Thankyou Threat System for keeping me safe….

Have you ever wondered why as human beings we feel anxiety? Fear? Anger? Disgust? They’re kind of a pain, so why have we evolved to experience them? Life would be much simpler if we didn’t….

And in some ways it would.

But in other ways we need them. Because these emotions are signals to alert us if something is wrong, and they’re designed to be uncomfortable so that we pay attention to them and do something about it. They are linked with our “threat system”, which is described in Compassion Focused Therapy as the areas of our brain that are designed to alert us to potential threats. These parts of the brain are part of the “old brain”, structures that have been around for many hundreds of thousands of years, and are tasked with the fundamentals in life – safety, survival, resources, attachments and reproduction. And they are brilliantly effective at what they are designed to do – which is getting us to pay attention to potential threats and react in order to minimise the risk of harm. They trigger threat responses that either activate us (fight or flight), or deactivate us (freeze, flop, fawn).

But the trouble is, our brains have evolved and we aren’t only governed by the “old brain”. We have relatively newer parts of the brain, particularly the pre-frontal cortex, that are evolutionary new kids of the block, and allow us to do all of the astonishing things we can do as human beings….plan, reason, ruminate, learn from the past and plan for the future, apply logic…it’s these areas of the brain that separate us (as far as we know) from other mammals.

But….

It’s also these parts of the brain that cause us problems as human beings. Paul Gilbert refers to it as the “tricky brain”, because it’s the interaction between the new and the old parts of the brain that can add to our distress. And here’s how…

Our old brain involves structures including the amygdala (hot spot for emotions) and the hippocampus (headquarters for memory), and they are designed to react quickly and often reflexively. And in a life or death situation, this makes sense. We haven’t got time to sit and digest it, ponder on how to respond….we just need to act. However, these same parts of the brain can be activated by perceived  threats, as well as real ones. And this is where the new brain comes in….we can ruminate on something that’s happened a long time, that poses no current threat to us, but our thoughts and perceptions of it still feel very current and so can activate the old brain and all those uncomfortable emotions. And to the other end of the spectrum, we can imagine threats, anticipating situations that have not even happened yet. And this is still enough to trigger our old brain into feeling the same as if it were happening….and so this interaction can become “tricky”, adding to our suffering or emotional distress when at times it may not need to.

We can dwell and ruminate on things that keep us locked in the past.

We can imagine future scenarios where terrible things happen (but haven’t actually happened).

And we feel it.

And this is ultimately down to our threat system being activated by these tricky interactions, and responding how it’s designed to – by ringing the alarm, by sending out those signals “Be careful, don’t let your guard down!” And, man alive, it’s hard to function when our threat system is activated. It rules the roost. And it’s designed to – so thankyou, Threat System, for doing what you’re designed to do. I appreciate you looking out for me.

But this is where the wisdom comes in….

The knowledge that our threat system can be activated at times when it doesn’t necessarily need to be. Often by the “tricky brain”. Because our threat system is designed on a “better safe than sorry” principle. It’s better to react as if it’s a bear in the woods, rather than hang about and check. And so, even though the threats we tend to face now (whether that be physical, verbal, social, emotional) are rather different from a bear ready to pounce, our threat system still acts first (thinks later). And so it can become hypersensitive over time.

If we’ve faced adversity and stress and trauma, it learns that it needs to keep it’s guard up more than ever. And so can be set off by the slightest thing, and that’s when we notice that we’re feeling on edge a lot of the time. Anxious. Struggling to relax. Irritable. Problems sleeping. Angry.

And it’s often at this point that I get to meet people in therapy, who have had enough of living like this. And want to explore what can help. And for me, exploring and understanding psychoeducation around our brains and how wonderful (and wonderfully tricky) they are is often the first step, because it brings with it a sense of “ah, ok – I get what’s going on”. And it brings in more compassion, and opens up avenues for how things can start to feel different. Because when we can understand why our threat system has become hypersensitive because of things we’ve lived through and because of how life has been, we can be more tolerant of a threat system that is on high alert. And then we can start to consider the things that help the threat system to learn that it’s ok now – in this moment, we are safe. Things like breathing, imagery, processing past trauma, nurturing our self-compassion, coping skills, vagus nerve stimulation, mindfulness, grounding techniques.

There is so much out there that can help regulate us, it’s just a case of trying things and finding the things that work for us.

So – thankyou Threat System for keeping me safe. I value you and appreciate your efforts. But you can take a break for a bit….I’ve got this.