How to disassociate from chronic fear state?

[Hayley]

Having intense fun. Fun in the sense of something that produces a slight adrenaline rush and pushes you out of your comfort zone just enough where you don’t feel scared, just alert and perhaps slightly nervous, and then can’t wait to do it again afterwards. I think finding an activity like this you can do regularly fixes so many mental health problems. It kind of recalibrates your ability to feel excitement and anxiety appropriately. We all saw fight club :)

 

[toolhead]

I feel like I'm as far as I can go with healing via diet, supplements, tests, etc. These things are important but not everything. There's a mental aspect that I haven't figured out yet.

Obviously the current state of humanity is a constant background stress. Food intolerances are also a major stress.
RP makes a valid point that stress can cause all sorts of health issues and recommends avoiding food triggers and stressful environments; which makes sense. However, the more I avoid these stressors, the more terrified I get because I feel like I'm living in a house of cards. As long as I can control my food intake and environment I can manage, but that's becoming considerably harder these days and may be impossible in the future. So many things in the world are triggers for me at this point; bright light, loud noise, long car rides, even slightly cold temperatures, EMF's, strong scents (including natural scents like virgin coconut oil for example), indoor pollutants (mold, dust, etc.), plus the ever present possibility that even my 'safe' foods are secretly triggering something. I basically just stay home now. I only go out for work and to get groceries. I feel like I'm living in fear of migraines, stomach pain, brain fog, chronic illness, tick bites, and all the symptoms that I've had on off over the years. Migraines have returned after two years (thought I cured them, guess not).

I realize the importance of a novel and stimulating environment and the need for feeling like a productive member of society; I'm working on that. I still go for walks, get out in nature when I'm feeling well enough. I hang with family and friends when possible. Try to learn new things and get involved in various activities. But these things are becoming increasingly difficult to do since they all involve getting out of my comfort zone which is my home. At home, I can be in control of food, food frequency, air quality, I can hide in a dark room if I get a migraine, I have a medicine cabinet of remedies for everything. But this isn't the answer. I need to find a way to be resilient at least to moderate amounts of stress.

I need to figure out how to disassociate from this fear state so I can live my life. I've looked into hypnosis, limbic system retraining, meditation/mindfulness. Hypnosis seems almost like tricking yourself into some other state of mind. Meditation/mindfulness helps with managing pain but I don't feel like it really solves anything. Limbic system retraining seems promising but something about it doesn't seem quite right; like it lacks a spirituality component or something.

Anyone have any thoughts on this?

D-Cycloserine? It’s been years since I looked into it.

 

[Zpol]

D-Cycloserine

Just looked it up; it's an antibiotic that can be used to treat phobias, including social phobias and even arachnophobia. I think it's too much for my situation but sounds interesting. Thanks.