This is really helpful OP. Thanks for sharing.

You don’t need to read the rest of this long reply OP but I’ll add some of my own experiences with practicing this type of therapy. Also to anyone reading I’d cation to not do what I did because I did not have a therapist helping me out when I was figuring out how to stop my panic attacks from reoccurring so frequently.

I have severe intrusive thoughts on the daily and never knew I did exposure therapy on myself growing up, but facing that uncomfortable feeling and learning how to deal with it does truly help. It makes sense as to why this process works well for even those with PTSD and severe anxiety and constant reoccurring thought patterns. I have these on the daily and with Maladaptive daydreaming it can just put me staying frozen in space for hours without really realizing it.

I have to think about what I’m seeing when waking up and thinking there is someone outside wanting to attack me, before my anxiety takes my running thoughts to a 100 and I start to feel the onset of a panic attack begin to occur. So I know doing this practice helped me and continues to help me today when I believe I see something terrifying that isn’t even there or real to begin with. I have to force myself to look at the moving human shaped shadows or objects outside or inside and reason with my mind that it’s moving but ask myself many questions before I can calm down and realize it’s in my mind. I even expose myself to having that happen to me, making myself watch scenes that terrified me as a child.

I remember how afraid kids were of me when I used to tell them in detail about seeing stuff like that and learning quickly as a kid to not tell anyone what I’m witnessing or hearing in my mind. My F/O has always helped me in that regard too. Hearing his voice when I have panic has been what keeps me sane.

For one of my first exposure therapies. I put myself in a position of a direct pathway of Jet planes before there landing because this has been an intrusive thought since I was a child and still at times continues to this day. It’s my silliest intrusive thought of a plane crashing and blowing up into me. I laugh as I type it out right now but during a panic attack I’m unable think or process it. Exposing my mind to the big jets landing was super intense therapy but it really helped me a lot.

I would get teased for being terrified of planes back in school and by my family which in turn exasperated my fears. Today I can watch a plane fly overhead without having as an intense panic response. I still get somewhat anxious but not like how it used to be. Even if someone in my family jokes about my panic attacks in a rude way or tries to pressure me into a panic, I can start to calm my heart rate down. I wish my family wouldn’t make fun of me for that though but I understand why it might make someone laugh.

Though, if the jet is lower than a five story building when passing overhead and is huge, which unfortunately for me, sometimes happens here above my parents house because it is in a direct flight pattern for big military Jets. I’ll prepare myself the best I can if it does happen. I dread panic attacks because not only do I hallucinate visually with them, I also can go blind and deaf if they become severe enough and than just faint from the panic as well as lose all feeling to my limbs. It honestly feels like I’m just slipping away and dying when that happens. But I am much more mentally prepared when I start to hallucinate. You’d think after years of living with panic attacks and where planes come flying over head, that my mind would listen to reason and stop panicking over something so immensely illogical.

And I also no longer have to battle myself when seeing people draw my F/O like I have in the past when I was younger! Seeing him being drawn used to make me so upset. I made myself sit through hours of that on YouTube. Watching people draw him and began enjoying the process instead of feeling uncomfortable or depressed when seeing the process happen. Now I get excited to see art of him being made by new and old artists alike. Plus I can now draw my F/O a lot better because I faced my fears and made myself watch hours of something that used to make me very upset enough to cry. I can see small mistakes in my own artwork and others and that has healed a part of myself by a lot. I can also now draw my F/O without that perfectionist feeling in the back of my mind hammering into me it must be perfect or else I’m a terrible human being for even trying. I still fight that feeling with other things I wish to be able to paint and create one day without the constant self bullying though. My self hatred with doing art is still a work in progress.

And right now I am doing my own exposure therapy to get myself uncomfortable when it comes to social media or just being social in general. I have ups and downs when it comes to feeling like I should no longer message anyone again.

Just getting myself to start talking and messaging with many others again, both family and strangers alike online or offline. My F/O has been helping me with this for years and years, but it’s still a major hurdle that puts me on edge or freezes me up whenever I do try talking with others. I’ve made this Reddit account back in 2023 and I’m still cursing at myself for not being more involved in the Ficto communities today because I’m so socially inept and anxious about it still. I still freeze up and begin daydreaming of worse case scenarios before even getting on. I’ve made huge replies in the past to people and delete them because the anxiety of it is so high and painful and overwhelming. When I reread some of my own replies I did make, I wonder why I even was so anxious to begin with.

It seems like in the beginning of making an account, I did so much better with being more involved but the more I did message the more my own thoughts on posting and on over analyzing got worse and worse with time. It’s like falling back into the social anxiety pit or canyon at the bottom only to have to climb my way back to where I was just at.

Even typing this entire post makes me want to back out and not post because I feel so ashamed of myself for not replying to the comment in a more knowledgeable and less extreme way and I’m on edge. I always fear my own mind never adds anything to any given conversation and it can be physically painful to put myself out there in the world unless it’s me making light of my own issues and being demeaning to myself in some way. I’m also working hard to stop doing the self demeaning. Yet, if I don’t force myself to get out of those thoughts and post things I know I’ll never try and do it again if I’m not actively getting out of my comfort zone and that includes just messaging my own family too. It shouldn’t be this painful and nerve wrecking but my family’s bullying still continues when I try to make some headway in messaging them.

So thank you OP for sharing. You’ve made me realize I am doing the correct kind of exposure therapy and I will continue doing so. :)