Episode Details

You’ve heard of the Fight or Flight Stress Response but what about Tend and Befriend?

Ever wonder why you automatically say "yes" to everything, even when you don't want to? You're not broken - you're responding from a place of survival. In this episode, we explore the "tend and befriend" stress response, why it's so common in women, other minorities, and ADHDers, and how it kept our ancestors (and us when we were younger) alive.

You'll learn:

• Tend and Befriend v the better known Fight or Flight stress responses
• Why people-pleasing is actually adaptive survival behaviour
• How ADHD masking connects to this trauma response
• The difference between Tend and Befriend and Fawn
• Practical steps to start setting boundaries without (well, with less. Progress not perfection) guilt

Remember: Your nervous system was wired this way to keep you safe. Now you get to choose how to move forward. 💙

Resources mentioned:

• Feel Better Every Day Podcast: feelbettereverydaypodcast.com – especially the Purr! Hiss! Freeze! ep which goes into greater detail around Polyvagal Theory and adaptive survival responses
• Sole to Soul Circle membership
• Self Care Coaching: selfcarecoaching.net

#TraumaHealing #ADHD #PeoplePleasing #TendAndBefriend #TraumaResponse #Boundaries #NervousSystemHealing

Chapters

(0:00) What is the Tend and Befriend Response?

(0:38) Meet your host: Eve Menezes Cunningham

(1:11) Feel. Love. Heal. – A framework for self-care, Self care and collective care

(1:34) People pleasing and survival instincts

(2:16) Survival of the kindest

(2:36) The science behind Tend and Befriend

(4:24) Fawn and Freeze: Trauma in the body

(6:22) How early trauma shapes us

(7:00) Why we people please (and what we’re really seeking)

(8:27) The power of saying No

(9:28) Spotting red flags early

(9:37) Practising safe boundaries

(11:19) Remember: You have the right to autonomy

(12:27) Moving from survival to love

(13:21) Healing through support and connection

(14:54) Learning to honour your preferences

(16:29) The Runaway Bride egg question

(17:16) It’s never too late to get to know yourself

(18:04) Final thoughts and resources

FULL TRANSCRIPT

Tend and befriend response. So if you were to imagine being very, very under stress, under threat, and if you think about the most powerful people in society, if you think about like the white men, it's safe for them to fight, it's safe for them to run away. Women, minorities typically have to placate, have to be appealing, have to be pleasant, all these things with tend befriend when it's a trauma response, when it is also very common with ADHD.

Hi, you're listening to the Feel Better Every Day Podcast. I'm your host and producer, Eve Menezes Cunningham, and I'm a trauma therapist and survivor and ADHDer, a supervisor, supervisor, supervisor, Self care coach, author and columnist. And you can access full show notes and links and free resources through the feelbettereverydaypodcast.com or selfcarecoaching.net.

In this episode, we'll work through my Feel. Love. Heal. Framework.

Feel, which is about the active self- care, Love, which is about that uppercase Self S for the highest, wisest, truest, wildest, most joyful, brilliant, miraculous part of yourself. And the Heal element is the collective care.

We're talking about the “tend and befriend” stress response today. I was interviewed for a UK national paper recently and the interview went 45 minutes, and which was longer than I think either of us were expecting. And I still have so much more to say, I thought I'd do a podcast episode about it. (I’ll share the link when it’s published.)

Tend and befriend is something that can lead to peopl