Thaw the Freeze Trauma Response: a Polyvagal-Informed Approach

Hey, I'm Justin Sinceri. I'm a therapist, a coach, and the creator of the Polyvagal Trauma Relief System. Welcome to Stuck Not Broken, where I teach you how to live with more calm, confidence, and connection without psychobabble or woo woo. There's a really good chance you exist in a freeze state, and I want to address that in this episode- what freeze is through the polyvagal theory and, uh, some pitfalls or dangers in addressing the freeze state.

And then also, well, what can you do to start coming out of freeze? So first off, freeze is a combination of the sympathetic flight fight state, plus the shutdown dorsal vagal immobilization state. If you can't be safe and you can't run away, you can't fight a danger, then you'll go into shutdown. But freeze is a combination of shutdown and flight fight. So that's being mobilized and immobilized at the same time.

That could be immobilized through force or it could be immobilized through perception. So basically the accelerator and the brake are on at the same time. The body is highly revved up. Heart rate is up. Muscles are tense. It's ready to move, but it can't. If it sounds like a panic attack, that pretty much wraps it up nicely. But freeze can have a couple of different feels to it, or flavors as I often call them.

Because it freezes, the immobilization of shutdown, plus flight fight, but it's flight or fight, really. When you're immobilized while in flight, then the freeze flavoring will be flight. It'll be more like panic, intense chronic anxiety. If you're frozen or immobilized when in a fight state. It's going to be more of a fight flavored freeze. You'll have more underlying chronic anger, control issues, bullying, abuse, that kind of stuff.

Rage, this underlying rage and explosive rage really comes from fight flavored freeze. So freeze can be more flights, um, or more fight. But it's basically the most important thing to know here would be that it's a combination of sympathetic flight fight plus dorsal vagal shutdown. So flight fight plus shutdown. Revved up, but the brake is also on as well. Freeze is really difficult to work through. It's not a quick process.

The problem that I see with freeze and how we address it is we tend to talk about the context leading to freeze, which is not a bad thing in and of itself. But if you start talking about what led you to freeze, like those traumatic incidents, then it might just end up reinforcing the freeze.

Talking about stuff doesn't necessarily mean it's helpful. It actually might be downright reinforcing of the state that you're in. So if you have a therapist who is pushing you to talk about stuff you've been through, trauma narratives, that could be reinforcing of the freeze. To come out of freeze, just like the other defensive states, you have to have a nice strong anchoring in your safety state.

Your safety state has to be strengthened enough to allow freeze to come out of the immobilization and then to eventually release the flight fight activation. In polyvagal terms, that's called the vagal brake. Your vagal brake, which is the influence of your safety state on your heart- the vagal brake has to be strengthened enough to allow self regulation.

The vagal brake has to be strengthened enough to allow the immobilization to come off and then the flight fight activation to be used or discharged through some means. That's different for everybody. The vagal brake has to be strengthened.

So when you attempt to talk about the trauma narrative or the thing that you went through, things you went through, and your vagal brake isn't strong enough or your safety state's not strong enough, then it, it just ends up reinforcing your stuck defensive state. The way you would know it's strong enough is if you genuinely are curious and interested about all of you. You know, if you're genuinely curious and interested in what it feels like to be you.

What it feels like to have your freeze stuck inside of you and to be open to what comes of it when you pay attention to it. If this sounds terrifying, then that's probably a pretty good indication you're not quite there yet. And that's okay. It's totally okay. That just indicates we need to work on the safety state more. As you work on accessing and building the strength of your safety state, then the freeze can thaw and the flight fight can discharge.

I, the, um, image I use with my one on one clients, my therapy clients, my coaching clients. When we do our virtual sessions or, you know, meet in person, I'll put my fist out and say, this is the flight fight activation. And then I'll take my other hand and put it over the fist and say, this is the shutdown immobilization that is freezing. the flight fight activation in place.

It's like locking it in. So just by itself, the fist, the flight fights active, it's vibrating. It's like ready to roll, right? It's ready to run away and ready to fight. But shutdown is also active and freezes it in place. Okay. So we have the image of my fist with my hand and my fingers over the fist. So to come out of freeze, generally, we have to get the immobilization to thaw, or we have to get the freeze to thaw, but the immobilization has to come off.

It has to unlock, like it has to slowly melt away. Okay, so as that melts away, then that opens up the capacity for flight fight to discharge. To be used. But not all at once. It's a slow process, and I think it should be a slow process. We don't want this to be this big blow up out of control, chaotic, panicky, or rageful or overwhelming thing. We want, we want it to be, um, under control. The safety state has to be able to maintain that thaw.

Once the safety state is active, active enough, then the, uh, the freeze can thaw and then flight fight can be used. We want the safety state active, remove the thaw or remove the freeze, excuse me, and then use flight fight activation. It's a slow process. What could happen. And I think is kind of a unrealistic expectation is that we'll go into like a therapy session and do the whole shaking and trembling and release our trauma and we're good to go. And that's not the way it works.

