The freeze state in your nervous system is like a circuit breaker. It shuts things down when activation gets too high. It's also the HIGHEST state of activation.
So how can we tell if we're in a state of freeze or if we're actually resting?
Sleepy Sisters podcast is hosted by Elizabeth Brink and Sarah Durham. This show is unedited and often unprepared for, so we hope you enjoy our resistance to perfection!
www.thrivingsistercoaching.com
www.kattywhompous.com
The freeze state in your nervous system is like a circuit breaker. It shuts things down when activation gets too high. It's also the HIGHEST state of activation.
So how can we tell if we're in a state of freeze or if we're actually resting?
Sleepy Sisters podcast is hosted by Elizabeth Brink and Sarah Durham. This show is unedited and often unprepared for, so we hope you enjoy our resistance to perfection!
www.thrivingsistercoaching.com
www.kattywhompous.com
Hello, the sky. The Sleepy sisters are back. It's been a couple of weeks and haven't missed. Yeah, can I be honest? This space not you haven't missed recording only because it's been a really busy couple of weeks. It's been a nice break. I'm Elizabeth brink. I'm Sarah Durham. And we have this podcast to talk about whatever we want to talk about. And we are not going to edit. And we have very little preparation. So right along if you want, feel free to get off anytime, right. Okay, do you have your good microphone setup? I do. Can you hear me? Okay? Well, it's a little low. But oh, maybe it's my speaker. Okay. Okay, so we're gonna talk about freeze the freeze response. So for those who are unfamiliar with the threat response cycle, our nervous system automatically enacts these different responses, fight, flight freeze, are the primary ones when, when we sense threat, and this happens before there is like a cognitive knowing of what's going on. So it's like, happens in our physiology. For before, we have really a thought about it. We have a thought about it, our systems already made the decision, and has responded with, you know, one of these states. And the freeze response, I think is really interesting, for a lot of reasons, but I think it's particularly interesting, because there are so many people who are living in a functional freeze, and I use the word functional very loosely because they or people around them may debate how functional they are. And when I say they, I mean us. I mean, I'm counting myself as part of that population, not necessarily Sarah, I wasn't meaning to attach that to you. But if you want to be with that, you can't. So so I thought it'd be helpful because I've talked to a lot of clients recently about this. And as we get toward like, end of year, a lot of people experience more stress. Anyone who's grieving or having a hard time tends to experience more intense emotional, rehab, heaviness, whatever you want to call it, trying to avoid Pathak pathologizing words, like dysregulation, and it's just like, yeah, you might just have some big feels this time of year. And so I think the other piece of it is that we're forced to perform and a lot of ways, depending on your background, your culture, your, the spaces where you move in and out of, you're forced to show up and function to varying degrees, in the end of year, hustle for many people, not everyone. And for those who are forced to kind of play the part, I think that feeling, our sense of internal freeze, is like, it's so much more obvious. And sometimes it can make people feel like depressed or more anxious when they notice how kind of detached from what's actually happening around them, they feel so when you're in a freeze state, you are in the highest state of activation, which I think is so important for people to know that it is not, it's not the collapse the part where you've like, frozen, and now you are just like wiped out and you take a nap. Like that's not for you. To freeze is the highest level of activation. It's your nervous system saying I can't fight, I can't run I but I am so activated. I want to do one of those and I can't and so I am just going to play basically play dead. But to do that every single cell in my body has to be activated to hold me still to hold me into a place of stillness so that I don't run or fight back. And so I think understanding it as the highest level of activation is really important. Because sometimes you have an experience of being in freeze and you did nothing all day long. And you're like why am I so tired? And it's like well, you've been working hard sitting on the couch. So okay, so that's that's just a very tiny bit about freeze. There's there's so much more but I don't want to overload information but what I think is it interesting is how confusing it can be to know like, Am I in freeze? Or is that or am I resting? Am I in like a? I mean, I even asked my own therapist like, is this health? Or am I just like in a perpetual state of freeze? Freezing? I'm like, you know, midlife, I'm not caring about as many things anymore about other people's opinions anymore. And