Not really any history of paranoia. Maybe once or twice over something stupid years ago but it was at a time in my life where I was experiencing extreme anxiety so all my thoughts were messed up. I had fears of people finding my diary and stuff and I would have to find my diary to make sure no one had it, but I'm really messy so I couldn't find it and I would totally freak out and think someone MUST be reading it!

My therapist...I dunno..not necessarily, I can't tell. I don't think he'd be seeking me out, I don't think he'd be able to track me as all my usernames are different, I'm really careful about that. I also never cross post between forums, as I don't want anyone from one forum to recognise me on another. I suppose I thought maybe he was just another user on the forum and that he might have recognised me through something I said...like maybe I'd told him something that came up in a post later so he was able to tell it was me. It's unlikely, though, to be honest. The active users there are people I recognise from previous posts and no one has come across the same way he comes across. I'm doubting more and more that he's on there and the whole thing is probably just a coincidence. He could have been zeroing in on something, it just seemed strange he should do it that particular session because I've mentioned the same thing a bunch of times and he's always pretty much ignored it. Then he asked some leading questions etc...but it's entirely possible that he's just suddenly had a thought about what I have been talking about for months and zeroed in on it at that point.

The thing about fear of exposure, I dunno. It's sometimes a feeling of shame, but other times just a feeling of wanting to have my own private life, my own inner world, that no one else can get into. It gives me a feeling of separation from others/of space. The psychoanalytic explanation would be that my parents were intrusive, which I would agree with. However, I would also say that it is 100% normal for people to want a certain amount of privacy. It's a human need. I guess sometimes I post very private things anonymously on the internet because I'm kind of discussing things maybe I'm concerned about and I find it easy to feel that other internet users are not people, but are like machines or figments of my imagination.

Oh hang on....erm, yeah, sometimes I think people can read my thoughts, I guess. Or that there are secret cameras in the walls of my home. Not in a delusional way, I know it's not true, but it feels so true that I feel watched all the time and find myself hiding myself in certain ways (say if I'm naked). That's not all the time, though, just sometimes.