If you are paying this much in fees then you are making a mistake somewhere, or you are using a custodial service or exchange which is ripping you off and pocketing the difference. I have been using bitcoin and making transactions all throughout this fee surge and have never paid anywhere close to $5 or half the value of the transaction in fees. To pay $5 for a standard 200 vbyte transaction you would need to paying upwards of 120 sats/vbyte in fees. I've been making transactions at a tenth of this or less without any issue.

I would suggest you pay more attention to the mempool and learn how to appropriately pick your own fee, as well as making sure you are holding your bitcoin in you own wallet which allows you to set your own fee rather than being charged an arbitrary expensive fee. And of course, use full native segwit.