By which I mean learning to handle making mistakes, because everyone makes mistakes. But when you've got that awesome combo in the thread title it makes it very hard to accept that. this brought to you by some thinking I've been doing, and since it's not exactly venting I thought it would be better to put it somewhere that isn't my Brainbent thread. Since I think a lot of other people wrestle with the same stuff.
I have a weird combo of being impulsive (probably from the ADHD) but also being EXTREMELY CAUTIOUS because of my anxiety and so I end up vacillating wildly between the two. It sucks. Every time therapy or self-care helps boost my confidence I become over-confident or careless, and then I make a dumb mistake, feel utterly ashamed, and want to hide for the rest of my life. I also have that problem where I will randomly think of a mistake i made months before and feel utterly ashamed. My last therapist tried to help me combat this stuff with logic i.e. "no one noticed", "no one cared", "everyone will forget in a couple days", etc. So I can call phrases like that to mind pretty easily now, but...it doesn't stop the physical anxiety reactions. The tightness in my chest and stomach, the feeling of shame and the fear of taking risks. And this is over stuff like "I accidentally pulled a boss in an mmo too early after telling someone else not to". Like. small potatoes, right? But my brain says NO ONE IS GOING TO WANT TO PLAY WITH YOU ANYMORE, I BET THEY'RE TELLING THEIR FRIENDS ALL ABOUT THAT HYPOCRITICAL DUMBASS THEY GOT A PARTY WITH. And this is a video game...I get that way about school and work, too. It makes me hypervigilant but it's exhausting and I'm always asking questions for clarification, and even then if I don't have enough details about a task I will freeze up and be unable to do it, out of fear that I'll mess something up out of ignorance. It's just terrifying to me. I guess...has anyone else had experience with this? Or some success in combating it?
Witnessed. It is balls. My psych recommended When Perfect Isn't Good Enough specifically because of my anxiety-based perfectionism/procrastination, which helps with the mental aspect. Getting physical activity reduced how often I experience physical anxiety symptoms, which reduces my mental anxiety, since my brain goes "well you feel anxious so there must be a reason". It's still not easy to deal with, but it's only been a couple months that I've been working on this.
Witnessed. I have severe perfectionism/procrastination issues and absolutely no idea how to deal with them. Therapy helped me be a bit easier on myself and now I'm okay at the whole "well I can either put this behind me or I can tear myself apart over it and I know how well that goes" but I still can't bring myself to attempt any of the things I actually want to do, like writing or learning to art and such. I vividly recall the one time I decided to make a serious attempt at writing a thing, got half a paragraph in, and then had to stop because I started feeling violently ill. It's awful and I don't have any tips or advice but yeah. Gosh dang do I know that entire feel.
