Fight or flight sense

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I've gotten into a lot of fights at school over the past few years and have been suspended because of them. Sometimes, my reasoning for them is good, sometimes not. My consuelor said it was because of my fight/flight sense.

What does that mean?

The "fight or flight" response is a term given to the effects of the release of adrenaline in the body, when a person feels fear or even stress in a situation. Adrenaline gets released in order to get you ready to either get away from the perceived threat as fast as possible -- even gearing up the muscles to perform better in that task, if physically performed -- or to stand your ground and confront the threat with enough aggression to win the battle if necessary.

It's one of the tools our brains and bodies still have from literally "caveman" days when we had to deal with physical threat in the form of attack from both fellow humans and wild animals. Trouble is, we now have this response in reaction to more mental and emotional stress factors such as arguments with other people, and other modern stressors.

Maybe your counselor means that you tend to experience your school environment and the people you deal with there as stressful enough to trigger adrenaline, and your response is to become combative as a defence mechanism?

.

I go into fight/ flight mode a lot. Increase adrenalin and it makes me go to a point where I can't think, brain shuts down, have a hard time talking and express my thoughts more than normal. It happens pretty often but happened more often when I was around lots of people, and there was bright lights and load noises. I have been put on a beta-blocker to decrease adrenaline and seems to be helping still anxious but not going into fight flight mode as much. Flight is more common then fight. There's also a freeze response I've done that before to and it's a horrible feeling because all this pent up adrenaline and no way to release it, and stimming tends to happen then or other behaviours such as self harm, eating disorder, substance use, because I hate the pressure it feels like, it literally feels like my heart is going to explode but it doesn't, its scary and I hate that sensation so much.

I love the adrenaline what I get with the fight or flight thingy.

It makes me feel very alive.
Although it does arrive at weird times sometimes.
Ba dum chish.




(Explanation of bad pun)
I used times and then sometimes
Now it isn't funny.

Explaining a joke is a lot like dissecting a frog,
you understand it after,
but both the joke and the frog are dead.

Adrenaline is good if you are actually going to fight or flight but it's when you get a freeze response and you can't find a way to release the adrenalin that it causes problems at least for me. Imagine all that built up adrenalin you are using to fight someone or run away but the inability to do either of those and no way to release it, I hate it, I have been known to self harm in order to release that energy that is build up because it's so uncomfortable.

I think many of my anxious reactions could be described as fight or flight. Just because something unexpected happened or someone said the wrong thing I will become very stressed and globally unable to communicate. I usually do not actually fight or flight (although I have a strong urge to flee) but I remain very still and tense, and most significantly I remain focused on the present moment and can't think about anything else. That is what makes me describe it as "fight or flight" like.

Maybe some betablockers could help me, I never thought of that. I should discuss it with my doctor.

Oh yea it is possible to switch in between fight flight and freeze. Like it's originally used for a survival method. Let say a person runs into a tiger the adrenaline rush will give him the power to either fight or flight to get out of the situation. Some situations call for freezing, playing dead, for example if you are being attacked by a bear it is safer I think to freeze then to try to run or fight. Also in a traumatic experience, say someone is being abused , they may freeze at the moment because it's a way of protecting themselves because they are afraid of what will happen if they try to run away or fight back. Lets say someone is freezing out of fear but than there abuser goes to the bathroom then it could switch into flight mode and the person tries to get out of the situation as fast as possible.

Now having said that a lot of times are fight, flight, freeze happens in non dangerous situations, say when we are in a social situation, but it is triggering the part the brain that is used for survival, but it is over activated in situations that are not dangerous but it feels like it is dangerous, ie. panic attack= feels like your going to die. If the adrenaline builds up and say you are in the freeze state you will want to find a way to release it because you body at that point is preparing yourself to either fight or flight. So if the opportunity arises to do either of those you will likely take it. A lot of times the freeze response can be a way to stay safe until the ability to fight or flight arrives.