Things People Secretly Do Because of Social Anxiety (with Natasha Daniels) | Ep. 401

There are 5 hidden habits people with social anxiety secretly engage in and today we are here to offering insight and actionable tips to help you manage and overcome Social Anxiety Disorder.

What to expect in this episode:

• Discover the surprising ways social anxiety manifests in everyday habits, from checking to rehearsing conversations.
• Learn why people with social anxiety tend to overanalyze body language and how this impacts their relationships.
• Explore the common habit of rereading texts and emails, and how to break free from this anxiety-driven behavior.
• Find out how social anxiety influences communication patterns, especially keeping track of who initiates contact.
• Get practical, therapist-approved tips on how to be more present and challenge these behaviors in your daily life.

In this podcast episode, Kimberley Quinlan chats with the incredible Natasha Daniels about the secret habits people often engage in due to social anxiety. Social anxiety is much more than just feeling shy or nervous in social settings—it can show up in subtle, secretive ways that deeply impact daily life. 

Natasha shares her insights on how social anxiety manifests, drawing from her personal experience and her upcoming memoir Out of My Shell: Overcoming Social Anxiety from Childhood to Adulthood. Let’s explore the five hidden behaviors that people with social anxiety might recognize in themselves.

1. Over-Checking: A Need for Reassurance

What it looks like:
Many people with social anxiety engage in compulsive checking behaviors. This can involve constantly checking things like body odor, facial expressions, or even clothing to make sure nothing is out of place. Natasha reveals how she frequently checks her face for redness during social interactions, especially in situations where she shares personal stories.

Why people do it:
The underlying fear is often about appearing inadequate or embarrassing in front of others. Whether it’s checking for sweat marks or reapplying deodorant, it’s all about preventing a potential social disaster. For many, this behavior is a response to the fear of being judged or rejected.

Actionable Tip:
Next time you catch yourself checking, pause and ask: “What’s the worst that could happen if I stopped checking?” Challenge yourself to let go of the need for reassurance, even if it feels uncomfortable. This is a small but powerful exposure exercise.

2. Rehearsing Conversations: Preparing for Every Possible Scenario

What it looks like:
People with social anxiety often mentally rehearse conversations before they happen. Whether it’s practicing what to say at a drive-through or planning a script for a phone call, rehearsing can take over one’s mind.

Why people do it:
This is a way to avoid awkwardness or saying something “stupid” in social situations. However, constant rehearsing takes you out of the present moment, leaving you distracted and even more anxious when the situation doesn’t go as planned.

Actionable Tip:
Try reducing the amount of rehearsal time by focusing on being present. Mindfulness exercises, like grounding yourself in the five senses, can help redirect your focus away from overthinking and toward the present moment.

3. Rereading Texts and Emails: Looking for Mistakes

What it looks like:
Do you reread every text or email you send, scanning for typos or potentially awkward phrasing? For those with social anxiety, this habit can be all-consuming, leading to unnecessary stress and self-criticism.

Why people do it:
The fear of appearing unintelligent or making a social misstep can drive people to meticulously check their communications. Natasha describes how the introduction of the “edit” feature in text messaging was both a blessing and a curse—it offered more control but also fueled the anxiety around perfection.

Actionable Tip:
Set a limit on how many times you can reread a message before sending it. Allow yourself a few minor mistakes and remind yourself that everyone makes them—your worth isn’t defined by a typo.

4. Overanalyzing Body Language: Searching for Rejection

What it looks like:
People with social anxiety tend to overanalyze others’ body language for signs of disinterest or judgment. Whether someone glances at their watch or yawns during a conversation, the anxious mind can interpret these signals as proof of being disliked.

Why people do it:
Social anxiety often comes with a heightened awareness of others’ reactions, making it easy to misinterpret neutral actions as negative judgments.

Actionable Tip:
Challenge the assumptions you make about other people’s body language. Instead of immediately assuming someone’s lack of attention is because of you, practice asking yourself, “Could there be another reason for their behavior?” This shift can help reduce the pressure to interpret every action negatively.

5. Keeping Track of Who Initiates Contact: Avoiding Rejection

What it looks like:
People with social anxiety may keep close tabs on who initiates communication in friendships or relationships. If they are always the one reaching out, they might start to worry that they’re being too needy or bothersome.

