Okay, so. I have anxiety issues, I guess, so little things can lead to a lot of dwelling and bad feelings for me. Embarrassingly, this can include just answering the door.

Yeah, my big issue boils down to that; I really wanted to not answer the knock, but the part of me that wanted to be polite won out and I went ahead and opened it. I still have no idea exactly what he wanted and I'm not sure if he just explained it poorly or if I wasn't listening well. From what I got, it was some sort of offer for a newspaper subscription in return for a donation to something child-related. I feel like a complete moron for giving him anything without completely understanding, though.

That said, the one smart thing I did was refuse to give debit card information and I didn't donate much. But it still makes me incredibly anxious that my address and phone number was written down and I wish I had refused to let him step inside for a moment (my reason at the time was that it's cold outside and that it would have been rude not to). I should mention that I don't live alone, but my brother wasn't home at the time and even the nicest stranger is suspicious to me.

Still, I shouldn't be concerned about this either way, right? Someone tell me I'm just letting my anxiety go out of control.

Advice for the future: the hell with "being polite", just don't answer the door if you're not comfortable doing so. People who come selling/scamming to your doorstep are not "being polite", they are pestering you in your own home, and you owe them nothing. Put your own safety and peace of mind first.

You let a stranger inside your house; you gave them money, without understanding what you were giving it for. You should be concerned; you may very well have just got scammed, and it could have been something far worse than mere scamming. Since you didn't give out your debit card details, I think you don't have to worry about there being any likely repercussions from this particular incident; but what you do need to worry about is what you're going to do the next time something similar happens.

I don't want to sound too harsh here, because I understand suffering anxiety, not dealing well with people, having a hard time saying no when someone is being pushy... I'm very much the same in all those respects. I'm terrible at dealing with people face-to-face. That's a huge part of why I never, ever, answer knocks on my own door, unless I can be fairly certain that it's someone I'm expecting.

You aren't being harsh at all; you're being honest and realistic and I really appreciate that, especially since I tend to get caught up on little things and forget to look at the big picture, which is resolving to never let this happen again. My anxiety and my desire to be polite are really tightly bundled up together (which is why I defaulted to trying to be polite, I suppose), but you're right that there's no politeness involved when someone is coming to your door to sell/scam something. Next time, I'll do my damnedest to just completely ignore the knocking unless I'm expecting someone at the door.

Other than that, I just hope that nothing bad comes out of it, but I suppose there's no point in worrying unless something does happen (that's what I'll be telling myself to keep my anxiety levels down, anyway). My big relief is that I didn't give out my card information, but I tend to be very careful about that as a rule.

Anyway, thank you so much for the great advice; I'll do my best to hold true to it in the future.

Don't ever ever EVER let a stranger in the house, ESPECIALLY as a female alone. He could have been a robber casing your house. x.x I'd tell your brother about what you did so he's on the lookout. Zyfe's already hit the nail on the head by saying you don't owe anything to random people showing up on your doorstep trying to get you to buy stuff. Don't be pressured into buying their crap. The fact he was asking for a debit card is REALLY suspicious. He is supposedly going door to door selling things for a charity...generally those people don't have access to debit card processing systems.

I too suffer from anxiety about little thing. I NEVER answer the door unless I know who is on the other side. is correct the fact he asked about debit card information is highly suspicious. Don't ever give that information out to someone going door to door. I would also as Magic said tell your brother about this so he can be on the look out for suspicious activity. I under stand wanting to be polite I really do but your peace of mind is soooo much more important. If your not comfortable answering the door then by all means ignore it. It's not worth the anxiety to me to deal with people that I do not know.