So rather than put ourselves through that, we just try to avoid it altogether. Basically if confronted with a stressful situation, we are unable to Fight or Run, so we just Freeze and often Dissociate on the spot. Here’s a brief break down of the Freeze and Fawn trauma responses:įreeze: Many “freeze” types unconsciously believe that people and danger are synonymous, and that safety lies in solitude*. For the purposes of this post, I want to focus on the Freeze-Fawn response. Pete Walker’s book breaks down what all 4 trauma responses are, and I encourage you to check it out for not only Freeze and Fawn, but also for great insight on Fight or Flight. So that makes me a Trauma Response type of Freeze-Fawn. Once I began to dive deep into what each of these truly mean, and that were more than just the initial two reactions, it opened up a whole new world of self-awareness and understanding.Īfter much research, working with a therapist, and my own self-assessment, it was evident that I engage in neither Fight nor Flight, but rather a hybrid of two additional “F’s”, Freeze and Fawn. I had known of Fight or Flight before, but at the time I hadn’t realized that were more than those two alone. When I first became aware that I was a survivor and I learned about the 4 F’s, I thought of myself immediately as a “Flight”. I highly recommend, “ Complex PTSD, from Surviving to Thriving.” I’ll be referencing some of Pete’s book throughout this post because it’s such an amazing resource, and led to an immense amount of understanding after I read though it.
Of course these factors also help determine our default responses and what of the 4 F’s we are.
There are 4 basic defensive structures, or responses to a traumatic event: Fight, Flight, Freeze, Fawn (The 4 F’s, as Pete Walker describes).Įach of us is different based on how we were raised, the varying types of trauma we endured, how we view ourselves, birth order, and many other factors which can make up who we are and what we are about. The way that we respond to stressful situations now can often be traced back to events that happened in the past years and even decades later.Įssentially, the way that we responded to trauma before, can affect how we respond to stress now. Understanding our responses to trauma and why we react in the way that we do, leads to greater understanding of ourselves.
0 kommentar(er)
