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Most “social anxiety therapy” focuses on managing your thoughts, building social skills, or pushing yourself to face your fears. But for a lot of adults I work with in my anxiety therapy practice in Los Angeles, that kind of therapy misses the point — because it doesn’t touch the body.
Social anxiety isn’t just overthinking. It’s your nervous system saying, “This isn’t safe,” even when your brain knows better. So if you’ve tried therapy and still feel anxious, wired, or disconnected in social settings — this post is for you.
I’m a dual-licensed therapist in Los Angeles who specializes in anxiety therapy, trauma, somatic work, IFS, and attachment repair. I’ve been featured in TIME Magazine, HuffPost, Verywell Mind, and other major outlets for sharing honest, human insights about what real healing actually looks like.
You walk into a room and your body tenses before you’ve said a word. Your chest gets tight. You start scanning for cues — did I say the wrong thing? Are they judging me? Why do I feel like I want to leave my own skin?
If you’ve been calling this social anxiety, you’re not wrong. But also…maybe that label’s too small.
Social anxiety isn’t random. It usually starts from experiences — often early on — where being real or honest didn’t go well. Maybe you shared something and someone made fun of you. Or you opened up and got shut down. You showed your true self and it felt like too much for someone else.
So your brain went: Okay, noted. Let’s not do that again.
And from there, you started hiding little parts of yourself. Not because you’re fake — but because it felt safer. You learned to say what people wanted to hear. To avoid rocking the boat. To be likable. To be “easy.”
I’ve worked with so many clients who’ve said things like:
“Nothing bad is happening, but my body still freaks out.”
“I feel wired the entire time I’m around people — even the ones I love.”
“It’s not just overthinking. It feels like it’s in my body.”
If you’ve felt this, you’re not “crazy” or “overrreacting” — you’re just really damn tired. Social anxiety drains you because you’re constantly “on,” even when you don’t want to be. You’re managing how you come across, second-guessing everything you say, trying to keep it together while your body’s literally buzzing underneath it all. It’s exhausting. And confusing. Because deep down, you actually do want to connect — it just doesn’t feel simple.
Most people assume social anxiety is just being shy. But that’s not what it is. According to the National Institute of Mental Health, social anxiety disorder is an “intense, persistent fear of being watched and judged,” that can disrupt everyday life — from speaking with friends to going out — for at least six mont
And for a lot of adults, it’s more about the exhaustion of constantly wondering how you’re being perceived. It’s the pressure to perform, to say the right thing, to not come off weird, awkward, or “too much.” It’s less about avoiding people, and more about feeling like you have to earn your place with them.
For so many people, what gets labeled as “social anxiety” is actually a response to feeling unsafe in relationships…sometimes for years.
It’s what happens when you learn, often early, that being open or honest could cost you something. That people might leave. Turn on you. Embarrass you. Or use what you shared against you.
Now your body’s on high alert — not because you’re overreacting, but because it’s learned that certain situations come with pain. Being ignored. Embarrassed. Shut down. Whatever it was, it stuck. So even if today’s situation isn’t the same, your body doesn’t actually know or understand that. It just sees something kind of similar and goes, “Nope. Not doing that again.” It reacts like the past is happening all over again — even when logically know that it’s not.
So you catch yourself overthinking everything — replaying convos, overanalyzing someone’s tone, reading wayyy too much into a text. You’re scanning the room, checking every little shift in someone’s vibe. Not because you want to be doing all that — but because your body’s like, “If we catch the warning signs early enough, maybe we won’t get hurt again.”
And it’s not that you’re “too sensitive” or “too much.” It’s just that your body and brain learned to stay on guard because at some point, you probably had to. Maybe people were unpredictable. Maybe you got shut down, ignored, or made to feel like your feelings were a problem. So now, your nervous system watches for anything that feels even a tad bit off. And it makes sense if you were raised around inconsistency, silence, criticism, emotional immaturity, or anything else that taught you connection wasn’t safe.
So what’s really underneath the social anxiety? Honestly, for a lot of people, it’s not just fear of being around others — it’s actually a deep fear of being seen. And I mean really, truly…seen. And for a lot of people, that feels intense as hell. Not because they don’t like people (quite the contrary), but because attention feels like pressure. Like there’s suddenly a right way to exist — and you’re afraid you’re doing it wrong.
You start monitoring every word. Reading people’s faces. Wondering if you said something weird. Feeling like you need to shrink or edit yourself so no one has a reason to leave.
That doesn’t come out of nowhere.
This usually traces back to environments where visibility came with a cost — something I see all the time with my clients.
Maybe you were criticized for speaking up.
Perhaps your needs got labeled as “too much.”
Or maybe the only time you were valued was when you were performing — not when you were just being. For many clients, this anxiety goes all the way back to childhood — especially if they grew up with emotionally immature or unavailable parents.
So now, even in everyday moments, your body treats connection like a threat.It doesn’t care that the situation is technically safe. It’s scanning for risk. It’s trying to keep you from feeling that thing again — the shame, the rejection, the silence.
Your anxiety didn’t start in your head. It lives in your body. And your body’s smart — it remembers what it had to do to survive.
When people talk about anxiety, they usually mean thoughts: spiraling, overanalyzing, imagining worst-case scenarios.
