“Survival mode” has multiple stages — Which one are you in?
You survived a lot. You overcame a lot. You built a business, career or a family that you’re proud of. But now everything you had to do to get where you are is starting to catch up with you. And you might be waking up in the morning with your head spinning, your heart pounding, wondering “is this sustainable - or is it all going to come crashing down around my ears?”
If that’s you, I get it and I’ve been there. The things we do to survive become both our greatest strengths and our greatest weaknesses.
Getting stuck in chronic survival mode doesn’t happen overnight.
There are multiple stages or “gears” in our survival response
Understanding how there gears work can help us identify where we are and how to navigate out.
In early stages, our “fight or flight” response gets hyper-activated
This triggers stress hormones like adrenaline and cortisol.
Side effects can include nervousness, shaking, agitation, or feeling high strung and on edge.
Chronically elevated cortisol and adrenaline levels cause a ton of wear and tear on your body.
Elevated cortisol can put you at risk for diabetes and certain types of cancer while elevated adrenaline can contribute to heart damage and migraines.
Your body can only sustain this for so long and over time begins to physically burn out.
Our adrenal glands loose the ability to produce adrenaline and cortisol and we start moving into the next stage of our survival response known as “collapse and shutdown”
In this stage, our brain prepares to conserve resources at all costs.
Side effects of getting stuck in collapse and shutdown include chronic fatigue, brain fog, physical or emotional numbing and sudden drowsiness.
One thing I hear all the time is “I know what I need to do to get better, I’m just too distracted or “I’m just too lazy”
But I don’t think that’s true
I don’t think you’re lazy or distracted. Instead you are probably stuck inn fight/flight, collapse/shutdown or somewhere, in between.
Beating yourself up OR trying to “positive think” your way out is not going to work
You need solid information and skills that allow you to figure out
What stage of your survival response you’re operating from
Exactly how to navigate out using tools that are actually accessible to your nervous system right now
The good news is, you have a choice. You can honor your nervous system for doing what it needed to do to get you here. And you can decide to do something different now. You do not need to stay in survival mode for the rest of your life. Because the reality is, that’s not really living.
You paid the price. You put in the work. Now you have to learn how to live in a new way. And that’s a skill. The good news is, you’re great at learning new skills.
In resilience,
Caitlin