I thought I was dissociated… So I got therapy

“I didn’t even know my body could talk to me…

-how somatic awareness helped me recognise anxiety, overwhelm, burnout, and nervous system dysregulation in daily life.

There was a season where I genuinely thought something was wrong with me.

I felt disconnected. Flat. Tired in a way sleep didn’t fix.
I’d get heart palpitations, or butterflies in my stomach for no apparent reason.
I would shut down emotionally randomly out of the blue.
My mind was busy, but my body felt miles away.
I couldn’t always feel joy properly — but I also couldn’t fully access sadness or rest either.

So once I started talking therapy I told my therapist I thought I was dissociated.
And honestly? In some ways, I absolutely was.

But what I didn’t realise at the time was this:
My nervous system had been stuck in survival mode for so long that I’d never learned how to listen to my body.

I didn’t know my body could talk to me.
And I definitely didn’t know it had been trying for years.

When Anxiety and Burnout Don’t Feel Like Anxiety and Burnout

I didn’t look like someone struggling.

I was functioning. Leading. Creating. Supporting others. Designing spaces that felt calm and beautiful. Showing up for work and life.

But underneath that competence, my body was carrying chronic stress, overwhelm, and nervous system dysregulation.

It showed up as:

• Constant tension in my shoulders and jaw

• Brain fog and/or low energy

• High-functioning anxiety masked as productivity

• Trouble switching off or relaxing, even on weekends

• Emotional numbness mixed with sudden overwhelm

• A sense of being disconnected from myself

• Endless joint pain

• Digestive issues

I thought these were personality traits. Or just the cost of leadership and responsibility.

Now I know they were somatic signals — my nervous system asking for regulation and safety.

The Moment Therapy Opened a Different Door

Going to therapy was one of the best decisions I made.

It helped me understand my story, my patterns, and the trauma responses I had been carrying quietly for years.

But something unexpected happened along the way —
I began to realise that healing wasn’t just about insight. It was about sensation.

I started noticing my breathing.
The tightness in my chest during conflict.
The exhaustion after overstimulating environments.
The freeze response when I felt overwhelmed or unsafe, and not just that, I started noticing what ‘unsafe’ felt like - I’d never paid any attention before.

This is part of the tragic trauma loop - you shut down your feelings, becasue they’re too painful. So you don’t ‘hear’ the signals, or cries for help that your body is trying to send you, because you’re stuck in functioning freeze.

You need something to disrupt the cycle.
For me - Therapy started this disruption.

For the first time, I wasn’t just analysing my experiences —
I was feeling my body.

That was my introduction to somatic awareness.

What Somatic Awareness Actually Means

Somatic awareness is simply this:
learning to listen to what your body is experiencing in real time.

Because trauma, stress, and anxiety don’t just live in your thoughts — they live in your nervous system.

Your body carries everything:

The pressure to perform
The emotional load of leadership
The environments that overstimulate you
The conversations that leave you drained
The chronic stress that never quite switches off

And when we disconnect from those signals for too long, we lose access to regulation — which is often when burnout begins.

Somatic awareness might look like

Noticing shallow breathing before panic builds

• Noticing shallow breathing that occurs before the panic builds

• Feeling tension in the body before overwhelm takes over

• Recognising when you’re in functional freeze - you’re functioning supposedly ‘normally’, but you’re actually shut down.

• Becoming aware of sensory overload in your environment, whether emotional, environmental or relational.

• Pausing long enough to down-regulate your body instead of pushing through, listening to the signals your body is telling you that it doesn’t feel safe - this is the start of re-wiring your trauma triggers, so your body feels safer.

It’s about reconnecting with information your body holds, so you can understand why your body doesn’t feel safe, and what it needs in order to feel safe.

How Environment and Neuroaesthetics Fit In

Our environments are constantly sending signals to the body.

Lighting, clutter, noise, layout, colour, even the emotional history attached to certain spaces — all influence whether our nervous system feels safe or under threat.

This is the heart of neuroaesthetics.

When our homes and workspaces feel chaotic or disconnected from who we are, our stress responses stay activated.

When our environments support regulation, familiarity, and calm, our body finally has permission to soften.

And suddenly, somatic awareness becomes easier — because your nervous system isn’t constantly fighting its surroundings.

From Disconnection to Regulation

I didn’t suddenly become calm overnight.

But I did start listening.

The goal is not to be regulated and grounded all the time.
Our nervous system is designed to react — to protect us, alert us, pull us out of danger. The ability your body has to protect itself and let you know you’re in danger is a good thing, a gift, and an intricate part of how you’re made. The problem isn’t that we feel activated — it’s when our bodies get stuck there, responding to old threats as if they’re still happening now.

Somatic work isn’t about silencing the body — it’s about learning its language. Therapy, awareness, and practice create space to notice what your system carries, what it learned to survive, and how it’s trying — sometimes clumsily — to keep you safe. When we listen instead of override, the body becomes less of a battlefield and more of a guide.

For me, this meant realising how much past trauma had quietly rewritten my definition of safety. My body was sounding alarms long after the danger had passed. I’m still in the process — because this isn’t a neat finish line — but I’ve been learning how to unwind old triggers, recalibrate my responses, and teach my nervous system that not everything is a threat. Regulation doesn’t mean becoming someone new — it means finally learning how to come home to myself.

I notice anxiety before it became burnout.
Fatigue before it became shutdown.
Overwhelm before it turned into emotional numbness.

And slowly, I can begin reconnecting with my body — not as an enemy, but as a guide.

Because what I thought was brokenness…
was actually protection.

And when your nervous system learns that it’s safe enough to feel again, everything shifts — clarity, creativity, leadership capacity, emotional resilience.

Not perfectly.
But sustainably.

Have you ever felt disconnected from yourself —
numb, exhausted, or “fine” on the outside but overwhelmed underneath?

What might your body be trying to say — through tension, anxiety, fatigue, or burnout — that you haven’t had space to hear yet?