It can work that way where there is, and I've had those sessions where there's the shaking and the trembling and, and the release, but that doesn't necessarily mean that. the problem is solved. It's a good indication that the person was mindful enough to really feel and release some of what was happening within them and to get to the next step. But it's not the only step. It's not the final answer. You know what I mean?

As far as, um, trauma recovery goes, but it's a really good, it could be a good sign. So yeah, it's a long process. The safety state is the priority. It's always the priority. Identify safety, feel it mindfully, and continue to practice doing that. As you do that, then the immobilization can come off. Flight fight can start to come up.

You feel that mindfully and then do something to release it. Mindfully. A lot of times when it comes to coming out of freeze, it is, it's an overwhelming experience. It can be a very overwhelming experience for, for someone, especially if it's new, you start touching on this stuff and then the body's like, "cool, Let's self-regulate!" And it wants all the stuff to come up all at once.

But um, no, what I would recommend then is, prioritize safety, practice feeling safety every day, just in like micro moments, not 30 minute meditations. Micro moments. Use your senses, feel safety, mindfully experience what it feels like to be safe in your body. Notice where safety lives in your body. As that becomes easier and you have the capacity for more safety, then

you can start to be curious about. or notice when you become curious about feeling the defensive activation, the flight fight activation that's within you. And then you do the same thing. I would really recommend doing micro moments. So feel safe, touch upon the flight fight activation that's within you. Just very briefly come back to safety that back and forth is called pendulation. This is a very light um, approach to it.

I had a session with, with someone who was doing a lot of therapy before me had been doing a lot of therapy, somatic experiencing stuff. And this person would go all in, like, I'm going to do all this things, these things all at once. I'm going to feel all my shutdown all at once. This person kind of knew intuitively what to do, but then also had all this guided practice, which was nice. But there was a lot of freeze underlying the motivation to, to go all in.

And so what I did was I recommended to them, instead of that, because that might actually be reinforcing of all this- let's lightly touch upon these things. Let's, instead of closing your eyes and immersing yourself in a safety for some 30 minute meditation, just lightly touch upon it, notice what it feels like, and then keep moving on, you know, like with your day. It doesn't have to be this all in thing.

So if you notice you have a lot of freeze within you, uh, panicky rage kind of stuff, just like underlying and flavoring your existence, touch upon safety first, build that up and then touch upon the defensive activation lightly.

And I would do it like you're skipping a stone like, you know, you throw a stone across the water goes Like that like touch upon safety touch upon the defense touch upon safety like just real quick and over time hopefully through that little practice we notice that safety builds The flight fight

activation becomes more tolerable. And yeah, this is over time. We're talking about super easy like light practices here. Hopefully, it becomes more tolerable and over time, some more permanent unstucking can happen. That's the general idea. In my coursework and in my upcoming, uh, two books, Stuck Not Broken 2 and 3, Stuck Not Broken 1 came out already. In my next two books, we'll touch upon, or we'll go way more into how to build the strength of your safety state in a lot of depth.

And then in book three, I touch upon, or I talk very in depth, excuse me, it's the opposite. I talk very in depth about how to feel your defensive activation, uh, mindfully and with self compassion and the strength of the safety state is unbelievably important in that process. But once you get deep enough into safety, then you can notice where the defensive activation lives in your body. You can mindfully experience it. You can use description.

You can, well, it's a whole separate process that that you can go through. Um, but that's way down the road. If you're just starting out, on these practices, lightly touch upon these things. You don't have to go into the trauma narrative. You don't have to think about past stuff. It might come up, but what I, if I was you, I'd really focus on the present moment, feeling safety in the present moment, in micro moments, alright?

So that means like today, can you mindfully experience the taste of a strawberry? Can you mindfully look your pet in the eyes and smile and pet 'em? Can you mindfully take a walk outside and feel the sunshine on your skin or the breeze on your skin, smell flowers? Can you mindfully give your spouse a hug? Like micro moments of mindfulness, micro moments of safety and connection over time, then micro moments of lightly touching upon defense.

And then back to safety and then back to defense until you've, you know, just a few times, just maybe a few times back and forth until it feels like that's enough. And then just move on with your day and then do the same thing the next day. All right, that's it for this one. I hope this was helpful to at least start approaching your freeze activation.

Maybe thinking about you know, talking about this stuff in depth or delving all the way into it might be not a great idea and then also understanding what freeze is According to polyvagal theory and how it's different than shutdown if you like this stuff My first book came out stuck not broken book one This is the not for resale version, which has a banner across the middle. But yeah book one came out. Teaches you about freeze teaches you about shutdown all the polyvagal theory stuff.

It teaches about all the polyvagal theory, plus, helps you build a new self understanding, a new self narrative based on that, um, that does not involve shame, blame, or judgment, does not involve ruminating on past events or reliving past experiences. Very present moment focused. Otherwise, yeah, I hope this episode has been helpful for you and thanks for spending some time with me. Bye. This podcast is not therapy, not intended to be therapy or be a replacement for therapy.

Nothing in this creates or indicates a therapeutic relationship.

Please consult with your therapist or seek for one in your area if you are experiencing mental health symptoms. Nothing in this podcast should be construed to be specific life advice, it is for educational and entertainment purposes only.