so I'm like, Am I in freeze? Or am I free? Especially when you're someone who's activated a lot? Yeah, those personalities where we're like, we have a lot of health and have done a lot of work. But just our particular nervous systems and our paths combine, Elizabeth and I are both activated pretty easily. And we're doing work constantly in that. So it is hard to know if the end result is am I resting? Or was what I was what I was doing to like, do the work or to kind of help myself was that? Was it really doing that? Or was it? Am I now frozen? And super trippy? It's like, which way is up? I don't know. Yeah, so I think so there's some language from somatic experiencing from the training that I've been doing around this that I think is really helpful. So it talks about freeze, as the state of freeze is like a circuit breaker. So it shuts down your physiology, when it's overloaded. And then this other idea around, it happens automatically. And sometimes it's sometimes it's it's something that's passed down generations generations back, where it's just like, the only viable option for survival is to just be really still try to blend into the wallpaper, as they used to say which wallpapers back now. So maybe people understand that saying, There was a period of time where maybe, yeah, for any of those millennials out there that don't know wallpaper. This anyway. So I think it's interesting, because when you are someone who is dealing with chronic stress, which is most people, or if you have trauma in your background, if you're neurodivergent in some ways, then I think identifying when you're feeling frozen can be really helpful. Like for me, it doesn't necessarily like move me out of a state of freeze to notice it. Sometimes it does. But it helps me to have a totally different perspective on whatever I've been doing or not doing it like completely reframes entire days sometimes for me. What's your experience with Freeze? Or what's your thoughts about it? Well, I mean, you've been saying this for a little while you you've been making this kind of offhanded joke or like, is this health? Or is this real? Is this restaurant for like, a few months now? So of course, it has me thinking about it more. And, you know, I'm like, am I watching this show? Am I binging on below deck? Because I am frozen? Or is this fun for me? You know, and I think I'd be late lately is I'm probably in phrase. Almost exactly the question I asked. I think it even was me binging on below deck. Blackjack as a TV show. Just don't worry about it. Yeah, it's just, I'm owning my reality TV now. I'm just like, I'm over it. Like, who cares? I am, whatever I'll take action from. So I've turned 50. And now whatever happens happens. So all that to say, you know, I think I think what I I'm thinking about it more, I'm thinking about it more in terms of the functional part. I think I have questions about it as far as like, when you hit freeze. I know if it ends up being functional freeze. It's like probably because you can't you're not getting the things that you need for your system to truly rest. I think the where I, I guess we're in I guess I want to ask you like, is this right or not? But I guess you know, we'll see if it's that kind of a question. But when I come out of like watching a binge watching a show or doing something, do I feel connected or do I feel drained, I come out of it like wanting to like, talk to my kids and like oh, now I want to throw frisbee outside or I can go take a walk now or mess with my art or am I looking for something else? Like do I want to slide under my bed or do I want to like you know, do something even more dissociated or more like away from that like wanting to connect. And that's kind of the way I've been filtering it. Like, there's days that I'll watch a show, and I'll be doing art at the same time, and I feel a type of way in my body that is just a little more alive and playful. So that's kind of does that make sense? I mean, it's Yeah, yeah. So it's tricky, because freeze feels so good. Okay. It doesn't always feel good, I'll say just depends on the circumstances. But I think knowing your life circumstances in mind, and being in midlife, with the privileges that we have, I think we have the privilege of being able to feel into freeze and it can feel good to just feel like I can check out I can dissociate a little I can numb out whatever language you know, works. Would you say functional? is a lifestyle? And rest is a moment or an event? Leave? I'm looking back at the last month or two, can you just be have been in functional? You just didn't know? And now I know. Or is it? Can you be in it and be like, I'm in functional? Please? Is it like, I think it's Yeah, I mean, here's the thing about about freeze? Is that like, there's the research isn't that great on it? So I think, you know, a lot of it is is like it's It depends, like machine Hagar my somatic experiencing. Teacher is always that's kind of how she answers every question that anyone ever asks. It's like, well, it depends. So, so I'm, I