“Trust Your Gut”, and Why That Doesn’t Work as Concrete Advice for Trauma Survivors
The phrase, “Just trust your gut”, is overused in my opinion when it comes to working with survivors of trauma. Frequently, abuse survivors develop heightened nervous systems which actually impact the accuracy of their gut reactions. Abuse can cause gut reactions to often be an either over or under reactive response to years of harm. This is a coping mechanism activated by the nervous system to help humans survive a once dangerous situation/s.
When we grow up with chronic abuse and trauma, our nervous system will cope in one of two ways (or both). The first, is that it will shift into fight or flight mode. There is a lot of recent talk about “fawning”. It should be noted that fawning, is not a nervous system response but a learned behaviour coping mechanism used to avoid conflict to seek safety. In fight or flight, our nervous system is in control of our emotions and actions. The frontal lobe, the thinking and processing part of the brain, becomes less active as the more primal limbic system takes over. The heart rate increases to send more blood to the arms and legs, eye sight, hearing and sense of smell become intensified and one begins to see everything and every one through the lens of potential harm. The digestive system isn’t prioritized, as well as, sleep. When in fight or flight, the body is redirecting capacity to survival, not to eating and digesting food. In addition, the nervous system recognizes we are at a higher risk of harm during sleep. If we do not feel safe in our space, deep and restful sleep is probably not going to come easily, if at all. The “gut” response, that anxious feeling of “Something isn’t right” kicks into high gear. This is actually the nervous system responding to perceived threat and keeping us alive and as out of danger as possible.
If a person cannot escape threat or abuse after a prolonged period of time, the nervous system may shift into “shut down” or “dorsal” mode. This means that the nervous system’s only priority is to disconnect as much as possible from the harm (disassociation) and keep the body breathing and “alive”. This often feels like a depressive episode or is often described as “living in a dream” for survivors. The body is conserving any energy it has and completely withdraws from other humans and activity.
Our bodies and nervous systems are not meant to live in fight/flight or shut down for a prolonged amount of time. This system of survival is in place to protect us from danger in short spurts. For example, we are living thousands of years ago, hunting for food. A predator comes and chases us. Our fight/flight system kicks in and we either fight off the threat or escape it. We then return to safety and back to a regulated and secure state.
When we experience chronic and developmental, not a single event trauma, our nervous system begins to shift into a hyper vigilant state more permanently. This means that the body begins to understand fight/flight as the normative state, which means, they are often on the lookout for danger even when none is present. For example, survivors of abuse may respond intensely to loud noises, people walking close to them or unexpected touch with a similar response to how they responded while living in abuse. This may be despite the fact that there is no actual danger present.
Therefore, this is the same with “gut responses”. When we grow up with a hyperactive nervous system, we need to acknowledge that this has impacted our nervous systems response to perceived danger. This also means that our brain and nervous system may unintentionally be confusing stimuli similar in life to real danger. For example, people yelling at each other in a park increasing your irritation and heart rate because yelling often led to the following act of physical abuse.
When we come from trauma, our gut is important and can absolutely provide us with helpful information. However, it is also necessary to balance that gut reaction with facts and non-emotion led information. Sometimes, in solely following our gut reactions, we may actually be confirming misinterpreted signals by our nervous systems and continue a trauma cycle for ourselves that is no longer present.
Next time your gut has a strong response to a situation, try to pause and ask yourself what tangible proof is present to confirm the danger signals your body is giving off. At first, this will probably not be possible to do in the moment. It will probably occur after the situation and response have passed. However, with time and dedicated practice (and a trained therapist), you will be able to notice your body response, understand why it is happening and fact check that it is the appropriate response.
For more information and knowledge on this topic, I highly recommend the book The Polyvagal Theory by Deb Dana.