I’m not sure if anyone else gets this overwhelming feeling that wherever you go, whether it’s to the grocery store or meeting someone for the first time, that you are like entering a “staff only” area, but the staff includes everyone but yourself. I feel constantly like my mere presence in these public and private areas is inappropriate or even illegal despite the fact that in the moment I’m not doing anything wrong. This perpetual, eerie sense that everyone around me notices that I don’t belong and just aren’t speaking up. I have no idea where this feeling inside of me comes from or if anyone else experiences this.
"The feeling of needing to justify my existence to an authority figure."
Big oof.
I feel that. Spend a childhood justifying your existence to the person/people who made you exist and who you rely on for your needs being met.
Definitely makes the adult brain struggle with authority and always feeling like you don't belong...
I felt this one. The feeling is bad enough to where I won’t leave the house, unless my husband takes me, so I know I’m “supposed” to be there because he took me.
Ufff yeahhhhh. I always thought it was the weed but I stopped and it didn’t stop. I now understand that I learned to expect my boundaries to be violated, that I had no right to feel safe. A parent who makes their kid feel that way should never be responsible for another person. Unforgivable.
I relate to this a LOT. I always feel unwelcome or unwanted, even places where everyone should be welcome like the gym or certain stores, restaurants etc.
I think for me it's not truly feeling like an independent adult due to not feeling in control of my life. Like I'm gonna be having coffee at a cafe or getting milk at the grocery store and a cop's gonna come up and be like "alright hon let's find where your parents went" or something. 💀
Omg same I always feel like I’m about to be busted
Do you also feel like others notice you look on edge/have you been called 'shifty' or asked what's wrong before because of being noticeably on edge?
It always catches me off guard then I feel this secondhand nervousness that someone's going to be watching me thinking I'm up to no good because I'm highly uncomfortable, as if I'm convinced that I look like I'm going to rob a place
I always worry people think I’m on drugs or homeless but I look totally put together. I have good style and everything. There’s no rational reason for my fear.
I walk around feeling like three kids stacked on top of each other in a trench coat pretending to be an adult. Like Vince Adultman, here after a long day at the business factory.
I don't know how you managed to find a way to even more specifically call me out, but you did. LOL. I feel like Vincent Adultman except I don't even have ride or die friends who feel the same to help pilot the Totally-an-Adult-Woman.
And if I’m not feeling like I’m not supposed to be there, instead I feel like “This is not for me.”
I cannot have/enjoy/participate in whatever it is because it is not for me. It is for other, better, normal, people.
I feel like “This is not for me.”
Yes. I felt like this for years! Stores, restaurants, concerts, etc. It's for people better than me, above my station. Almost like I'm a scullery maid above stairs when she shouldn't be, trying to rub shoulders with the "quality," aka normal people.
Imposter Syndrome
Damn, realizing I definitely feel this pervasively in my life
Same😭 way too often. Even when I AM the staff like damn not even then..
To put it in perspective:
Trying to join groups at the library (you know how people LOVE telling other people to join groups) - they're all run by the same lady who works there. She just kind of... looks at you. Doesn't greet you, doesn't say, "hey, are you coming to the group tonight? Is that why you're conspicuously sitting here?" It's like, all right. Guess I don't need to be here either. Even something as simple as picking up a cup of coffee is weird like that. And it's always been like that.
But yes, send me to another therapist who will tell me to try jOiNiNg a GrOuP, and there's all these great people out there for you to find.
that feeling of being barely tolerated by people you feel don't actually want you there is the worst, I've cried over it plenty during my life. it sucks that if you ever mention wanting to make friends or date or whatever it's always "join a group! join a hobby group?" like it's not scary, impractical sometimes based on things like location or age, and in my experience always accompanied by this feeling. I'm with you
Yeah, I feel like this anywhere outside of my room. My car is also safe for some reason, so if I'm feeling really vulnerable I will satisfy my need to leave the house by driving for a couple of hours.
