How Safe Is It For You to Feel Your Emotions Around Your Partner?
I can't look you in the eye.
My worldview narrows.
I can't feel my body or anything in it.
My brain begins to shut down high-level functioning.
I feel like I'm floating and not attached to anything.
This state of hypoarousal I describe several times in the memoir I'm writing about the year that changed my life and transformed my sex, love, and relationship.
Beyond the typical fight, flight, or freeze stress cycle, a state of hypoarousal or hyperarousal is an extreme reaction from trauma.
For example, hyperarousal activates the sympathetic nervous system so you feel a lot of physical energy, high emotions, and a low ability to regulate and calm yourself.
With hypoarousal the parasympathetic system is blunted, and you experience low energy, low-level emotions, and low access to cognitive functioning.
In this week's episode of the Epic Couples Podcast, Permission to Feel Your Emotions, Shaun and I share our experiences with these states and more.
Shaun says, “You’re not going to fix it. It's almost like you invite them into coming into balance.”
Hear me say, “When I actually honor how I feel and what I want to do as opposed to fighting it, feeling guilty about it, judging myself around it…it passes so naturally.”
Through our conversation consider whether you talk over your partner, attempt to fix them, or tell them how they’re wrong as opposed to holding space for them to feel and figure things out on their own.
Begin to look at your own patterns of reaction around emotional expression while being curious about how you can support your partner in deep healing.
Giving you permission to be and feel whatever you need in any given moment,
Daniela
P.S. Recognizing the signs of hypoarousal and hyperarousal in yourself and your partner sometimes isn't enough.
You can email me for a free 90-minute introductory session with me for additional support and experiencing deep healing with your relationship or schedule one here.
