I work in a department where although I am responsible for my own project, there is frequent interaction with other people. Many on this forum are suffering from anxiety and depression, do your colleagues know what you are going through? Not friends in the office, but people who work with you.

I moved to another country for my PhD so I don't have a lot of emotional support face to face. And I don't reach out to other people because they'll think I am making excuses for not being productive enough. Also I am very afraid of judgement and office gossip. I have seen it being done behind other people's backs, and absolutely hate it, which is probably why I have slowly withdrawn from being social at all with officemates. They are not bad people per se, just that I want to finish this process without having to make the effort to befriend them. Even if I talk to someone about it, since we are not close, I expect they wouldn't know what to say and a lot of awkwardness will ensue.

My supervisor knows that I am going through some stuff, but thinks I should get over myself. I haven't taken any concrete time off since I started 16 months ago, so my loved ones ask me to take a few days off and go away. But this is out of the question as I know I will get even more stressed due to the guilt of not working hard enough, I have fallen behind already. I have never been confident of my abilities and unfortunately this PhD is bringing out the worst in me. Earlier in my career I have always got positive feedback academically and personally. This is the first time I found people around me who think I am as bad as I believe I am, resulting in me losing even more confidence and paralysing my work.

There is very good advice on this forum for all kinds of problems, so I'm wondering if anyone with social anxiety has dealt with depression and imposter syndrome?
thanks!

I just spent an hour digging through this forum for a similar post to mine. The thread, "please..help.. severe depression" by "compsci" 5 years ago made me feel better and that its not something to be ashamed of. People have bad phases.
Strength to all...

It's something we should be able to talk about freely but the reality is we often cannot and there is a context to how we express our thoughts and feelings i.e. we can usually talk more openly with family and close friends than work colleagues. Having read your post I can see you are very hard on yourself and sensitive to how others may pereceive you. Please try to be kinder to yourself and if I could suggest one thing I think you should seek counselling at your university. I do think you would benefit from it. Try to remember, you earned your PhD place through hard work and you have a right to be there. Please seek that counselling I suggested and all the best for the future.