I get compliments on my appearance and there are people that clearly think I'm fun to hang out with. Does this make me better at being social? No. Do I wish it did? Yes. My anime backstory on why I'm like this is that I was socially isolated from most of other kids growing up and my family sucked shit thru a straw. I was homeschooled and my parents were part of weirdo Christian sect. This technically wouldn't have been a problem if I was brought to events other homeschool/weird Christian sect kids went, but we weren't near many and we didn't have a lot of money. That doesn't even begin to cover the PTSD and the complex hang ups I have about socialization I gained from my mom's parenting. A big theme of hers is that if u opened up about a problem, it was a toss up on if she'd b helpful or make you out to be the devil incarnate. Eventually I learned to ask anyone BUT her when I had a problem.
Now even though I got all these positive traits, talking to other people is terrifying. I'm slowly getting better about it but I find it hard to talk to people mainly due to the irrational fear that anyone I talk to could be as emotionally unstable as my mom was. It's almost worse than the fear of not holding a convo. The fear of saying "how you doing" and getting "How am I doing? HOW AM I DOING?!?!!? 'HOW YOU DOING' KILLED MY DAD, YOU HEARTLESS SWINE!!!" And the worst is even after a convo goes fine or is just harmlessly boring, I'm still left w the fear that one day I'll talk to the wrong person and they'll respond to wat I say by ripping my face off. Should I just keep trying to strike up convos as exposure therapy? What do I do if I encounter someone emotionally unstable like that? Anyone else PTSD here that can give advice?