have the instinct to say that too, I think, understanding that we go into freeze because activation is, is unbearable. So that activation gets so high, that it shuts our system down into a state of freeze. So sometimes when you're working with freeze in a healing space, as somebody comes out of freeze a little bit been right beneath that could be a ton of activation, because it's it's protective, right? Like it's protecting you from having to sit in the buzzing of the activation of what's going on. And so I think they're, I think the difficult thing, one difficult thing, for neurodivergent people are folks who are chronically stressed is that we also can deal with a lot of fatigue. And, and I think that, you know, sometimes that shutdown, feeling can be the fatigue kicking in and the like, Oh, I'm not getting enough rest, and my body is going going going and it's shutting things down and saying like, you just can't, you can't go any further. And so that's where I think there's some nuance there and like, what it feels and looks like for each individual. And getting to know it, I think is where the where the power is, is like, oh, what does it look like for me? So an example is like, I sometime this past year, there was a phone call with somebody that I was supposed to have. And I mean, if you're listening to this, and you're like, I hate phone calls, you're probably neurodivergent. I mean, that should just be like part of the diagnostic criteria. But I started this phone call. It was planned with somebody who I like and was looking forward to talking to but it was going to require a certain amount of like, mental energy. And I don't know, I didn't really investigate very much about my don't want to mess around it. But when it came time to have the phone call, I felt really resistant to it. And I was sitting on our couch and I was like I didn't have clients. It was like midday, and I was sitting on the couch and I was thinking, Oh, I have to have this phone call. This person is going to call I should just text them right now and tell them I can't talk. Something's come up. Don't feel good whenever you know. And and all of a sudden, I started feeling really sleepy. I was like, Oh my gosh, I'm so tired. I can't wait. I think I slept terribly last night. I'm I feel like I probably need a nap. I mean, this is around the time I would take a nap if I needed one. I'm just too tired for this call and I laid there letting myself feel into like being tired and feeling like I needed to fall asleep like it was true sleepiness. And then it occurred to me that it might be freeze. I might be experiencing like my system was so stressed about this phone Call, it just started to say like, let's just check out, like, Come on, let's just come over here late, lay your head down. And so I texted Anna Lopez, who's really good friend, therapist, somatic, all these things. And I'm like, Hey, do you get sleepy when this whole exchange around like, Yes, this is super relatable. So I think like in that situation I was aware of like, I have this thing and my body is having a response to it. And then there was this other layer of like, now I suddenly feel sleepy, and it seemed disconnected. But the more I was able to actually stay present with it, and not just take a nap and turn my ringer off, and basically just no show this person. I ended up having the phone call with the person, which felt like a huge victory. Like I let myself lay there, I set a timer for like nine minutes, it was ridiculous. I had like hardly any time, nine minutes, and I let myself lay there and like full on, pretend I was going to fall asleep, knowing there was an alarm, I was like, just go for it, just ease into it. And then the alarm went off, I actually felt a little rested, which was weird. And I had this phone call. It was so energizing. It was I loved it, it was such a good conversation. And it was just this example of how tricky our systems can be, and how disordered our relationship to them can be because of the world we're living in. And so that's why I'm always just like, it's so important to get to know your system, like what does freeze look and feel like so, yes, sometimes when I'm watching TV, I feel numb, I feel like I'm not paying much attention to what's happening. And it's just noise. It's keeping me company. And other times I feel like I'm really engaged in the storyline. And sometimes that's an indicator for me of like, am I? Yeah, like what system? What part of my system is online right now. But I don't know if it's like a hard science, I have two things to say about that example. First thing is, of course, you feel better, because we always talked about you taught me this, and I've read a course about this, that social connection is a way to get your system back into the right state. Right? So of course, right? So just so you know, the first way to like move out of a dis, you know, come lobulated We're not going to use the technical term, but like you're getting into activate it out of activation into like the ventral is that