Why people do it:
This behavior stems from the fear of being rejected or not valued in relationships. Natasha explains how, especially with new friendships, she’s very aware of who reaches out and whether she’s the one initiating too often.

Actionable Tip:
Try to let go of the need to keep score. Friendships and relationships naturally ebb and flow, and the balance of who initiates contact may change over time. Practice reaching out without the expectation of immediate reciprocity.

Final Thoughts

Social anxiety is more than just shyness or feeling nervous—it can involve deeply ingrained habits that fuel anxiety. Natasha Daniels reminds us that overcoming social anxiety begins with focusing on self-compassion and challenging those automatic behaviors. While it’s important to recognize the behaviors that keep social anxiety going, it’s equally important to remember that these habits don’t define you.

Take small steps toward being kinder to yourself and less critical of your actions. With patience and practice, you can start to reduce the power of social anxiety in your life.

Want more tips? Be sure to check out Natasha Daniels’ upcoming memoir, Out of My Shell: Overcoming Social Anxiety from Childhood to Adulthood for more insights and personal stories on how to navigate life with social anxiety.

Transcript

Kimberley: Welcome back, everybody. We have the amazing Natasha Daniels here talking about the five things people secretly do because of their social anxiety. The reason I wanted Natasha on to talk about this is she has a new memoir coming out. She’s the person to talk about the secrets behind having social anxiety. She talks all about it in her amazing new memoir that’s coming out. I’ll let her share more about that as it comes up. But, welcome.

Natasha: Thank you for having me. I appreciate it.

Kimberley: Can you tell me the name of the book that you have coming out?

Natasha: It is Out of My Shell: Overcoming Social Anxiety from Childhood to Adulthood.

Kimberley: I’ve read it and I loved it. It was so good. I wanted you to come on today because I think people think of social anxiety as just like someone in the corner like shaking and shivering and can’t talk, and that’s how it looks. But you’re here today to talk about the secret life of having social anxiety and what you may secretly experience.

Natasha: Yeah, I think people really don’t understand what social anxiety looks like. A lot of times people will say, “Oh, we all have a little bit of social anxiety,” so they discount the struggle, or they’ll say, “You don’t have social anxiety.” I’m getting that actually a lot, or I did get that a lot when I was starting to write the memoir. But I even had relatives who were like, “We don’t really have social anxiety, do you?” I think we keep it on like a lot of mental health issues. You’re really good at masking.

Kimberley: Yeah, and I think it doesn’t match our idea of what that looks like as someone who’s stuttering and can’t get their words out. That’s one presentation. But you’re here to tell us a little bit about some other presentations. Do you want to start by telling us the first secret thing that people do because of social anxiety?

Natasha: Yes. I want to preface it with, a lot of people do these things, but it’s the level that we do them that becomes dysfunctional. I was trying to think of some broad categories, and the first one is over-checking. Not in an OCD way unless you have OCD, but I check a lot. Actually, even though I am an anxiety and OCD therapist, when I created an Instagram account just for social anxiety, it was more of a confessional account, like I’m just going to post reels and confess. It wasn’t like I’m going to wear my therapy hat. It was actually really therapeutic because I’m saying all these things, and I was shocked that so many people were like, “Me too, me too. I do that, I do that.” I was like, “It’s so much validation.” I wanted to say that before I go into what we check because it’s weird. 

Checking smells—that’s a big one. Did I put deodorant on? Do I smell? Compulsively checking, like, do I smell? Does my face look red? I went through a period of time where I was worried about blushing, which is a super common social anxiety thing, and it was only in my therapy sessions. So weird. It was only if I disclosed anything about myself. There was a very particular rule. And that was my style—to teach through, like a story. That’s how my style is. So the minute I would start to try to say a story, I would feel the warmth on my face, and I would excuse myself and go to the bathroom, and I would check, like, how red do I look? I know I feel red, but how red do I really look? 

