Stress Cycle Completion
Heal your burnout, grow your resilience
Have you ever felt like you were on the verge of tears all day, then you finally make it home, barely make it into your closet and sob? Just me? Or, just absolutely lost your shit on your family or on the traffic around you and then ugly cried all the way home? Ever watch one of your darling children lose their ever-loving mind, then sob, then get hysterical with laughter? If after any of the above tantrum situations, the person then breathes out a massive sigh of relief and is able to move on in a better mood then they’ve been in all day, you have likely witnessed a stress cycle completion.
There are a few myths to bust before we explore this further.
You are not witnessing bipolar disorder in the making.
You/they are not being manipulative or “dramatic”.
This is not demon possession or Dr. Jekyll/Mr. Hyde shit.
What you experienced or witnessed was a pressure release from a build up of stress. It might be one of my favorite tools to educate people on because I see it having such a profound effect on a family’s ability to stay connected in high stress and bounce back after a set of relentless challenges.
Emily Nagoski (PhD) is the author of Come as You Are: The Surprising New Science That Will Transform Your Sex Life advertised as “An essential exploration of why and how women's sexuality works—based on groundbreaking research and brain science—that will radically transform your sex life”. As a family therapist that often works to support the intimate lives of prenatal, postpartum mamas as well as couples in every stage of life, this book is an absolute necessity. Within this fantastic resource is a chapter on stress cycle completion, and I’m so grateful that Emily Nagoski and her sister Amelia Nagoski (DMA) then co-wrote an ENTIRE book on this topic. Yay!
This book, Burnout: The Secret to Unlocking the Stress Cycle summarized as “why rest, human connection, and befriending your inner critic are keys to recovering from and preventing burnout” is an incredible tool for all humans in the modern world of chronic stress.
Here is the premise, stress is physiological process in response to our environment that releases stress hormones. Stressor are experiences and interactions that alert the stress process in our body. Stressors are often chronic, so we get stuck with all that “upset juice” coursing through our veins. Imagine a bottle-necked traffic jam of adrenaline and cortisol. Non-human mammals involuntarily push these stress hormones through as soon as their environment is safe again. Just do an online search for “stress shake gazelle” and you’ll see that first the animal goes limp, which is the freeze option of fight, flight, freeze, triangle or fawn list. Then, the predator runs off and the gazelle trembles all over, literally shaking off the stress.
No PTSD for that gazelle!
Unfortunately, most of the time humans do not do this involuntarily so we have to manually pursue this shaking off process. You may not love to hear this, because I swear nowadays the answer to every malady is this same answer, but to manually reset the nervous system there’s one tool that tops the list. It’s exercise. Intense physical movement is incredibly effective, particularly HIIT (high intensity interval training), toward the goal of reliably completing a stress cycle.
I encourage each person to discover their unique cocktail to get to their gushing sigh of relief. Mine is 25 minutes of intermittent sprints on my indoor bike followed by turning on my “that always makes me cry” music while I get into child’s pose on my mat in my garage.
The sweat and tears just flow and then I feel like a brand new person.
Doing something highly strenuous that gets your heart pounding (lunges, speed walking, rucking, squats, spin class, boxing with a heavy bag) will be your shortest path there, and I recommend giving yourself a nudge in the direction of emotional release as well. Primal screaming into pillows/towels, sobbing, dance party cranked all the way up all really clean out the bottle-necked stress hormones. I know it sounds wild, and I guess it actually is exactly that, primitive. It happens to also be oh-so-helpful to showing up with grounded, joyful, playful, content energy with your family.
Here’s a caveat for those that deeply detest movement based recommendations for stress relief, there are some other methods of completing a stress cycle. Go down this list and see where you find your sigh of relief. Deep slow breathing, positive social interaction, belly laughter, playful affection, dance parties, cathartic crying, and creative self-expression are all tools the Nagoski sisters mention.
How to Pop the Bubble with your kiddos
Let’s discuss how to apply this to parenting. Consider this option if you are ever in the middle of what I call a “Rolling Tantrum” kind of day, which is a day where your kiddo cannot keep their feelings settled for any period of time before turning back into a puddle. It’s like just about the time they get back to “ok”, they get set off by the smallest of inconveniences. If you find yourself here, I recommend manually popping their bubble. I know it sounds nuts. You might think that walking on eggshells and tending to the sensitivity is the way to go, however I have found that helping them run into a (metaphorical) wall with a “no” to something they want, can be just the thing needed.
It goes like this, they are in and out of puddle mode all morning, then you decide, “I’m going to help them pop their bubble”. I like to alert my partner that I’m planning to pop the bubble so he can otherwise hold down the fort. You find a good enough reason to say “no” to them when you are generally calm and ready to catch them as they fling and flail. Help them to a space where they can really let it out and stay with them. You might need to offer the guidance of “I’m asking that you keep my body safe so I can stay with you.” Imagine it’s a set of contractions moving through. No fix it or problem solving allowed. Hang with them until it seems it’s crested and is coming down. See if you can move closer to them as they might warm to the idea that a snuggle sounds good. Wait until they are ready for the cuddle, and then notice if as the minutes pass they actually are ready for a small tickle or playful connection.
If they sigh a big “ahhh” or show interest in silliness, turn toward the play and make room for the both of you to reset and move back into the normal rhythms of the day.
Stress cycle completion changes my life on the regular. I hope you run your own experiments to learn your unique pathway out of the chronic stress pattern you most often get stuck in given your current season of life.