right? The ventral stream? Is that immediate, like kind of social connection, right? So but the second thing is, so as you're describing this, and you're sitting on the couch, and I'm just imagining you talking about how you know, you could just text this person like basically you're flighting yourself through to a nap. Because isn't free freeze is the most you said it's a little activation. So it starts off as flight, don't want to do it. I'm going to Texas person I'm getting out of dodge, this is not my deal. Okay. And you went full width. So it sounds like you flooded yourself into basically freeze, which makes me think if you're at the highest level, and I know there's it's nuanced, we have sensitive nervous systems you and I do. And you got your day. And also, I'm just curious to know. Like, that's not a tip, that's probably because for you, I'm sorry for you for you because you probably were already feeling activated from other things like you had not maybe had enough rest that that thing was going to send you into that level of activation. The whereas normally flight you might just be like yeah, just texting get out of it or just move out of that and just go ahead and just make make the call but you actually felt so activated. So do you think there were other things? Absolutely. So that that speaks to like my capacity, I didn't have the capacity to work with those initial things that were happening. And I think that's that's like a baseline state for me. So they're in somatic experiencing there is this nervous system state called Global high activation. And it's where basically you are just a little or a lot activated all the time. So people who maybe identify as having anxiety, they might resonate with this, it may not manifest an anxiety necessarily so don't count yourself out. But um, but machine says you know that because of the state of the world, we're going to see more and more people are actually operating with this level of activation all the time. There are ability to access rest and digest and like actual calm and connection is depleted. And or it's just not available, the system is like that is not safe, I need to be on guard, I need to be activated I need to be moving and doing. And so because of that, the more I live in that activated zone, the less room there is, in my system, if you're imagining it like a mountain top, if I'm like, kind of near the summit point, I think that's what it's called. I don't know why I use these hiking metaphors, y'all. I'm not a hiker. And I always do this, I have no idea what I'm actually saying. So. So if you're if you're near the if you're near the summit, and you're activated, your your nervous system is on that up, we're tick, and the freeze is up at the top. And I guess you know, if I have hiked before, you know, if you get all the way to the top, and it was strenuous hike, you are kind of depleted, and you do kind of go into a collapse, right? And, but hopefully you don't stop moving before you get to the top, it would be freeze. So let's see, it's falling apart. So if you're living in this place where you're highly activated, and you're not getting the flexibility in your nervous system regularly, where you're moving in and out of these different states, and you're actually accessing real rest, then what happens is something goes wrong, and you have no capacity, you're already activated, the only place to go if something goes wrong is up. And so if freeze is the highest state of activation, it makes sense that lots of people are struggling with either ping ponging between these states a lot of like, you know, and when I say activated, that's more of like the busy body like busy mind, maybe it's ruminating thoughts, maybe it's even panic, worry. It can look like someone who's really busy. But it's activated. It's like, I need to stay moving, I need to keep doing there's too many things on my list that's activated. So now if something goes wrong, I'm not coming from a baseline where I can get activated, and it's not super disruptive. It's just like, I'm a little worried. Like, that part of the scale has been lost for me. I'm up here in this activated state where anything goes wrong. And my system has no capacity for extra. So yes, what you're saying, absolutely is true that, you know, if I had had an I don't remember because it was several months ago. But if I had had a really stressful day, I think at that time, I was stressed in general about several things. I remember now. Things with my business, I had some travel. And so yeah, like, if I'm already activated, then an extra stressor is just going to send me into this place of like immobility, where I'm just going to feel like I can't go any further. I'm stuck. It makes so much sense that I'm just thinking about when people talk about, or when we talk about spoons, right, just for like energy level, are they able to like, you know, expend energy on mental or physical tasks, I think about in terms of activation. And getting to that point. If I were looking at like, kind of through Spoon