Understanding the Freeze Response as Sophisticated Survival
I want to share a story from my practice that I think about often. A client—I’ll call her Sarah—came to me deeply frustrated with herself. She kept saying: “I don’t understand why I freeze up. I know I should speak up for myself. I know I should say something when I’m being treated poorly. But when the moment actually comes, I just… disappear. I go completely blank. And then afterward, I’m absolutely furious with myself for not standing up, for not defending myself.”
She was describing what happens to her in conflict, in confrontation, in moments when she needs to set a boundary or defend herself. Her body just shuts down completely. She goes silent and still. Her mind goes offline. She can’t access her words or thoughts. And then later, when it’s over, she replays the situation endlessly and thinks of all the things she could have said, should have said, wishes she had said.
She felt broken. Like there was something fundamentally, irreparably wrong with her for not being able to fight back, speak up, advocate for herself in those crucial moments.
But here’s what I told her then, and here’s what I want you to understand if you relate to this experience:
Shutdown is not a failure. It’s not weakness. It’s not evidence that you’re broken, passive, or cowardly.
Shutdown is one of the most sophisticated survival responses your nervous system possesses. And if you’re someone who freezes, who goes numb, who dissociates, who shuts down completely in moments of threat or overwhelm—I need you to understand that this response kept you alive. It protected you when you had no other options.
I’m Abi Beri, an integrative holistic therapist and somatic practitioner. Welcome. Today we’re going to explore the shutdown response—the freeze, the collapse, the going offline, the part of you that disappears when things get too intense. And we’re going to understand it not as a flaw or deficiency, but as intelligence, as sophisticated survival, as your body’s brilliant way of protecting you when fight and flight aren’t available options.
What Shutdown Actually Is: The Neurobiology
Most people have heard of fight or flight—the sympathetic nervous system response when you’re facing danger. Your heart rate increases dramatically, your muscles tense and prepare for action, adrenaline floods your system, and you get ready to either fight the threat or run from it at top speed.
But there’s a third response that doesn’t get discussed nearly as much, yet it’s equally important for survival. It’s called the **dorsal vagal response** or **shutdown state**. It’s part of the parasympathetic nervous system, but it’s not the calm, relaxed, socially engaged parasympathetic state we think of as rest and digest. It’s the immobilization, collapse, shutdown state.
When Your System Initiates Shutdown
When your nervous system rapidly assesses and determines that you can’t successfully fight and you can’t effectively flee—that the threat is too big, too overwhelming, too powerful, or there’s absolutely no escape—it does something remarkably intelligent and protective. It takes you offline. It initiates shutdown.
What happens physiologically:
- Your heart rate drops suddenly
- Your blood pressure drops
- You might feel numb, disconnected, like you’re watching yourself from outside your own body
- Your thinking becomes foggy and slow, like moving through mud
- You can’t access your words or articulate thoughts
- You feel frozen, immobilized, stuck, unable to move
- You might feel heavy, like your body weighs a thousand pounds
This looks like you’re doing nothing, like you’ve given up. But you’re not doing nothing at all. Your body is doing something incredibly, brilliantly intelligent to protect you.
The Survival Purpose of Shutdown
It’s protecting you from feeling the full, overwhelming impact of what’s happening. It’s conserving your precious energy. It’s making you less of a target. In some cases, it’s literally, physiologically saving your life.
Think about animals in nature. When a gazelle is caught by a predator and there’s absolutely no escape, it goes into what’s called tonic immobility—it plays dead. The predator, programmed to hunt moving prey, often loses interest in something that appears dead. Or if the predator is going to kill anyway, the gazelle’s nervous system floods with endorphins so it doesn’t feel the pain of dying.
This is exactly what your body is doing when you freeze, when you go numb, when you shut down completely.
It’s saying: *I can’t fight this successfully. I can’t run from this. So I’m going to disappear. I’m going to make myself less present, less feelingly aware, so I can survive this moment with less damage, less pain, less overwhelming trauma.*
When Does Shutdown Happen?
Shutdown doesn’t only happen during obvious, severe trauma. It happens anytime your nervous system assesses that you’re in a situation you can’t adequately handle through fight or flight responses.
