I see a picture of a kid with down syndrome I'll freak out and start to wonder if I have down syndrome. I look back at my life and my acedemic succes and even though I was in the accelerated program I think maybe I imagined all that and I was with the slow kids. Or what if I was a slow kid and people had pity on me for trying so hard they put me with the smart kids to make me feel good about myself.

I spend hours a day reading the same studies over and over and over again as an attempt to relieve the anxiety. For example the dunning Kruger effect and imposter syndrome come up a lot. And I'll say oh good, maybe I'm experiencing imposter syndrome, but then I feel like I'm experiencing dunning Kruger for experiencing imposter syndrome

Or I'll read about people in similar situations, and I'll come accross someone saying how smart people tend to have lower self esteems because they're more aware of their ignorance and limitations. Or they compare their knowledge to an abundance of knowledge whereas dumb people compare their knowledge to the absence of knowledge and that's why they think they're smart. Which makes sense until I read something suggesting people tend to feel dumb when they're surrounded by people smarter than they are. I feel dumb all the time so would that mean everyone or most people are smarter than me, therefore I actually am stupid!! I can't take this, it never ends. I just want to feel content for 1 day.

3
User Profile: PacificSunrise
PacificSunrise May 6th, 2016

@Tillyangelli I can see that with all the thoughts that is going through your mind, it can be hard to focus when there are a lot of thoughts that keep getting you to think you might have this or that. Each one is scary and doesn't uplift you in anyway. We are here to support you and I wanted to let you know that there's a self-help guide here on 7 cups that might be able to give you some tools to help you deal. The link is https://www.7cups.com/anxiety-help

Feel better and I hope you are able to get your 1 day and many more.