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Fight. Flight. Freeze. Fawn. What's your stress response?

Rachel Rauch • December 1, 2024

Have you ever felt your heart race during a stressful situation, experienced brain fog in the heat of a moment, or found yourself going along with something just to keep the peace? These reactions are tied to the body’s survival mechanisms: fight, flight, freeze, and fawn. They often originate from past traumatic experiences or ongoing stress. Though they may help us in acute situations, chronic activation can have long-term consequences on our physical and mental health.


Let’s look at how each response impacts your body and mind—and what you can do to restore balance.


Stress responses are hardwired into us as part of the autonomic nervous system, designed to help us survive threats. These responses were critical when our ancestors faced physical dangers in the wild. However, in modern life, our stressors are often more psychological than physical—like teaching school, social conflicts, or financial concerns. Unfortunately, our bodies can’t always tell the difference.


Here’s a breakdown of the four main stress responses:

  1. Fight - This is an aggressive response to perceived danger, marked by anger, frustration, or the urge to confront the threat.
  2. Flight - This response pushes you to avoid or escape the threat, leading to behaviors such as running away or avoiding conflict altogether.
  3. Freeze - When neither fight nor flight seems viable, the body may become immobilized. This can show up as indecision, dissociation, or feeling stuck.
  4. Fawn - This response involves people-pleasing or appeasing the threat, often sacrificing personal needs to avoid conflict or gain approval.


While these responses are essential for survival in short bursts, they take a toll when activated repeatedly or chronically. Let’s dive into the effects each has on your health.


1. The Fight Response and Its Health Implications


When you’re in fight mode, the body gears up for a confrontation. Adrenaline and cortisol levels spike, causing your heart to race and muscles to tense up. You are ready for action!


Physical health impacts of that are:

  • Insomnia: It is hard to sleep when your body is primed to fight!
  • Muscle tension and headaches:
  • Digestive issues: Blood flow is diverted away from digestion, potentially leading to conditions like irritable bowel syndrome (IBS).


And the Mental health impacts include:

  • Chronic anger and irritability: If you're always in fight mode, it can lead to burnout, anxiety, or depression.
  • Difficulty in relationships: Constant conflict or defensiveness can alienate loved ones, creating isolation or loneliness.


2. The Flight Response and Avoidance Patterns


In flight mode, your body’s focus is on escaping, whether physically or emotionally. While it may seem safer to avoid situations, constantly running from stress can lead to unhealthy coping mechanisms.


Physical health impacts of that are:

  • Poor sleep again: Similar to the fight response, chronic activation of the flight response keeps your body ramped up, unable to relax to sleep.
  • Fatigue: The constant state of alertness can lead to adrenal fatigue and poor sleep, where your body is depleted from the never-ending need to “run away.”


And the Mental health impacts include:

  • Anxiety disorders: Avoidance can lead to social isolation, reinforcing anxiety and making the stressor seem even larger.
  • Procrastination and perfectionism: Constant avoidance can create a cycle of procrastination, making it harder to accomplish tasks and exacerbating stress levels.


3. Freeze: The Health Impact of Feeling “Stuck”


In freeze mode, the body shuts down to avoid a threat. This can happen when you feel powerless or overwhelmed by a situation. While freezing may feel protective, it can be paralyzing.


Physical health impacts of that are:

  • Immobility-related issues: Being stuck, whether emotionally or physically, can contribute to muscle stiffness and low energy levels and even constipation.
  • Suppressed immune function: Prolonged stress can weaken the immune system, making you more susceptible to illness.


And the Mental health impacts include:

  • Dissociation: Chronic freezing can lead to emotional numbness, disconnection from reality, and difficulty engaging with the world.
  • Depression: The sense of helplessness often associated with freezing is a common feature in depression, making it harder to break free from the cycle.


4. The Fawn Response and People-Pleasing


Fawning, or the tendency to appease others to avoid conflict, may seem like a harmless way to maintain peace. However, neglecting your own needs can have a profound impact on both your physical and mental health.


Physical health impacts of that are:

  • Chronic stress: By constantly bending to others' needs, your body remains in a prolonged state of stress, leading to fatigue and tension.
  • Digestive issues: Similar to other stress responses, fawning can trigger digestive problems as the body’s energy is diverted from rest-and-digest functions.


