Good evening, I’m wondering if anyone knows if there is a specific phobia or disease concerned with the fear and paranoia of feeling that everyone is secretly angry at you? Not really that anyone is planning to hurt you or anything, just the feeling of awkwardness and hate directed to you from everyone you meet in the day (whether it actually exists or not). We’ve all had days in our lives where it feels like everyone we interact with is secretly mad at us (for example, you sometimes feel a similar fear when you can’t remember drinking the previous night). Is there a specific name for the kind of paranoia this is, fearing everyone secretly angry at you (whether you’ve done anything or not)?
this might be useful: http://ask.metafilter.com/153135/I-think-they-hate-me
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I am always suspecting that people secretly hate me, or they are secretly mad at me, or they are generally acting towards me in ways that conceal their inner (potentially manipulative) emotions. What could cause this, and how do I stop?
I suspect that co-workers, employers, professors, roommates, etc. all secretly dislike me or are secretly mad at me. I worry that my “friends” secretly hate me, or that my significant other is secretly thinking terrible things about me and planning to break up. I suspect my therapist of having secret and emotionally threatening motivations/insights that she is not revealing to me (e.g. I have a personality disorder or she’s trying to trick me into talking about something). I don’t trust the outward behaviors & communications of other people–often misinterpreting things as anger/dislike/etc. and dismissing positive interactions.
I am trying to learn to check with people openly, but I’m embarrassed, and I can’t do that with everyone all of the time. To clarify, this is definitely not any intense sort of paranoia that people are trying to kill me or anything. I’m not ready to talk about this extensively with my therapist yet; we’re dealing with other things.
So, for now, I seek your insight: what could be causing these suspicions and interpretations, and how can I stop/prevent them?
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This is a facinating topic and something I have given a lot of thought to. I spent most of my life as a supervisor managing small crews of 40 people or less. I can’t think of any time in my life where I didn’t have at least 2 on a crew that didn’t have this problem to one degree or another. Usually about 10% of the workers expressed at least some feelings like this. In some cases it resulted in the loss of their jobs or clinical intervention as it progressed into confrontations or retaliatory vandalism to cars or other personnal belongings.
I noticed that other compulsive behaviors from these same individuals was not uncommon. Gambling and drug addiction or abuse are the first two that come to mind. I have no idea how well these cases respond to therapy or drug treatment.