Theory, I guess, you know, it's one of the reasons why I've been thinking so much about social media lately, because when I am on social media, I'm immediately active. Even if I have really great people I'm following or whatever, there's always going to be something that's going to slip in with the state of the world between like climate crisis, Palestine, I mean, just all of these different things, you know, the election, you just do one little thing, and well, I do and I'm, like, immediately activated. And so that stays with me, you know, even the ACT anything. But even getting into a social media platform, activates your system, because there's so many places to look. So you instantly are engaged in like scanning, you're scanning, you're looking, you're looking for the people that you want to look at the things you want to look at. You're instantly bringing your system online into like surveilling the situation. Well, yeah. Because that's like, aside from the content. Okay. Yeah. Because I want to I want to say something about that, too, because I think it's an important point that you make with me pretty often, in that, that the activation part does not have to be negative, and that's part of our fire too. So when we see something on social media, and we're scanning and looking at like our system is engaged, and if I see something that could be really positive, right is that that's part of my life. I want to like engage with that. I want to do something with that. It's inspiring me that it doesn't have to Yeah, sure. Yeah. It's still like, it's still inspiring action. And, and that requires activation in your system to take action. Right? So, yeah, I'm also saying that just the logistics of like, needing to look around, right is is encouraging this vigilance of like, Did I see all the right people stuff that kind of sets you up for then when there's content that's also activating, you're just you're already on the ladder, you're already like climbed way up there. And so someone had these really great memes the other day, and they were using neurodiverse incorrectly. And I really wanted to use them. And I was like, these are really great names. But it really annoyed me that I could not use them. We'll see. And then this is why there's internet trolls, because they're on there. They're all they're seeing all this stuff. And they can't not say something, they can't not snap back and make a comment. And it's just like the worst part of humanity in the comment section. But yeah, so here's here's one illustration that that machine also shared with us that she got from Kathy Kane about what freeze looks like. So if you imagine, and I may have told you this before, but just pretend like I have it. So if you imagine like a water well, in the ground, like a brick wall, and someone falling into it. So it can be any kind of hole. But it's got it's got formed sides, it has strong sides, right? There's cement or their brick, and they're falling down. And they catch themselves with their hands and feet on the walls on the sides of this thing so that they don't fall all the way to the bottom and get really hurt. So they're holding themselves steady on the sides. And they are like if I even think I might fall, Liddell and move a single cell in my body, right? That's freeze. So when you have someone or you yourself are experiencing freeze, and someone comes along and says like, all you gotta do, oh, just get Have you thought of, have you gotten want to, oh, I'm gonna send you a link. Or like, Hey, let me help you. What can I do to help this happens with people all the time? What can I do to help I want to help you. It's like, I can't answer that I'm trying to stay alive. I need to hold really tight, so that I don't fall. So then we get relational conflict coming into the picture, because they've got someone who cares about them saying, I want to help, what do you need, and they can't vocalize it for maybe a number of reasons. But one of them could be that their system is in this state of preservation and stillness. And so looking for signs of, of connection, rather than, Oh, they're not answering me or they don't have much to say, or they never know how they feel. And they never know what they need. Right. It's like, maybe just starting with a simple like, we talked in the last thing about the the appreciation practice, but it doesn't have to be that but like, gratitude does turn on your relational channels in your brain. So even if you can internally for yourself, and I this gonna sound kind of gimmicky, but whatever, y'all, it's science in our works. But if you can, you know, think of something that you're grateful for, if you can get into a relational headspace and you can invite that person into that, you might see some of that freeze, thaw a little bit, you might be able to connect a little bit. movement also does tend to move people out of freeze. And one thing that Anna Lopez said, when we talked about this on a podcast once, and she was saying that sometimes if she is struggling with Freeze, like with