I went to the zoo the other day. It was all parents and kids (as expected). I felt so disgusting like I was making their experience worse by being there. I felt like everyone was staring at me but of course they weren't. I kept repeating the thoughts "I'm allowed to be here just like everyone else" and "I'm safe", but it didn't really work. So unfortunately I couldn't really enjoy the experience because I was too dissociated. I'm used to that though.
It's funny, because I was thinking about how if I go out with someone else I feel 'allowed' to be there. Because the other person is allowed and I'm with them, so they're giving me a 'pass'. But whenever I'm with someone else I don't feel safe to be myself. There's no way I can win. :(
Yup, what you said in the last paragraph. It’s easier with someone, cause obviously that someone else has a good enough reason for being there. For existing, for taking space. And if you’re with them, you’re somehow more allowed to exist too.
yup... I've also heard it described as feeling like everyone else got a handbook on how to act and you didn't. Which is kinda true in my case as my parents never taught me social skills or allowed anyone else to either.
highly relatable as someone who had selective mutism, did not speak to people and my parents just let it fester
In the movie "Fearless" (1993), that feeling is portrayed. Like being on the outside of a reality that you can almost touch, but it is not yours.
The way you put that, really resonates with me!
I’m gonna watch this tonight!
Great movie !
I relate to this a lot. Even when I am explicitly invited somewhere, I still feel like I shouldn't be there. When you've spent your whole life around people who hate you and want you to make yourself scarce 24/7, it's difficult to believe that you belong anywhere.
I also have AVPD, though, which makes everything ten times worse. I'm afraid of texting people back even when they start the conversation because I'm convinced subconsciously that they don't want to talk to me. 😅
Even when I was a kid and would walk home from school, I would get to my house and think about how I might have made it all up. My mom would get home after me and not know who I was or what I was doing there and everything was all in my head, it never happened but everyday I would wait for it. I pull into my driveway now as an adult and think about how this must not be my house and I don’t really live there and I’ll go inside and the actual residents will kick me out. Then I’ll realize that it was all fake and I was just dissociating or something, I don’t know. Did it never really end??
This is so deep. I just wanted to say I appreciate your brain and I’m thankful you shared this perspective.
Thank you so much for your words they mean a lot to me.
I like your demogorgon with rainbow hairs
I totally get this "maybe I made it all up" feeling. I don't usually get it on a grand scale like that, but about smaller, everyday things. I just doubt my own sanity and perceptions constantly. (From being gaslit a lot in childhood of course)
Yep! 🙋🏼♀️
What I sometimes feel is a sense of being unworthy of being at a particular place, namely the gym. I love the gym to death, but once in a while I get this thought like "people don't like that you're here. You're bothering everyone with your presence. They can tell you don't belong here. You're taking up their space".
I used to feel it more often. Not as much nowadays, but it still happens. Or maybe it just became something more subconscious. Like it's there in the background, but you've learned to ignore it. Once in a while it gets stronger though, and harder to ignore.
YES. I have zero friends or relationships in my life and am.incredibly lonely but every time I go to like a group setting, and I see people who already know eachother, already in their groups, I get this overwhelming feeling that I'm excluded and don't belong even tho i don't make any effort to join...I just feel already excluded and looked down upon... i think they're giving me dirty looks.like they hate me and cant stand me.on one hand i know it's not logical but on the other hand the feeling is so intensely strong that it makes me run away. Thanks for sharing and making me feel less alone
Yep. I feel this way when I drive literally anywhere. I'm afraid that all the other drivers will be mad at me for...I dunno, existing and daring to also be on the road?
I also haaaate crossing the street when I'm out walking. If it's an uncontrolled intersection I feel like I'm dying inside if a car has to stop to wait for me to cross. Like I'm inconveniencing them, again just by existing in the world. And even at busy intersections with lights, I feel like I have to speed walk across so no one will be angry at me for being too slow or just that everyone is watching me and, as you suggested, knows that I don't belong and is harshly judging me. It's a pretty fucking weird way to live day-to-day life.
