Trauma Responses to Local Mass Shootings

The recent school shooting Uvalde and the hospital shooting today in Tulsa have touched many of us. These events are not just “news” when they happen nearby, when there are people we know who have been hurt or even killed, when our children see familiar faces and places on television in the middle of crisis. Big feelings in response are normal, healthy, and absolutely valid. Let’s look a little bit at how this impacts our brain so that we can better understand how to care for ourselves and those around us.

Higher and Lower Brain

In neuroscience, it’s the “mammal brain”, or higher brain, that turns you toward your caregivers when you are in danger. This is the pull toward “home”, whether it is your own parents or chosen family. This is why children - whether ours or those we teach or love - turn towards us for learning how to handle a crisis, how to regulate our emotions, and how to feel about all that is going on in the world around us. That’s why we start texting each other, calling each other, going near the crisis to try to be together…. because we are designed that way, to “herd” together when there is danger, to connect with others for safety and stabilization. We literally, biologically and neurologically, need each other to survive.

It is the “reptile brain”, or lower brain, that tells us to run from danger. That’s why we run when we are afraid. That’s why we stop sharing our feelings when we don’t know how others will respond to us. That’s why we don’t talk about hard things when we don’t feel safe. That’s what cringes inside us when we hear stories of people being exposed, getting sick, or so many people dying.

There are times in life when the brain gets both signals at once, causing a conflict that makes it feel impossible to respond. For example, in a shooting, both wanting to run away from danger but also stay close to others who need help. Or not being able to tolerate the stories coming in on the news or social media, but also not being able to turn it off.

All of this is a natural response to trauma - and especially those who were on site of the shooting, even if they were not themselves directly harmed. Trauma is not just when you get hurt physically, but when external situations leave no way to get out of what is causing danger, but also no protection from that danger. This includes every single person who experienced nearby lockdown or on campus even if they were not ultimately in direct danger. They still experienced the same danger.

The Polyvagal Nerve

To make things even more challenging, your brain itself doesn’t actually perceive context. It just knows signals it receives from your body and the chemicals rushing through your body. So sometimes even the experience of this dynamic, either relationally (with others) or only the perception of danger, is enough to tell your brain that you are in danger and initiate a trauma response.

When your brain gets the signal that you are in danger, one of the things it does is send a message to the vegus nerve, which goes from your brain to all your major organs (heart, lungs, etc.). Because it branches off along the way, it is called the “polyvagal nerve”. This is what prepares your body to respond to danger.

When your trauma response is activated, the polyvagal nerve presses down on your organs so that you are ready to respond to danger. You can’t detect danger and then decide to respond and then tell your body to get ready for it. For survival, your body has to already be ready to respond to danger as soon as it is detected.

When you are not in danger, it means you are feeling safe and you others around you also feel safe. Your brain knows this through tone of voice, content and rhythm and pacing of conversation, and facial expressions. Your body matches these as part of safe mode: your affect is brighter, and your voice is modulated (goes up and down in pitch), and so you feel calm and good and happy.

Flight, Fight, and Freeze

But when you feel there is some danger, or your body senses it, then the nerve is activated against your organs, so as to prepare your body to respond to that danger.  Your body doesn't have to be in actual danger - it might just be perceived danger - even just another person's facial expressions or tone of voice can be perceived as danger.  Then your own facial expression goes flat, and your voice goes more monotone, and your heart and lungs are pumping in preparation for "flight".   This often is where panic attacks happen.

If you aren't able to feel safe again quickly, and you still feel in danger, then your body thinks now your life is being threatened (whether it is or not), and you drop down another stage into "fight".   Because you couldn't get away from the situation, now your body wants to fight.  This is when verbal aggression increases, or you feel then tightness in your arms and legs instead of just your chest.

When you can't win at fighting, even if it's just with someone who argues better or differently than you do - even if that's not oppressive or even abusive - then your body goes into shutdown mode, or “freeze”.  Your mind goes blank.  You basically dissociate.  You don't respond to anything.

Falling down that "ladder" - from safety to flight to fight to shutdown - always happens in that order, though some stages may happen more quickly than others for some people.    And to get back to safety, you have to go back up the ladder in the same order you came down - so back up to fight (being willing to confront a situation or something you were avoiding or something you need to try or do differently) and then up to flight (getting away from what isn't healthy, what isn't safe, what patterns are not positive or beneficial for you) until you get back up to safety.

When there is a mass shooting in our community, we as individuals (and as communities) are experiencing a trauma, collectively. There is no way you can actively “fight” the actual danger itself, and there is no way to get away from the experience of the danger (“flight”). It impacts us in every area of our lives, and it impacts all of the people around us. No one is “safe”, and everyone around us is also responding to the same experience. Our brain literally steps down into the “freeze” response.

