From Fight to Freeze: Understanding The Four Responses to Trauma
“Traumatized people chronically feel unsafe inside their bodies: The past is alive in the form of gnawing interior discomfort. Their bodies are constantly bombarded by visceral warning signs, and, in an attempt to control these processes, they often become expert at ignoring their gut feelings and in numbing awareness of what is played out inside. More than anything else, being able to feel safe with other people and within themselves defines true mental health”
Relational trauma has a direct and significant impact on both our psychological and physical health. The experiences of emotional harm in relationships are not just stored in our memories, but also in our bodies. This form of trauma affects the nervous system in a way that alters our emotional responses, physical health, and behaviors. Symptoms like heightened anxiety, physical tension, and altered stress responses are common. These physical manifestations are often overlooked but are crucial indicators of the deep-seated effects of past traumatic experiences. Understanding this connection is essential for recognizing the signs of relational trauma and taking steps towards healing and recovery.
This aspect of our biology plays a pivotal role in our response to traumatic experiences. When faced with relational trauma, the nervous system often enters a state of heightened alert, akin to a sentinel on constant watch. This leads to the chronic activation of the sympathetic nervous system, the part that governs our 'fight-or-flight' response. As a result, individuals might experience ongoing symptoms like a racing heart, muscle tension, and difficulty sleeping.
This prolonged state of arousal creates an imbalance with the parasympathetic nervous system, which is meant to calm us down after stress. Consequently, areas of the brain like the amygdala, which are involved in processing emotions, become overly sensitive, leading to increased anxiety and emotional responses that are often disproportionate to the current situation. The body, in its effort to protect, becomes hyper-vigilant, often misinterpreting everyday stressors as threats due to the blurring of lines between past trauma and present experiences. This deep-seated impact on the nervous system illustrates just how profoundly relational trauma can influence not only our mental health but our physical well-being too. In the realm of trauma responses, we're familiar with fight, flight, and freeze, but there's a fourth, less acknowledged reaction: fawning. This response, rooted deeply in traumatic experiences, particularly those from relationships, reveals itself in various subtle yet impactful ways.
Fight-Flight-Fawn-Freeze
When discussing relational trauma, it's crucial to recognize the four primary responses that our bodies and minds resort to when faced with traumatic experiences: fight, flight, fawn, and freeze. Each of these responses is a survival mechanism, deeply rooted in our biology and shaped by our past experiences. In the context of relationships, these responses can manifest in various ways, influencing how we interact with others and handle emotional situations.
Fight Response in Relationships
The fight response is a survival tactic triggered in the face of perceived threats or stress. It is characterized by a confrontational or aggressive stance, not necessarily physical, but often verbal or emotional. This response is rooted in the instinct to protect oneself from harm or to assert control in a threatening situation. In many cases, the fight response is a learned behavior, developed in response to past traumatic experiences where assertiveness or aggression was perceived as necessary for survival. The fight response is characterized by a confrontational or aggressive reaction to perceived threats. In relationships, this may manifest as quick irritability or anger during conflicts. For example, someone with a predominant fight response might become defensive and argumentative when feeling criticized or misunderstood. Their response is a protective mechanism, often rooted in past experiences where assertiveness or aggression was necessary for emotional survival.
Signs of the Fight Response in Relationships
Quick to Anger or Irritability: A propensity to become easily angered or irritated, especially during conflicts, is a hallmark of the fight response. Individuals may become defensive or aggressive in arguments or when feeling challenged.
Domineering or Controlling Behavior: Exhibiting controlling behaviors in relationships, often as a means of asserting dominance or preventing perceived threats, can be indicative of the fight response.
Hypercritical or Judgmental Attitude: Being overly critical or judgmental, particularly towards partners or close ones, can be a manifestation of the fight response, where criticism is used as a defense mechanism.
Difficulty with Vulnerability: A reluctance to show vulnerability or admit weaknesses, often accompanied by a facade of toughness, is common in individuals with a predominant fight response.
Argumentative or Confrontational Communication: A tendency to engage in arguments, even over minor issues, or a predisposition towards confrontational communication styles can signal a fight response.
Flight Response in Relationships
The flight response, a well-known reaction to trauma, often surfaces in subtle and complex ways, especially within the dynamics of relationships. Understanding this response is crucial, as it plays a significant role in how individuals manage stress and interpersonal conflicts, often rooted in traumatic past experiences. The flight response is the urge to escape or avoid threatening situations. In relational terms, this might look like withdrawing from deep or meaningful connections, or consistently avoiding emotionally charged conversations. A person exhibiting a flight response might end relationships abruptly or avoid intimacy, as getting too close to others feels overwhelmingly vulnerable. Their behavior stems from an unconscious need to protect themselves from potential relational trauma.
Signs of the Flight Response in Relationships:
Avoidance of Deep Emotional Connections: Individuals with a predominant flight response may shy away from forming deep or meaningful relationships. They might withdraw from intimacy or avoid situations that demand emotional vulnerability.
Quick to Leave or End Relationships: A tendency to end relationships abruptly or to leave situations when they become emotionally challenging is a hallmark of the flight response. This behavior often stems from a fear of being hurt or overwhelmed.
Procrastination and Busywork: Engaging in constant busywork or procrastinating important tasks can be a form of the flight response. It's a way to avoid dealing with stressful or emotionally taxing situations.
Changing Topics or Distracting During Conversations: In conversations, especially those that are emotionally charged, individuals might frequently change the subject or use humor to deflect. This is a way to escape confronting uncomfortable emotions or topics.