I can relate to this a lot. Definitely felt like an inconvenience while crossing the street or at checkouts when the next person is waiting. I realize I'm thinking this way almost automatically and it's really concerning, like other people's needs are more important than my own.
The driving one is so relatable 😕
Yes, god every single day. I've (verbatim) always had the thought that I'm banned from life.
I genuinely feel like my soul has been permanently banned from human experiences;. Banned from having friends, banned from love, banned from family ,banned from having a personality, banned from being respected. I feel like I'm banned from society, banned from life.
I feel like I'm not allowed to live or be apart of society, and society reflects that back to m every single day. I think I've fooled myself into thinking I'm really a person just like everyone else, and everyone's just pitying me and agreeing so I feel like i fit in. Everyone thinks I don't know I don't, they think I can't see it in their face. I know. I know I'm not human. I'm so disturbed you can feel it when you walk past me.
My fear of abandonment and loneliness is so severe but it's the only experienceI've had in life. I have experienced true loneliness, a loneliness that 99% of humans will never experience. I always will feel lonely, my childhood has carved an extremely deep empty black cave that loops and never ends into my soul. It's unfillable and manifests as deep extreme loneliness. The friends I make always leave, well the friends I make aren't even really friends. The people I consider friends probably barely even consider me an acquaintance. I am easy to third wheel and I am invisible no matter where I go. The people who matter to me so much.. I don't even appear in their thoughts. I can't even say I'm an afterthought, I never was thought of at all.
I don't feel welcome anywhere I go, I feel like I'm forcing myself into people's spaces. As a teenager I referred myself to a pariah, everywhere I walked I could feel peoples disgust and annoyance towards me radiate in the air. I vividly remember being seven on the school playground, thinking to myself "Im meant to be dead. I don't want to die, but I know I wasn't meant to live this long." Ever since I had that thought I've always came back to it, the vivid memory of having this thought of how I've over welcomed my stay. That's how I could describe my life, all my social interactions, people's facial expressions when. I gaze into their eyes for a second. I feel it everywhere. I'm not meant to be here. I keep telling myself I'm healing but I feel like I'm just forcing myself into people's spaces
. I feel it all the fucking time. My entire life. I know I'm banned from society, I knew it even as a kid and I just keep thinking I'm a human who can be respected just like everyone else. Someone needs to get it through my thick skull that I'm different. I'm not a person. No one has ever experienced what I have, and nobody cares. When I say I've been truly alone nobody can comprehend it. I am alone and I feel so alone in my loneliness. I don't think there is anyone else who has seen and been through what I've been through.
Relate so much to what you’ve said.
Omg so relatable!!! Similarly, I feel like everyone knows some type of secret “rules” or “know-how” for life/society/public areas that I just don’t have and it’s obvious thus outing myself as someone who doesn’t belong.
Yeah. I feel like this whole life thing wasn’t meant for me. That I shouldn’t be here and the longer I defy the world and stay here the more the universe punishes me. I’m probably going to kill myself.
I'm sorry to hear you feel this way, too. I'm always putting it off for superficial reasons that all actually boil down to a deeply existentialist fear of both the unknown and wasting my one chance here when it "could get better", but it always lingers at the back of my mind. Sometimes I think of myself as living out of spite.
And then the sun shines, and the trees are all glowy and green, and the birds sing, and even though I spend all of my time reading and gaming and watching movies on my own in my tiny little apartment, it makes me feel a bit more like it's worth it just for the little things. I recommend the poem Wild Geese by Mary Oliver; though it's about sexuality and has helped me in that aspect too, it's a poem that brings me a lot of comfort when I feel like humanity would rather I never existed.
I hope things can get better for you, you're not alone in feeling this way at least, even if none of us have the solution <3
Thank you. I hope it gets better for you as well
Yes
100℅! Some days it's really bad and I can't even leave my room or really interact with anyone.
Same Was struggling with this today, big time.
I fixed this by tricking my brain with logic and then lots and LOTS of exposure therapy in crowded places until the truth of it sank in. no one is paying attention to me. why would anyone be paying attention to me? I'm just some face in the crowd. it's self-centered and strange to assume that when I'm among other people all of them are looking directly at me and thinking about me. everyone else is in their own little world focused on their own life. interactions with me, even if they're negative, will be forgotten about in like five seconds because I am just another person passing through like everyone else. even if I fuck something up or make a spectacle of myself, what's the worst case scenario? a bunch of people who I ALSO don't know or care about will notice me for maybe a minute max? and then ALL of us will go back to our lives.
try it! it really works!
You're right. This is the logic I that I reminded myself in my mind, when I was in this situation earlier today. And while it didn't make the feeling go away completely, it did help me separate my the traumatized part of my brain from the logical side. But like u said, it takes repeated effort, so im sure I will get better with it
you WILL get better!!
to paraphrase, I hate to advocate forcing yourself out of your comfort zone repeatedly until your nervous system has enough experience to understand that your thoughts do not create reality and stops priming you with panic oil, but.... it sure worked for me!!! and it's free and you can do it by yourself lmao
how do you get your brain to realise this?
you have to do it repeatedly and survive. it's the same as building a muscle: use it until it hurts, then the muscle tissue heals and gets a little bit stronger every time. you also have to do it with intent. like, I'm going into this grocery store to prove to myself that no one cares or is paying attention to me. and when you leave, tell your brain, see? nothing happened. (if something DOES happen, tell yourself, they'll forget about me because I am not the main character of the world) the intent is really important because you're trying to NAIL it into your brain that this is a delusion and you're beliefs do not actually reflect reality. I don't know anything about these people or their lives. how often do I remember the people I saw at the grocery store? can I even think of their faces ten minutes after I drive away? of course not lmao.
your body will learn it first before your brain does. it'll just gradually feel less tense. then you'll be at the store shopping for like five whole minutes and then go "wait. I'm usually freaked out by now?!"
wow okay thank you!!
Oh yes. Especially at group events I feel like I’m only invited out of pity or as a favor to some mysterious person who has ordered it to be so, but not because anyone wants me to be there.
Big relate to this, especially since the Covid lockdowns. I only go out for a reason (usually work) nowadays, and I feel uncomfortable in situations where there are a lot of people (had a huge mental shutdown at London Comicon a few years ago, as an example).
For me it’s not quite an ‘illegal’ feeling, more a feeling of being detached from humanity. Kinda like being an alien and not entirely understanding how to human properly, if that makes sense?
(Edit: random half sentence at the bottom of the post 😅)
Imposter syndrome. Welcome to the club!
i'm currently hardcore spiraling back into this behavior
even when i finally try to be brave about it and make space for myself as an exclamation of "im allowed to be here too, i belong here", it never lasts
most frequently thanks to someone who constantly shut me down any time i tried to take up space, who instantly turned the convo back to herself anytime anything came up
I appreciate this thread so much. It's a very vulnerable one but I struggle so much with feeling this way, of barely going outside and feeling extremely anxious and stared at and paranoid when I do, and it's really reassuring to see that I'm not alone even if I'm also kinda sad that so many other people have to suffer at the hands of their own brains like this. Thank you all for sharing <3
Yes. Standing on the outside as some sort of alien hiding inside a human body that doesn’t belong.
I try to repeat to myself, "It's okay to take up space. You're doing nothing wrong by occupying a space. " It's a difficult feeling to overcome, especially when that feeling is networked into your brain pattern at a young age. In my experience, I didn't realize how much trauma I held until I was away from it. I needed to be able to examine it at a safe distance with safe people. There's still a lot that's unfolding.. Therapy can help with the healing process, but I still prefer to buy my groceries online. Grocery stores can be terrifying. Recognizing where these thoughts and feelings are originating from, can help with overcoming them. I hope the best for you during this healing journey, and I hope that you can find peace in a process that works for you.
I felt like I didn’t belong anywhere along with having anxiety of feeling if I opened my mouth it would prove how I wasn’t worthy of bejng outside my isolation
Same I thought it was just my social anxiety and trauma from being bullied😩
It was like that for me in college. Had realubad anxiety back then and I alwaus KNEW I'm not supposed to be there, I didn't belong, and everybody knew it. Everybody knew I'm weird and different and thought I should just leave. I had that feeling in almost every setting, but never as bas as in college.