It is important to remember that all of your feelings are valid as you experience this, and as you feel the impact of it in many ways.  Everything you feel is okay, and all of your feelings are normal. It makes sense why you are responding the way that you are.

In the days and weeks and months following the experience, you may notice shifts in these trauma responses.

You may feel more tired, slow, or less motivated while in the “freeze” response. It may be difficult to focus, pay attention to others, or complete tasks. You may be hypervigilant in other ways, like staring at patterns of tile in the bathroom or at light dancing on leaves outside. You may struggle to focus on conversation, tolerate the noise of children, or stick to any kind of routine. You may feel pulled down by gravity, struggle to smile, or forget to laugh. Time may get slippery, the days blur together, and hours disappear. You may feel less real, or like you are watching yourself, or like the world around you is unbelievable.

The word for all of this is “dissociation”, which is a continuum of the “freeze” response.

You may also experience some grief responses for your loss of normalcy, the loss of your routine, and especially loss of contact with friends. You may also miss the ease with which things were accessible while still taken for granted. You may crave the earlier stability you experienced from your work or other routines. You may feel at a loss without the validation that you are busy enough, doing enough, or productive enough.

But you are enough.

What you are experiencing is a trauma response: flight, fight, or freeze.

That "fight" could look like anything from irritability to an increase in bickering with children or arguing with adults to actual aggression.   "Flight" could look like avoidance behaviors, such as scrolling on social media for hours at a time, eating too much of unhealthy foods instead of keeping things balanced,  too much screen time instead of using some of the time to organize or clean while you have the chance, isolating in your bed instead of interacting with others who live with you, or disengaging from family and friends instead of finding creative ways to connect.  

"Freeze", then, could look like staying under the covers instead of being able to get up for your day, feeling sleepy or lethargic, staring into space for long periods, or needing extra sleep, or being overwhelmed with tasks as you try to work from home, or if you are still having to "go" to work, or if you are having to   help children learn from home.

Fawning, Following, Fortifying, and Fabricating

There are others as well, which may be more your style, besides just the common fight, flight, or freeze:

“Fawning” is when we try hard to be very good, so that we are not caught or blend in or fly under the radar. This is a very common way for children with relational trauma to behave so as not to upset the parent. It also happens frequently in domestic violence situations. After a shooting, this could like stuffing feelings instead of expressing them, avoiding triggers of what reminds you of the shooting, or volunteering so much to help that you are caring for others instead of caring for yourself.

“Following” is what happens when you go along with things despite the danger. In abuse situations, it looks like doing what the abuser says to do in hopes that joining with them will keep you safe. After a shooting, that looks like blaming others for the shooter’s decisions if that is what the “crowd” is doing, or over-idealizing with the shooter or the shooter’s ideology.

“Fortifying” is when we make our “walls” higher and stronger to defend ourselves better than before. In abuse survivors, this may look like disruption in relationships or increase in dissociative symptoms, and it can look like social disconnect instead of social distance. After a shooting, that could look like aggression or defensive tactics - literally or emotionally - that make you feel stronger without actually addressing the underlying emotional needs.

“Fabricating” is when the story is changed so it’s not scary. This is a kind of denial more than it is an attempt to actually deceive, though deception is what happens by default. In abuse situations, this could look like a child making up happy stories about their parents. In domestic violence experiences, it is telling yourself someone loves you despite the pattern of them hurting you. After a shooting, it shows up when safety recommendations to prevent such trauma are dismissed or downplayed.

None of these are "bad" or "wrong".   They are trauma responses.  Your brain is literally trying to catch up the processing of what is happening to you.  Remember that your brain does not know context.   It only knows the signals it receives and the chemicals flowing through, which right now is a lot of stress information.  Your brain may interpret that as "danger", without understanding you are doing everything you can to be safe and to continue functioning.

Feeling and Facilitating

Feel all there is to feel. Let it come up. Notice it. Acknowledge it.

But then let it go.

You have the power to choose your response.

All of your feelings are valid, but your feelings are not reality. They only give you information about what is happening in reality. Receive the information, but then empower yourself to choose your response. An example of this is receiving a home delivery: the delivery person is your emotions bringing a package of information. You accept the information, but let the delivery person go on for the next delivery. It’s okay to let your feelings come up, and notice them, and sit with them, and learn from them.