That checking of your face—this is another really embarrassing one that I continuously do and I can’t stop. I thought I was the only one, but I did post this on a reel, and a lot of people said they do it too. And then I actually did have a friend who reached out and said, “That’s so weird. Why do you check that?” And that is when I leave a bathroom. I always check to make sure my fly is up. There has been somebody who actually commented on that reel and said, “I checked to see if there’s toilet paper on my feet.” I think it’s this idea of something embarrassing from this intimate situation, leaving the bathroom and making sure that you’re not in a vulnerable state. It only takes that one time where you check and you’re like, “Oh my gosh, it is down to reinforce that behavior all over again.”

Kimberley: Just to be clear for people who are maybe newer to social anxiety or maybe just questioning ‘Do I have it,’ from my understanding and my experience as a clinician, and you please weigh in, a lot of the times with social anxiety, there’s a fear of humiliation, a fear of embarrassment, a fear of people judging them. Are there any other fears that you are doing these checking behaviors to reduce or eliminate?

Natasha: Yeah, and thank you for saying that because I do feel like people think social anxiety is about, on a very surface level, a lack of social skills or conversely being shy. Those can be components, but that’s not what defines social anxiety. It is that fear of rejection, embarrassment, and not enoughness. I think it’s that fear of being found out. It’s different for each person with social anxiety, like what your core fear is. It’s not universal. So some of the things that I do for my social anxiety may not be what someone else does, depending on their core fear around it. I think mine is the fear of rejection and looking stupid. Those are some of them. Smelling and then being ostracized or being vulnerable and embarrassed by having something exposed that wasn’t intentional, or even the fear of looking inadequate in a therapy session. My face is blushing, so there’s obviously something wrong with me. And now they’re going to find out that I have my own issues. There’s all these stories that we tell ourselves.

Kimberley: For sure. I remember I used to do this a lot, was check to see if I had sweat marks. Especially as a young teen, to have sweat water under your armpit, I don’t know why, but in my mind that was the most humiliating thing that could ever happen to you on the planet. That was something I would constantly secretly create scenarios that I could go and check that to see if that was going on.

Natasha: That’s a big one. That’s still a big one for me. When I look at my wardrobe, I choose it based on whether it would disguise any kind of sweat. This is what I mean by the acuity of it, because I will even take the fabric, and as I’m getting ready, I will put water under the arms and see what it does to the fabric. I won’t wear it. If I’m going to be interviewed or if I’m going to be in a public event, I will absolutely not wear that to the point where you look at my wardrobe and it’s mainly patterns. I’m wearing a pattern today, or it’s black. I’ll never wear just this blue shirt. 

Kimberley: It’s like, so already, and I’m just jumping in just so people know, a lot of the things that you’re telling me, I’m having actual images of exposures that I’ve done with clients where they purposely would rub pepper into their teeth or they’d purposely put water under their shirt to practice having that happen. I’m just laughing at the opportunities here. Okay, fantastic. Are there any other checking behaviors that you feel we have to review or look at? 

Natasha: Those are the ones that I thought about that were big ones for me, but I do feel like everyone has different things that they check. So just being aware of that as someone who has social anxiety. What things do I need to check all the time?

Kimberley: Right. I feel like there’s such an overlap here for people who have body image concerns as well and how that also becomes a part of their social anxiety. Like, what if someone notices the weight that I’ve gained or the shape of my body or the size of my breasts or my receding hairline, for men and women. I think that other insecurities or vulnerabilities can clash, and now you’ve got this double whammy of checking, trying to keep it secret so no one could see this vulnerability that you may or may not have.

Natasha: Yeah, absolutely.

Kimberley: Okay. Let’s talk about the second thing that people secretly do when they have social anxiety.

Natasha: Rehearsing is a big one. I was trying to think of general things that then got very specific. I think a lot of people with social anxiety do a lot of rehearsing in their mind, which is distracting. We’re not present because we’re so busy rehearsing, and I rehearse in so many ways. When I’m going through the drive-through, my kids can’t talk to me when we’re getting even close to the street of where we’re going to pull in. I’m like, “Tell me your orders now. We’re like 20 minutes away.” This actually happened yesterday. It happens all the time. We’re driving, and my son’s telling me all these things. “I want this sauce, and I want this. And then say deluxe because I want the deluxe.” And then I’m practicing in my head and I’m like, “I’m not going to remember any of this.” I go up, and then as soon as she’s like, “What do you want to order?” I look at him, and I’m like, “What do you want?” It’s gone. Or if I’m by myself, like just really practicing in that drive-through, especially like—this is going to sound like a first roll problem—Starbucks or Dutch Bros. If you have a Dutch Bros, their drinks are like Double Rainbro, venti this. 

