Dealing with paralyzing fear of rejection

Exactly What It Says on the Tin.

I'm utterly terrified of being rejected (not just in social situations, but when I ask for things). I have most of my family to thank for this, as they subjected me to this sort of treatment in regards to basic needs (medication, schoolwork, food, etc.) when I was a kid.

I'm not a kid anymore, and I know that I can ask for what I want, but often, I psyche myself out so badly thinking about it and what could go wrong beforehand that I don't go through with it. This includes things like asking to buy things or even for help. It. Is. Paralyzing. I've been trying to work through it for years, but it hasn't seemed to help. I am in counseling partly to deal with this.

But my inability to ask for what I want/need leads to me doing things I shouldn't, like just taking something (if I'm at home) because I'm that afraid of it being refused.

And it's making me utterly miserable. I don't feel like I can let myself be happy because it just gets brutally stomped on shortly thereafter. I hate this - I often don't even get to the "ask" stage because I shoot my own idea down first. I feel resigned to "I'm just setting myself up for dissapointment - again, so why bother?" I can't stand it.

I really, really, really want to change this pattern. Does anyone else have this, or have anything I can do to practice ridding myself of this?

I know that this probably sounds lame and whiny to some if not all of you, but I'm tired of making myself miserable. I need help in the interim until my counseling really starts getting focused (I haven't been going to this one for more than a month yet). Please.

Here, you just got rejected. Was it all that painful, really? Or did it just make me look like an asshole?

OK, kidding aside: I don't know if this is going to help, but I find that rejection is a good way to come to terms with fear of rejection. Try to take some silly "risk", something that has a high chance to fail but is not going to lead to anything particularly bad if it does — I dunno, write a short story and submit it somewhere, this sort of thing.

edited 20th Nov '11 10:46:21 AM by Carciofus

Yeah, see, the worst thing you can do is not try because then nothing will change. So take the risk and go for it.

"I find that rejection is a good way to come to terms with fear of rejection."

Yep. Once you realize it isn't that big a deal, there'll be nothing to psyche you out.

I find that two things help.

One, realizing that since you already don't have what you need/want, if you ask and someone says no, you're no worse off than when you started.

Two, if you are defeatist and assume nothing will work, it actually gets easier to ask for things, because you can never be disappointed, only pleasantly surprised.

My philosophy that you might as well just be bold and ask because you've got nothing to lose if you're rejected has gotten me a lot more things than it's lost me.

Your issues seem a lot more ingrained then others. While I recommend the same as the other tropers, I would also suggest seeing if there was a local support group for people with confidence or communication issues. There you can have a good support as well as a safe place to practice.

If you're already getting counseling, that's good. Until I read that, my first thought was to recommend you talk to a psychologist, since from your description, your fear of rejection seems to be on a deep-seated emotional level; probably, it isn't that helpful to just list ways to rationally understand why rejection shouldn't be such a huge concern.

That said, perhaps it might be useful to think of it like this: when you're considering asking for something, split up the possible outcomes, and try to assess the probability and consequences of each. If you get rejected, what's the worst that could plausibly happen? Maybe it'll help if you find that you can't come up with any concrete examples of outcomes that are bad enough to justify not asking in the first place.

edited 24th Nov '11 11:25:14 PM by Enthryn