Perception.

See, I like to think I'm an amazing badass who can do anything if I just apply hard work, elbow grease, and the American way.

I'm not sure if you've noticed from reading my blog, but that is not always the case. There are a lot of situations I would require enough elbow grease to fill a swimming pool to get through, and a lot of times the American way ain't gonna accomplish shit. I simply cannot just push myself through a lot of things, and this makes me feel guilty.

I can't speak for you, obviously, but I am intimately familiar with guilt. I feel very guilty about my inability to do certain things. This only gets worse when someone asks me why I can't do whatever it is. My answers tend to be along the lines of "I don't know" or "I can't explain right now" or just "I'm sorry." I understand that these are terrible answers and they don't help you!

Here's the thing: they don't help me either. I think there are very few people who find it helpful to be pressed about their feelings while they are in the middle of a breakdown. Therapy is, of course, very helpful for a lot of people! But therapy is different from your mom telling you, "I don't understand why you're making such a big deal out of this," or whatever it is your mom tells you.

I think a lot of people don't understand themselves why a certain thing triggers them so much. I know I don't. And being pressed to explain something I don't understand, while crying, and often while ruining some kind of plan, just serves to make me feel incredibly guilty.

Guilt sucks. So does feeling worthless or pathetic for not being able to force yourself through things. I don't know how to deal with guilt yet, but I promise I'll be back to tell you if I ever do discover a way.

In the meantime, I do have a method for feeling less pathetic about my weaknesses. Remember how I like thinking about what a complete and total badass I am? I can still be a badass. Watch:

If something in a class is upsetting me, I get up and walk the fuck out because I don't need no bells to tell me where to be. Rules don't apply to me.

If I don't want to talk to someone, I tell them, "Listen up, I'm not in the mood for chitchat." My feelings are more important than theirs.

If I can't bring myself to go out with people, I ring 'em up and say, "Sorry your party's gonna be shit without me," and then hang up.

Try to change the way you think about things! Turning someone down doesn't have to mean you're a shitty person who sucks and is letting them down forever and they'll hate you now. Sometimes it means you have too much badass inside you and it just dribbles out until you're sitting on the couch in a pile of bipches and hoes.

Now, I don't know how common it actually is to have the same feeling as I do, that I am a fuckin' badass biker babe trapped in the body of a shygirl. Maybe you don't hold yourself to the same standards or wish to ollie out of depression on your sick skateboard. But I know that, whatever you are like, there is a way for you to look at your situation differently.

hearts, shygirl

How to help people.

I don't know.

Sorry if I got your hopes up by writing that as my title, as if I am a master at understanding how to help. The real problem is that I don't think there exist any masters at this tender subject. It's very hard to help people. Everyone is different, after all. There is no one single way to help.

For example, I like when people post pictures of themselves holding up inspirational quotes on slips of paper and smiling. That makes me happy. But at the same time, I know there are a lot of people who think that's a stupid hipster thing to do. So it's hard to get your message out to everyone if you're doing it on cute pieces of paper.

The best method I can think of right now is talking openly, and that's not going to work for everyone either. People have a lot of trouble speaking openly, especially shy people -- the very ones I am trying to reach. Even if you read a blog post or essay or book by someone who is trying their best to speak to you from their heart, even if they say "please talk to me, I want to help you and everyone like you," it might still feel next-to-impossible to reach back out to them.

How do you open up conversation with someone whose entire problem is their inability to have conversations? I don't know. I think what needs to happen first is that you need to be able to wear your heart on your sleeve and convince people that you are speaking entirely truthfully. Everyone, not just shygirls, has trouble believing that other people want to help them 100%. We are all a little bit skeptical.

But I do want to help with my entire heart. I want everyone to feel strong and loved and beautiful. I want everyone to believe in the goodness of people like I do.

I also want to say that while I don't know everything, I want to help. I think that everyone can help, too. Even if someone has an issue you aren't very sure about, saying to them, "I don't understand how you feel about this, but I am willing to listen while you explain it to me," seems like the best thing to me. There are also issues that you may never understand. I have heard that I, as a white girl, will never be able to truly understand how it feels to be a person of color.

And that's okay. I also think there are people who will never truly understand what it is like to be shy or depressed.

That's not meant to be a barrier between any of us. It's meant to be a bridge. We will never understand everyone about each other, but we can use our own experiences to help us with other people's experiences.

love, shygirl

Saving everyone.

I realize I've left this blog empty and forgotten in the depths of the Internet for months, and that's not very nice of me.

Fortunately, I seem to have returned to it. Let me tell you why:

I want to save everyone.

This is the part of my personality that makes me motherly. This is the part of my personality that says both "you should go out of your way to make people's lives easier" and "you should go out of your way to stop people from doing things that are wrong." This is the part of me that is sensitive and wussy, and yet this is where I find my strength.

That was all very poetic until I said "wussy," wasn't it? Oh well. I think I got my meaning across.