But for a lot of folks, the body kicks in before the mind even catches up. You walk into a room and suddenly your chest tightens. You feel buzzy, like your whole system’s speeding up. Or you space out completely — disconnected, numb, like you’re not even in the room anymore.
That’s your nervous system flipping the switch. It’s scanning for danger, even if nothing threatening is actually happening — which is exactly why we do somatic therapy: to work with the body, not against it.
(This is exactly what Polyvagal Theory explains — that the body’s survival responses kick in long before logic does.)
If you had to grow up always checking the mood in the room — like who’s pissed off today, or how do I keep the peace — then yeah, your body learned to stay on high alert. And that was smart. It kept you safe.
But the hard part? Even if life is more stable now, that old habit doesn’t just disappear. Your body still scans for tension. Still watches for someone’s tone to change. Still reacts to tiny shifts — because it had to for a long time. You just haven’t had enough experiences yet where your body fully believes, “Okay, I don’t have to be on high alert anymore.”
You might not even call it “anxiety” at first. You just know that something feels off in social settings — even ones that should feel easy. And the wild part? You might come off confident. Put-together. No one would ever guess how hard your body is working to keep you from feeling exposed.
Here’s what it can actually look like:
What It Actually Takes to Heal Social Anxiety in the Body
Real social anxiety therapy shouldn’t just teach you how to blend in better. It should help your body stop bracing for danger in every conversation. That’s why I don’t do surface-level strategies. I use a trauma-informed, nervous system-based approach to help clients actually feel safe — not just “act confident.”
Anxiety exists for a reason. It’s literally built into your body to help you survive. It’s biological + evolutionary. Your body was literally designed to notice threat and respond fast — so if you’ve been through situations where connection didn’t feel safe, your anxiety is just doing its job.
Second — you start noticing the patterns, not judging them. Because anxiety gets so much louder when you try to shove it down or pretend like it’s not there. So instead of asking, “OMG – Why am I like this?” try something different. Something more compassionate, like, “What’s happening right now that my body thinks is a threat?” That one shift changes everything. Instead of spiraling, you get curious.
Third — you come back into your body. This part feels weird at first, especially if you’re used to living in your head. But anxiety lives in your body, not just your thoughts. So you practice checking in: Where’s the tension? Can I exhale? Can I feel my feet on the ground? It grounds your body to the present moment.
Fourth — you stop doing it alone. And for good reason. This kind of healing happens in relationship and NOT in isolation. And not by overanalyzing. You don’t need to have it all figured out to deserve support. Regulation happens through connection. You were never meant to carry this on your own. This is the work I do with clients every day — helping their bodies stop performing through somatic, body-based therapy so they can, stop panicking, and finally feel safe being seen.
I work with adults who look fine on the outside — they’re high-functioning, responsible, the go-to person for everyone else. But inside, they’re anxious, constantly scanning the room, and tired of performing just to feel safe.
Most don’t need more coping tools. They’ve got those.
What they actually need is a place to unpack why their anxiety exists. Why their body still braces in connection. Why being seen feels risky, even around people they love.
That’s where my work comes in!
I’m Cheryl Groskopf — a licensed therapist in the Greater Los Angeles area. My approach is trauma-informed, integrative, and honest. I draw from:
I don’t do surface-level symptom management. That sh*t doesn’t last. Instead, I help clients understand what’s actually driving their patterns — so they can stop reacting from survival mode and start living like they finally have options.
If your anxiety doesn’t make sense on paper, and you’re looking for anxiety therapy in Los Angeles that actually helps you get to the root — not just manage the symptoms — I’d love to help.
Notice what’s happening in your body when you're in social situations — before your brain starts spiraling.
Pause instead of pushing through — this interrupts the auto-pilot pattern of anxiety.
Track your triggers (without judgment): is it being interrupted? Eye contact? Silence? Your body is reacting for a reason.
Regulate in real time — not just with breathwork, but with awareness. Shift your posture, orient to the room, come back to your body.
You over-prepare for basic conversations, even in text.
After seeing friends, you replay the entire interaction and question everything you said.
Your body feels wired, tense, or disconnected — like you’re floating or frozen.
Receiving compliments makes you uncomfortable instead of seen.
You're constantly tracking others: their tone, body language, energy — all while completely bypassing your own.
Avoiding vulnerability leaves you disconnected. But when you try to show up more fully, it feels like too much.
Because their nervous system learned at some point that connection wasn’t safe.
Maybe you spoke up and got laughed at. Perhaps your needs were ignored or made to feel like too much. Or maybe your caregivers were emotionally inconsistent — present one moment, distant or critical the next.
So your nervous system did what it had to do: it adapted.
It linked attention with danger. It labeled vulnerability as a threat. It taught you to perform, shrink, or disappear — not because you’re weak, but because that kept you safe.
Now, even in “safe” situations, your body gets triggered and responds from a trauma response instead of real time.
You want connection — but your body dreads it.
You commit to plans, then spend the entire day feeling on edge. You show up, monitor everything you say, then leave convinced you got something wrong.
Even around close friends or family, you can’t relax. You either say too much and feel exposed, or shut down and feel invisible.
There’s a constant loop in your head:
“Did I sound weird?”
“Did I talk too much?”
“Are they pulling back?”
I’m based in the Greater Los Angeles area and work with adults from all over — including Silver Lake, Highland Park, Brentwood, West LA, and Hollywood. Some clients come in person. Others prefer to meet online from wherever they are in California. Both work.
