11/02/2026
Triggers: A Psycho, Somatic and Neuro Perspective
PSYCHO 🧠
At its core, a trigger is about safety. When someone is triggered, the foundation beneath the reaction is that they do not feel safe. That lack of safety may not be rational or conscious, but it is profoundly real to the psyche and the nervous system.
In our formative years, the psyche develops through patterns of attunement or misattunement with caregivers. If we were not consistently seen, soothed, heard or valued, core attachment beliefs begin to organise our identity. These beliefs often take the shape of I am not loved, I am not heard, no one understands me, I am not valued, I am too much, or I must adapt to belong.
Later in life, when an interaction mirrors the emotional tone of those early experiences, implicit memory is activated. The present moment is filtered through past imprints. From a psychodynamic perspective, defence mechanisms such as projection, denial, minimisation or victim positioning arise to protect the ego from re experiencing those original wounds. The intensity of the reaction reflects unresolved material, not simply the situation at hand.
SOMATIC 🫀🫁
Psychological imprints are embodied through somatic dynamics. Implicit memory is encoded not only in narrative recall but within fascial tension, breath patterning, muscle tone and autonomic baseline states.
When a trigger occurs, the body responds before the mind interprets. Somatically, this may present as tightening in the throat when feeling unheard, constriction in the chest when love feels threatened, clenching in the jaw when anger surfaces, or a hollow sensation in the abdomen when value feels questioned. These are sensations. Emotions are the meaning layered onto those sensations.
If early attunement was inconsistent, the body may live in chronic hypervigilance. The soma anticipates rupture. A boundary or clear truth can therefore register as relational danger, even if no harm is present.
NEURO 💫 🧬
Neurodynamically, a trigger begins in the limbic system. The amygdala, a cluster of nuclei deep within the temporal lobe, scans incoming stimuli for threat based on stored associative memory. When it detects something reminiscent of past relational pain, it signals alarm rapidly, often before the prefrontal cortex has had time to contextualise.
The amygdala activates the hypothalamus, which initiates the stress response. Through the hypothalamic pituitary adrenal axis, corticotropin releasing hormone is secreted, stimulating the release of adrenocorticotropic hormone from the pituitary, which then signals the adrenal cortex to release cortisol. In parallel, neural signals travel down the sympathetic chain ganglia that run alongside the vertebral column. One pathway projects directly to the adrenal medulla, prompting the release of epinephrine and norepinephrine into the bloodstream.
These catecholamines increase heart rate, elevate blood pressure, dilate pupils and mobilise glucose. Subjectively, this feels like racing thoughts, irritability, agitation, restlessness or an urge to act. Over time, sustained cortisol output can lead to fatigue, immune suppression and emotional depletion.
Within polyvagal theory, this entire cascade reflects a shift out of ventral vagal safety into sympathetic mobilisation. If the perceived threat feels overwhelming or inescapable, the system may instead drop into dorsal vagal shutdown, characterised by numbness, collapse or dissociation.
The nervous system does not distinguish clearly between physical and relational threat. A boundary can be coded as abandonment. A difference of opinion can be coded as rejection. The body reacts to perceived loss of safety.
What it means for Embodied Integration ⬇️
Understanding triggers through a psycho, somatic and neuro lens moves us out of blame and into responsibility. A trigger is not proof that someone else is wrong, nor is it evidence that you are broken. It is a signal. It is your system communicating that something unresolved has been touched.
At the psychological level, it highlights a belief that was formed when safety, love, being heard or being valued felt compromised. At the somatic level, it reveals where the body is still bracing, constricting or anticipating rupture. At the neuro level, it shows a nervous system doing exactly what it was designed to do: detect threat and protect survival.
The work is not to eliminate triggers. The work is to increase capacity. Capacity to notice the sensation before the story takes over. Capacity to pause while the amygdala fires and allow the prefrontal cortex to re orient to the present. Capacity to remain in, or return to, ventral vagal regulation even when discomfort arises.
When we build this capacity, triggers become teachers rather than tyrants. They show us where implicit memory still needs integration, where attachment wounds require repair, and where safety must be rebuilt internally rather than demanded externally.
Healing is the gradual recalibration of the nervous system. It is the integration of past imprints so that the present moment is no longer filtered through outdated threat templates. It is the development of embodied safety, where truth no longer feels like danger and difference no longer feels like abandonment.
In that space, we can respond rather than react. And that is where emotional and relational maturity begins.
www.fireflysomatics.com
