Spooky Season for the Nervous System: Demystifying the Fight, Flight, or Freeze Response
A house with one door and with nine windows lite up with light. There are three windows with no light in the roof along with two chimneys. There are trees and clouds in the background.
Spooky season is officially in full swing. Haunted houses, jump scares in scary movies, and mysterious creaks in the hallway at night are all designed to give us a sudden, heart-pounding thrill.
When we step into haunted houses, fake monsters jump out of the shadows, and we may gasp, jump, or scream. We may even hear others behind us or ahead of us scream. Seconds later, we may then laugh with our friends or family as the adrenaline washes out of your system. We know that experience is a set up meant to intentionally give us a fright and that nothing can happen to us. And yet our mind and body respond in a manner that makes it all feel real.
It’s fun when it’s entertainment. But for millions of people—especially high performers, athletes, and those navigating chronic stress or trauma—a similar "haunted house" reaction is happening inside their bodies during normal, everyday moments: during a team meeting, right before a game, or while sitting in traffic.
Understanding your nervous system's internal alarm system doesn't require a neuroscience degree. This October, let's look past the spooky season tropes and demystify what’s actually happening when your body hits fight, flight, or freeze.
The Biological "Security Guard": Your Autonomic Nervous System
Your autonomic nervous system has one primary job: keep you alive. Thank goodness for our autonomic nervous system! The ANS is a component of the peripheral nervous system and has the very important responsibility of regulating involuntary physiological processes like heart rate, blood pressure, respiration, digestion, and sexual arousal (Waxenbaum et al., 2025). Again, thank you ANS for taking care of these functions so we don’t have to consciously think about them. And like Halloween haunted houses that tend to have more than one room similarly the autonomic nervous system (ANS) has its divisions. These three divisions are the sympathetic, parasympathetic, and enteric (Waxenbaum et al., 2025). When the sympathetic nervous system (SNS) is activated we call this our fight or flight response and physiologically we feel our heart rate and blood pressure increase, our glycogenolysis is stimulated to break down stored glycogen into glucose units for energy, and our gastrointestinal system becomes more inhibited since it is not a necessary system for protecting ourselves (Waxenbaum et al., 2025).
Hang tight! Just a little bit more science before we can leave it behind. This last nugget of science grounds us in how a stress response is mediated. Our stress response happens via a rather complex interaction of the nervous, endocrine, and immune systems that activated the sympathetic-adreno-medullar (SAM) axis, the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis, and the immune system all with the purpose of readying the body to face internal and external environmental challenges that come our way (Chu et al., 2024). All of this to say that our stress response has a big responsibility and is wired in such a way that it truly has thought of as much as possible to ensure our survival. All of this happens without us having to think about it! While the stress response does serve its purpose, when the response is left running because of chronic stress it wears on us.
Survival States In Real Life
The sympathetic system is called the fight or flight response, but we often lump in the freeze response. However the freeze response is associated with the parasympathetic nervous system (PNS) (Roelofs, 2017). Also part of the autonomic nervous system, the PNS predominates in a quiet “rest and digest” state lowering the heart rate and helping the body relax (Tindle & Tadi, 2022). And remember both the parasympathetic and sympathetic nervous system as part of the ANS are covered in Porges (2022) Polyvagal Theory about how different circuits are recruited based on context. Adding this knowledge, helps prepare us for breaking down the three different responses that we frequently hear about and what they might look like when we experience a frightful or stressful situation:
1. The "Fight" Response (The Haunted Monster)
What the body thinks: "I am in danger, but I can overpower this threat if I attack."
The Physiology: Your heart races, blood rushes to your major muscle groups, your jaw clenches, and your eyes narrow.
How it might look in daily life: It’s not just physical fighting. In work, sports, or relationships, a fight response shows up as sudden irritability, defensive arguing, perfectionist control, or explosive frustration over minor inconveniences.
2. The "Flight" Response (Running from the Slasher Movie)
What the body thinks: "I am in danger, and I need to run away to survive."
The Physiology: Adrenaline surges, your breathing becomes rapid and shallow, your digestive system shuts down, and your legs feel restless or jittery as they get ready to move.
How it might look in daily life: Chronic anxiety, racing thoughts, panic attacks, workaholism, or an overwhelming urge to leave uncomfortable conversations or back out of high-stakes commitments at the last minute.
3. The "Freeze" Response (Playing Dead in the Dark)
What the body thinks: "The threat is too overwhelming to fight or run from. I must freeze and play dead to survive."
The Physiology: Your heart rate drops, your body temperature cools, your muscles feel heavy or leaden, and your brain releases natural opioids to numb physical and emotional pain.