getting out of bed in the morning, she will envision herself doing like a certain yoga pose. Like she'll envision some kind of movement. And like she's doing it and then it helps her nervous system to kind of shift and she's able, she's next thing she knows she's out of bed, doing the next thing she needs to do. So I think sometimes like working with the imagination, and some of the creative ways in which we can communicate with our bodies without words can be really helpful. If you're feeling like maybe you are in a little bit of a sad because you've said we've talked about anchors before and that makes perfect sense if that we can show if we can show our bodies that were safer. Right? Just a little more ease, right? Because we can't so expect like someone just to jump on the well and all of a sudden be like boom, I'm ready to go. Yeah. But like to where they can move back up to fight to crawl up a little bit or to grab your hands. Is that what you're saying? Nothing more. Yeah, it's like when you're immobilized. When, and I keep talking about somatic experiencing, sorry, it's just gonna happen. But one of the things that Peter Levine talks about is that the freeze response and fear get bundled together. And so when we start to feel immobilized when we start to feel, feel the stillness of freeze, the stuckness of freeze, for some of us, that feels scary, and it makes us think that we are scared. And so we're not always scared, but but our system is responding in this self preservation way that I think can lead to some confusion. So I think when you think about an animal in the wild, who is playing dead and waiting for the predator to run off, and then they slowly kind of, it looks like come back to life, you can Google this, it's wild. You know, what we see is that there's this ability to hold that free state for a period of time, and then that immobility has to be kind of worked out and shaken off, or whatever you would see an animal do. And that's where I think we don't get a chance to do that full process, because our lives are so stressful. So we just kind of like constantly circle, this same loop where we go, right, we just get enough collapse, right, I get a nine minute nap. To get me back into the game, right back into activation, I'm still not that far away from freeze again. I've like just barely given myself a little bit of collapse, so I can get back into it. I hear that in clients where it's like, despair, like, I've just why even bother. And then life, you got to get up, go to work, you have to do different things. And then all of a sudden, it seems like they're in being able to like do a thing. And like, you know, connected a little bit. And then they're fighting a bear on the street or doing that. And then they're right back there a few days later. Yes. Right. They're just right back there a few days later. So what you're saying is that, that process of really like, rebuilding and kind of getting up out of that really exhaustive state. While we're incredible, aren't we? Oh, we are I know, it's like, seriously? Yeah. Taking advantage of our nervous systems right now. And we need to like to figure out how to do this for ourselves. Right, like, but it's so hard because our systems are set up. Like, who had like you said, with privilege or who has time? Yeah. Yeah, I mean, I think it's it is always take a lot of time, like, like, I guess I'm curious about that. I guess it just depends, right? It does. Yeah, it just depends. But I think too, it's, you know, this is why I love the nap ministry and her work. And of course, I'm like totally spacing on her name because I'm terrible. Is Tricia Hersey. Yes, for sure her see the nap ministry just talking about rest as a radical practice. And the thing about an activated nervous system that has been activated for a very long time, which is a lot of us is that sometimes real rest feels scary. And it's not something we can just like force ourselves into, it's like very tiny bits of it, building a capacity for it over time, so that the nervous system starts to learn, Hey, it's okay if we slow down and don't like overfill our schedule. Because rust is not just about sleep it it's about like play Joy connection, things that like if we are in like a grind culture and the productivity culture and we are go go go it's one thing for someone to say oh, you know what, I'm going to get extra nap today like trying to titrate that rest in but rest there looks a lot of different ways. We're very you know, complex people, you know, humans and so active, you know, actually participating in little joyful moments or small luxuries that extra can be scarier, and more uncomfortable than say, I'm gonna take the weekend. I'm not going to go out this week and I'm just going to chill and you're like, why am I still tired? Yeah, yeah. Are you spend the whole weekend dissociating, you know, watching lots of television but not really watching it. You know, when I lived alone, way back In the day, like, I spent a lot of my free time, just like kind of killing time, like