Why Recovery Feels Slower
I didn’t recognise that I was no longer bouncing back in the way I once had. It unfolded gradually over months, maybe even years, and at the time I attributed it to circumstance rather than pattern.
In 2020 I noticed changes in my capacity and what most would call burnout crept in quietly. I found it harder to concentrate, words slipped away mid-sentence and reading became an effort. I needed more sleep than usual and woke the next morning feeling groggy.
By that stage in my late thirties, as hormonal rhythms were beginning to shift and sleep was less forgiving, that decline in capacity was no longer buffered in the way it once had been.
The difficult part for me was that I recognised the signs. My training in nutrition and trauma awareness meant I understood what prolonged activation does to the nervous system. I could see that I was moving towards a full shutdown, and I knew that the only sustainable way out was to leave the source of the stress. When the panic attack eventually came it did not surprise me. It confirmed what my body had been signalling for months.
I left knowing that removing the external pressure was necessary and that staying would only prolong the strain, yet I didn’t fully grasp how deeply my body had adapted to that over adrenalised state or how long it would take to unwind once the source of stress was removed. I assumed relief would come quickly, yet recovery unfolded far more slowly than I expected. The sharp edges softened, though the fatigue lingered and my nervous system did not immediately return to equilibrium.
I drew on the tools I knew: regular meals, reducing sugar, quieter mornings, daily meditation and a deliberate reduction of situations and dynamics that heightened my activation. Gradually, almost imperceptibly at first, my body began to respond. What shifted most was my willingness to stop overriding what I already knew. Once I acknowledged how depleted I truly was, certain pressures eased and some commitments naturally fell away. My recovery was a rebuilding of steadiness and trust between my body and the choices I was making.
In the years that followed I noticed that recovery felt different. After particular kinds of interactions, especially emotionally charged conversations or social situations that required my sustained attention, my body no longer settled quickly and the activation lingered.
There have been occasions where I have sat across from someone who needed to talk and I listened carefully, tracking their words, tone and expression while keeping my own responses measured. On the surface I appeared present and composed, yet internally I could feel the effort of holding myself in place. My jaw tightened, my back ached with tension, and I wanted to run, to break eye contact, to signal that it was enough, yet I stayed. I remained attentive, agreeable and deferential, a posture that is often praised in women without acknowledging the cost it extracts from the nervous system.
Later, sometimes hours later, the cost would surface. My body would feel heavy and slightly electric at the same time, my concentration would fade, background noise would feel intrusive and a dull headache would settle behind my eyes. I would withdraw or need sleep to reset and sometimes tears would come once what felt like it was gripped in place had space to release.
What had changed was the speed at which I could settle afterwards. Earlier in life I could move through tension and feel restored by the next morning and that was always my superpower. Gradually over the years that return slowed and my body began holding on to what it once processed more quickly.
The stress response itself is not the problem. It is designed to switch on when needed, mobilising energy, sharpening focus and preparing the body to respond. Where this becomes costly is when the system does not fully complete the cycle. Activation requires an equally strong capacity to down-regulate, to signal safety again, to soften muscle tension, deepen breathing and return to a resting state. When that settling phase becomes less efficient, even ordinary interactions can leave a longer imprint.
Over time I began to recognise that what I had been calling exhaustion was often something closer to freeze. Freeze, sometimes described in nervous system work as a dorsal state is a protective state that follows prolonged activation, a moment when the nervous system conserves energy because it has been stretched beyond its comfortable range. It can feel like heaviness in the limbs, fog in the mind, noise sensitivity, withdrawal or an inability to initiate even simple tasks. In my case it sometimes arrived with a low headache and a sense of being internally stuck, as though I could see what needed doing but could not quite access the impetus to begin.
Years of shortened sleep, irregular fuel and repeated emotional suppression condition the system to remain vigilant. Hormonal buffering narrows, circadian rhythm destabilises and glucose fluctuations increase the frequency of adrenaline release. None of these shifts are dramatic on their own, yet together they increase the overall load the body is carrying. When load accumulates, recovery lengthens and the swing from activation into freeze becomes more likely, particularly as hormonal buffering narrows in perimenopause.
What I experienced as heaviness, fog and withdrawal was a nervous system that had activated fully and then struggled to complete the return. The energy expended in tracking someone else’s tone, managing my expressions and suppressing the impulse to leave required physiological output and that output needed time to metabolise. When the system is already carrying residual strain, that metabolising process slows and the body defaults to conservation.
Understanding this altered the way I responded to it and instead of questioning my resilience, I began to pay more attention to my recovery. I noticed how long it took for my body to soften after certain conversations. I noticed how often I told myself I should be fine by now. I noticed how quickly I minimised the cost of staying composed.
The kind of exhaustion that follows prolonged vigilance might show up as heaviness, withdrawal and a reluctance to engage the next day or irritability, brain fog and an urge to cancel plans that once felt manageable. Sometimes it’s lying in bed scrolling, aware that you are tired and unable to switch off. If that feels familiar, it is worth pausing long enough to ask whether your system has truly settled or whether it has moved from activation into freeze.
When you recognise that slower recovery reflects load rather than weakness, the question becomes less about why you think you cannot handle life and more about how much activation your body has been carrying without adequate downregulation.
Understanding this means you cannot keep overriding the signals. A system that takes longer to recover needs space between activating interactions, consistent fuel and honesty about the moments you stay when your body wants to run.
If you have noticed that you don’t bounce back the way you once did, that awareness is not a sign of decline but information. What you do with that information determines whether the pattern deepens or begins to shift.
Slower recovery is the signal that override has been accumulating.
This article is part of the Resilience Series.
Start here: When resilience changes.