Did I turn off my emotions just to survive?
Survival mode-Ask Liza Express Answers
Yes. Emotional shutdown is one of the body’s most sophisticated survival strategies. When you experience trauma—especially prolonged or childhood trauma—feeling becomes unsafe. Your brain learns that emotional pain is too overwhelming to process, so it dulls your emotional capacity for the sake of survival.
This is not weakness; it’s intelligence. Your mind protected you when no one else did. It wrapped your emotions in a blanket and hid them away so you could keep functioning. In trauma psychology, this is called emotional numbing, a hallmark of survival mode.
In survival mode, the goal isn’t joy—it’s endurance. The nervous system prioritizes safety over connection, stability over vulnerability, and selfpreservation over feeling. That’s why your emotions may feel muted even now. Your body doesn’t realize the danger is over.
But survival mode is not meant to be permanent. You can transition from surviving to living by slowly reconnecting to your emotional self. This happens through safe relationships, traumainformed care, grounding exercises, and spaces where vulnerability is responded to with care rather than harm.
You didn’t lose your emotions—you buried them to stay alive. Healing is the slow and gentle process of letting them come home.
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