I felt self-conscious in the shopping mall today

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I've been wanting to do some clothes shopping for a while now and today was the chance I got. I got up early (after not sleeping very well last night) because I prefer shopping in the morning when the streets are quieter. But today the streets seemed extremely busy, and it wasn't Black Friday.

Anyway I felt the tired look in my eyes had caught the attention of other women and it spoilt my shopping day. In one clothing store while I was looking for some stylish clothes I saw two middle-aged women talking loudly, then suddenly they went quiet when I came near and I felt them gawking at me in my periphery. Then I heard one of them say, "sshh" to the other. Now while there could be an explanation, I had an anxious feeling that one of them whispered something bad about me causing the other to shush her in case I heard. I just pretended I didn't even know they were there and I carried on browsing, but inside I felt upset.
Then in another clothing store I was engrossed in looking at a rail of some really stylish jeans in my size, and 2 young women came in the entrance. My back was to the entrance as I was looking at this rail of clothes, and they were casually chatting about trying on clothes, but one of them broke out in giggles as they walked past me. Now they could have been laughing at anything but they giggled as they were talking about something so casual, so I had a feeling they saw me and started to snicker. And tired eyes or not, these girls wouldn't have known because I had my back to them.

What the f**k is wrong with people? I wasn't dressed quirky or anything, I KNOW I wasn't because I have a good sense of fashion and I don't go out looking ridiculous or different in any way. I had a trendy handbag (purse) over my shoulder and just looked like another ordinary woman doing what most women like doing best, which is clothes shopping. And it wasn't because I was on my own, because I see people of all ages shopping on their own. And I don't stim or stand funny, I'm just there to do shopping. Also I had washed and straightened my hair and put lipstick on, so I looked nice. I even looked in the mirror a couple of times to check but I couldn't see anything comical.

But I felt like I was in the spotlight, like people were laughing at me or whispering about me. Why do I have to have this treatment? Why can't people just grow up and get a life instead of focusing on a random stranger who's no different to anybody else?

I've been advised by relatives not to post on autism sites about my self-consciousness because of the replies from other autistics assuming just because I'm on the spectrum it means I'm unaware of my actions and I look weird, as it makes me feel worse and agoraphobic, but what the hell.

So, people laugh and whisper and shush in general - there's a very good chance that none of their giggling or whispering had anything to do with you personally. Many times people "shush" cos their conversation is private and they don't want ANYone to hear - it doesn't mean it was about you. It's very easy to assume that any laughter or whispering is because of one's self, even if / when it isn't. Anxiety, self consciousness, and paranoia can make it seem more plausible than it really is. Often times, when we feel like we're in the spotlight like that, it's all in our head, and nobody is actually paying attention.

I used to do exactly that. Thought every laugh every giggle ever whisper was a direct result of something about me. I reversed it by convincing myself that all of that couldn't possibly be as a result of me. Someone remembered a funny story, got a silly text, told a joke, whispered something embarrassing about themselves, but it definitely WAS NOT me they were laughing or giggling about. Now it doesn't bother me, even if it IS me, cos I make it about them, rather than me.

Short Version: You are probably noticing them more than they are actually noticing you.

What the above person said.

You are probably not as important, and not central to the Universe as you think that you are.

Good answer.
No matter how engrossed I am in a task I can still hear everything that's going on around me.

It might be some form of PTSD from the treatment I got at high school. Back then I really did attract negative attention from kids I didn't know, like I was a target. And to this day I still think I'm that target. I do feel more socially anxious around strangers, and I do worry more about what strangers think of me than what my own friends/family/colleagues think of me.





You make me sound like I'm some sort of narcissist.

It seems like a case of social phobia.
You are afraid of people judging you so you constantly look for signs that they are judging you - just like a scared animal looks for signs they are about to get attacked (normally if you walk past a normal dog it will ignore you and go it's way, but if you are dealing with a scared dog it will consider it an attempted attack and bite you or escape with it's tail hidden - you are the "scared dog", thinking too much).

That's how fear works.
What you "see" isn't true but what your brain considers true. In my mother language there is a wise saying "Fear has big eyes", which means just that. If you have arachnophobia you will believe the home spider you just saw is the size of a tarantula. If you have social phobia you will believe people are laughing at you and talking about you when they are simply doing their own business.

People like laughing and any reason is good. For example recently a guy painfully pushed my friend in a crowded tram. Not a single "Sorry". She seemed angry, so I looked at him and saw him wearing a bag with "Slytherin" printing. So I whispered "What do you expect from a Slytherin?" to my friend, pointing at the bag. We both laughed. My friends mood got better right away. And the guy? He was already too far to hear us to know what's going on, and about to leave - waiting for the door to open. The people closer to us were probably more distracted. If any of them had social phobia they would probably think we are laughing at them.

That could be the case with the giggling girls. They saw something that made them laugh (could be some printing on a t-shirt there, they are good reasons) and you thought its about you because you happend to be close enough.

And the talking women probably saw you looking at them (they were being too loud and your stare made them realize that). That was good enough reason for a "sshh".

What you said about fear is very true. Some days I feel more self-conscious than other days, and it mostly depends on what mood I am in. But I do have basically all the symptoms of social anxiety, so hopefully it IS social anxiety getting the better of me. I try to tell myself rationally that it's all in my head, but my social anxiety tells me otherwise and I get paranoid in case my social anxiety is right. But like I already said, it might be to do with my past.

As long as you’re clean and not smelling up the place, it’s nobody’s business how you look in the mall.

I have much more to do with my time than gossiping about some woman’s or man’s outfit.

Have you seen them before? No. Are you likely to see them again? No. Are you trying to make friends with them? No. Then it just doesn't matter what they think. Yeah without talking to them you do not know the explanation of why they were acting the way they did and yes anxiety/depression will lean towards the negative possible explanation rather than the neutral or positive possible explanations. But really I find just adopting a "IDGAF" (I don't give a f**k) attitude helps insulate me from what others think of me when I'm out and about.

I have what is called 'The Spotlight Effect'.
It's a common social anxiety trait where you think that you are being noticed all the time like a neon light. Often when I'm standing near someone whose back is to me (not too near because I like my personal space), after a couple of minutes they look around at their environment (people do this every couple of minutes), then when they see me in their periphery they swing their head right round to check me out or something. As if to say "who's that freak standing there? It wasn't there 5 minutes ago", and I know you'll just say that they do that to check if you're a murderer or not but I feel they only do it to me. So I think that I have this vibe I give off no matter how normal I try to look, and then that conditions me to think that people ARE laughing at me because of this unfixable vibe I give off. It's a vicious cycle.

I WAS like a neon light at high school. Kids saw me and targeted me. Like one time at school I was sitting on a bench eating a snack whilst waiting for a friend, and these girls came walking by then stopped when they were behind the bench. I heard them whisper to each other, then one of them gently kicked my coccyx through one of the gaps in the back of the bench, and they all giggled and walked off. I didn't even know them.
And that was the sort of behaviour I had to put up with all through my high school life.
Yes I know kids can be tactless and childish but I've had it happen a few times in adulthood too, by other adults. So now when I hear whispering or laughing I just think it's aimed at me, probably because my past experiences taught me how horrible some people are.