And the Mental health impacts include:

  • Loss of self-identity: Fawning can erode your sense of self, as you may prioritize others’ desires over your own just to maintain peace.
  • Low self-esteem and resentment: Over time, the act of people-pleasing can foster resentment, frustration, and feelings of unworthiness.


Healing from Chronic Stress Responses

Recognizing which stress response you default to is the first step toward breaking the cycle. Here are some practices that can help:

  1. Begin to notice how your body feels throughout the day in different scenarios. Do you feel engaged? Tense? Disconnected? This awareness can help you identify your stress triggers and habitual responses.
  2. Movement, especially aerobic exercises like running, walking, or swimming, can help discharge the fight or flight energy, bringing your nervous system back to balance.
  3. For those who freeze or dissociate, practices like focusing on your breath or engaging with your physical senses can help bring you back to the present moment. Try the 5-4-3-2-1 exercise: notice 5 things you can see, 4 things you can touch (different textures), 3 things you can hear, 2 things you can smell and1 thing you can taste.
  4. If you tend to fawn, learning to set clear boundaries is critical. Setting boundaries are not to force the other person to change but to help protect you. Therefore, you don’t set a boundary on them, but on you.
  5. It can be helpful to bring in the support of a professional therapist to help you process past trauma or chronic stress that is interfering with your current life. 


Fight, flight, freeze, and fawn are natural responses to stress, but chronic activation can have a detrimental effect on your well-being. Understanding your patterns and taking proactive steps to manage stress will not only improve your mental and physical health but also help you feel more balanced, present, and empowered in your life.


By tuning into your body’s cues and cultivating healthier coping mechanisms, you can transform these instinctual responses into conscious, empowered choices.

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From Overstimulated to Peaceful: How Lifestyle Choices Shape Your Emotions