I kind of grew out of it or something, I don't really know, it just gradually stopped.
Mine is assuming that if people hear what I'm really thinking or feeling on a regular basis, they will start avoiding me as a group, like "uh-oh here he/she comes"...Assuming that my natural thoughts and feelings are irritating to people. Even though I know intellectually that they probably don't even think about it or remember it a day later.
Yes
All. The. Time.
Absolutely. I've been told I always look like I'm "sheepish" or up to something. Recently learnt about hypervigillance, explains so much. I always feel like I'm in the wrong place at the wrong time and have a constant trickle of anxiety/feeling like something bad is going to happen.
For me my autism definitely plays a part. I function differently, even if it's only in very subtle ways. I think other people just sense it and will tease or point out things about me, just to get a reaction. I must look like I'll jump out of my skin if you say 'boo' (which if you're behind me and I don't realise I probably would even if you're someone I know) and people just love to get a reaction. It's cruel.
I always try to come across as less of a 'target' by consciously hiding my urges to fidget/do stressful compulsions repeatedly, trying to look sure or certain/unbothered but I'm not sure it helps or works. But I've had so many negative reactions to me just existing/being myself that I'm always anticipating the next one. Just thought I'd share where I think mine comes from, although it's likely there's more to it than that as I'm only recently realising a lot of stuff
I also feel this way a lot
I feel like this as an autistic with cptsd and adhd. Not everywhere but when I’m with people I work with, old friends, family, more ppl that I see more often. I feel less like that when I meet people for the first time, but if that relationship continues I usually feel like this over time.
It sucks
Literally wrote this song about that last week. Not trying to self promote - just, you aren’t alone.
Definitely have and do sometimes feel like I don’t fit in when I’m out about in the public and socially. This feeling is so multi textural, sometimes I feel like a flashlight is on me and everyone is looking but they are not. Sometimes I feel like people can see ‘what I feel on the inside’ on the ‘outside’ but I understand this an embellished story line that overstates peoples telepathy style body language read. I think it comes from anxiety and feeling alien, the trauma belief ‘that there is something inherently wrong me’, ‘I’m being judged’, when in reality people are just peoples and we are all living in our own little inner worlds, we are seperate but together.
I have started experiencing this with my therapist. I am f****d I think.
Whoa. Yeah.
Yes! I’ve never been able to put it into words and I didn’t realize it was a CPTSD thing I just always chalked it up to social anxiety which I’m sure still does play a part. When I start getting anxious and thinking that everyone is staring at me disgusted, I just start repeating to myself over and over, “I deserve to live just as freely as anyone else” sometimes it helps calm down the raging thoughts. Sometimes not though and I just gotta get tf home from wherever I’m at.
I felt this all the way up to a severe case of agoraphobia for a long time. Couldn't leave my house but on rare occasions and often had anxiety attacks, panic attacks.
There are a lot of things that cooked up that recipie, but I think it was suddenly I realized that I was stuck in the past and couldn't get out long enough to breathe. I was afraid of running into people. Afraid something horrible was waiting for me. It felt like everyone knew the worse things that happened to me, the random at the gas station to the clerk whose been checking out my groceries for 15 years.
Growing up, I moved around a lot, and all this time later I'm still within the general 100 mile area I grew up. So no matter where I go, there seems to be bad memories there. Its like I'm reliving the things that happened there and I know those were wrong so it feels like a perpetual state of im doing something wrong. Someone is going to confront me. "What will I do if-" constantly.
Honestly, growing up a little, trauma therapy, and distancing myself from toxic environments helped a lot. I dont recommend this is for everyone, but my anti depressant was given to me to mostly treat joint pain and severe anxiety. And I feel like it helped tremendously.
