Death, more specifically, my death, isn’t something I fear. After so many years of living in its shadow, and having more than my fair share of very close calls, death isn’t something I am all that afraid of. I mean, even now, as a healthy, physically active adult, I still think about death and dying daily, but more in a reflective way rather than a fearful or dreadful way. 

For the record, I am in no way looking forward to dying and death. Personal experience has taught me that dying fucking sucks. But, death itself isn’t something to fear, no matter what you believe happens after we die (unless you believe Dante’s Inferno is a real place, in which case I just feel bad for you). It would take a book to explain why I don’t fear death like most people I know do (which is why I’m writing a memoir). 

It might also take the same book to explain why I’ve lost sleep and been nauseous the past week or so, dreading a required Public Speaking college course. At the time of this writing, the course starts in less than two days, and I am absolutely terrified of it.

Honestly, I don’t know specifically why I’m so damn scared of public speaking. I just am, and I don’t know what to do with this fear other than rip the bandaid off by taking this course sooner than later. If I don’t take the course, I don’t get my degree. And, I’d like to get my degree eventually. 

It’s tough. It’s gonna take a lot out of me, even with an extensive game plan in place. If I could skip it or be exempt from the class somehow, I absolutely would. But, I can’t, because public speaking is a very major part of college, and a very major part of many careers. 

Both my parents do public speaking for a living, and have gotten used to it. Well… Mom actually loves public speaking. One of her favorite classes in college was the same public speaking course I’ll be taking. As for my dad, even though he struggled with social anxiety in college, interestingly, he didn’t (and doesn’t) struggle with public speaking all that much. Sure, it never was his favorite, but he still preferred talking to a room full of people instead of just one-on-one with someone. Nowadays, he travels the country and teaches people about construction materials and how to do their jobs. And, Mom is a real estate agent who is spending the rest of this fall giving real estate related lectures to new homebuyers. 

Neither of my parents understand my severe, almost crippling social anxiety. Honestly, they never really have, which is why I haven’t really opened up to them about it. I’m just too damn good at hiding my fear in the moment, but I still feel the physical symptoms of total panic. When the adrenaline finally starts to leave my system, I almost always end up puking, then feeling woozy for hours or days after. It’s awful. 

My doctors recently sent me a “survival prescription package” for college to help with some of these symptoms, which includes medications such as Zofran, Buspirone, and Propranolol, as well as my usual Sertraline. I'm pretty pissed off at the fact that I need even more pills to keep my body from self-destructing in the middle of class, but it is what it is, I guess. 

Because of my severe public speaking phobia, I can’t help but be jealous of those who were basically born to be public speakers (AKA my mom). Hell, I’m jealous of people who have gotten over their fear of public speaking and now do it for a living without any issues. I don’t have a damn clue how they do it. Likewise, they can’t understand why I’m so damn scared of it. Well… to be fair, I don’t know what it is about public speaking that terrifies me either. 

It just does, and it sucks that nobody really seems to realize the extent of my anxiety because I'm too damn good at hiding my fear.