My anxiety is becoming a problem

I am absolutely terrified of speaking on the phone. I will only speak to 3 people with ease on my phone at home.. My mum, my dad and my best friend. If a number comes up on caller ID I don't know I don't answer it and panic.

I have a mobile and I never answer it. Even though I can see who it is, I don't answer. I wait a few minutes and send a text back hoping they will just text me.

The thing is, I work as a receptionist. So I have to answer the phone a lot every day. In every single job you need to speak on the phone at some point so there's no getting away from it. I can manage to answer the phone because I know my job well, but when it comes to making a call I get palpitations, I panic and I find any excuse I can not to do it. I don't know why this happens but it has been going on for years. Now its getting worse. I can deal with people face to face no problem.

Does anyone else suffer with anything similar?

YES! I am terrified of the phone too! it sucks because the phone is part of my job as well so because I am good at my job I do it, but thankfully I only have to handle a few calls a day. twice a month I have to break the receptionist though and I dread it. I panic...thankfully, I hve interns working for me most of the year and I can get them to cover the phone for me. I can also get them to make calls for me.....lol

I loathe using the phone. I only answer it if I know the number or caller ID shows me who it is. Just yesterday I made a call that I've been putting off for weeks and was relieved that I got voicemail, but now I've got to answer it when he calls back because it's for something that needs to be done to our house.

I'm also super anxious about talking on the phone. Even calling to make a dentist appointment terrifies me. I don't know why, and rationally I know it's silly, but the feeling persists. I've been this way for years. I don't even like talking to my own husband on the phone, although I will.

I'm not anxious about it per say but I'd prefer not to speak over the phone if possible. I find it a nuisance and chore more than anything. If you sit down and think, what would be the worse things about speaking on the phone?

To answer that question for me, it was my "phone voice" and that I wouldn't know what to say. As far as the voice, I was always taught by people I thought knew better that you have to sound overly proper on the phone which made me more self conscious. When I worked at a call center and co-workers where speaking with their natural normal voices, I loosened up a lot. As for not knowing what to talk about, I think being at work were you have somewhat of a script makes it easier. I just started breaking all phone conversations into a kind of script and it's helping. If it's a personal call to a friend, my boyfriend, a more distant family member I make a mental list of several things to talk about.