Always, before the DV/SA and much more pronounced after. I had a realization last night over something insignificant, really. I enjoy smoking joints in bed before going to sleep, which helps the transition. Being clumsy, I knocked the ember off the end, and it exploded onto my sheets and bedding. I was partially cuddling with my partner when I, for whatever reason, flicked the lighter to look at the joint. For whatever reason seeing it was in fact out and I did accidentally burn the sheets threw me into a rage--as if I didn't already know and say c*nt a hundred timed as I put the embers out, weirdly gaslighting myself tick from the past.
"I'm going to smoke out in the living room since I apparently can't do it in bed without ruining the sheets like a fking r*d." I sat down on the couch pissy and relit the joint, immediately rethinking what just happened and why. In my waves of thoughts, what came up was: "You punished yourself for *one mistake and revoked total access to the activity. You took yourself out, and instead of just letting it go and re-lighting it in bed, you turned it into a whole tantrum." I'm praying to the gods that this realization will help me in some way:
"I made one mistake and revoked access to the entire activity."
"You decided your worth hinges on perfection and never breaking any rule ever."
Because I was taught that if I don't do "it," whatever it is, perfectly the first time then hell would rain upon me, or at best I went without eating until it was decided I could eat (DV ex)/we had the money (growing up poor mom spent it on booze). Otherwise, I will not get a second chance. I was constantly attacked for making any mistake whatsoever that I became a perfectionist control freak to "gotcha" the others the way they got me. Turns out people really hate it when their target is factually and morally correct, but they need you to be the blacksheep scapegoat.
My abuser trained me very well to sit in silence in the room until his next order (14-19, most important developmental stages) so doing literally anything for myself feels wrong, and if I dont do it "right," then I'm worthless and wasting all the time, money, and resources in the world that could've been better used on someone who actually deserves it. I'm not sure how this realization will help my agoraphobia and paranoia (double points yay Christian trauma!) But I may be able to actually treat myself with kindness and grace now that I know I won't die or be murdered for making any mistake in life, especially as I learn and grow.
I guess a very short way of saying this is I feel like a plant who's trapped inside and circling the room, roots outgrew the pot but no way to transplant or upgrade to a bigger house because some vague feeling of doom and the other shoe will drop keeps me from being consistent in any routine, change or movement.
Hyper vigilant guilt and shame. Probably from being blamed and gaslit all the fucking time
It’s the imposter syndrome. I feel it too
I definitely went through it. I "fixed it" only to have new issues. I don't even have answers anymore... I mean, I probably have answers for some people. If you can understand the biology of feelings and emotions, they are just chemical reactions happening in the body, and your mind interprets those feelings. So, if it's a few problems, you can just let whatever random emotion comes up sit there. I mean, counter argue it ideologically, which will probably at least reduce the emotion intensity. "There's no reason for me not to be here, so this is probably just a random chemical imbalance causing emotions dysregulation and cognitive distortion. It's not true, because I belong anywhere I go. Does that satisfy you concern brain and body?"
But with mental illness, there's never going to be perfect emotional balance really. So whatever pain or emotion dysregulation is left is kind of what you're stuck having to feel. And you don't need to agree with the emotions, it's like stepping on a leggo, it hurts, it's fine, but it's going to keep hurting for a bit, and there's not much you can really do about that until the pain goes away on its own.
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I can relate to this. I was often unsupervised at home, but when observed, often felt like what I was doing was wrong. I knew that, in the absence of an authority making me feel that way, I'd be basically happy to keep doing those things, but I had a tremendous fear of disapproval. That's probably why I learned that "Alt+Tab" exists, so I could keep up appearances better. Weirdly, I haven't had as much of an issue with this lately.
EDIT: Then again, I'm a lot less of an explorer lately, and that might have a lot to do with it.
I can’t leave the house without having a reason. Like I’m expecting to be pulled over by a cop the moment I pull out of my driveway, and when he demands to know where I’m going, I need a good enough reason to explain why. I used to think it’s cause I smoke weed and I was afraid of getting caught. I live in a legal state and have a med card, still doesn’t change the feeling of needing to justify my existence to an authority figure.