Physical Symptoms of Anxiety: The flight response can also manifest physically, with symptoms like restlessness, an inability to relax, or a constant feeling of being on edge.
Fawn Response in Relationships
Fawning, a less commonly discussed response but also known as people pleasing, involves appeasing or pleasing others to avoid conflict or harm. In a relationship, this could appear as constantly agreeing, going along with what the other person wants, or not voicing personal needs and desires. This response often develops in individuals who have experienced relationships where their safety or acceptance depended on prioritizing others' needs over their own. Fawning is an adaptive behavior developed as a response to trauma, particularly in situations involving complex interpersonal dynamics. It involves a pattern of appeasing or pleasing others, not out of genuine care or kindness, but as a survival strategy born from past trauma. This behavior often stems from interactions with individuals who may have toxic or challenging personalities, where the victim finds that the only way to ensure safety or avoid conflict is by becoming overly accommodating or subservient.
Pete Walker, the therapist who introduced the concept of fawning as a trauma response, describes it as a mechanism where individuals seek safety by aligning themselves completely with the needs and demands of others. This often means sacrificing their own needs, rights, preferences, and boundaries. It's a learned behavior, frequently originating in childhood, where safety and attachment might have been contingent on serving the needs of a demanding or narcissistic parent.
Signs of Fawning in Relationships
Chronic Apologizing: Constantly saying sorry, even when not at fault, is a sign of fawning. This behavior stems from a deeply ingrained belief of being inherently at fault, leading to excessive apologies.
Inability to Express True Thoughts or Feelings: People who fawn often struggle to articulate their genuine feelings, especially to those close to them. This might be due to a fear of offending others, a lack of understanding of their own emotions, or a habit of prioritizing others' feelings over their own.
Overenthusiastic Communication: Using excessive emojis or always being the one to conclude conversations can be a sign of fawning. This behavior often comes from a fear of offending or a need to be perceived positively by others.
Prioritizing Others' Needs Over Self: Consistently putting others' needs above one's own, to the point of self-neglect, is a common trait in those who fawn. This might manifest as agreeing to things one doesn't want to or constantly trying to rescue or fix others' problems.
Excessive Flattery: People who fawn might engage in exaggerated praise or flattery, often without sincerity. This behavior is a way to ingratiate themselves with others, stemming from a fear of rejection or conflict.
Freeze Response in Relationships
The freeze response, often referred to as the "camouflage response," is a crucial but sometimes misunderstood survival mechanism in the face of threats or danger. It's what happens when an individual finds themselves unable to react to a threat - unable to run, fight, or even move. This response, exemplified by the image of a "deer in headlights," is a profound physical and psychological state of immobilization. Historically, the freeze response has been a vital survival tactic. Our ancestors might have "played dead" in the face of predators or used it to buy time to assess the situation. Some experts suggest that the freeze response is the first reaction to any threat, giving us a moment to determine our next action.
In the modern context, however, chronic activation of the freeze response can be problematic. Unlike fight or flight, freeze is often what happens when neither of those options seems viable. It's an involuntary response where the body decides that immobility is the safest way to handle a threat. In relational contexts, this might be observed in someone who seems disconnected, distant, or unresponsive during emotionally intense situations. They might struggle to communicate or make decisions, appearing 'stuck' or detached. This response often stems from a history of traumatic experiences where disengaging emotionally was a form of self-protection.
Signs of Freeze Response in Relationships
Emotional Withdrawal: Pulling away emotionally during conflicts or stress, leading to a lack of emotional expression or engagement in the relationship.
Communication Difficulties: Struggling to express thoughts and feelings, particularly in tense situations, which can result in silence or minimal responses.
Physical Detachment: Showing reluctance or inability to engage in physical intimacy or closeness, appearing physically distant or unresponsive.
Passivity in Decision-Making: Avoiding making decisions or expressing opinions in the relationship, often deferring to the partner's choices without voicing personal preferences.
Overwhelmed by Emotional Intensity: Seeming overwhelmed or shutting down in situations of high emotional intensity, even if the emotions are not directly related to the relationship.
Dissociative Behavior: Seeming disconnected or 'checked out' during emotionally charged or stressful interactions, indicative of dissociation as a coping mechanism.
All reactions to danger and trauma, such as fight, flight, freeze, and fawn, are natural survival strategies. Ideally, a well-functioning stress response should revert back to a baseline state after the immediate threat has subsided. Consider the scenario of our ancestors encountering a bear: their fight-flight-freeze mechanism would activate to manage the threat. However, once the danger – the bear, in this case – retreated, their nervous system would typically start to normalize within 20 to 30 minutes.
Today, some individuals experience a persistently heightened stress response. This means their stress levels don't settle down to a baseline even after the danger is no longer present. Various factors, including stressful life experiences like childhood trauma or experiences of burnout, can contribute to this prolonged stress response.
While the fight-flight-freeze-fawn responses are critical in navigating through immediate threats, they can become problematic if they remain constantly activated. For instance, if someone habitually resorts to the fawn response in all their relationships, even in non-threatening situations, it could lead to patterns of codependency or the development of unhealthy attachment behaviors.
Understanding the nuances of our body's stress responses is not just about recognizing how we react to danger but also about realizing when these reactions are not serving us well. If you find that your stress responses are persistently overactive, it might be time to seek support. Whether it's through therapy, mindfulness practices, or simply starting a conversation about mental health with loved ones, taking the first step towards understanding and managing your stress responses can lead to a healthier, more balanced life. Remember, acknowledging and addressing these patterns is a sign of strength, not weakness.
If you’re brave step today towards a better understanding of yourself and a journey towards healing, reach out to schedule your free consultation.
