Ever get the feeling...

...that people are staring at you and talking about you behind your back?

If you experience this feeling more often than not when you're in public, you may be suffering from "social phobia", a condition that affects millions of people. It happens most often in situations where you meet new people: you find yourself deathly afraid that you are going to do something to embarrass and/or humiliate yourself. You increasingly find excuses to stay home.

I can't imagine how awful and limiting being afflicted with this would be.

My phobias include very mild, controllable arachnophobia, severe claustrophobia, mild aviophobia (amplified by my claustrophobia) and a dislike of huge crowds (not quite agoraphobia level) In reading about the dozens of bizarre phobias people suffer from, I was pleased to discovered that I am no more phobic than most phobically inclined individuals.