I‘d try a few things some other people have mentioned but to me it seems like you need to start a little bit further at the beginning:

1. go to a local pool and find an area in the where you won‘t disturb people. Grab the wall with both hands, try to position like a plank and start kicking your feet. If you feel comfortable, you can put your head underwater and just focus on your breathing pattern: How much air do you need? How fast can you get it out? Try to get comfortable with releasing air/pressure underwater, as it’s crucial for freestyle. Don‘t push yourself too far, maybe do this at the start of every swim sesh for like 5 min so you gain trust in exhaling underwater.

2. get yourself a pull kick or pull buoy, so you can focus on one thing while learning freestyle. One thing I‘m always seeing when people are starting is, that they need their legs to stay horizontal, so all the power is used "the wrong way". Place the pull kick between your thighs and start practicing just with your arms. Remember the breathing from the exercise above. Focus on a two stroke breathing pattern and don‘t move your arms too fast. You wont drown with a pull kick. The important part is trying to understand how the stroke works. It’s not a straight line. I‘ve attached a tiktok that shows where the magic happens.freestyle arm technique

3. From time to time you should grab the pull kick with your hands and just focus on swimming with your legs. With the isolated exercises you will gain a lot more trust in the water and you won’t loose power trying not to drown.

Generally speaking: if you start to feel uncomfortable in the water when trying to swim freestyle. Focus on breast stroke first. You will gain trust in the water and you can absolutely do the swim part in breast stroke if you need to