How Toxic Positivity and Emotional Suppression Impact the Stress Response and HPA Axis

This episode, hosted by Dr. Donnelly Snipes, delves into the detrimental effects of toxic positivity and emotional suppression on an individual's stress response, specifically the HPA axis. Toxic positivity is defined as an excessive optimism that denies or ignores actual problems, while emotional suppression involves permanently avoiding feelings and distress. The distinction is made between unhealthy suppression and healthy distress tolerance skills, which are temporary coping mechanisms used until one can process emotions in a more appropriate setting.

The podcast highlights several negative consequences of these behaviors. Suppressing emotions prevents individuals from developing effective plans to feel safe and empowered, leading to emotional clutter and leakage, where unresolved feelings accumulate and eventually spill out. It can also make the 'inner child' feel scared and out of control, hinder the processing of loss and grief, and foster a chronic sense of unsafety. This perpetual state of perceived threat keeps the HPA axis, the body's stress response system, constantly activated, leading to a worldview shaded by negativity, pessimism, and anxiety, ultimately contributing to increased stress-related physical and mental health issues.

To counteract these effects, Dr. Snipes introduces the concept of 'hardiness,' proposed by Kobasa four decades ago, which encompasses commitment, control, and challenge. Commitment involves being aware of both the positive and negative aspects of one's life, embracing 'tragic optimism' by finding meaning or positive aspects even in difficult situations, and living in the 'and' – acknowledging distress while still pursuing important goals. Control focuses on using distress tolerance skills to manage emotions without being overwhelmed, developing mindful awareness of what can and cannot be controlled, leveraging personal strengths, and practicing radical acceptance of uncontrollable circumstances.

Finally, the 'challenge' aspect of hardiness encourages exploring difficult situations with curiosity and hope, seeking tools and strategies to manage them, and developing a sense of agency and optimism. The episode concludes by reiterating that toxic positivity exacerbates HPA axis dysregulation, emphasizing that a balanced approach of acknowledging both the good and the bad in life is crucial for developing effective coping mechanisms, fostering a sense of safety and security, and ultimately improving overall mental and physical well-being.

"toxic positivity means being overly optimistic and failing to acknowledge what's actually going wrong"

"emotional suppression means avoiding permanently feelings and or coping with distress"

"toxic positivity teaches people to ignore or suppress their distress and only focus on the positive"

"when you aren't dealing with things they're not going away You're Just shoving them into that closet or into that drawer"

"if you're suppressing your emotions then you're unable to process the loss of things that are important"

"if you're not feeling safe your your stress response is on and if you're almost never feeling safe then your stress response is almost always on"

"hardiness and this was proposed four decades ago by kobasa but it represents commitment control and challenge"

"embracing tragic optimism and this can be the dialectics embracing the good with the bad"

"radical acceptance means looking at a situation and instead of doing an anger about it just saying okay it is what it is"

"toxic positivity promotes an increase in stress related physical as well as mental health issues as a result of your stress response system getting out of whack"