The people I want to save most of all are shygirls, as you might have guessed. But shygirls -- especially depressed ones -- are very difficult to save. We don't ask for help. We often don't think we deserve help. Society allows girls to be quiet and writes us off as "shy" without worrying about any deeper meanings.

And here is the biggest issue: if you stand up and say "I am a shygirl and I want to help," you stop being a shygirl in our eyes. By definition, anyone who can give speeches to crowds and save people with their strength is not a shygirl. If you're up there talking about how you feel, how can you be shy? If you were shy like us, you wouldn't be able to do that.

Standing up for yourself and others like that is a massive hurdle. Once you pass it, you can no longer connect with the people you want to save. On one side of the wall are shygirls huddled unable to communicate, and on the other side are well-meaning teachers and friends and me, saying "we know how you feel!"

But if you're screaming about it, if you're standing up about it, you can't know. You can't understand what it feels like to be trapped in your own feelings. You can't understand what it's like to burn up inside, unable to speak. You can't understand the fear and loneliness when you're introduced to a new group, the thrill of horror whenever group projects are announced, the shaking of your knees when you try to read aloud...

But that's not true. I know all these things, and I am willing to listen to any experience you have had that I have not. I don't know everything, but I'll learn it all if it can help someone.

So I've come back to this blog. I still don't know how to make sure my feelings reach the people who need them, but writing them down seems to be a step in the right direction.

hugs, shygirl <3

Rejection.

I'm still learning to say no. I mean, obviously I can say the word. I just can't seem to manage it in the right situations. I'm not sure why this is a shygirl thing, but it does seem to be one. Probably because we're so used to just going along with what happens around us that when someone gives us the chance to change it, we panic.

The reason I'm writing about this is that just a few minutes ago, I told my friends I didn't want to go downtown with them today. I think this is a fairly normal occurrence, both the planning to hang out downtown and the rejection. But I don't think my reaction is exactly normal. It's normal for me, of course, but I hope I have managed to establish that I am not entirely normal.

I hate to turn people down. I really do. Part of it comes from me being naturally very motherly, etc., and part comes from my conception that I need to make other people's lives go smoothly. I don't need to speak up if speaking up means it'll hurt other people. When my friends respond to my rejection with things like "but whyyyyy?" and "no you have to come pleeeeease" I feel incredibly guilty. I feel guilty about a lot of ridiculous things, like mistakes other people have made and my grandmother buying me shoes.

You know what? That's not fucking healthy. I have a ton of feelings, and nodding along with other people isn't going to get them out there. The problem is that one side of me wants to smooth things over all the time and the other side says, "fuck that, my feelings are just as important as anyone else's."

My shrink says one side is the depression talking, that what I really want to do is stand up for everyone in the world, including myself. I believe that. I have to believe that so I have something that's not depressing to believe in, okay? And honestly, how can anyone save other people if they haven't saved themselves first?

On a completely different note that I will one day expand on, I want people to understand depression and suicide. The misconceptions people have make me want to punch things. I get angry whenever I hear someone ask why so many of our nation's youth are committing suicide recently, as if they've never heard of a reason someone would do that, or when someone describes a person with depression as "sad" or "disturbed."

Depression is the most common cause of suicide. And guess what? Depression is a disease. It has nothing to do with how disturbed you are or how many friends you have or whether or not you like your job. Someone with depression is going to feel wrong, just like someone with any other illness. The difference is that the flu makes you vomit and depression makes you want to die. And of course, depression is inside your head, infecting not only your body but your thoughts.

Because I am kind of pissed about people being stupid, I have made a list of people who might, at some point in time, feel suicidal.

• Sad people
• Happy people
• Gym teachers
• Seventh graders
• Thirtysomethings
• Businessmen
• Businesswomen
• Cellists
• Me

So, as you can see, this is a varied list. There are so many more people I could add to it, but I really don't have the time or the energy. The point isn't that these people's professions or whether they think they're happy: the point is that they most likely have depression.

You can be a happy person and still suffer from depression. Don't ever let yourself think the depression will take over, because it won't. It's a disease, not part of you. The happiness is what's truly you.

xoxo, shygirl <3

Not dead.

I was considering giving up blogging forever like the overdramatic girl I am, but a few of my friends reminded me today.

I read an article the other day that pissed me off to no end. Generally, with me, one can tell I'm truly angry because I start to swear copiously. I like to swear as kind of a fashion statement most of the time (if that doesn't make sense, I might try to explain later) but when I'm angry I just add curses to sentences in places they really don't belong. So if I describe something as pissing me off rather than just annoying me, you can tell I really fucking hate it.

I'd link you to the article, but I'm not sure how to find it again. To be perfectly honest, I don't want to find it again. I cried from anger when I read it. Crying is one of my responses to anger, besides swearing. I think the crying is a leftover from my shygirl days.

Who am I kidding? I'm still a shygirl. I'll probably always be one.

