When Toxic Relationships Hijack Your Nervous System—And How You Take It Back
For a long time, I thought my nervous system was just “my personality.” Always tense? Normal. Jumping at loud noises? Normal. Apologizing to furniture if I bumped into it? Also… normal?
Turns out, none of that was my personality. It was survival mode wearing a disguise.
I Didn’t Know I Was Living in Survival Mode
I felt the heaviness. I felt the tightness in my chest. I felt the anxiety that could outrun a cheetah. But I didn’t know these were signs of a nervous system that had been trained by a toxic relationship. And eventually, that toxicity didn’t stay outside—it became my inner voice. I ended up in a toxic relationship with myself.
Survival Mode Has Symptoms…Who Knew?
Here’s what t I didn’t realize were red flags:
I jumped at every loud noise like I lived in a war zone
I apologized for things I didn’t even do
I over planned like it was my side hustle
I walked on eggshells…alone
I questioned my worth before I questioned the behavior around me
Not. Normal. But my nervous system thought it was.
The Turning Point
God didn’t thunder in from the sky (though that would’ve been dramatic). He whispered. He reminded me:
“You are not unsafe anymore.”
“Your trauma is not your identity.”
Relearning Safety
My healing looked like:
Breathing deeper
Grounding in nature
Speaking kindly to myself
Letting God sit with me in the messy middle
Resting without apologizing (a skill, by the way!)
Little by little, my nervous system chilled out. The internal wilderness quieted.
Here’s what I want you to know
You can retrain your nervous system. You can unlearn survival mode. You can break the patterns you never chose. And most importantly — your trauma is not who you are.
Your wilderness may look different from mine, but you’re just as capable of finding your way out. Healing isn’t one-size-fits-all.
This sky felt like the nervous system finally loosen its grip.