In Conflict and Confrontation
Maybe you freeze in conflict. Someone raises their voice at you, criticizes you harshly, confronts you aggressively—and your mind goes completely blank. You can’t think of what to say in response. Your body feels heavy and stuck. You just want it to be over. You’ll agree to anything to make it stop.
During Intimacy or Sex
Maybe you shut down during intimacy or sex. You’re physically there in the room, but you’re not actually present. You’re somewhere else entirely in your head. You feel nothing, just numbness. You’re just waiting passively for it to end, disconnected from the experience.
In Overwhelming Social Situations
Maybe you dissociate in social situations. You’re in a crowded room, people are talking and laughing, and suddenly you feel like you’re watching everything from behind thick glass. You’re technically there but not really there. Everything feels distant, unreal, like you’re in a dream or watching a movie.
When Life Becomes Too Much
Maybe you collapse when you’re overwhelmed by life demands. Too much is happening, too many demands piling up, too much emotion to process—and your body just… stops functioning. You can’t move. You can’t think clearly. You can’t take action. You just want to curl up and disappear, to cease existing temporarily.
Emotional Numbness
Maybe you go numb when you’re supposed to feel something significant. Someone tells you devastating news, something terrible happens, and you feel… nothing. Blank. Empty. Disconnected. And then you feel guilty and confused for not feeling enough, for not having the “appropriate” emotional response.
All of these are shutdown responses. And they all make complete sense given your nervous system’s history and conditioning.
Where Did This Pattern Start?
For most people who have a strong, easily triggered shutdown response, the pattern started when they were young. When they were in situations that were far too much for their developing nervous system to handle, and fighting or fleeing wasn’t a realistic option.
Childhood Origins
Maybe you grew up in a home where there was yelling, violence, chaos, unpredictability. And you were a small child. You couldn’t fight back against adults. You couldn’t leave or run away. So your body learned its most important survival lesson: when things get intense and threatening, go offline. Disappear internally. Make yourself small and unnoticeable. Don’t feel it fully because feeling it fully would be unbearable.
Maybe you had a parent who was critical, controlling, overwhelming, or emotionally volatile. And when they came at you with their anger or profound disappointment, there was nothing you could realistically do but take it, endure it. So your body learned to shut down automatically. To go numb. To not be fully present so it didn’t hurt as much, so you could survive it.
Trauma and Abuse
Maybe you experienced something specifically traumatic—abuse, assault, a serious accident—and in that critical moment, your body went into freeze. You couldn’t move. You couldn’t speak. You couldn’t fight back. And afterward, you felt deep shame, like you should have done something, should have fought or escaped. But your body was doing the only thing it could do—protecting you through immobilization.
Subtle Conditioning
Or maybe your shutdown response developed more subtly. Maybe you just learned gradually over time that big emotions, big needs, big expressions of self were too much, were unacceptable. That you had to stay small, stay quiet, stay manageable and compliant. And shutdown became your automatic default setting for navigating the world safely.
Whatever the origin, your body learned that shutdown was the safest, most effective option in threatening situations. And it became your go-to response, your primary survival strategy when things feel like too much.
The Problem with Shutdown in Adult Life
Here’s what’s difficult and problematic: the shutdown response that genuinely protected you as a vulnerable child is now limiting you as an adult.
You freeze in moments when you actually need to speak up. You go numb when you need to feel and process emotions. You dissociate when you need to be fully present and engaged. You shut down in your relationships, in your work, in situations where being offline isn’t serving you anymore—it’s actually creating more problems.
And then you judge yourself harshly for it. You think: *Why can’t I just stand up for myself? Why can’t I speak up when it matters? Why do I go blank at the worst possible times? Why am I so weak and passive?*
But you’re not weak. You’re not passive by nature. Your nervous system is simply doing what it learned to do, what kept you safe. It’s trying to protect you the way it always has, the only way it knows how.
The Outdated Protection System
The problem is that your nervous system is still operating on old, outdated information. It’s still reading current situations as if you’re that vulnerable child who couldn’t fight or flee. It doesn’t consciously know that you’re an adult now with more options, more resources, more power than you had then.
