Physiology of Anxiety, Part 2: Turning off the alarm system

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In Part 1, we talked about how our body’s response to anxiety is to activate our fight or flight response, also called the sympathetic nervous system. Demystifying this body alarm system for kids is hugely important all by itself, since uncomfortable feelings in our body that we don’t understand:

  1. Feel dangerous, even if they are safe (Why do I feel this way!? Will I die??)

  2. Feel like an emergency, even if they are not (I have to make this stop!)

  3. Feel TRUE, even if the threat is not (There must be REAL DANGER nearby, or why would I feel this way?!)

Now that we know that our body can misinterpret a situation and give us false alarm feelings, we need to teach kids how to turn off the internal alarm system.

Unfortunately, as anyone who has ever attempted to tell themselves “calm down calm down CALMDOWN” before that big presentation knows, we can’t turn off the alarm system by “talking” back to the threat evaluation system in the brain with our thoughts. That watchdog, the amygdala, is a part of our limbic system, an old-school part of the brain that does not respond to conscious thought this way.

This means that rationalization or “knowing” that something is safe is typically not effective in deactivating a child’s (or adult’s) fight or flight response. This is a trap that many parents I hang out with fall into. They tell me:

“But little Billy KNOWS that Froufrou the dog won’t bite! He has spent time with her plenty of other times, and we’ve talked about it over and over!”

Even if there is clear evidence that nothing bad will happen- the rock climbing instructor shows you the equipment is secure, there are 50 people in the rock climbing gym doing the exact same thing with no dire consequences, you have even rock climbed safely and successfully before… even all this evidence cannot get to the watchdog amygdala, who has deemed such heights unsafe. So the fire alarm is pulled- the heart still pounds, the stomach still feels queasy, the palms still sweat.

But. There is something that we can do to “talk” to the watchdog amygdala and tell it to turn off the alarm system. And it’s deceptively simple.

Breathe.

Of all the things that occur with sympathetic nervous system activation, our rate of breathing is the thing most under our conscious control. You can’t willfully slow your heartbeat or stop yourself from sweating (probably best that those things happen automatically), but you can change how you breathe.

Breathing is like a jedi mind trick for the amygdala. It convinces that watchdog, in a way that words never will, that the situation you are in is safe and that the alarm system is not needed. It says, in essence (hand wave included if you are a Star Wars fan):

“This is not the threat you are looking for.”

The key: taking breaths that are not necessarily deep, but S L O W and steady. This is called controlled breathing, and it helps activate our parasympathetic response, the “rest and digest” system and the counterpoint to fight or flight. Deep breaths can be great (lots of evidence out there on the benefits of “diaphragmatic” or abdominal breathing), but if your rate of breathing is too fast or irregular, deep breaths won’t help- no safety signal will get sent, and you may even increase anxiety (a.k.a. what happens when you hyperventilate). It’s the slow and regular breathing that can send the message to the brain’s watchdog that nothing is wrong.

Guess how many breaths a person takes when they are sleeping? Five or six per minute. That’s it. Our goal is to slow down to roughly this rate- think a 4 count in, 2 count hold, 6 count out.

So, how do we teach this to kids?

  1. Teach kids about Worried Body, the watchdog amygdala in the brain, and false alarms (see Part 1)

  2. Explain that while we can’t “talk” to the watchdog and tell him that we are safe, we can SHOW the watchdog that we are ok and that this is a false alarm by slowing our breathing down. Just like in real life if your dog barks at the mailman, explaining the situation does not work. I don’t know any talking dogs, do you? (Insert Jedi mind trick metaphor here if you have a Star Wars fan on your hands. It works, I swear!)

  3. Pick a slow breathing exercise and practice, practice, practice. Start practicing during calm moments- we want this skill to be so ingrained that when the anxious wave hits, your kid automatically slows down their breathing, no thinking required.

In part 3, I’ll share some breathing exercises that are great starter options for kids.