By Rachel Rauch • January 16, 2025
Caffeine and I do not get along. Consuming a caffeinated beverage follows a predictable pattern for me. I become hyper and hysterical. First, everything is over-the-top funny or fearful and I talk twice as fast as normal. Then, I crash into the depths of despair, and I feel like I could cry for hours. After that, I want to sleep for a few more hours. Understanding the Connection Between Lifestyle and Emotions Obviously, my extreme response warrants me avoiding caffeine. It is a regular reminder to me that my lifestyle choices affect my emotions. And while you may not react to caffeine the way I do, most of us deal with daily lifestyle choices that impact our emotions. For example, Insufficient sleep leaves us irritable the next day Too much sugar can leave us angry or sad. Caffeine can increase anxiety levels. Overbooked calendar leaves us feeling overwhelmed. Scrolling on social media makes us discontented and jealous. Our lifestyle choices have a profound impact on our nervous system, which in turn influences our emotional state. The nervous system is the body's control center. It constantly takes information in from our environment and decides how we should respond. Because of the constant demands of our culture along with chronic stress or past trauma that we experience, our nervous system can get stuck in “fight or flight” mode, producing extra cortisol and adrenaline. A fight or flight response, also known as our sympathetic nervous system, is crucial in an emergency or survival situation, but a long-term response depletes our body of the reserves needed to maintain emotional balance. To compensate, we can choose activities that activate the “rest and digest” part of our nervous system instead to help us recover from the impact of fight or flight. The rest and digest, or parasympathetic nervous system, reduces cortisol and helps us to relax so our bodies can focus on healing. Spending time in nature, prioritizing sleep, and practicing deep breathing support the parasympathetic nervous system, reducing anxiety, and promoting a sense of calm. God designed our bodies to be most balanced when we have rhythms of rest built into our life. The twenty-third Psalm says, “He makes me lie down in green pastures, he leads me beside quiet waters, he refreshes my soul. He guides me along the right paths for his name’s sake.” There are times when we need to step away from the noise and expectations of our culture to rest so we can be refreshed. Sometimes rest is sleep, but sometimes it is play, or spending time with friends, or doing something creative. The Negative Effects of Overstimulation Overstimulation occurs when the brain becomes overwhelmed with too much sensory input ranging from bright lights, noise, rapid changes in the environment, or excessive emotional demands from other people. This overloads the nervous system, making it difficult to process and respond appropriately. Additionally, multi-tasking, excessive demands, and the daily pressure of managing life can add to the overload on the nervous system. Overstimulation can trigger a stress response, causing your body to release extra cortisol and adrenaline, sending you into fight, flight, or freeze. In fight or flight, you might find yourself more irritable or anxious. Your mind is racing, and you can’t settle down. In freeze, you may notice that you feel emotionally numb or apathetic and unmotivated. To distract from the uncomfortable symptoms of fight, flight, or freeze, we often reach for more stimulation in the form of social media or other entertainment. This creates a vicious cycle in the body. Women particularly, deal with the negative effect of overstimulation. There is the cultural pressure to “do it all”. To curate the perfect Instagram feed, to workout to have the perfect body, to make sure the kids don’t miss out on any opportunity, to perform to earn that promotion at work. The constant demands truly are overwhelming and overstimulating! Cultivating a Lifestyle That Promotes Emotional Balance There are several beginning steps you can take to reduce stimulation and create an environment that does not overwhelm the nervous system, so you can feel more emotionally balanced. Set household boundaries with technology. For example, no phones during mealtimes. No technology for 1-2 hours before bed. (Blue light from screens suppresses melatonin production, interfering with restful sleep.) Set a time limit on social media or gaming apps. Don’t check emails after you leave work. Dim the lights in the evening. Create intentional quiet time. Spend 30 minutes per day or 4 hours per weekend doing something that is restful and restorative. I talked more about this in my last blog post. This may be napping, but it could also be games as a family, taking a walk in nature, playing with a pet, reading a book or taking a bath. Prioritize self-care. You can’t take care of your family or meet reasonable expectations if you don’t first take care of yourself. Are you sleeping 7-8 hours per night? Do you eat 20-25 grams of protein with every meal? Are you getting moderate exercise 3-4 times per week if you default to fight or flight mode? Are you stretching daily and taking walks if you default to freeze mode? Are you limiting caffeine and drinking sufficient water? I find that one of my biggest challenges with overstimulation as a Christian is to be still long enough to hear God. You too? It has been helpful to me to have a designated time and place to meet with God each day. I want this area to be free of distractions. I silence my phone so I am not interrupted. One of the most powerful ways for me to reset my emotions after overstimulation is to rest in God. To stop my striving and allow His presence to calm and soothe me. Psalm 46:10 says, " Be still, and know that I am God. " This verse encourages us to quiet our hearts from overstimulation and allow God to bring us peace and restore our emotions. Trying to address the constant overstimulation in our lives can be overwhelming. We can’t avoid all stimulation, nor should we. Some stimulation is healthy. But when our mood and emotions are negatively impacted, we want to take steps to reduce the stimulation. Start with small steps. Don’t try to change everything at once. It is small consistent changes in lifestyle that bring peace and joy and improve our emotions.

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Find joy and connection this Christmas.

By Rachel Rauch • December 4, 2024
The Christmas season often feels like a whirlwind, doesn’t it? I catch myself rushing through the days, barely pausing to savor the beauty of this time of year. Do you feel the same way?  At other times, the challenges in our world feel heavier during the holidays. The hard realities don’t pause for December, and there are still people who are hurting, lonely, and in need of hope. In my Wholeness Restored Program, I talk a lot about how relational health is a vital part of our overall well-being. It’s about giving and receiving in meaningful ways—not just through material gifts. True health includes physical, emotional, relational, and spiritual wholeness. Here are three simple ways to invest in relationships this season and boost your health while bringing joy to others: Smile! Make eye contact and share a warm smile with strangers—the cashier at the store, the delivery driver, fellow attendees at holiday events, or someone at church you don’t know well. You’ll not only brighten their day but also find yourself feeling happier, too! Reach out to someone nearby. Visit a neighbor or an elderly person who might not have family around to keep them company this season. Give with purpose. Adopt a struggling family or support an internationally displaced family through a local charity. Alternatively, partner with ministries like Samaritan's Purse or Voice of the Martyrs to send gifts to children or families around the world. This could be a meaningful group activity with friends or family! If sending gifts overseas, consider including a personal letter or photo. Christmas can feel both overwhelming and lonely at times but investing in relationships can help us find purpose beyond ourselves. It’s a reminder of why Jesus came to earth—to relate to others, bringing hope and light into a world full of challenges. So, this season, smile, visit, and give. There are people around you who need the hope you carry through your relationships. Wishing you a Christmas full of joy and meaningful connection!
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