I think rehearsing ordering in general can be really hard for some people with social anxiety again because you don’t want to appear stupid. Also worried about people behind you. Rehearsing is a big one. I’ll rehearse sometimes before I call someone. I’ll think, ‘What exactly am I going to be saying to them? How do I want to phrase it?’ A lot of times, if I want to speak in a meeting and people are talking, I can tell that my body is preparing me to talk because my heartbeat will start to race and it’ll start to beat faster. In my head I’m practicing what I’m going to say over and over again until they call me. It’s a lot of just anticipatory anxiety. And then I’m missing what’s going on in the meeting because I’m so focused on what I’m going to say. And then the worst part is when they move over and it’s a different topic now, I’ve lost that opportunity because I was so in my head. This can happen in a social situation too, where you’re in a group and you have a story to tell or you want to interject in the story and you’re just waiting. 

I think one of the hard parts with some people’s social anxiety—definitely one of my struggles is when to jump in in a group setting. Don’t want to dominate because a lot of people with social anxiety — and I keep saying a lot of people because it’s different for each person. I’m just speaking about my own experience, but you don’t want to come off as selfish. There’s this hyper-fixation on not looking vein, narcissistic, or self-absorbed. This over-concern of I don’t want to look like I’m dominating this conversation. So letting other people talk and letting them have their conversation and then jumping in. And then it’s like, “When do I jump in where it’s smooth and it’s not this awkward?” I often wind up just being really awkward, even one-on-one, where I’ll just try to transition to a different topic, and it’s clunky because I practice it enough. 

Kimberley: Yeah. But I think this is an interesting topic—this idea of rehearsing—because I think there’s a balance. Some people secretly do this in a compulsive manner, whereas some people also do this in an effective manner, like some people who do have social anxiety and are still developing their social skills. I often will do some rehearsal with clients to get them used to having these flowing conversations. But I do agree with you, it does make it a little clunky. I’ve heard lots of people say, “This is so hard on dates.” You’re really interested in the person. You want them to feel like you’re interesting and you’re interested in them, but as they’re talking, you’re thinking about how you’re responding. And then that person is thinking, ‘They’re off. Do they like me? They’re off with the fairy.’ It’s such a difficult experience because the person with social anxiety cares so much. They want to be in relation with these people. It’s such a bummer that anxiety gets in the way.

Natasha: Yeah. I think that’s a good thing to highlight that people with social anxiety want to be connected. They work relationships. I do feel like sometimes people think, ‘Oh, they have social anxiety, so I won’t bother them.’ I’ve had that experience where people are like, “We won’t reach out to her because we don’t want to make her socially anxious,” or “We won’t invite her because we don’t want to make her socially anxious.” And that really just feeds the narrative of “I’m not included. I’m not enough. I’m separate.” 

I feel like these lists are not safety behaviors. Some of them might have some productive quality to them. I think they’re just some things that we do and some things that do serve a purpose. I don’t think I’ll ever stop 100% rehearsing when I’m in a drive-through for sure or when I’m in a group setting. It’s just my brain is wired to do that, like to think, ‘Okay, you have a good story for this,’ or ‘You have a point.’ I think this is an individual choice. I’m working on focusing more on the moment one-on-one. I want to immerse myself, like you said, being on a date. That’s not going to happen for me, but being in a one-on-one relationship, like a friendship. I don’t want to look distracted. I really want to hook up with this person, and I’m missing out on fully soaking up the experience because I’m so busy analyzing things. We’ll talk about some of the other things as that plays into that conversation of why your mind is not there and you’re not present for that, for that experience.

Kimberley: Yeah. I love that you brought that up because we’re discussing five things that people do secretly, but what we’re not suggesting is that you have to do a radical elimination of these things. Again, I think that some rehearsal, like I sat down and I looked at the questions today, and I did some rehearsal. I did that because I didn’t want to look ridiculous. But that’s effective. That’s effective behavior. You taking a minute to breathe before going through a drive-through can be super effective. I want listeners to really don’t feel a lot of judgment around this either, that we’re all doing the best we can. Everyone has to decide for themselves whether it’s helping or hindering.

