Best Practice

Fight, flight or freeze? Getting yourself out of survival mode

Teachers – like many others – will be feeling the pressure and stress of the current crisis and may be operating in survival mode. Shahana Knight offers wellbeing advice to help you manage your work, family and mental health

It is safe to say that the mental and emotional pressure on young people, parents/carers and teachers has increased during the coronavirus outbreak. This is something we need to acknowledge and address to prevent this new normal from becoming overwhelming.

Indeed, coronavirus might well be sending us into survival mode. When we are stressed or worried about something, our bodies feel that stress and our brain responds. When our survival brain is on, our thinking brain turns off.

Our thinking brain helps us to make rational decisions, empathise with others, reason and reflect on our behaviour, the situation or our feelings and helps us to recall information.

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