Beneath the Surface: Releasing Suppressed Emotions

I’m Amy Wilson — a trauma-informed Introspective Breathwork® therapy practitioner. In my work, I explore what happens when we swallow emotions to “keep the peace” — how that impacts the brain, the nervous system, and even our health. And most importantly, how we can begin to safely release what’s been buried.

Most people think trauma only means a major event. But suppressed emotions don’t always come from “big trauma.” They can quietly accumulate through work stress, relationship struggles, childhood conditioning, or everyday frustrations. Over time, the nervous system pays the price.

Research shows that suppression is linked to chronic stress, trauma-related brain changes, and even inflammation in the body. This can look like anxiety, gut issues, fatigue, autoimmune flares, or the sense of being “stuck.”

The good news? With the right tools — like polyvagal-informed breathwork, sound healing, journaling, and somatic practices — the nervous system can reset, making space for balance, clarity, and healing.

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Your Brain on Suppression

The back of the brain is where many survival systems live. When we suppress emotions, these regions work overtime.

Brainstem — The Survival Switch

• Calm state: Regulates breathing, heart rate, digestion, and sleep.

• Under suppression/stress:

  • Triggers fight, flight, freeze, or fawn.

  • Breathing and heart rate become irregular.

  • Digestion slows or shuts down.

  • Survival takes priority over balance.

Cerebellum — The Body’s Fine-Tuner

• Calm state: Coordinates movement, balance, rhythm, and supports emotional regulation.

• Under suppression/stress:

  • Clumsy movements or shaking.

  • Scattered or “jerky” thinking.

  • Heightened reactivity and disorganization.

  • Muscle tension woven into posture.

Occipital Lobe — The Visual Processor

• Calm state: Functions like a movie projector, turning visual input into clear images.

• Under suppression/stress:

  • Tunnel vision or narrowed focus.

  • Difficulty taking in details.

  • Hypervigilance, scanning for danger.

  • Shifts into “security camera mode.”

This lobe also helps store traumatic memories. Painful images can get buried here, creating fragmented or incomplete memories that later surface as flashbacks or visual triggers.

Parietal Lobe — The Sensory Integrator

• Calm state: Processes touch, pressure, temperature, math, and language. Keeps us oriented.

• Under suppression/stress:

  • Numbness, hypersensitivity, or feeling detached.

  • Difficulty focusing, organizing, or making sense of surroundings.

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How Memories Get Buried

When something feels overwhelming or unsafe, the brain may block full processing to protect us.

• Amygdala: Sounds alarms (“Too dangerous to feel this now”).

• Hippocampus: The organizer goes offline → memory fragments.

• Occipital lobe: Holds the visual pieces.

• Prefrontal cortex: The reasoning brain downshifts.

This creates buried, fragmented memories. Later, triggers like sights, sounds, or especially smells can bring them flooding back.

Explicit vs. Implicit Memory

• Explicit memory: Conscious recall (“I remember what happened”).

• Implicit memory: Stored in the body as sensations and emotions without a story.

Smell is especially powerful — it bypasses the thinking brain and goes straight to the amygdala and hippocampus. A scent like cologne, alcohol, or laundry soap can trigger panic or nausea, even if no conscious memory is present. These reactions aren’t “crazy” — they’re survival alarms resurfacing.

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Why Memories Can Return Later

Trauma often blocks explicit memory, but implicit memory remains. As safety increases — maybe after a perpetrator dies, or when stability is built in adulthood — the brain may finally allow access.

This can feel like:

• Sudden recall or vivid dreams.

• A slow unfolding story.

• Waves of grief, anger, or shame.

These late memories are not imagined. They’re the brain’s way of saying: “Now you are safe enough to heal.”

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The Cost of Suppression

When the back brain stays stuck in survival, the front brain — our calm, wise, reasoning self — loses access. That constant drain shows up in body, mind, and behavior:

• Anxiety & Depression: The nervous system is bracing nonstop.

• Physical Symptoms: Gut issues, fatigue, inflammation, autoimmune flares.

• Disconnection: Feeling numb or “checked out.”

• Control Behaviors (OCD tendencies): When the inside feels chaotic, the brain often turns to external order. Rituals like cleaning, counting, or organizing offer temporary relief — but they’re the nervous system’s way of grasping at safety.

These symptoms aren’t weakness. They’re evidence of a nervous system working overtime to hold what couldn’t be expressed.

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The Myth of “Giving Power Away”

Many people fear that revisiting pain means giving more power to the one who caused it. “If I go back and feel it, they win. They get to hurt me again.”

But avoiding pain doesn’t erase it — it buries it deeper, where it quietly fuels triggers, reactivity, and illness.

Healing isn’t about re-living trauma. It’s about completing the process the brain and body couldn’t finish at the time. Once integrated, the story no longer hijacks your nervous system. The trigger loses its grip.

✨ True freedom isn’t avoiding the pain. It’s processing it — and taking your power back.

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The Path to Healing

Many of us learned early that hiding feelings was safer. But healing begins when we create safety for the nervous system to relax, and the prefrontal cortex — our clear-thinking, compassionate self — comes back online.

Gentle somatic practices help unlock this:

• Breathwork

• Sound healing

• Journaling

• Somatic movement

These tools allow emotions to release gradually and safely, without re-traumatization.

Suppression may have kept you safe in the moment. But healing is what sets you free.