Nina is the only child of an absentee single mother. She grew up with few friends and fewer family members. Instead, Nina’s formative years were spent in the company of a loving nanny and many books.
Nina’s adult life is structured to suit her comforts and needs. She works in a bookstore, hosts several book clubs and trivia events for socialization, and even has a best friend (a cat named Phil). Nina has started branching out. She is even starting to date a little when, suddenly, Nina learns the identity of her recently-deceased father. It turns out that she has a vast, involved, emotionally demanding family.
Nina has social anxiety. People overwhelm her, so she avoids them. It’s a lonely road. Social anxiety is common and many great techniques can be used to combat it. Here I’m giving tips on one method, Exposure.
Make an exposure chart (3 columns)
In the left column, list situations you have avoided because of anxiety.
In the middle column, rank how scary the situation is to you (1 = not very, 10 = exceptionally)
In the right column, rate how important the situation is to you (1 = not very, 10 = exceptionally)
Use the Exposure Chart to create an exposure ladder moving from less to more on the scariness scale.
Prepare for a low-level exposure
This is a planned experience. Write down the following:
Exposure (feared situation to be faced):
Anxious Prediction (what I’m scared will happen):
Distortions (the distorted thoughts my anxious predictions rely on)
Perfectionist Goal (what are all the shoulds I have about this situation):
Realistic Goal (what I can accomplish even when anxious):
Safety Behavior (what I usually would do to prevent anxiety):
Values (why am I doing this again?)
Coping Thoughts (what I can tell myself when I’m feeling most anxious):
Engage in the Exposure
It’s time to bring out your bravery. Engage in the exposure focusing on avoiding your old safety behaviors, attempting to hit your realistic goals, and using your coping thoughts as needed.
Assess what worked and didn’t work in the exposure
Also, notice that your anxiety went down towards the end of the exposure or after the exposure was completed.
Do another exposure that is one rung up on the ladder
Same skill, new application. Keep working your way up.
Let’s apply everything we learned above to Nina.
Nina’s Exposure Chart might look something like this:
Avoidance Situation | Scariness Rating | Importance (1-10) |
Spending time with a new family member who doesn’t accept her. | 10 | 3 |
Spend time with new sister, who shares her interests. | 2 | 8 |
Go on a date with her crush, who has repeatedly asked her out. | 8 | 7 |
Meet new brother, who seems warm, nice and curious about her. | 5 | 10 |
Text new brother to set up meeting | 3 | 10 |
Contact new sister’s mother to coordinate get-together. | 1 | 8 |
Say yes when crush asks her out. | 7 | 7 |
And, her exposure ladder would likely then be:
Spending time with a new family member who doesn’t accept her.
Go on a date with her crush, who has repeatedly asked her out.
Say yes when crush asks her out.
Meet new brother, who seems warm, nice and curious about her.
Text new brother to set up meeting
Spend time with new sister, who shares her interests.
Contact new sister’s mother to coordinate get-together.
From there, we move into preparing for the exposure. Here’s Nina’s continued example:
Exposure (feared situation to be faced): | Contact new sister’s mother to coordinate get-together. |
Anxious Prediction (what I’m scared will happen): | The mom will say no or be rude to me. |
Distortions (the distorted thoughts my anxious predictions rely on) | Generalizing that others are all feeling the same way as one negative person. Mind reading, assuming I know other’s thoughts. |
Perfectionist Goal (what are all the should’s I have about this situation):Realistic Goal (what I can accomplish even when anxious): | I have to have a perfect plan for the time together before reaching out. |
Realistic Goal (what I can accomplish even when anxious): | It’s ok to start a conversation with ideas and openness to other options. |
Safety Behavior (what I normally would do to prevent anxiety): | Never text, generally avoid. |
Values (why am I doing this again?) | I want to know the sister who is most like me and who happens to be young and in need of extra love. |
Coping Thoughts (what I can tell myself when I’m feeling most anxious): | I’m doing the best I can, I get along well with kids, Sister and I will have lots of books to talk about when we get together. |
So, then Nina would text and come up with a plan with the sister’s mother. She would likely see that the text was well received and planning was relatively easy. This would embolden her to go to the next exposure, meeting sister in person, with the same process. And up the ladder she’d go.
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