I thought it might be “fun” to look at the four different fear/stress responses and discover where we might find them in a law firm or other demanding work environment. Doesn’t that sound fun? As a recap from the last post, here are the steps from fear to chronic stress:

• Step 1: The initial threat triggers a fear response.
• Step 2: The brain prepares the body by releasing stress hormones.
• Step 3: If the stress or fear is continuous, the response can become chronic.
• Step 4: In this state, fear and stress are interchangeable.

The four different fear/stress responses to a threat are:

Fight: Standing up to something that might harm you.

Flight: Running away from something that might harm you.

Freeze: Standing still when something might harm you.

Fawn: Comply with someone who might harm you in an attempt to reduce the threat.

So let’s say the Diver Person in the picture sees a huge Great White shark with big teeth in front of them. Their brain will say “Yikes” and start releasing stress hormones to get them ready.

The diver just saw Shark Week and they are feeling bold. So they decide to Fight the shark by hitting it in the gills as they learned in one of the episodes. Perhaps they did not see Shark Week and decided they better run. So they initiate the Flight response and hide behind one of the rocks or if they panic, swim to the surface as fast as they can and get the bends. Let’s say they watched Shark Week and are absolutely terrified when they see the shark and do not know what to do. Their brain tells them they might as well just give up, so they go into Freeze mode and swim in place, waiting for the shark to come and eat them. (Interestingly, in this response, the brain releases pain-numbing endorphins so it doesn’t hurt as much to be eaten.) Perhaps in one of the Shark Week episodes, they show how to communicate with sharks, so the diver compliments the shark using the Fawn response to reduce the threat. (Disclaimer: I made up the part about communicating with sharks. Do not try this at home.)

But seriously, the Fawn response is a new addition to the fear response list and is found when humans are either abducted or in chronically abusive environments. I am hopefully not offending anyone by making a joke about it. If you need more information, please go here: https://www.webmd.com/mental-health/what-does-fight-flight-freeze-fawn-mean#1-3 If you need help, please call 911 or the National Domestic Violence Hotline (USA) at 1 800 799-7233.

Stress Response in Demanding Workplaces

Fight

The Fight response is found quite a bit in the legal field as you have seen on tv. (Some of the lawyer stuff on tv is true, but not much.) In some types of law, like litigation, fighting is the core. Someone does not like what someone else has done to them and so they sue, using a lawyer. The lawyers do not engage in hand-to-hand combat (that would be pretty cool), but they are in a battle of words, and the lawyer who knows the law best wins. They may be fighting in court as they tell the judge and jury why their client should be the victor.

Law firms are also very competitive places to work. Not only are lawyers fighting with lawyers outside of their law firm to defend the virtue of their clients, but they are also fighting each other. They are fighting other associates for partnership, trying to get a raise, or striving to make the billable hour requirement. Law firms have a hierarchical leadership structure and the bottom wrung have to fight their way up the ladder.

Flight

The work itself is a constant never-ending battle. There are multiple deadlines from the court, clients, and your boss. If you work in a larger office, the work never stops, even if you finish your work, you need to help your neighbor finish theirs. You are always running from one deadline to the next.

I know that I am stretching the Flight response a bit here. Technically, in the Flight response, if you encounter a threat, you would run away from it. You would not get much work done this way if you ran away from every task that threatened you. Running away from your boss if they gave you a tough assignment would not be good for job security.

Chronic stress occurs when you are constantly bombarded with events that your brain and body say you should run away from, but you don’t. After being overly exposed to stress, you might decide to run by quitting your job.

Hyperarousal

If you consistently expose your brain and body to a fight-or-flight response, you might be living in a hyperarousal state. You are on constant alert, easily startled, and might become irritable with angry outbursts. Living in this state for a long time is not good for your health and can lead to health issues such as exhaustion, headaches, high blood pressure, digestive problems, chest pain, muscle tension, aches and pains, and a weakened immune system. I will talk more about this in a later post, but wanted to introduce the concept here.

Freeze

We have all been there. Your boss asks you for that assignment that you forgot to do or did not have time to do, or your partner asks why you forgot the milk. You just remembered something due yesterday. You freeze. You do not know what to say or do. Your brain is telling you that you cannot fight or run.

The freeze response in law firms might occur if you are constantly exposed to deadlines and work and you are becoming overwhelmed. You might start feeling numb or empty, depressed, cannot think clearly, fatigued, and detached from yourself and your environment.

Hypoarousal

This state of shutting down is called hypoarousal. Instead of being in a hyper-response state, we are in a low-reaction state. It has its own set of health issues with chronic occurrence, which might include digestive issues, sleep disturbances, and substance abuse. Again, I will talk about this in more detail in a later post.

Fawn

As I mentioned earlier, the Fawn response is a newer addition to the list of fear/stress responses. It is a reaction of child abuse or neglect victims as a survival mechanism to minimize harm by becoming highly agreeable with the aggressor. Signs of this type of response are overdependence on the opinions of others, having little to no boundaries with other people, and being easily controlled and manipulated.

Where do I see this response in law firms? Well…..let’s just say that some people who work in law firms are not very nice. They are probably living in a chronic stress state themselves and taking it out on those around them. The subordinates who have to work for these people might engage in a Fawn response with them. They are overly pleasant to these people who are being mean to them and do not have boundaries so they might work 60-70 hours a week.

That’s just corporate America you say! We need to Fawn to get ahead in this world! Do we though?

Let’s get positive

Sorry to scare you with all of these fear responses. I do not mean to be negative. I just wanted to give you an idea of the different responses we have to threats in our environment and help you understand chronic stress and its effects. While lions and tigers and bears may no longer be a threat, we have new threats in our world, most of them in our work environments.

There is a solution. There is a middle ground. A place where we are at our best. It is the optimal zone where you can deal with the daily stresses of life. Stay tuned!

Do you want to share some stories of where the fear responses show up for you at work?