How it might look in daily life: "Functional freeze"—feeling emotionally numb, brain fog, procrastinating on basic tasks, staring at a screen for hours unable to start, or feeling completely disconnected from your physical body.
Something to note is that there is now talk of another “F” to go along Fight, Flight, and Freeze. It is known as Fawn. This post is not going to dive into this response for simplicity sake, but does acknowledge that there is research that supports Fawning as a survival mechanism.
Why Your System Gets "Stuck" in Spooky Mode
In a healthy system, a stress response is temporary. The monster jumps out, we react, the threat passes, and our bodies return to baseline safety. This is what is called acute stress where we experience short-term physical and emotional reactions to a real or imagined threat (Russell & Lightman, 2019).
However, when we experience prolonged stress, athletic burnout, or unprocessed trauma, our nervous system's threat detector gets miscalibrated. It stops realizing that the "monster" was just a prop. We end up living in a perpetual haunted house—where a simple email notification triggers the physiological equivalent of a jump scare, or a tough workout pushes you straight into a shutdown freeze, for example.
3 Somatic Tools to "Turn Off the Haunted House"
When you notice your body jumping into fight, flight, or freeze, you cannot easily logically argue yourself out of it. You have to speak to your nervous system in its native language: somatic signals of physical safety.
1. For Fight Energy: Complete the Physical Cycle
If your body is surging with frustration or anger, trying to sit completely still will only increase internal pressure.
The Practice: Give that energy a safe, physical outlet. Press your palms firmly against a wall and push as hard as you can for 10 seconds, or squeeze a stress ball tightly while exhaling forcefully through pursed lips.
2. For Flight Energy: Extend the Exhale
When anxiety has your heart racing, your breathing becomes quick and shallow, signaling to your brain that the monster is chasing you.
The Practice: Practice "double-exhale" breathing. Take a slow inhale through your nose for a count of 4, then exhale slowly through your mouth for a count of 7 or 8. Longer exhalations stimulate the vagus nerve, slowing your heart rate.
3. For Freeze Energy: Micro-Movement and Temperature
When you are numb or stuck, asking yourself to execute a massive task is impossible. Focus on bringing gentle awareness back to the senses.
The Practice: Splash cool water on your face, touch a textured object near you, or simply wiggle your toes and fingers. Small physical movements tell your nervous system: "The freeze is over; we are moving again."
Please note: The somatic concepts, exercises, and insights shared in this post are intended for educational purposes and personal self-exploration only. They do not constitute therapy or medical advice. Please listen to your body and consult with a licensed mental health professional or medical practitioner for individualized support.
The next time your heart leaps into your throat or you feel completely paralyzed by a simple task, stop and take a breath.
Your nervous system isn't trying to sabotage your performance or ruin your day. It’s simply an overprotective survival system trying to keep you alive by doing its job. When you learn to listen to its signals with curiosity instead of frustration, you can step out of the haunted house and back into felt safety.
take action today moment:
There has been so much written about the sympathetic nervous system. And it is probably pretty safe to say that we all know what the fight or flight response feels like within our own experiences. Take some time to really get to know your own responses. Many of us favor one of the three reactions. Which one do you naturally favor or is your go to? Challenge yourself to really get familiar with your reactions so that you can identify the best calming strategies for when you need them. Use the example exercises above as a place to start if they speak to you!
Learn More About Fight, Flight, or Freeze Response:
What Is the Fight, Flight, Freeze or Fawn Response?
Understanding the stress response
What Does Fight, Flight, Freeze, Fawn Mean?
References
Chu, B., Marwaha, K., Sanvictores, T., et al. Physiology, Stress Reaction. [Updated 2024 May 7]. In: StatPearls [Internet]. Treasure Island (FL): StatPearls Publishing; 2026 Jan-. Available from: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK541120/
Porges, S. W. (2022). Polyvagal theory: A science of safety. Frontiers in Integrative Neuroscience, 16, 871227. https://doi.org/10.3389/fnint.2022.871227
Roelofs K. (2017). Freeze for action: Neurobiological mechanisms in animal and human freezing. Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological Sciences, 372(1718), 20160206. https://doi.org/10.1098/rstb.2016.0206
Russell, G., & Lightman, S. (2019). The human stress response. Nature Reviews Endocrinology, 15(9), 525-534.
Tindle, J., & Tadi, P. Neuroanatomy, Parasympathetic Nervous System. [Updated 2022 Oct 31]. In: StatPearls [Internet]. Treasure Island (FL): StatPearls Publishing; 2026 Jan-. Available from: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK553141/
Waxenbaum, JA., Reddy, V., Das, JM. Anatomy, Autonomic Nervous System. [Updated 2025 Dec 1]. In: StatPearls [Internet]. Treasure Island (FL): StatPearls Publishing; 2026 Jan-. Available from: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK539845/