Working with Defensive REsponses

What are Defensive responses?

A defensive response is an automatic and powerful physiological response to a perceived survival threat meant to help bring us to safety - these fall broadly within three categories: fight, flight or freeze (various forms of ‘going away’ or shutting down/collapsing).

These defensive responses are meant to arise, get us to safety, and then to subside or complete. When these defensive responses don’t get to ‘complete’ in response to a perceived survival threat (for a variety of reasons), then their impulses and energy can remain stuck in the body/the physiology until they are digested. This is what we call ‘trauma’. 

Helping this charge move through is critical to reclaiming vitality, ease and wellbeing. Often, we need support to do this re-negotiation work. Sometimes we may be working on this on our own in between therapeutic sessions.

​A dear friend made this graphic and I hope it supports you! It’s specific to more active expressions of freeze (hide) and fight/flight: