Alleviating Fight or Flight Stress in Children

Pediatric CareNewborn ChiropracticWellbeing for Adults

Mar 31

At ChiroHouse, we regularly meet families navigating challenges like anxiety, poor sleep, frequent illness, digestive struggles, inflammation, and big emotional responses, despite doing everything they can to support their child’s health.

This struggle leaks into their behavior, marked by frequent meltdowns and an inability to self-calm or regulate. These persistent challenges may be indicative of a constant activated stress response causing struggles for their delicate nervous systems.

Today, more children are experiencing ongoing health and developmental challenges than ever before. What we continue to see clinically is that the nervous system plays a central role in how these patterns develop and persist.

When a child’s system becomes stuck in a stress response, often referred to as “fight or flight,” it can trigger a cascade of stress hormones and sirupt vital processes like sleep, digestion, immune responses, and development. At the same time, the restorative parasympathetic “rest and digest” state becomes harder to access, creating a cycle we often describe as the “Perfect Storm.”

If this sounds familiar, it’s important to know that many families are in a similar place. Understanding the role of the nervous system can be a meaningful step toward making sense of what’s going on and exploring supportive options.

How Kids Get Stuck in a Fight or Flight Stress Response:

Your child’s nervous system, like a switch, goes between active and relaxed modes. When there’s a short-term danger, it goes into “fight or flight” mode. But problems happen when the stress reaction stays for too long.

The Vagus Nerve’s Function

At the heart of nervous system regulation is the vagus nerve, controlling the activation of the body’s “rest, digest, and regulate” parasympathetic nervous system. This critical nerve regulates digestion, breathing, heart rate, and inflammation and is more tied to restoration. We also know that the vagus nerve is essential to social and emotional regulation, speech, and so much more.

Impaired vagal tone traps your child in fight or flight, leading to a condition called dysautonomia. Dysautonomia (or out-of-balance autonomic nervous system) can then lead to a host of other chronic health challenges in kids.

What Getting Stuck in Fight or Flight Looks Like in Kids

Here are signs that your child may be stuck in fight or flight mode:

Heightened baseline anxiety, worry, and panic responses
Frequent emotional meltdowns and outbursts
Disrupted sleep and nightmares
Loss of appetite or overeating
Increased food sensitivities and allergies
New onset headaches or body aches
Overreaction to minor frustrations
Poor focus and concentration troubles
Frequent illnesses and decreased immunity
Persistent fatigue or hyperactivity

When your child’s nervous system gets overloaded and stuck, churning out stress chemicals, it turns into a range of symptoms that can disrupt health and development. Leading to:

Anxiety and Mood Changes
Cognitive and Behavioral Challenges
Physical Hurdles (including): Headaches, body tension, abdominal pain, low energy, and immune weakness
Growth and Development Delays

How to Get Our Kids Out of Fight or Flight Long Term

Parents, you hold immense power in nurturing your child’s well-being at home. It’s always a great idea to engage daily in breathing exercises, helping with the relaxation response. You can try gentle movements like yoga to process cortisol. Ensure optimal nutrition to replenish drained reserves, and consider natural supplements for gentle inflammation modulation. Prioritize restorative sleep for holistic health.

However, time and again, we meet parents who have tried everything under the sun to help their child learn to calm, regulate, and balance their emotions and nervous system, but to no avail.

In cases where the nervous system seems stuck in fight or flight, Neurologically-Focused Chiropractic Carecan help.

These adjustments target vagus nerve stimulation and release pent-up stress within the sympathetic nervous system.

As adjustments start to help restore better sleep patterns and enhance neurological health for your child, you can then introduce breathing exercises, calming activities, and nutritional programs.

So, if your child is expressing symptoms tied to a stuck-on, fight-or-flight nervous system, and you’ve exhausted every avenue without success, consider addressing nervous system dysregulation and subluxation as the missing link.

Please reach out to us at Ottawa ChiroHouse today. If you are not local to us, check out our PX Docs directory to find a local office near you. We want to help empower you to guide your child toward a healthier, more balanced life.

Here are 3 ways we can help!