just getting it to get by without realizing that that's what I was doing. And feeling like, well, I need this, I deserve this. I've been working so hard all week, I've been so busy lately. But then I wasn't actually feeling refreshed. I wasn't feeling like I was getting out of it what other people were talking about that they would get out of, you know, downtime, you on that call the example you brought up earlier, you're going into that nap would not have fixed the problem. It was because you engaged with that person. That you know, that's not always the case. But I'm talking for this specific scenario, when you said you came out of the night, wow, I felt really good after talking. Some of it is because it was a positive conversation, where I was able to discharge some of the activation. Because I was using my voice. We were very excited. We were sharing ideas. It was like very invigorating. And I think some of that stress energy that had been built up released in the conversation. But I think actually that that net with that little nap did that little tiny rest. I think it actually just gave my body what it wanted. It was like I'm too activated, I need to shut down. And this has happened my whole life. And I have all these curiosities around neurodivergent, especially ADHD, folks who get diagnoses of narcolepsy. Because when we're bored, we can tend to feel super sleepy. And so I have all these like curiosities around this because my whole life, if I go to a professional conference, I now know I have to book a room in the hotel where the event is because I am going to have to go and lay down. Otherwise I have in I have risked falling asleep in public, which is like my worst nightmare. I'm so scared of doing that. So I won't do that. I'll fidget. I'll do all kinds of things. I'll stand at the back of the room, I'll sit at the back of the room. But I have this fear about falling asleep in important places like while driving the car. And like, Could I go convince somebody that I have narcolepsy? I don't probably not. I don't actually know what the criteria is. But I think about my system and how it responds to over activation was sleepiness and how it responds to boredom with sleepiness, like I have this propensity to get to a place where I just feel like I must be really actually physically tired and need to rest. So I do think that that nap. I do think it gave my body a little of what it needed and wanted in that moment, and it gave me a little bit of capacity to accept the phone call when I got it. And then I think having the conversation energize me because I'm an extrovert. And because of all of the things I said before about just the physicality of conversation for me, especially as I'm a very physical person, when I'm talking my arms move, and my voice fluctuates and all that. But having conversations is also a stressor, right? It's also a certain activation and a stressor. So that's why I'm saying like, there's this loop that we get kind of stuck in around activation and more activation and a little less activation and more activation, but not often getting to that place of what's my baseline. What does it look like? Do I even know what it feels like in my body to feel rested? Well, I know taking like the year off after teaching and really learning how to play and experience joy and in breast there was a lot of crying. There was a lot of uncomfortableness you think like oh, you what's your problem? You got this time off and I was like, Ooh, gnashing of teeth. Like it was it was such a process. And now I feel broken. Because my system will only let me get to Sir, I was so hyper vigilant. I was a machine when I was a teacher. You know, I mean, like being a mom of three and like, just like take care of myself do I mean take care of myself when I say that? I mean like exercising when I'm actually taking care of myself. Um, but like Yeah, I think that's been my question. This year is broken and broken in like the the eyes of society in the systems like, can I ever engage in hostile culture again, to the point where I can actually get the things that I want to get because like, by system because I'm neurodivergent and midlife Can I gather, Gather ye resources I'm like, do the thing now? Because I've actually learned how to do that. Does that make sense to you? Yes. Yeah. Because I feel like when I think about that, that woman who taught me in that space, yeah, it broke me to the point where like, I had to, like, I collapse my body collapse. I had to like, this was not like, just this was like, I was having panic attacks, I mean, all kinds of stuff. And there was it was nuanced, it was layered, but at the same time, taking that time off, now that I need to, like, get into my fire, it's a little trickier. It's a little it's not as revved up. It's not as Yeah, it's, it's like feels so vanilla compared to what we used to be able to do. I think you're asking, like, is this life or is this freeze, because it's like, when I when I think about being freeze, I think like my window of tolerance, which