Natasha: Yeah, exactly.

Kimberley: Cool. All right. Let’s talk about number three, the third thing that people do secretly because they have social anxiety.

Natasha: Rereading texts or email. A lot of people do this, but we do this ferociously. I think looking for things. I reread every text I send as soon as I send it, and then I see typos or I see like, “Oh, I didn’t make that point.” When Apple decided they were going to let you edit your text, it was a beautiful thing.

Kimberley: I was just going to say it was either beautiful or it just made it more complex.

Natasha: I liked it because there was nothing worse than seeing my comment with a typo or not conveying what I wanted, or it sounded wrong because instead of putting a little asterisk and then typing it, because it’s that perception of now you think I don’t know how to spell, or now you think that I’m stupid. 

The other thing that the reviewing of texts serves is reading into texts. I remember one time—this is a long time ago—I was talking to somebody, I don’t remember who, and they wrote ‘Thank you’ with a period. I was like, ‘I think they’re mad at me.’ He’s like, “Why?” I read it, and I was like, “Because they wrote ‘Thank you’ period.” He was like, “I don’t think that’s a big deal.” I’m like, “Who puts a period in a text?” This is an example of how you can read into things. He goes, “Get your phone.” He goes, “Look, if you write thank you, it automatically puts a period in there.” I don’t know if it’s true, but it’s that reading of the messaging behind, the deeper messaging behind it, or “Oh, I’m obviously bothering them because it’s been five minutes and they haven’t replied yet.” I don’t think that those are very helpful. Those aren’t very helpful behaviors typically.

Kimberley: Yeah. Well, I think one thing that often does come in, and we’ll talk about this later on, is when you check your text, it opens the door for so much self-criticism of your own. I am notorious for spelling errors. Not because I don’t know how to spell; it’s just that I’m usually in such a rush that I just move on. Even some of my clients will joke at me and be like, “Your texts or your messages are off the charts incorrect.” I’m like, “You got it really quickly. Would you prefer it to take longer, or do you want it really quickly? I can’t do both.” But I think when we do go back to respond, if I went back to respond, I could very quickly start to tell a narrative to myself about my intellect, how people see me. I’m mind-reading now. I’m comparing myself. I’m using very critical words. That’s where I would be careful around that behavior because it does open a door to that self-critic that you speak about in your book a lot about talking to that critic and talking to the different stages of your life where that belief showed up in your life.

Natasha: Yeah. It does. It’s just fuel. It’s fuel for the story that your inner critic is just looking for evidence to show you. And that’s what I describe in the book. I name it because I’m all about personifying it, but my para—I call it para for paranoid—is constantly searching for evidence to fuel the narrative that I’m not enough or that I repel people. There are stories that my social anxiety wants to reinforce, and it trains the brain to look for evidence to support that. When you’re reviewing texts that supports that—we’ll get to the next one—when we get to that point, the next one we’re going to talk about that supports that, and —

Kimberley: Go ahead.

Natasha: The next one is overanalyzing body language. I feel like the social anxiety brain is always searching for objective proof that you’re not enough or that people don’t like you, or that you’re being rejected. It feels so real to the point where I didn’t even really understand that I had social anxiety until I was in my forties. It was an acute social anxiety. Now I look back, and I’m like, “Wow.” I couldn’t put out Christmas decorations without thinking the entire neighborhood was staring at me. I would have to get my husband to come out with me. The whole 20 minutes, I’m like, “Hurry up, hurry up, get it out,” because I feel like we’re on stage. Even just walking to my mailbox, which is down the street, that felt like walking on a catwalk. My neighborhood’s really quiet. There’s nobody out. Or even just walking yesterday, I mean, it doesn’t always just because you can identify social anxiety and you work on it. I mean, I remember going to the mailbox yesterday. I normally drive there because it’s on my way, and I’m like, “Am I walking funny?” All of a sudden, I feel like I forgot how to walk, and I’m focusing on my walk. And then I feel really awkward, and the whole walk is awkward because I’m like, I don’t know how to walk. It’s so much you get so in your head. 

