Fear of Presentations

[PinkButterfly]

So in highschool I started to have a fear of giving presentations or talking infront of the class. I am assuming that it coincided with emet because I would begin to feel clammy, nauseous, and have a horrible stomach pain and worrying I might V*. Throughout college I'm still super nervous and I hate it, but we have so many presentations in about every class that you kind just have to get over it. I'm in my senior year and today I didn't even have to get up, I just sat at my desk and spoke out in front of everyone like a few sentences or so about my research. I thought I was going to V* the whole entire time. I'm wondering if my emet is beginning to get worse by using this site. I think that I had it really bad years before and not so bad now, but its bringing back memories about my long nights of being N* for no reason. Is anyone feeling like they are in the same boat? What should I do? I saw others talking about not visiting the site.. Maybe it was a good thing to see that I'm not alone.. My boyfriend thinks I need therapy now. The only things that bother me is being around others who have or are going to V* because I automatically think I am going to get it, or start feeling sick because they were there. And I'm super anal about washing hands and using sanitizer before eating or touching anything that I know is "dirty". I don't think its a problem for me, just my way of life. I don't see anything wrong with it. The only problem I really have is hoping I can handle the situation once I have children in my future.. Maybe then I might resort to this page?

[klikittyklak]

I used to get this but in the form of stage fright. It was terrible, because I was a musician so not performing was not exactly an option. I mostly hated that when they closed the stage doors they effectively cut out any escape route for the "what if" situation and I would have to v* in front thousands of people. So what mine stemmed from was a fear v*ing in public. Yours sounds like it might be the same thing? Whatever it is, once you've identified the root fear then figure out how to fix it. For instance, in class if you felt s* surely you could just run down the hall to the bathroom? It might also help to think about how many minutes in your life you've spent v*ing, compared to being normal. That should put things in perspective. ie, "I've spent less than 30 minutes of my whole life actually t*u*, so why should this 30 minutes be any different than almost every other halfhour of my life?"

eta: good luck!! if it helps I've noticed that hardly anyone attends to anything a student presenter is actually saying in class.

[PinkButterfly]

Yeah, mine is V* in public as well. I thought I was getting over this. I've thought about all those things you've said. It just came back full blown yesterday, it was terrible. I couldn't do anything about it and I was put on the spot and had no time to contain myself. So the whole time while i'm talking I have this horrible feeling in my throat. I've never felt that bad before giving a presentation

[klikittyklak]

Is it possible you could take something to relax you before you go on? A doctor might even prescribe you something. Sometimes if I'm really nervous I pop a Dramamine because I figure that'll keep me from v*ing in the moment anyway.