we're not gonna get into today. We've talked about, we'll talk about it another time, because it's getting late. But it's so much my capacity is so much bigger. So my gut says, I am not in freeze, my gut says, I might have moments or like, I might have like periods, of course, because I have stressors. But like, I'm doing things to, like, move in and out of these different states. I have a lot of support in different ways to do those things. And guys still dissociate. I still don't so it's not about like this. I'm like, I'm accessing my full humanity. Okay. Well, yeah, I mean, a healthy nervous system is one that can access all the states when they're needed. Right. And so I'm thinking it's just vanilla. I think I'm much less we want you to come to this. sighs we're not advertising, but I think a little bit of what you're describing, I think is like your trauma. I think it's like, you know, someone with trauma gets through can get to a place of healing and healing feels so disorient disorienting feel so unfamiliar. It's like, what you're describing exactly that like, okay, but can I read anymore? Well, yeah, but like, you were so highly revved like, that was not good for your body, that was not good for you. That is what leads to chronic illness. That's what leads to disease, quite literally in the body. So I think it's a real shift in perspective. And in goals, really, in expectations. When I have a client come and say, I just really got to figure out how to get back to a place where I can XYZ, and they are a person with ovaries in their 40s. I'm like up, okay, here we go. We got some work to do. Because it's not about getting back to that place. It's about renegotiating the relationship with your body, with the systems around you, the people around you with yourself. And my reading now looks like I can actually show up to that social thing I want to go to that I said I was gonna go to, because I have time and capacity for it. It doesn't look like Oh, I did five social things. And I volunteered for this and I am working, you know this much. And I right like I'm, I'm not over functioning anymore. And that for me with my history feels like under functioning. Yeah, I think we're in the same spot. I think that's the bottom line of this conversation is like we're functioning. We are function. We're like reach we're finding our bait our new baseline. Yeah, we're Yeah, I mean, that's true. And it's it's strange. It is strange, but it's so good. And I had a conversation with Cory just the other day where he was really appreciating in our appreciation practice. He was which we're still doing, y'all. We're still doing it. It's been weeks. And it is like some kind of magic because it is really shifting some things for me internally, if you don't know I'm talking about listen to the last episode, because I'm not gonna explain it again. But he was appreciating that I have a real sense of my capacity. And that I know when I need to say no, and I know when I when my yes is a yes. And it made me cry. It was like to have him see that in me when I don't even know if I've really identified that for myself. Until this point, you know that this like, yeah, I I do have a sense of my limits. And that was definitely not true a year ago was an beyond word. Yes, for sure. I see that I need to and I would say true. Not a year ago or so. And it's so much better, y'all. It's so much better. So come over to the other side. Yeah. Okay. We're gonna go I know I'm sorry. This is I was gonna know, this isn't worried about This and it is so relevant with everything. Listen, I want to say this too, because we're wrapping up the year. I mean, we're not wrapping that we will probably have on the podcast by the end of in December but 2023 If you're if you if no one has said this to you was not good. Even if you think it was good. Listen, I had I had joy this year, I had some really cool things happen, like really mind blowing cool things. But they were few and far between. Most of it was full time doing the work to, to kind of really access that full humanity that we were talking about. It was a lot of work to be at baseline this year. Yeah. And so if you're feeling like, feeling it, just whatever we're with you was a lot. And, you know, I'm not gonna think about 2024 yet. I'm just gonna, like, say that right here right now. Like we're with you in that. And yeah, I feel like, I have this picture in my head of being like little and on a grassy hill and in, you know, laying like a burrito and having someone push you down in it. It's not that fun in my imagination, but that's how I'm going into 2024. So it's about right. I'm being kind of pushed into it. And I'm just like, whatever. Let's just rolling. Let's see if we can make it fun on the way in. Yeah, I'm glad we have each other. Me too. I love you. Love you too. All right, well, I guess that's how we end a lot of conversation. That's actually very fitting for the sleepy sisters. That's how we should sign up every sign up. I gotta go to bed. All right, I'll see you later. Bye.