But I wanted to talk about the body language because this one is really big for a lot of people. When you’re having a conversation with someone, it’s almost like your brain is trained to look at those cues of disinterest. Are they looking away? Are they looking at their watch? Did they check their phone? Did they look annoyed by what I said or disinterested? And unfortunately, I think we get really good at picking up subtle cues that other people miss. 

I know when my husband was alive, he was like the antithesis of someone with social anxiety. He thought it’d be funny if he said a joke and no one laughed. To him, that is hysterical. To me, that’s my worst fear. We’d be together with a stranger or whatever. If somebody was in a bad mood, like checking us out or whatever, and they were rude, that was a challenge for him. He’s like, “I’m going to make this person laugh.” For me, I’m mad at them for being mad at me. He’ll say something really awkward, and it won’t land because the person is in a bad mood, and he’ll think that’s hysterical. Sometimes I would see other people’s body language, like if we were out, and I’d be like, “They don’t like you,” or “They’re not finding you funny.” 

When you have social anxiety, I think you are actually really good at reading body language to the point where it harms you because you do learn. I think I do actually pick up on subtle cues because I’m so clued in that other people have the gift of being oblivious.

Kimberley: Yeah. I have to tell you the funniest story. Last week, I was invited on a very well-known podcast in my area of expertise. They were interviewing me, and they yawned three times during the episode. I’m not talking like a little yawn. I’m talking like, you know that yawn where they’re trying their best to hold their face normal. They’re like these. I was in that moment thinking, ‘Thank God I’m not having a social anxiety fit right now,’ because that could have totally ruined the entire episode for me. Once upon a time, if that had have happened, I would have been 10 out of 10 anxious for the rest of the podcast. I probably wouldn’t have been able to get my words out. I was just so grateful that I was able to not take it personally in that moment. But when you have social anxiety, that’s merely impossible.

Natasha: Yeah. That would’ve totally derailed me. 

Kimberley: Totally. I got off it, and I was telling my husband, “You will not believe. Not once, not twice, but three times.”

Natasha: That would’ve devastated me. That’s amazing. You were able to just keep going on. That would’ve been so distracting.

Kimberley: Yeah. But I know. I already knew because their scheduler had told me this was their fourth episode of the day. So I had in my mind like, this person is exhausted. But still, those are the kind of body language cues that can be so heartbreaking for people with social anxiety.

Natasha: Yeah. A lot of times they aren’t necessarily about you. They have a meeting, so they’re looking at their watch, or there’s an emergency, and they’re checking their phone. Sometimes it is about you. Really, the goal isn’t to convince yourself that people actually do like you; the goal is to convince yourself that you don’t need other people to like you in order to be whole yourself. 

Kimberley: Yeah. Before we go on to the last one, I’m going to just ask you a question that we didn’t really prepare for, but with symptoms like obsessive-compulsive disorder and other anxiety or obsessive-compulsive-related disorders, the fear is ego-dystonic, meaning we have it, but it doesn’t feel true to our values. For you, in your experience having social anxiety and treating people with social anxiety, do you feel that the fear is in line with your beliefs or can you see it to be not, like it’s just you could say that’s my anxiety? How is it that you truly do in those moments believe that you’re not enough or you’re not good enough? Or is it not a belief, it’s more ego-dystonic?

Natasha: Love that question because that I think is the number one struggle with social anxiety, is that you do believe that it’s true. In my book, I’m debating and almost to the point where I thought, am I debating too much with myself because I’m doing therapy with my younger versions of myself. I’m talking to Miss 7 and Miss 14, Miss 21. A lot of the early sessions until I think I hit my thirties, most of this conversation in the therapy sessions that I’m having with my younger self is about identifying it as social anxiety and my younger self arguing and saying, “No, you don’t understand. I do repel people or people just don’t like me.” I think that’s one of the hardest parts about social anxiety, and it’s probably why it wasn’t until I was in my forties that I was like, “Oh my gosh, I have social anxiety, not mild but severe,” was because I told myself that it was legitimate, that it wasn’t that I’m having upsetting thoughts that made me think I’m not enough or people don’t like me. The story was, you are not enough. Here’s all this evidence. Here’s all your history. You do repel people. I’ll point it out over and over again why you repel people and how you repel people, and there’s something wrong with you. I think that is the first step in recovery with social anxiety, is recognizing that it is social anxiety and that yes, you might be more attuned to body language and rejection. You’re like a little sponge of negativity. You can pick it up a mile away. Yes, some of it is real, but it’s the spinning of the story and then the behaviors that we perpetuate. Because of that, that perpetuates the social anxiety and keeps it going. 

