Coping Skills for When We Experience Fight, Flight, or Freeze

BY KELLY BOPRIE, LMSW

We are living in a time where things have changed, and have changed rather quickly. Our WAFs (worries, anxieties and fears) seem to be much more present, and many of us are experiencing worries and fears that we haven’t ever expected to be presented with. Perhaps, in this very moment, your brain may be trying to “ gure out” what is going on.

Bare with me for a moment as we go down a road of a brief introduction to neuroscience …

Our neocortex, or prefrontal cortex, is a part of our brain that likes and needs accurate information. Without it, we experience uncertainty…uncertainty of what is to come, what the future may hold, and uncertainty of how long our “normal” life may be disrupted. When the prefrontal cortex or ‘thinking” part of our brain can’t seem to make sense of what is, when it can’t problem solve for the future, the body will o en respond with panic, where we then start to move into the “alarm” portion of our brain, called the amygdala.

Our amygdala is the part of our brain that is scanning for a threat, and will o en interpret a perceived threat as a real threat, which can throw our bodies into a  ght,  ight, freeze response, activating our sympathetic nervous system.  e amygdala can override our cortex or “thinking brain” which is why it can seem like we can’t think our way out of our WAFs.

Fight,  ight or freeze may look like:

Di culty breathing An increase in heart palpitations Shortness of breath Muscle tension Feeling hot or  ush Headaches Nauseous Experiencing diarrhea Tingling in our  ngers or toes Tunnel vision

We can recognize these as symptoms of our body being stuck in the sympathetic nervous system, i.e., in a state of panic,  ght,  ight or freeze. We need to practice coping skills that can calm our body and mind down, so that we can get back to our thinking brain.

Some of the most e ective coping skills to use when in a state of panic or when we notice physical symptoms of anxiety in our body include:

Deep breathing or belly breathing. We can lie down on our  oor, sit in our chair, stand straight, and practice this skill anywhere. We want to take deep breaths where our belly actually expands instead of our chest. We can make it fun and practice this with our kids, too!

Grounding exercises. In these exercises, we focus on what is going on in our body or in our immediate environment instead of getting stuck in the downward spiral of our thoughts.

My favorite grounding exercise is called 5, 4, 3, 2, 1 where we use all 5 of our senses to ground. For example, I will name:

5 THINGS I SEE in my environment around me (my desk chair, bookcase, glass of water, stapler, computer screen)

4 THINGS I FEEL (my hair, my back pushing  rmly into my chair, my feet planted on the ground, the couch I am sitting on)

3 THINGS I HEAR (my kids in the background, my  ngers typing away at my computer keys, and the sound machine in my o ce)

We need to practice coping skills that can calm our body and mind down, so that we can get back to our thinking brain.