Trauma Responses

You might have heard of the “fight or flight response,” referring to our automatic reaction of fighting or running away when we face a threat. There are actually 5 responses, but all of these are biological responses that our brains automatically do to keep us safe when it perceives we are in danger.

Fight – it is what it sounds like, body gets prepares to fight someone or something off. The threatened individual may respond with overt aggression, but this can also include things like screaming or saying “no”.

Flight – is when your body gets prepared to run away; this can mean you put space between yourself and the threat. So you could physically run away, you could move to another space, hide or you could back away. Sometimes it may not be possible to physically run away so this could be where our mind disconnects from our body and the situation.

Freeze – is when your body completely freezes, you cannot move and some people cannot even think. Animals often freeze to avoid fights and potential further harm, and can ‘play dead’ to avoid being seen and eaten by predators.

Flop – is almost like fainting but your brain doesn’t actually turn off. Your body becomes very limp and floppy. Sometimes your mind can also shut off or it can still remain active. The body can go floppy as this is its way of protecting itself from the pain when it reaches the limit of what it can take – this can be physical or mental pain.

Friend – is where the person experiencing a traumatic event is nice or does things to the person who hurt them or seems to participate to prevent them from being in further danger. It is important to note that does not mean that you were consenting, it is a survival instinct.

The only aim of all 5 responses is to keep you alive and to reduce any further harm. These responses are all biological responses that your brain does without you knowing. There are different parts of the brain that are involved in this process, the main two are the Amygdala and the Hippocampus.  

The amygdala is known as the “fear centre” due to its ability to automatically sense real or perceived danger. It will assess the threat and send information (via the release of stress hormones) to other parts of the brain to advise how we should respond depending on the situation – this is where the different responses kicks in. Whenever we perceive a threat, we will feel emotions such as fear, anxiety, or anger and these emotions will then trigger one of the responses as the body prepares to deal with the danger.

The hippocampus is closely connected to the Amygdala, but the hippocampus’ job is focused on memory. When we experience something traumatic, the memory isn’t stored properly by the hippocampus. This is because the Amygdala is heightened and pulling all the resources to it. This means that you may not remember all details of the experience, you may remember them later on, it could be a smell, a colour a sound that brings that memory back up. These are often experienced as Flashbacks.

You may feel conflicted about how your body reacted to the trauma. In a moment of danger, these responses all happen automatically to try to keep us safe. This is a biological process that our brain does without us thinking about it. As we don’t have any control of this, our body may react in different ways after incidents of trauma. So, one occasion might result in a friend response, but another may be flop. It also could be a combination of responses. Our brain will take over in that moment and automatically respond in the way it needs to keep us safe. The important thing to remember, is no matter how your body responded, it is not your fault!