Kimberley: Yeah. I think it’s hard, and I’ll speak as an outsider looking in, as some of the people I know with social anxiety, yourself included, I would never guess they have social anxiety because they’re so lovable. They’re so sweet and kind and just great human beings. And that could be because they’re constantly checking and making sure they are good human beings. But it’s funny, and I would say this to anybody with social anxiety, that you could for one second be thinking that you’re not good enough, whereas I’m over here adoring on you and just so appreciate who you are and what you do for our community and all the things you do, and it’s the great person. You are a great mom. It’s funny that that belief makes it feel so real for people with social anxiety. But people looking from the outside in would never agree.

Natasha: Yeah. I think that’s common. I think that people looking out would not really identify that. Even when my siblings read my memoir and my uncle I’m close to, my brother and my sister were like, “I had no idea.” They were like, “Wow, that’s a lot. We wouldn’t have guessed.” These are people who know me in and out that I think were surprised. I think a lot of times masking is really a strong thing, like that you can fake it till you make it a lot of the times, and there’s always a but. Yeah, I might be in the OCD community or I might be in the anxiety community, but… There’s a little side story that we say to ourselves about that that sabotages it.

Kimberley: Lots of thought errors, like discounting the positive and magnifying the worst, and a lot of those errors. Yes. Okay, tell me the fifth thing that people secretly do when they have social anxiety.

Natasha: They keep track of who initiates contact. This just happens automatically in my brain, and a lot of people with social anxiety where if you ask me, “Here’s this friend that you have, who was the last person who contacted? Her or you?” I would be able to tell you right away, which I think is probably abnormal because I know.

Kimberley: You’re making me nervous.

Natasha: I mean, not with everybody. I’m not like, “Oh, I reached out to Kimberley, and she didn’t reach out to me. This is my third time reaching out to her.” Maybe some people are like that. But I really have taken a lot of effort to create friendships since my husband died. He was really my only friend, and that was enough for me. It was a comfortable arrangement for my social anxiety. When he died, I was like, “I have to have a support system. I have to have friends.” And so I worked really hard in the last three and a half years to develop friendships. They’re all new friendships. I have maybe four what I would call close friends, people that I had maybe a loose association with before Jimmy died. And then they just showed up for me because they’re nice people. And then I clung to them like mold. I was like, “Please don’t ever let go. I need a friend.” But with those friendships, because they’re newer, like three and a half years new, I’m very aware of like, when did I reach out? Am I bothering you? This is the third time that I reached out to make plans, and you haven’t reached back out to me. I think that’s a struggle with social anxiety that we keep tabs on. That’s not helpful because people may not reach out for all sorts of reasons, and it doesn’t really speak to the quality of the relationship. 

Kimberley: Yeah, for sure. I think that’s, again, that piece of where you were talking about body language as well, is you can make so much meaning out of that. They didn’t respond to me, therefore, fill in the blanks. They don’t like me, or I said the wrong thing. I know a lot of people with social anxiety review past conversations of like, was I weird, did I say something awkward, and so forth. I think that is so common. But again, I want us to say so common for social anxiety, but also just shows how much they genuinely want to be in relationship with these people.

Natasha: Yeah. I think that is the missing piece, is that there’s this desperation to belong. There’s this desperation to be included. Not that you’ll always accept the invitation to be included, but you want the invitation so that you can decide. I do feel like people with social anxiety, and this is a biased opinion, but I feel like they are some of the most kindhearted people because they care. They care enough to want that approval, to want that connection, to want to belong. So they’re normally very aware of how they’re interacting and are super thoughtful friends. I mean, I wish that I could reach out and just be friends with a whole bunch of people with social anxiety because we make great friends. 

Kimberley: Yeah, and they’re attuned. They want to be deeply attuned than having just this surface level, even though it’s scary. I completely agree. I think I always remember Christopher Germer, a presentation that I went to of his where he said, and I’m curious if you have rebuttal or agreeance to this, “Social anxiety is not an anxiety disorder; it’s a shame disorder.” And that always deeply resonated with me because as much as people experience anxiety, either in addition to it or underneath that anxiety is this very strong emotion of shame. Do you agree or disagree with that?