Let me give you specific examples of how this shutdown pattern shows up and limits adult functioning:
In Relationships
Your partner wants to have a difficult but necessary conversation, and you shut down completely. You can’t access your words. You feel nothing emotionally. You just want them to stop talking, to leave you alone. They experience this as you not caring, being cold and distant, withdrawing emotionally. But what’s actually happening is your nervous system has gone into freeze because their intensity or the conflict itself feels like threat, like danger.
At Work
Your boss criticizes your work or puts you on the spot in a meeting, and you go completely blank. You can’t think. You can’t defend yourself or explain your position. You just… freeze like a deer in headlights. And afterward you replay it endlessly and think of all the perfect things you could have said, and you feel ashamed and angry with yourself.
During Sexual Intimacy
You’re with someone and your body just… isn’t present at all. You feel numb and disconnected. Like you’re somewhere else entirely, watching from a distance. And you either force yourself mechanically through it or you avoid intimacy altogether because you know this dissociation is what will happen.
In Overwhelming Life Situations
You have too much to do, too many demands on your time and energy, and instead of taking effective action, you collapse. You can’t move forward. You scroll mindlessly on your phone or stare at nothing. You feel paralyzed. And then you judge yourself harshly for being lazy or unmotivated, when actually your nervous system has shut you down.
Do you see how this protective response that once saved you is now getting in your way, creating real problems in your adult life?
What You Need to Understand About Shutdown
You Can’t Think Your Way Out
First crucial point: **Shutdown is not something you can just think your way out of**. You can’t tell yourself to “snap out of it” or “just speak up” or “just stay present.” When your nervous system goes into dorsal vagal shutdown, your thinking brain is offline. You literally don’t have access to your words, your reasoning ability, your capacity to act or respond.
This is why all the well-meaning advice about “just communicate better” or “just be more assertive” doesn’t work for people who freeze. You’re not consciously choosing to shut down. Your body is doing it automatically, beneath your conscious control, as a survival response.
Willpower Won’t Force You Out
Second: **You can’t force yourself out of shutdown through sheer willpower**. If you try to push through it, try to make yourself feel when you’re numb, try to speak when you’re frozen—you’re just fighting against your own nervous system. And that internal battle usually makes the shutdown worse and longer-lasting.
What actually works is gentle, gradual, compassionate reconnection. You have to work with your nervous system, not against it. You have to befriend it, not battle it.
Shutdown is Not Permanent
Third: **Shutdown is not a permanent state or fixed personality trait**. You’re not irreparably stuck like this forever. But healing shutdown requires that you first understand it’s not a character flaw or moral failing. It’s a response, an adaptive survival strategy. And responses can be worked with, gradually shifted, slowly transformed over time with the right approach.
A Somatic Practice for Working with Shutdown
Let me guide you through a gentle practice for beginning to work with your shutdown response. We’re not trying to force activation or make you “un-freeze” through willpower. We’re just going to acknowledge what’s there with compassion and curiosity.
The Practice
Get comfortable in whatever way feels right—sitting, lying down, standing. You can close your eyes or keep them soft and slightly open. We’re going to do something gentle here, something that honors where your system is right now.
Take a breath. Slow and easy, no forcing.
And just notice your body right now. Notice if there’s numbness anywhere in your physical experience. Notice if there are parts of your body you can’t feel at all. Notice if you feel heavy, stuck, immobilized in any way. Notice if your mind feels foggy, slow, offline, unclear.
Just notice without any judgment or criticism. This is simply information.
Now I want you to think about a recent time when you shut down. When you froze. When you went offline. When you couldn’t speak, couldn’t move, couldn’t be fully present. Don’t go to the most traumatic, overwhelming moment. Just something manageable and recent. A moment when you wish you had been able to respond differently, but you simply couldn’t.
As you bring this moment to mind, notice what happens in your body right now. Do you start to feel heavy or numb? Foggy or disconnected? Do you want to check out right now, even just thinking about it? Do you feel yourself starting to freeze?
Just notice. This is your shutdown response. This is what your body does when it reads: too much. Can’t handle. Need to go offline for protection.
And instead of judging it, instead of being frustrated with yourself, I want you to try something radically different.
Place your hand somewhere on your body. Maybe your heart. Maybe your belly. Somewhere that feels grounding and safe.
And speak directly to the part of you that shuts down. The part that freezes. The part that goes offline when things get intense.
