I have Addison's Disease, so none of my glands work. Flight or fright is no longer a part of me.
As far as your friend goes? I'm not understanding the situation. Sorry.
I am concerned about YOU, though. My PTSD has not really been dealt with so I get very depressed and anxious about it. I have medication, but adjustments are needed, I think strongly.
It's so difficult to have it and then worry about people who don't get it. I would say, don't let him get to you. Stay out of his presence for your sake and your friends(?)...good luck. Please keep updating. I think you know myself and the rest of your friends here are right here for you.
Take care.

Never considered it, but it strikes a chord with me. I'll speculate with you.

My unconsidered reaction is that I fawn before I freeze. The freeze decides whether I will fight of flee. Flight always seems to be my first choice. The only clean fight I know of is the one I avoided. My fawning is the hope that I can avoid the threat. I am not much of a fawner, though. I bail pretty quick after the need for fawning arises. Seems to me like fawning would be a quality of people pleasing and that particular symptom doesn't take up much space in my own PTSD baggage car.

In the case of hubby's bachelor buddies, I choose premeditated flight. I already know my presence will spoil the male bonding moment and it's no fun feeling like . . . Ah, give me the word for it. . . The third wheel?

For sure my friends often comment on how much I change when hubs is around. That partner bond be some potent chemistry and . . . It is what it is, whether I understand it, or knot.

High fiber chew, muj. Thank you.

P.S. On the co-dependency note, I wonder if your "fawning" is what hubs and I have been calling, "The Egg Shell Waltz" where we dance around the ugly truths in hopes of avoiding conflict. Not my personal favorite dance. Works in progress. . .

I had to fawn my father all the time. It is like Pete Walker said in that article: He used the worst verbal abuse and behavior for “talking back”, and hence ruthlessly extinguished my fight response. We had to walk on eggshells around him. I fawned my rapist too, so that he didn't abandon me. I don't fawn my father anymore. And my rapist knows what I think of him very well and that there will be no nice words or behavior towards him. Thanks for sharing. It made me think, there may be another problem to deal with. I had trouble reading that article you shared. The words were like jumping out of their place.

Fawn is a fourletter eff word for a reason. IMHO. Fawn on my dad, you might not be harmed as viciously... or he would rage at you for fawning. Fawning is a common response, i bet, but we are trained to think of it as showing proper respect or obedience or simklar "positive", so maybe that is why it stings so deeply. The perversion of the concept of respect for others.

I never tried to fawn o my sister, interestingly. I think she tried hurting me because fawning on our dad was sketchy, whereas i was so much younger and smaller, she knew the outcome would be in her favor. I did want a sister like on TV and in movies, warm and fuzzy, but her abuse brought up anger. Possibly because our dad was a skilled charmer and narcisisst, so he had you convinced... and she did not get that skilled till long after i learned to hate being in her presence?

I can see how that would trigger you, Muji. When I am expected to kowtow based on a mere title or similar, I react very strongly coming froma similar place about all that fawning. Ugh.


Many hugs

I'm sorry you had to go through that. I do relate to that article - it was a revelation to me.

Thanks, everybody. I knew about the PTSD fight or flight response early on in therapy. "Freeze" came later, along with my "dissociating" symptom. This idea of "fawning" is new to me this year, but in my case the shoe fits. It's been a survival mechanism that I'll admit has stood me in good stead many times in my life around abusers.

However, in learning about it I realized that using it in the long term hurt my self esteem more than fighting or even fleeing did. In making the decision to fight or flee I made an overt decision that was clear to myself. But in "fawning" over a bully to get them to lay off me I was often kidding myself, and over time kidding myself took its toll.


Interesting, huh? Thanks for checking in about this one with me, I appreciate the support. Working on this fourth "F" has the payoff that I'll like myself more. For us PTSD survivors, that's always a good thing.

yes I can relate to your post about fawning,when I think about the people who had power over me,mostly in my childhood,and I wanted someone to say sorry,but now I am starting to feel my own power,and I dont feel so angry.all the best to you.

muji,Thank You for bringing this here,although i'm sorry you needed to.i had never really known about it,i am,and have always been more concious of my flight or flight responses..but upon thinking about, i definitley "learned" to do this...especially within my past abusive relationship..i wonder,does this have anything to do with "losing your voice",because keeping quiet keeps you safer,(for maybe a little while anyway)?
no pressure to respond,just thanks for helping me to think on this and maybe bring it to therapy..

I'm new the this, so do forgive me if I stumble on the terminology with my posts as a newbie here in this forum. Thanks for sharing that article. It was highly informative and interesting. I ended up reading several articles from the site. I need to soak it all in, but as they say, knowledge is power. Cliche maybe, but true.

Big hug for you muji... I'm so sorry these terrible memories have been triggered for you
When I was very young I took a lot of crap and just sucked it up as I had no choice really... At some point in my teens I made a conscious choice that no one will ever fugg with me again... So it's the extremes and I don't know that, that's been the right thing as well... I have looked a little at Peter Walker but have found it to be too triggering when I'm without a therapist to work with
Love the "Egg Shell Waltz"

SC, I can imagine how Pete Walker's site might be too much to digest without the context of therapy. My dream is that we could all have Pete as our own personal therapist just for that purpose, you know? He seems to really get what we're about.

I don't go there often, but when I have it's helped me understand some of what we talk about here. I didn't know about Complex PTSD or CPTSD until I heard about it here and asked somebody about it and they sent me there. So I'd say if Pete's site is too much and triggers us, maybe we can just digest a point of his here in this context and be safer.

I'd never heard of "fawning" as one of my PTSD responses until recently, either. It was familiar to me as "sucking it up," as you said you did, too. And once you try to change that like you did in your teens, "it's the extremes," as you say. I can go from "fawning" to the other extreme, when what I really want to do is split the difference down the middle and have balance.

Thanks, split, for spinning off another thread about this, too, because your insights there applied to me as well. As I said there, I don't think I really began to find my voice about this stuff until I came here to DS PTSD and started to find expression for it in writing in this support group, to be honest. Work in progress....