Its okay I am here

Why do two people go through a similar stressful event, but one person recovers quickly while another stays activated for a long time?

At first glance, it can look confusing.

The event may look almost the same from the outside. Maybe both people were criticized. Maybe both had a conflict. Maybe both faced rejection, stress, or fear.

But the recovery is completely different.

One person feels shaken for a while and comes back to normal. The other stays anxious, tense, shut down, or emotionally affected for a long time.

Why does this happen?

Because people are not meeting the event from the same nervous system.

One person may already have more nervous system capacity, more internal safety, and a system that knows how to return to calm after stress.

Another person may already have a system that is overloaded, sensitive, and used to staying on alert.

The difference is the nervous system that is receiving the event.

To understand this better, let us take a simple childhood example.

Imagine two children are playing and both of them fall down.

The first child starts crying. The mother comes, picks up the child, holds her, and says, “It is okay. You fell down. It hurts, but you will be alright.” The child cries, the mother comforts her, and after some time the child settles. Then the mother says, “Okay, now you can go and play again. Just be careful next time.”

What does this child’s nervous system learn from that moment?

It learns that pain can happen and still be manageable. It learns that crying is okay. It learns that expressing a need is okay. It learns that support is available.

And most importantly, it learns that after stress, life can return to normal.

Now let us look at the second child.

This child also falls down. But this time, the mother is already overwhelmed by her own stress, abuse, or emotional pain. Instead of comforting the child, she comes and reacts harshly. She scolds the child, maybe even beats the child, and says, “How many times have I told you? This is what you always do. Stop crying. Shut up.”

Now the nervous system learns something very different.

It learns that pain is not safe. It learns that crying is not safe. It learns that expressing need is not safe.It learns that when something bad happens, support may not come. More danger may come instead.

So the child begins to adapt.

The child learns, “I should not take risks. I should not cry. I should not express. I should keep everything inside.”

If something like this happens only once, the system may still recover. But when it happens again and again, the nervous system starts shaping itself around that repeated experience.

It starts to assume that danger can come at any time.

Over time, the nervous system starts reacting not only to big threats, but also to smaller and smaller triggers.

A tone of voice / Silence / A delayed response / Criticism / Conflict.

From the outside, these things may look small.

But inside the body, they can feel much bigger.

This is also where the amygdala plays a role. The amygdala is the brain’s alarm system. When someone has lived through repeated stress or trauma, this alarm system can become more sensitive.

When stress hits, the alarm system in the brain reacts first. That is why you may know something logically, but your body is still reacting as if you are in danger.

That is why some people return to baseline quickly after stress, while others stay activated for hours, days, weeks, or even longer.

This is especially common in people who have lived through repeated stress or trauma  (like Narcissistic abuse )

Why?

Because the nervous system changes when survival becomes a long term pattern.

First, the brain begins to prioritize survival over comfort. Instead of asking, “Can I relax?” it starts asking, “What do I need to watch out for?” So the person becomes more alert, more guarded, and more ready for the next problem.

Second, the body gets used to stress chemicals being released often.

When adrenaline and cortisol are flowing through the system again and again, activation starts becoming easier than calming down. The body learns stress more easily than it learns safety.

Third, when emotions are repeatedly suppressed, the stress response does not get completed properly.

The body prepares for a reaction, but the person is not allowed to cry, express, fight back, or receive comfort. So that activation does not move through and settle. It stays in the system.

And when this happens for a long time, calm itself can start to feel unfamiliar. For some people, calm does not feel natural.

That is why two people can go through a similar stressful event, but recover in very different ways.

It is not only about what happened.

It is about the nervous system that is meeting what happened.

And that nervous system has been shaped by past experiences, past support, past safety, and past stress.

So if someone takes longer to come back, it does not always mean they are weak, overreacting, or too sensitive.

It may simply mean their system has learned to survive by staying activated.

In the next blog, we will understand the amygdala, the brain’s fire alarm system, and how it plays an important role in detecting danger.

Dr Dhivya Pratheepa 

Helping women attract true love