Say this, either out loud or silently:
*”I see you. I see what you’re trying to do. You’re trying to protect me. You learned that when things get too intense, too overwhelming, the safest thing to do is disappear, to go offline.”*
*”You’re not broken. You’re not weak. You’re not a coward. You’re trying to keep me safe the only way you know how.”*
*”I’ve been angry at you for freezing. I’ve been frustrated that I can’t speak up, can’t move, can’t stay present. I’ve judged you harshly for shutting down when I needed you most.”*
*”But you were doing the absolute best you could. When I was young and vulnerable, when I couldn’t fight or flee, you took me offline so I didn’t have to feel the full overwhelming impact. You protected me from unbearable pain.”*
*”I’m not asking you to stop protecting me entirely. But I want you to know: we’re not in that old situation anymore. We’re not that helpless child who had no options. We have more capacity now. More resources. More power and agency.”*
*”So maybe, slowly and gently, we can find a different way forward. Maybe we don’t have to go all the way offline every time things feel intense. Maybe we can stay present, even just a little bit more. Maybe we can expand our capacity gradually.”*
Notice what happens when you offer this compassionate understanding to the shutdown part of yourself. Does anything shift in your body? Does anything soften or release?
Or does the shutdown response stay strong and solid because it doesn’t believe you yet? Because it still genuinely thinks going offline is the only way to stay safe?
Either way is completely okay. This isn’t about forcing immediate change. This is about beginning to have a completely different relationship with this part of you—a relationship based on compassion and understanding rather than shame and frustration.
Take a few more breaths here. And see if you can bring just a little bit more sensation, just a little bit more presence back into your body. Not forcing it. Just gently inviting.
Maybe wiggle your toes. Feel your feet on the ground, the support beneath you. Press your hands gently into your legs or arms. Small, gentle movements that communicate: *I’m here. I’m in my body. It’s safe to be present right now.*
This is how you work with shutdown. Not by forcing yourself to snap out of it through willpower. But by gently, gradually, patiently creating more safety in your nervous system. Building more capacity to stay present even when things feel intense or threatening.
It’s slow work. It doesn’t happen overnight or even over weeks. But it does happen. Your body can learn that it doesn’t have to go all the way offline anymore. That there are other options now. That you can tolerate more intensity, more presence, more aliveness.
When you’re ready, begin to bring yourself fully back. Deepen your breath. Open your eyes if they’ve been closed.
Look around the room. Notice colors, shapes, textures, details. Ground yourself firmly in the present moment, in the here and now.
Moving Forward: Working with Your Freeze Response
Before you move on with your day, I want you to take this understanding with you:
Your shutdown response is not a character flaw. It’s not evidence that you’re weak, broken, or passive. It’s evidence that you survived something that required you to go offline, to disappear, to freeze as protection.
And now, as an adult with more resources and capacity, you have the opportunity to slowly expand your ability to stay present. To tolerate intensity a little bit longer before you shut down. To gradually increase your window of tolerance.
This doesn’t mean you’ll never freeze again. This doesn’t mean the shutdown response will disappear completely. But it means you can start to work skillfully with it, rather than fighting against it or being controlled by it.
The Beginning of Change
And that begins with understanding: freezing is not failing. Shutting down is not cowardice. Going offline is not weakness.
It’s survival. It’s intelligence. It’s your body doing the most sophisticated thing it knows how to do when fight and flight aren’t viable options.
So be gentle with yourself. Be patient with this protective part of you. It’s been keeping you safe, in the only way it knew how, for a very long time.
Thank you for being here, for listening, for starting to see your shutdown response differently, more compassionately, more accurately.
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About the Author:
Abi Beri is an integrative holistic therapist and somatic practitioner based in Ireland, offering sessions in Dublin, Naas, Newbridge, and online internationally. He specializes in trauma healing, nervous system regulation, and body-based therapeutic approaches that honor the wisdom of survival responses. Abi creates guided meditations and healing content available on YouTube, SoundCloud, Spotify, and Insight Timer.
For More Somatic Healing Practices:
- Website: www.blissfulevolution.com
- Somatic Therapy: www.somatictherapyireland.com
- Family Constellations: www.familyconstellationseurope.com
