Freeze

August 24, 2022

Here’s the “cute” trauma triplet no one ever talks about.  There’s Fight or Flight, which everyone knows.  But no one ever talks about Freeze.  Freeze goes largely unacknowledged and un-talked about.  Freeze appears when trauma has been so long-standing that Fight and Flight both got bored and wandered on to more immediate pursuits.

Freeze watches as “yes” turns to “no” but cringes in the corner and says nothing at all.

Freeze smiles demurely while everything inside her screeches “STOP!!!”

Freeze grins in photos when she wants to run away.

Freeze holds hands and kisses while everything inside her recoils and constricts.

Freeze nods and smiles and says “yes, fine, all good” when she wants to spit and curse.

Freeze participates in sex when she wants to vomit.  No, not lays passively and allows it to happen to her.  She will mount, sit astride, and actively participate.  Because if she can make “it” happen, “it” will finally be over so she can escape and find somewhere to silently cry or scream.

Freeze lies very, very still while being held, because any movement at all might be interpreted as an invitation for it to all begin again.

Freeze is silent horror.

Freeze is shame.

Freeze is self-blame and self-loathing and self-hatred.

And here’s the even cuter part about Freeze.  When she’s been active for just this much too long, she finally finds her lungs and shrieks for attention.  But it’s largely too late by then.  Anyone who might have heard her saw the “happy” photos and the hand-holding and the kissing and believes that she has been just fine this whole time and is suddenly having a spontaneous, uninstigated temper tantrum “like a girl.”  

And here’s the uglier part about Freeze.  When she’s been left in charge for extended periods of time, after finally being moved away from the trauma, big brother Fight finally, mercifully takes charge.  Mind you, he didn’t come in while any of the trauma was actually happening.  But now that it’s finally over, Fight takes over.  Now, walking down a perfectly benign street in a perfectly well-lit nowhere anywhere, Fight will take on you, your dog, and your baby in its carriage; just come an inch closer, motherfucker.  Do NOT smile at me; I will murder your family in their sleep.  Fight closes his fist around the heart that’s been battering itself, in panic mode, trying to escape, and squeezes. 

Fight reminds Freeze that she’s the very weak, insecure, stupid younger sibling who let bad things happen.  But Fight is here now, and that means anyone and everyone around will pay.  He is late to the party, and it’s all too late, and destruction has been the name of life for a long time.  But that part does not matter.  Because just as Freeze cowered in the face of the active trauma, now Freeze cowers in the face of her brother Fight, as he takes over and antagonistically shakes his fist at everyone and everything in the vicinity.  Which, of course, only serves to scare Freeze a little more.  Because now that she’s clear of the trauma, she’d like to make friends with safe people.  She really would.  But Fight stands guard growling and snarling like the protective big brother he should have been when she was in peril. 

And Flight, oh, Flight is here as well, wagging her finger of blame into the mix, piling onto the self-loathing.  You could have just run away.  Why don’t you ever just run away?  Who just sits there and grins like an idiot and takes it?  What is wrong with you?

And the next time she is faced with a circumstance she wants to walk away from, instead of saying “no” and walking away, she will cringe, laryngitis will take her yet again, and she will allow the same fear to freeze her in place.  

This is trauma.  This is fear.  This is watching the voice you finally find from amidst the trauma be dashed against the rocks, laughed at, ridiculed, questioned, reviled, dismissed, forgotten.  This is being reminded you didn’t say it at the right time or loud enough or with feeling.  This is “just be nice.”  This is “I thought you were kidding.”  This is “but you were into it.”  This is “but I never hit you.”  This is “I was only teasing.”  This is every emotional abuser’s byproduct.  The echoes and ripples are endless.