Natasha: I mean, I think shame is a component, but I really see it as an anxiety disorder because it’s all the what-ifs and the overanalyzing. I have anxiety in other areas, and it feels very similar. I feel like shame is a component, but it’s also just this desperation of what if I don’t belong? What if I’m not included? What if this always happens and I’m just always by myself? I think it’s bigger than that, but I can see where shame could be a component of it.

Kimberley: Yeah. I think it’s true because, as he said that, I was like, “Oh, that really resonates with me as someone with an eating disorder and having social anxiety in that era of my life.” It was all fueled by shame. I think for each person, like you said, different emotional experiences might exacerbate your social anxiety. But yes, definitely. I mean, anxiety being at the crux of it, I think everyone I’ve ever talked to with social anxiety has panic as well or has had panic attacks at some point in their lifetime. As we close up, what would you say to the person with social anxiety? 

Natasha: There’s a lot, but I think that the main message, and it can sound like a very trite, cheesy message, but it’s so true—the more I actually started to focus on myself and when you start to really appreciate yourself and even develop a counter story or even a counter character in your brain of here is my social anxiety and here is the voice in my head that’s rooting for me and start to defend yourself and start to love yourself and start to cheerlead yourself. And that can feel really artificial and inauthentic at first, but over time, that becomes part of your inner voice. The more you focus inward, the less you care about the outward. That’s really been the most therapeutic thing for me, is fueling myself, really focusing on myself and cheerleading myself, and loving myself. If someone’s mean to me, my inner self is like, “We don’t deserve that. How rude.” So pour your energy in yourself, even though that seems maybe counterintuitive, and I feel like the social anxiety gets better as well.

Kimberley: Yeah, I agree. I agree so much. Again, I think, I mean, if I were to add the sixth thing that people with social anxiety do secretly is they beat themselves up. I mean, we’re not adding a sixth thing, but that’s so much a part of this. If you can start to be kinder and cheerlead yourself or be your inner best friend—we talk about that here a lot—that’s going to be really huge. Thank you for coming on and sharing this. It’s very vulnerable what you’re sharing even. How is that for you? Can you do a little check-in once, explain how that feels for you?

Natasha: Oh, ironically, I mean, well talking to you because you’re so easy to talk to and you don’t really think about this being out there in the world. I’m very good at lying to myself. I’m like just sitting here just talking to you.

Kimberley: Just telling Kimberley a little story.

Natasha: I mean, I actually feel like I’m very comfortable talking about myself. It is a comfortable place, and it’s a good exposure to feel naked and to take the power away from social anxiety by filling all of its secrets. So there’s something really therapeutic actually about it.

Kimberley: Yeah. I’m so happy to hear that. Tell us about your book. Tell us what we can hear about you. Tell me all the things.

Natasha: Yeah. The memoir is called Out of My Shell, and I really wanted to write a book that would help people as well. I’m so into mental health memoirs. That’s actually how I wound up writing it because I was like, I wanted to read a social anxiety memoir to work on myself, and I couldn’t find one that was just solely social anxiety that spoke to me. The book is about going back and forth from childhood to adulthood. And then in between, there’s therapy sessions with my younger selves. Really the idea is that we have to go back and heal our younger selves because that’s the meat of social anxieties, all those younger experiences and perceptions. And then I do my own social hierarchy, and I put myself in really awkward situations. My hope is that people can read this and passively learn how to do these things for themselves or feel empowered to do that for themselves. Not only hopefully is it an interesting story and it’s engaging to read, but they walk away feeling empowered to take some actions themselves. 

People can find the book wherever books are sold. It’s released September 19th. They can go to SocialAnxietyReality.com, which is the website. And then actually, on Instagram, I have my secret confessional account, which I guess is not secret anymore. And that’s Social Anxiety Reality as well, where I am just really saying it as it is.

Kimberley: Good. I think that’s the piece. Let’s actually talk about what it really is. That’s the work. I am so grateful for you coming on. Thank you.

Natasha: I appreciate you having me.

Kimberley: I can’t wait to hear all the success of the book when it comes out.