What Is Polyvagal Therapy? Understanding the Science of Safety and Healing
If you’ve ever felt like your body goes into shutdown mode when you’re overwhelmed—or like you’re stuck in high alert even when you know you’re safe—you’re not alone. This isn’t just “in your head.” It’s your nervous system trying to protect you.
Polyvagal Theory helps explain why.
Developed by Dr. Stephen Porges, Polyvagal Theory gives us a map of how our nervous system responds to safety, danger, and connection. It’s especially helpful for those healing from trauma, chronic stress, or relational wounds.
In Polyvagal-Informed Therapy, we use this understanding to help clients feel safe in their bodies again—often for the first time.
What Is Polyvagal Theory?
Polyvagal Theory explains how the vagus nerve—a key part of your autonomic nervous system—regulates your body’s reactions to stress and connection.
According to the theory, your nervous system has three main states:
Ventral Vagal (Safe + Social)
You feel calm, connected, and grounded. This is the state we thrive in.Sympathetic (Fight or Flight)
Your body gears up to defend. You may feel anxious, angry, restless, or panicked.Dorsal Vagal (Shutdown or Freeze)
You feel numb, disconnected, exhausted, or like you’ve collapsed inward. This is a survival state, too—your body’s way of conserving energy when things feel overwhelming.
What’s important to know:
These are automatic, biological responses. You're not "overreacting"—your body is trying to protect you.
What Is Polyvagal Therapy?
Polyvagal Therapy, also known as Polyvagal-Informed Therapy, is an approach that helps you build awareness of your nervous system and gently shift out of survival states.
This might look like:
Learning to notice what triggers you into fight, flight, or freeze
Using grounding tools like breathing, sound, or movement to regulate
Exploring how past trauma shaped your nervous system’s current patterns
Reconnecting with a sense of safety in relationships and your body
The goal isn’t to “get rid of” your trauma responses. It’s to build flexibility—so you’re not stuck in survival mode all the time.
Why Is Polyvagal Therapy Helpful for Trauma?
Trauma isn't just stored in your thoughts—it lives in your nervous system.
You may intellectually know you're safe now, but your body still reacts as if you're in danger. That’s because trauma changes how your nervous system detects and responds to cues of safety or threat.
Polyvagal-informed therapy helps you:
Rewire these patterns over time
Increase your window of tolerance
Strengthen your ability to return to calm after being activated
Create more space for joy, rest, and connection
How I Integrate Polyvagal Theory in Therapy
As a trauma therapist, I use Polyvagal Theory alongside tools like EMDR, mindfulness, and somatic techniques to help you regulate your nervous system and heal from the inside out.
I often start by helping you identify what state your body is in—and what helps bring you back to center. From there, we work on healing the deeper roots of emotional pain, including attachment wounds, complex trauma, and relational patterns that no longer serve you.
This approach is especially helpful for clients struggling with:
Complex PTSD
Anxiety or shutdown
People-pleasing or fawning
Chronic stress and burnout
Relationship issues rooted in past trauma
Final Thoughts: Safety Is the Foundation of Healing
You don’t need to force yourself to “think positive” or “just relax.”
You need a map of what’s happening inside—and the tools to navigate it.
Polyvagal-informed therapy offers exactly that: a way to understand your nervous system with compassion and curiosity, not shame.
When your body learns that safety is possible, healing can truly begin.
Michelle Nosrati, LCSW
Licensed Clinical Social Worker | Trauma & EMDR Therapist | Los Angeles, CA
Helping adults heal from trauma, anxiety, and complex PTSD across California & Nevada
🧠 Interested in learning how your nervous system is shaping your patterns—and how to shift them? Schedule a consultation today.