This brings us to “Facilitating”, which is a way of coping that empowers yourself for positive change and healing, even if in little ways. This almost always happens in connections with others, through attunement experiences where your emotional needs are noticed, reflected and met by safe people around you. Any step towards this counts, whether it is telling the truth about abuse (they are not your secrets to have to keep), or unsubscribing from the toxic issues of others, or not taking the bait in negative thoughts in yourself or negative interactions with others.

Be gentle with yourself.  Give yourself breaks.  Let your body rest.   You may literally be exhausted from the trauma response happening in your body, even if you are not sick at all.

Connect with others in the ways you can.  Be both safe and creative in how you do. But do it.

Do deep, slow breathing periodically to help that polyvagal nerve come off your organs and remind your brain that you are safe.  Regular practice of progressive muscle relaxation would also help reinforce those signals to your brain, so that it knows you are safe and aware of the situation.  These very simple things that almost seem too silly make a huge difference for your brain.

Find ways to laugh and smile.  You have to do it intentionally until your brain knows you are safe. But the more you smile and brighten your affect, the safer people around you will also feel. Then they will start smiling, too, and feel better themselves, which also helps you feel better as your brain notices that. Smiling makes a physiological difference, I promise.

It makes sense you feel like you have fallen down a ladder, because you have.

But you also still have the power to climb back up again.

Talking with Children

Caring for yourself will help you care for others. For those caring for children, specifically, here are 10 tips for talking to your children about tragedy:

Start where they are

What your children understand about what has happened will depend on their proximity to the event, exposure to news media covering the event, and the responses of the adults around them. One mom kept it at her child's level by asking her son directly what he had heard about a school shooting, and talked with him about just these things and answered only his specific questions.

Gauge your own response

Usually, if the parent stays calm then the children will also stay calm. If the parent identifies specific coping skills, the children will use them as well. A father modeled emotional expression for his son by crying after a fire destroyed a nearby home, but also finding ways to volunteer.

Acknowledge fears, but counter them

Children may worry that a shooter will come to their school, too, or jump every time there is lightning because it might mean another tornado. Verbalize those fears, but also counter them with facts. One father pointed out that school shootings are rare, and another father reminded his children that not every thunderstorm brings a tornado.

Process with other adults

Before talking to your children, process your own emotional response with other adults. If you were more directly affected, modeling healthy grieving and mourning together is appropriate and healthy. One group of moms met for breakfast every week after a school shooting, working to keep their emotional needs separate from the emotional needs of their children.

Reassure safety

Talk about safety in a neutral way or even fun way. One grandmother role played with younger children, making safety planning fun and giving them practice without making it frightening. The older children helped brainstorm escape routes, ways to call for help, and safety items needed for a storm.

Follow the child’s pace

One mom let her children express themselves as they always have: playing outside, artwork, music, or games. Family dinners foster moments for good communication, and long walks or hikes give time and space for children to bring up issues they want to share. Physical movement and creative expression are excellent ways for children to process trauma, both emotionally and physiologically.

Normalize

Maintaining structure and routine as much as possible will help children feel safe and comfortable. Helping children maintain function will empower them to express their own emotions, process their own responses, and cope with the layers of feelings and thoughts they have as the world around them changes. One couple realized that funerals usually follow the death of a loved one, so took their children with them to a funeral as a normal part of mourning. This helped the children participate in their own grieving process.

Watch for regression, but don’t expect it

Children struggling with anxiety or overwhelming emotions often regress in developmental areas. They may begin bedwetting again, or lose their toilet training, or becoming clingy to parents. They may want to sleep with siblings or in the parents’ bed or need the nightlight like they did years ago. These are signs the child needs more help and opportunity to express her emotional response, and increased structure and normalized routine may also help. Some changes in eating and sleeping patterns, concentration levels, and topic of conversation is expected and will settle down over time.

Turn off the media

It is one thing to watch the news to know the path of a storm or prepare appropriately for shelter; it’s another thing to constantly stare at repeated images of the aftermath. A single mom watched the media carefully so her family could be prepared, but after obtaining the information she needed, turned on a movie and made popcorn. This way her children were well-informed and calmly prepared, rather than in crisis and anxious.

Respond actively

Finding ways to help with cleanup efforts after a natural disaster may help children feel powerful and in control, making a positive contribution to their community. Delivering flowers or stuffed animals to local children affected by a school shooting helps children not involved in the tragedy find a way to respond directly to what they witnessed. Writing a note to a child displaced because of a tragedy is a way to be a friend. Volunteering at a local agency or for a church service project can help people far away from the tragedy still contribute something positive.

Children look to us for safety, comfort, and modeling of healthy emotional expression. Talking with them about tragedies and teaching them how to cope is a vital part of raising them well. Helping each other is a part of mourning together, and we grieve because we loved so much.