Anyway, the article began with describing an ad for Zoloft. Zoloft is the medication I take for depression and social anxiety, and while I've heard of a lot of people who dislike it, it's been working wonderfully for me. The ad in question apparently showed a demure woman wearing a hat pulled low over her face, shading her eyes. The text read "maybe she's not just shy. Maybe it's depression."

It's not quite as exciting as Maybelline, but I thought it sounded like a cute ad. The writer of the article did not. She thought it was terrible to tell people who are "just shy" that they're "diseased."

Let's pause so I can tell you about my feelings for the phrase "just shy." It's up there with "are you okay?" and "it's always the quiet ones." Shy, for me, is not a "just." I realize that there are shy people out there who don't mind it, but for me shyness was painful and crippling. I felt like I was frozen or closed off in a glass box a lot of the time when all people did was ask me a simple question. So, on that note, I don't believe it's a problem to tell someone who feels that way that they are sick.

Her other point was that introverts are that way by nature, and that they serve an important role in society. To demonstrate this, she wrote about several species of animal that showed both introversion and extroversion (what I like to call shygirls and loudgirls). While one would think the loudest and most colorful male animals win over all the lady animals, there are some animals that take advantage of being quieter than their rivals. For example, a loudly chirping male cricket makes a better target for a predator. In the empty space, a quiet male can go and win over a female.

This is all a lovely metaphor, but I think she was getting one thing wrong. She wrote that she self-identified as an introvert. She was also writing a book about the introverted experience, as if she can speak for all of us. I realize I am also trying to speak for all of us, but I hope I'm not pissing anyone off as much as she did me.

I also believe that within the label "shy" there are many different people. We are not all shy for the same reason. It's easy to put us all together, but to me, there is a difference between shy and depressed and introverted and suffering from social anxiety disorder. This woman's problem was that she assumed all of these different people were introverted: the same as her.

I have my own definitions for these things, and they don't exactly follow along with hers. They may not follow along with yours, either. I apologize. If there is anyone out there reading this who would like to contribute to my definitions, you are free to do so.

Introverted: the opposite of extroverted, duh. An introvert is someone who enjoys the company of other people, but not all the time. They can be uncommonly self-aware, but they are not all superior beings who are completely in touch with every feeling they've ever had, ever. The main thing about introverts is that they are completely able to talk at any time: they just don't always want to.

Shy: what people call other people who behave a certain way. They don't speak much, they often blush, they might have trouble giving speeches or presentations. They don't take initiative when other would, they dress as if to hide themselves, they aren't comfortable in large groups. Shyness is about being uncomfortable in your own skin, whether you're around two people or twenty.

Depressed: a disease, not a personality trait. Depression is a mental illness (and, by the by, mental illnesses are as serious as any other and shouldn't be as stigmatized as they are). A person with depression might seem shy, because they can be reluctant to go places, engage in conversation, and often have closed-off body language that is often interpreted as shy.

Social anxiety: this is the kicker. I believe that the majority of shy behavior is caused by social anxiety disorder. Social anxiety is when shyness interferes with your life to the point that you can't live normally. Since speaking when spoken to, giving speeches, and being surrounded by large groups of people are all considered "normal," I would say most shy people have some level of this.

So if someone says "hey, anonymous, how are you doing?" and you say, "fine, but I'd rather not talk right now," you might be introverted. If you blush, look away, and mumble something, you might be shy. If you freeze up, you might have depression or social anxiety disorder -- or someone might just have caught you off guard.

That woman and her article pissed me off, but I'm kind of glad I read it. It gave me a chance to collect my thoughts and -- I hope -- organize them into something that makes sense.

peace out, shygirl <3

Welcome to shygirls!

Shygirls, shyboys, and shypeople of any gender, are vastly underrepresented.

Some people would say that's our fault. We don't stick up for ourselves. We don't push our ideas or opinions. If we only asked to be represented like normal people, we wouldn't have that problem.

Sometimes it's not that easy. There are depressed shygirls, shyboys with social anxiety disorder, and all kinds of shypeople who are just that -- shy. We don't feel comfortable talking to you first. We don't feel comfortable giving presentations, or standing up for ourselves, or standing up at all.

And we need help. I'm not saying that everyone who's shy needs professional help. Introverts and quiet people are lumped under the "shy" description with people are mentally ill and can't help their silence. (As a note, I am both fairly introverted and suffering from a delightful combination of depression and social anxiety disorder, and so I like to think I have some experience with both sides.) There are a lot of people who are perceived to be "just shy," and that's a problem.

You can't write us off as "shy." Some of us don't want to be "shy." Some of us don't want to be treated as "shy." Some of us are only "shy" in certain situations and can seem like a completely different person around our friends and family.

But the problem is this: shy is a useful description. I think of it as somewhat like the term "queer." It's a word that describes a whole host of people who are somewhere outside the "norm;" in this case, the norm being loud.

It's not good to divide the world into loudgirls and shygirls, but for the purposes of this blog, that's where we are.

love, shygirl <3