^{A's to your Q's}

When the freeze response has become an embedded part of how we deal with stress, meaning it’s constantly on to some degree, it can have many manifestations in our physiology, mind, and how we engage with the world.

Low blood pressure, constipation, poor circulation (leading to cold extremities), chronic fatigue and lethargy, and poor cognitive, digestive, reproductive, immune function are all pretty common physiological experiences when we are living with an unresolved freeze response.

Depression, lack of motivation or purpose, and a sense of hopelessness are also all common manifestations.

In evolutionary terms, the freeze response comes on in order to protect a mammal who has failed to fight off or flee from a predator by stopping all functions not immediately essential for survival, bringing the blood more into the core or the body, lowering the heart rate, and numbing the system…all to keep the animal from feeling the pain of being eaten.

Basically, if the freeze response comes on it’s because the physiology expects to die — hence the numb, dissociated state.

So, dissociation is a part of the freeze response function; it is not the freeze response itself.

When one starts to come out of freeze what generally happens is they start to feel things, often uncomfortable sensations and emotions associated with the unresolved trauma and activation the freeze was keeping a lid on. This may be accompanied by improvements in energy and biological organ and hormone function, especially if we can allow these uncomfortable experiences, not shut them down out of fear, which takes the right education, support, and tools, which you will get a lot of in this program.

Yes, this is the essence of dysregulation – BOTH the Sympathetic (Fight/Flight) and dorsal (Freeze) survival responses are on in the system at all times.

This leads to complex problems like chronic health syndromes as well as many mental health problems.  This is the gas/brake pedal both being pushed together analogy.

It’s also common when this is the case to flip-flop between being more dominated by one or the other of these survival energies; switching from ON to OFF without much middle ground. Bipolar disorder is an extreme example of such flip-flopping.

Healing trauma and restoring regulation to the nervous system is what restores our ability to have a middle ground, with everything functioning as it is supposed to.

It’s possible, but unfortunately it is much harder, or it may take longer. This is because the foundation of nervous system healing is safety.

Our home needs to be a safe haven where our nervous system can settle. This doesn’t mean there can’t be any stress, but if the environment is one of constant stress, it will be very hard.

One way it can work is if we manage to create a ‘good enough’ environment; a room that is off limits to others, for example, or a period of time in the day that is only for you.

If we can create just a little bit of safety in this way, we can do our work in these containers, and then as we start to heal we can develop better boundaries and greater capacity to deal with stress, which can lead to the overall environment feeling less threatening to our system.

It can be very useful to know the difference!

The destructive and maladaptive responses to survival energy are the ones we are all familiar with as trauma survivors.

On the fight/flight (Sympathetic) side of things, we have chronic tension, irritability, explosive rage, or anxiety. On the freeze (Dorsal Parasympathetic) side of things this could be depression, hopelessness, dissociation, clumsiness, poor circulation, or chronic fatigue.

And when you have both going at once, that’s when chronic health syndromes start to develop.

A healthy expression of Sympathetic energy would be things like eating, moving, dancing, healthy boundaries, expressions of healthy aggression (coming up in modules), exercise, bountiful energy, and a strong drive.

There really is no healthy expression of the freeze response as this extreme end of the Parasympathetic system is a last ditch survival effort, but healthy Parasympathetic function includes things like being able to rest, socially engage with ease, digesting our food well, menstruation and ovulation cycling properly, repairing our cells, and sleeping well.

The human system will often process or relive events in dreams. The mind and nervous system will often not differentiate between events that occur in the waking world vs. events that occur in the dream world, so a threat that is perceived while dreaming can produce a very real physiological response.

This can be due to a few reasons. Our posture may not support our diaphragm easily dropping down and so the breath is strained and we unconsciously hold it. It can also be part of a survival response — holding the breath to stay quiet and hidden.

This is actually a really complex question, so let's break it down.

Yawning itself isn’t necessarily "good" or "bad"—it depends on what's happening in your nervous system. Yawning can be a sign that your Parasympathetic Nervous System (PNS) is kicking in, which helps bring you down from the fight or flight (Sympathetic) response.

However, there are different parts of the PNS that could be at play:

The Ventral Vagus Nerve (VVN) is linked to feelings of safety and connection—this is the healthy part. The Dorsal Vagus Nerve (DVN) governs rest and repair, and when it's low energy (without the perception of threat), it’s also healthy. So, if these are the parts coming online, your yawning is a sign of your body moving into a calm, safe state, which is great!

But here's where it gets tricky: the DVN also governs the freeze response when there’s a lot of energy going to that system (high-scale inaction with the perception of threat). This can also cause yawning, but it’s not a good sign—it means your system is shutting down, which is a last-resort survival mechanism.

Unfortunately, many of us have learned to go into freeze as a default in times of stress, and this can show up as uncontrollable yawning, along with feelings of numbness, dissociation, or spacey-ness.

So, if you're yawning and feeling relaxed, calm, and at ease, that’s a sign of healthy nervous system regulation. But if you’re yawning uncontrollably and feeling disconnected, heavy, or foggy, it could be a sign that you're heading into freeze, and that’s something to be aware of.

You can tell the difference by noticing how you feel. If you're feeling tired but generally okay, that's likely just exhaustion. If you're feeling numb, spaced out, or lethargic, that's more likely to be freeze.