Overwhelm vs growth: when is practicing relational safety not worth doing?

Meconopsis, Branklyn Garden

I am going to try to answer this in relation to the glass workshop.

Was it worth doing the glass workshop? Were the gains greater than the losses? 

It was very stressful, especially at the start, but I stayed, I managed the panic, nothing really bad did happen, I did copy as I had wanted and I made something. 

But my body would have been flooded with cortisol yet again which is really bad for it and I think accounts for a lot of the physical problems I have been having since July, the month after mum left. 

So should I have stayed home instead?

I have come to understand that practising relational safety sometimes involves deliberate, time-limited doses of discomfort. The gain comes not from feeling safe, but from discovering that the body can survive the activation and return to baseline.

The cost–benefit (too much stress/cortisol for the gains) shifts when the exposure overwhelms rather than stretches the system.

So the question is rather:

Was this within the zone where growth is possible without retraumatising?

But how do you know when you are in overwhelm rather than growth? Because I did feel pretty overwhelmed. 

Overwhelm removes choice. 

I did freeze, not to the point of not being able to move or speak,  I was in a “functional freeze” state - minimal movements, minimal speech.  

I did lose speech / eye contact

I did go into panic / flee mode at “be inspired” - the rush to the toilet, bolting food and getting out. 

These are all signs of overwhelm.

I did feel this was a dreadful situation at the start and that it was a mistake and I did feel trapped.  But would I never want to be in that situation again?  That would be a sign of overwhelm.  If that teacher was doing something different I might go because I know what to expect.  That is growth.

Did I feel as though I couldn’t stop what was happening or remove myself.  Nearly.  But I did manage to remove myself - to go to the loo to calm down and take medication and to get out for a break at lunchtime. That is also growth

Other signs of growth:

• I did feel “activated” but after I took medication I was able to slow my stress responses, calm down, breathe, orientate myself in the room etc. 

• I could respond minimally, and increasingly initiate questions privately with the teacher and engage in small conversations with her.

• I could eat and go for a walk

• I could offer a compliment 

• I was able to complete the project and leave with a sense of achievement and agency

• By the time I went home I was already recovering

All of this was possible, even if the experience was hard so I think it was growth, even if the entrance was rough.

This was overwhelm that was metabolised in the moment which is different from overwhelm that imprints or spirals as it did under the Pigface and Social Services attacks when the trauma was ongoing.