How Stress Gets Stuck In the Body

Nervous System Tools  |  5 min read  |  Includes guided video

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h_UxGvz4QZU

Understanding Anxiety & the Body | Somatic Perspective with Nichole Ondersma

Anxiety is everywhere right now. In our families, our workplaces, our news feeds. It shows up in the parent who can't stop catastrophizing, the partner who snaps before they even know why, the person lying awake at 2am running through every possible worst-case scenario. If this sounds familiar — in yourself or someone you love — you are in very good company.

What I want to offer you today isn't just reassurance that anxiety is normal (though it is, and you are not broken). I want to offer you something more useful: an understanding of what anxiety actually does inside your body — and why working with the body is one of the most effective ways to find relief.

Anxiety Isn't Only a Mental Experience

We tend to talk about anxiety as a thought problem — a loop of worry, a spiral of what-ifs. And while the mind is certainly involved, anxiety is equally, and perhaps primarily, a body experience.

When we live under sustained stress — whether from the pace of modern life, geopolitical uncertainty, family challenges, or the relentless pressure of just keeping everything together — the body responds by bracing. The muscles of the torso tighten. The ribs hold. The shoulders creep up toward the ears. This is the body's ancient protective response, and in a true emergency it is lifesaving. But when it becomes habitual, when it becomes the body's default setting, it creates a problem.

These layers of tension build over time. And here is what makes it so hard to simply think your way out of anxiety: the body keeps sending the signal back to the brain.

The Vagus Nerve and the Body-Brain Feedback Loop

The vagus nerve is one of the most important nerves in the human body — a long, wandering nerve that connects the brainstem to the heart, lungs, and digestive system. Most people assume that the nervous system sends signals from the brain down to the body. But here's what's fascinating: approximately 80% of the information traveling through the vagus nerve moves in the opposite direction — from the body up to the brain.

This means the vagus nerve is primarily a sensory nerve. It's carrying information about what the body is experiencing — and feeding that information back to the brain constantly.

So when the body is chronically braced and tense — when the shoulders are locked, the ribs are held, the belly is tight — the message the brain is receiving, over and over, is: I'm stressed. There's a threat. We're not safe. The brain responds accordingly, generating more anxious thoughts, more vigilance, more activation. And the cycle continues.

This is why talking about anxiety, while helpful, often isn't enough on its own. If the body is still broadcasting the threat signal, the nervous system stays activated — regardless of how much cognitive insight a person has developed.

What Somatic Work Offers

Somatic therapy — work that involves the body, not just the mind — offers a way to intervene directly in this feedback loop. Rather than working only at the level of thoughts and beliefs, somatic approaches help clients develop an awareness of what's happening in their bodies in real time, and learn practical tools to shift those patterns.

In my work with clients, this often looks like learning to notice and release the bracing patterns held in the shoulders and torso — areas where anxiety tends to live most persistently. When we can begin to soften those holding patterns, the body starts sending a different signal to the brain. One that says: we're okay. The threat is passing. It's safe to rest.

The relief that follows isn't imagined. It's physiological. The nervous system is genuinely shifting states — moving from sympathetic activation (fight-or-flight) toward parasympathetic rest (safety and connection). And from that calmer place, everything becomes more available: patience, presence, clarity, and the capacity to show up for the people who need us most.

You Don't Have to White-Knuckle Your Way Through This

If you have been managing anxiety mostly through willpower — pushing through, staying busy, trying harder to think positive — I want to gently offer you another possibility. Your nervous system is not broken. It is doing exactly what it was designed to do. It just needs support in learning that it's safe to soften.

That is exactly what I help people do. And it doesn't have to be as hard as it has been.

Ready to Learn More?

My Somatic Stress Reduction program is designed for people who are carrying a lot — parents, partners, individuals navigating the very real stresses of modern life — who are ready to move out of chronic anxiety and into something that feels more like ease. It's skills-based, practical, and done together. Because one of the most powerful things I've learned, both personally and clinically, is that healing happens so much more readily when we don't have to do it alone.

→ Learn more about Somatic Stress Reduction  |  → Reach out to connect

About Nichole Ondersma

Nichole Ondersma is a somatic practitioner and therapist specializing in nervous system support for individuals, parents, and caregivers of all kinds. Drawing from Sensorimotor Psychotherapy, Internal Family Systems, and over 23 years of clinical experience, she helps growth-oriented people downshift chronic stress and reconnect with what — and who — matters most. Her practice is grounded in one simple belief: you don't have to do this alone.