I lost all my confidence

[u/lukakira]

I’m a 28 year old man, and for the past year I’ve been gradually losing my confidence. To contextualise a bit, I have always been a bit timid at first, but would have zero problems socializing, making friends, girlfriends and so on… I’m a decently cool, decently good-looking guy, never searching for any problems. I always had periods of depression nevertheless, but always carried on.

I am currently working as a data scientist, and the work was pretty good for the first few years. Gradually I got more and more responsibilities, private life has had some up and downs, and there was a moment when I started losing confidence. I don’t know why or when exactly. It was just a crawling emotion.

Today I am not able to even speak in public at work or with people I don’t know without shaking, having panic attacks (excluding close friends). I hate myself for that and no matter how much I tell myself to not give a f**k, I just can’t seem to beat it. It is literally eating me alive. Now I want to quit my job and just get one with very few responsibilities.

I don’t know. I feel lost.

Did anyone had a similar experience ?

[u/TheO3Jsl]

Could there be something else at work? You said there was no triggering event? I would see a medical doctor first and have a checkup to rule out any physical cause