Managing Fear & Anxiety With Neuroqueer Resistance

My Journey From Avoidance To Resistance

I am a person that experiences fear and anxiety in an extreme way on a fairly constant basis. I am not only Autistic and ADHD (AuDHD), I am also Schizophrenic. This means that I have experienced fear so extreme that my brain has altered my own experience of reality just to try and rationalise it. The problem is that fear and anxiety are not thins that are easily rationalised. For many years, I used drugs and alcohol to meet my need to feel safe; turning everything off seemed more manageable than simply existing. Now, at 9 years sober, I have had to reframe my thinking around the distress I experience and engage in new practices to feel safe.

Neuroqueering The Fear & Anxiety Away

Neuroqueering is the practice of subverting neuronormative thinking and embodiment. There are a lot more complex ways I could describe it, but for the purposes of this article that is the basic principle I need you to understand.

My first question is to consider why is fear/anxiety something to be avoided at all costs?

From the perspective of neuroqueer theory, the idea that fear and anxiety is wholly negative and not of any benefit is neuronormative doctrine. If we consider animals living in the wild, those are the feelings that help them stay safe from real danger. Cognitive Behavioural Therapists often assert that our need for anxiety is gone in the modern world, there are no more predators hunting us.

The idea that there is no threat to being anxious about is again neuronormativity. The modern world, particularly for marginalised groups and individuals, is a place with a great many threats. It is not unreasonable to experience anxiety when we are part of a cultural identity that is constantly under attack. For us, the predators still exist, and fear and anxiety are often what make us cautious enough to survive in such a world.

Neuroqueering Through Fear & Anxiety

The second question I have to ask myself is that if anxiety is not the irrational and useless feelings the world has taught me to view it as; What can fear and anxiety teach me about my relationship with the world around me?

I experience fear and anxiety because the world has taught me there is danger in my environment. By exploring those things that feel unsafe I am able to form a picture of what my distress is founded upon.

I am multiply neurodivergent and multiply marginalised. My feelings of being unsafe are the result of a hostile environment. Chiefly, a hostile power environment. I do not fit the neuronormative standards set by those with the privilege of power in my life. I am published for existing as I am. Therefore, my anxiety and fear is rooted in the thought that who I am, by my own nature, invites attack from the powers that be and those who influence them.