Whenever I tell people that I do get shy to eat in public or in the presence of people, they just carry on as if what I said was not important. For some reason, they don't seem to realize the struggle that comes with this stupid shyness of mine.
I've had friends bring food to my house in the past, and every time they ask me to go ahead and eat, I tell them that I have no plans of touching that food until they eventually leave my house. The last thing I want to do is lie to people, so most of my friends know about this silly shyness of mine and don't get upset when I don't immediately eat the food they've brought.
But that isn't the worst of it. You see, one of my main causes of this shyness is people. I don't want people watching, and for someone with a condition like that, people don't realize how much math I have to do when entering a restaurant for the first time.
There's a lady that sells superb food down the street. Whenever I go to her restaurant, just before I enter, I make sure to scan the place quickly to see if I can find an empty seat, preferably one with just one seat in it so that I don't get to be joined by anyone later.
Recently, I've been working on myself, so I forced myself one day to go see a table where another stranger was also having his meal. That was probably one of the longest meals of my life. I sat down at that table, barely eating anything; it felt like I was uninterested in the food until he eventually left.
If I didn't know how severe the condition was, well, I got to find out after that day. But the good news is that I'm working on it. I still haven't made any progress yet, but I'm hopeful that I will, because how do I go on dinner dates with someone I just met if I can't even eat comfortably in their presence? Because I actually plan on going on a couple this year.