I swear I'm more sensitive than other girls...

[cariboucutie]

So I am generally a fairly kind, happy person, but I often find myself criticizing people, even my closest friends. I have obviously learned to not do so out loud as then I would have no social life, but it is extremely hard for me to value my friendships. The few exceptions are my older brother, who is 19, and a few of our mutual friends his age. Because of this, I feel like I probably stress out over those friendships more even though we are definitely not as close as my friends in high school. The problem is that I have tried very hard to 'get in with his crowd' and though, when thinking logically, I know they have no problem with me, I freak out and over analyze it every time I am not invited to go out with my brother's group. Even though three-fourths of the time I am happily invited to hang out with them. The few times I am not, I often drive home crying because of the rejection. I know this is stupid, but why does an occasional rejection make me feel so unwanted and alone? I have friends in high school who I know I can count on and who love me, but for some reason I can't relate to them past school things. Do you think I might have some kind of social anxiety?

I don't think I deserve better treatment from my brother's group, but I also don't think it is wrong for me to not have 'clicked' with my group of high school friends. It may help to note that I go to a tiny, Christian high school (39 currently enrolled) which is the ministry of my small-ish Baptist church. It's not as if I have very many friends outside of these two circles.

Also, my parents are divorced and I went through, basically, a rejection from my best friend's life when I was in junior high right after my parent's divorce...it wasn't a very happy year.

[PSY]

Welcome to TeenHelp! =)

I have attended small private schools (Catholic and Christian), so I know how difficult it can be to connect with people. Yes, I know... logically, you should be able to connect with people more easily if it's a small, tight-knit community. Unfortunately, that's not always the case. Sometimes, when it's a small, tight-knit community, it can be difficult to "break in" to that community. You're also going to encounter less diversity... meaning that it may be harder for you to find people with similar interests.

I'm not a psychological professional, so I can't diagnose you; however, it doesn't seem like you're suffering from social anxiety or another anxiety-related disorder. No one likes to experience feelings of rejection, so your reaction is quite normal. What IS abnormal is the frequency with which you experience these feelings of rejection. The reason why you're experiencing them so often, and over even the tiniest hint of rejection, is something you may want to explore.

For example, you said that you experienced rejection when you were younger. Could it be that you are overly sensitive to any form of rejection now, because you're afraid that things will play out the same way now as they did in junior high?

Or perhaps the sensitivity to rejection is stemming from feeling of inadequacy or insecurity when it comes to friendships. You said that you stress out over friendships, but you also tend to push your friends away by being overly critical. Could it be that you're constructing "barriers" or "defenses" in order to protect yourself, which are preventing you from developing more intimate friendships? Generally, when people feel secure in their friendships, they don't fret over not being invited to events 1/4 of the time... they understand that they aren't rejections, and they understand that it won't ultimately result in a loss of said friendships.