Are you a Tiger, Gazelle or Opossum?Part two: Working with your nervous system

Lindsay M. Adler, LMFT, CEDS, E-RYT 200

In my last blog, we discovered how our nervous system has the power to protect us when facing danger. We respond like a tiger (to fight), a gazelle (to run), or an opossum (to freeze). Now it’s time to look at how you can use the powers of your nervous system to protect you from real threats, while avoiding activating your nervous system when the perception of threat is actually coming from your own thoughts. In other words, let’s look at how you can work with your nervous system to help create healthier responses to stressful situations.

Understanding what is a threat

As we learned, evolutionarily, our nervous system is wired to help us survive, meaning respond accordingly to threats. However, our brain is wired in this way so intensely that we can respond to something as if it is a threat when it is not. 

Take the classic example from your 8th grade science textbook. You are walking down the sidewalk and see a slender, brown object on the ground. You instantly jump back, your heart is racing and you start sweating. And now, that you are further back from this object you can calm down enough to take a closer glance. Then, you notice it is actually a stick, not a snake! Thank goodness!

---

This example explains how quickly our body responds to perceived threats. This fast acting survival mode not only works when we see a stick on the sidewalk, it also happens in other areas in our life such as work, school and relationships. ​

For example, say you have a big project you are completing for your company. You know most of your superiors will be analyzing your work. You start to feel stressed out, because you wonder what sort of impressions your work might make on your superiors. You start to think that if they don’t like your work, they will consider you a complete idiot and fire you. So, when you walk into the conference room to start the presentation, your heart starts racing. You start to sweat. All of a sudden you find yourself staring at the door. You have the urgent desire to exit the room, because it just seems like you are going to ‘die’ if you have to be in that room one minute longer!

---

This example shows how our own mind can increase our stress response by making up a (scary) story about a situation, which then creates a threatening experience. 

Because our mind has this capability, it is important to start to work with our nervous system by learning how to decrease our arousal to perceived threats; otherwise we will be on edge all the time. Being in a stress response all the time is what often leads to health problems such as hypertension, chronic pain and immune system deficiencies. 

Trauma’s influence on the perception of threats

These perceived reactions to threats are seen more frequently if you have experienced trauma, because your body has been more wired to be vigilant for threats. Thus, your brain will be more wired to prevent these threats from happening again. 

Let’s consider the example above happening to someone who had experienced bullying as a child, which led to feeling inferior or worthless. For this individual, being in the room of superiors at work could feel even more threatening. Then imagine one of these superiors makes a critical comment. The experience of threat jumps up even more, as the individual is reminded of a time being bullied as a child. You can see how quickly things can escalate, leading to the activation of someone’s nervous system by moving into fight, flight or freeze.

One problem with not resolving trauma is that it can lead to experiences such as the one I have described above. For someone who has experienced trauma, their nervous system is wired for a quick response to threats. If the individual hasn’t resolved their trauma, then their nervous system might overact to situations that have some resemblance to the trauma. This can lead to heightened responses to normal everyday experiences (or everyday stressors).

For example, someone with an unresolved trauma from combat might have a heightened nervous system response to situations which remind that person of the event, such as having flashbacks when hearing firecrackers during the 4th of July. This soldier’s nervous system is responding to a perceived threat due to the person’s past experiences. This is why good treatment for trauma should be used so that someone’s nervous system doesn’t always take over their life when they are not actually being threatened. 

Listen to what your nervous system is saying

One important factor is to start to paying attend to what your body is saying about a certain experience. Notice when your nervous system moves into fight, flight or freeze reactions. For instance, do you notice your heart racing at the sight of your boss? Do you notice yourself feeling sleepy or “cloudy” when approaching a looming deadline that seems impossible to complete? Or, do you find yourself avoiding situations that you know evoke fear? Answering questions like these are important first steps in discovering what to do next. 

Acting accordingly as needed

Acting accordingly is difficult. This is because sometimes our nervous system just takes over (remember the reptilian portion of our brain) and we find ourselves being unable to think about how to react; we just react. If you are someone who often reacts in response to the nervous system, it is often helpful to find a skilled professional such as a psychotherapist to help you learn to calm your nervous system. Learning to calm your nervous system allows your pre-frontal cortex or your thinking brain to come into play. 

In a calmer state, you are more able to understand and respond in more helpful ways to stressors. This can help you can decide whether something is a perceived threat based off of past experiences or an actual threat in the moment. Once you have the ability to differentiate between then two, then you are more able to decide the healthiest response. 

Let’s use the example above to explore this concept. First, the person would begin to understand how their nervous system responds to stressors. Then, they might notice the physiological responses to their boss such as increased heart and breathing rate when their boss makes the critical remark. Since they have awareness of this response, they can begin to use breathing techniques to start to activate their parasympathetic nervous system (to calm them). Once engaging in slowed breathing, they feel a tiny bit less stressed and because of this, they can start to use their thinking brain to challenge negative beliefs about the situation. For example, they might be able to now think, “It’s okay. The boss isn’t bullying you. They are giving you critical feedback,” or “You are an adult now, and you have the power to leave this room at any time.”  These thoughts will help the person further calm their nervous system and decide how they want to respond to the situation, instead of responding like the gazelle and running out the room. ​

However, it is important to remember that if you are seriously being threatened, you want your nervous system to respond immediately. We want our body to respond to actual threats. Meaning, if a bear is near you when hiking, you want to understand it’s dangerous and to get out (just walk away slowly with a bear). Without our nervous system alarming us that the bear is harmful, we could easily be injured. 
​
Sometimes, when someone has had a trauma which evokes more of a freeze response, they can struggle with reacting when needed to threatening situations. For instance, they might immediately feel sleepy and immobile when it would be healthier for them to run. In these cases, the individual would want to work on learning how to activate their sympathetic nervous system rather than their parasympathetic nervous system. All which can be best learned in psychotherapy. 

Working with the nervous system 

As you can see, sometimes we need to work with our nervous system to create healthier responses. This means, we might need help from a guide to learn about our nervous system and know how to respond to it. Some great resources include a trained trauma psychotherapist, yoga therapist, meditation instructor, movement therapist and massage therapist trained in treating trauma. 

It is also important to know that even if you haven’t had a trauma, it’s still possible you might struggle with an overactive or under-active nervous system. So, gaining some guidance can improve your overall wellbeing and reduce any risk related to chronic stressors.