Hello Oceanalla: My thinking, with regard to this, is that your pdoc is for the most part correct. However the question is with regard to how you "face" things.

There such a thing as "systematic desensitization" or "graduated exposure therapy". In this type of therapy a person is exposed to what she or he fears a little bit at a time so as not to overly stress the person. The amount of exposure is increased slightly with each attempt. This is the correct way to approach the sort of fear you describe.

It is not helpful in my opinion, in fact it may even be harmful, for you to simply keep beating your head against a brick wall, so to speak, trying to make yourself feel comfortable doing something you fear.

Since it appears you live in a major metropolitan area in the U.S. I would imagine there are going to be quite a few providers of systematic desensitization therapy. It might be worthwhile for you to look into this as one possible option.