Step Out Ireland was established as a support service for adults with social anxiety disorder. We achieve this through the provision of support groups and recovery services.
Social anxiety disorder affects at least 1 in 8 people living in Ireland today. The condition results in an excessive and irrational fear of social situations and interactions and can often manifest itself into other conditions such as depression or alcohol/drug dependencies and someone with the condition attempts to cope with social interactions.
Our services are as follows;
Positive Steps Support Groups
These are the ongoing peer to peer support groups which we currently operate in Dublin, Cork & Limerick and have held over 250 of these since 2015. The support group format is designed specifically to the needs of people with social anxiety. As the groups are led by people with lived experience, we have an in depth understanding of the needs of someone coming through our door and have used that knowledge to ensure the groups are as beneficial as possible for our service users.
Social Anxiety Recovery Program
Our peer led social anxiety Recovery program is a first of its kind program developed specifically for social anxiety disorder. It is for people who experience social anxiety and have a desire to experience recovery. There is a focus on personal responsibility, reflection and recovery action. While reflecting on the challenges participants face, there is an opportunity to develop new skills and tools to bring a greater sense of wellbeing and control to their lives.
Employment Support
Since our formation in 2015 we have hosted over 250 support groups and events supporting people with social anxiety. Through this level of interaction and understanding of the difficulties they experience in their lives we identified that there was an exceptionally high level of unemployment in the groups we support. Due to this we have begun to implement a support function for our service users experiencing difficulties in this area.