People Pleasing The Trauma Response that Inhibits Our Ability to Say “No”

By Nicole Sonnefeldt, MA 

On its surface, “people pleasing” might appear as a behavior people engage in with the motivation to be well-liked or accepted. It can look like difficulty saying “no”, putting others’ needs before your own, or putting off difficult conversations in order to avoid conflict. Ultimately, people pleasers struggle with maintaining boundaries with others, which can lead to overcommitting and overextending themselves to the point of exhaustion. 

If any of these examples resonate with you, you’ve probably experienced instances where your own people pleasing behaviors have been harmful to you. To feel better, you might justify it as a sacrifice for the benefit of others - but it can actually cause harm to the relationships we are in. And if you are someone who engages in relationships beyond the monogamous norm, it can cause even more stress and harm by multiplying the number of people you have to keep up with pleasing. 

People Pleasing & Non-Monogamy 

In the context of consensual non-monogamy, overextending yourself because you feel guilty saying “no”, often leads to double booking. You might be afraid of a partner being upset with you or feeling rejected, so you make excuses or blame your other partner(s), instead of being up front and honest about your other commitments or capacity. So instead of owning the agreements you’ve made, you shift the blame onto others. At a minimum, this will make it look like you are bad at scheduling, a necessary skill for having multiple relationships. In reality, it is more likely that it will make others view you as inconsistent, unreliable, or even manipulative. 

An example I often hear of in the lifestyle (mostly among cis-M/F couples who date and play with other cis-M/F couples) is the phrase “taking one for the team”- meaning that one partner involves themself sexually with another person that they otherwise would not, for the sake of their partner. This could come from a fear of abandonment, or even worse, might happen in 

response to coercion. Whatever the cause, it’s usually followed by feelings of regret or shame by the person who is agreeing to do something that is not actually a “Hell yes!”. 

After a while, doing all these things for other people that you don’t truly want makes you feel angry and exhausted. But because you are conflict-averse, your resentment just builds and comes out as passive aggression until you lash out. Those around you might begin to lose trust in you, because the inability to say “no” means your “yes” is not reliable. So others might ask why don't you just communicate how you feel and say no, in order to prevent that? It’s because changing this behavior isn’t that simple. 

A “Fawn” Response in the Face of Danger

“People pleasing” is not usually a behavior we engage in consciously - it’s actually a function of our autonomic nervous system, a built in protective response that maintains our body’s homeostasis.You may be familiar with our system’s fight/flight to perceived threat- often manifesting as anger & fear, emotions which drive us into action. Similarly, we have a freeze/fawn response when the threat becomes too overwhelming - or in situations where our system senses that fight or flight isn't an option - so as to bring our bodies back to a state of rest. 

The fawn response is not based on kindness- it is a survival response that attempts to create safety through connection by being “good”, as opposed to the movement-based fight/flight responses, or the disconnection-based freeze response. Fawning can appear as being hyperaware of others’ emotions and moods, over-apologizing, avoiding conflict, having difficulty maintaining boundaries and self-abandoning. People pleasing is also a function of the fawn response, much akin to a dog putting its tail between its legs while being scolded. When our system feels threatened, we fawn, making ourselves smaller to avoid rejection and danger. 

When you are in a state of freeze or fawn, it might feel like a physical “block” to speaking up for yourself, or even moving. This is why it is common for survivors to experience the inability to stand up for themselves, fight back, or run during their abuse. And the more trauma you face, the more stress your nervous system is under. Meaning that your freeze/fawn response will trigger faster than others who do not have the same trauma history. If you are a chronic people pleaser, changing this response can feel impossible , since a cognitive decision to change your behavior does not change your nervous system. 

So what creates a chronic people pleaser? As your nervous system forms in childhood, the actions of your caregivers influences its development. Some conditions that form this pattern include being raised by authoritarian parents, who expect obedience without question, and/or emotionally unstable parents, whose children learn to put their parents’ needs before their own. And throughout your life, any relational trauma- abuse, neglect, betrayal or inconsistency - in any relationship, can cause you to fawn in future ones. 

People pleasing can also develop from certain cultural messaging. Western patriarchal cultures that overemphasize strict gender roles or “duty” like in religious fundamentalism, can teach us people pleasing through subliminal messaging. For example, the belief that women are nurturers leads them to put others' needs before their own, and the belief that men must be providers pressures them to overcommit. As we grow up, these roles remain present in our relational power dynamics. We quickly learn through example about the inherent power cis-men have over others, via both privilege and physical strength. This power dynamic can make it extremely difficult for the person with less power to say “no”. In these cases, fawning often literally protects the person with less power- because for those who are women or gender-diverse, saying “no” to a man often leads to violence, or even death. 

As you read this, you might notice that “people pleasing” seems to cause a neverending cycle, like a runaway train embedding bad habits into your muscle memory. It's true - people pleasers

often become retraumatized by their own fawn response. And a chronic fawn response can lead to long term issues like depression, anxiety, low self esteem, and a distorted sense of self and our reality- in addition to being detrimental to our relationships. Unfortunately, our nervous systems pull us toward people who trigger the response, because it is what our body feels comfortable with, and what our nervous system associates with care and connection. And people who desire power or control over us are drawn toward us through the same mechanism their systems are picking up on the ways our fawn response makes us become smaller- whether physically or energetically. 

The good news is that we have neuroplasticity, which means that we can actually reprogram our nervous systems. You may be expecting me to teach you about what types of therapy will help or what techniques to use for personal healing and growth, but isolating yourself from others to “heal” won’t work on its own. A hyperfocus on your individual mental health, isolating emotional disturbance from context, continues to perpetuate a story that you are “less than” others due to the behaviors you are struggling to change. 

The best way to build new neural networks is through building relationships with people who encourage you to communicate your needs and own your autonomy. In healthy relationships, others will not only encourage, but celebrate your power to grant or take away your consent. 

The relationships which heal you are those that feel equitable and reciprocal, rather than lopsided and draining. Every time we speak up for ourselves around safe people and they respect our “no”, a new narrative begins to emerge. A true feeling of belonging is what brings the most healing. 

If you are reflecting on your relationships and it seems like everyone in your life tries to capitalize on your fawn response, how do you predict they will respond if you begin to change? If you are fearful they will reject or abandon you, begin to prepare by trying to find a community for social support. Start with your own interests and values, and begin to seek out others who have those in common. When you build relationships out of shared values as opposed to a trauma bond, you’ll begin to notice your community values you for who you are, rather than what you can provide. 

You might be asking - how do I know I am building healthy relationships with safe people, if my nervous system is primed to be drawn to those who use my people pleasing against me? Some “green flags” to look for when creating reciprocal relationships include: 

- They are consistent and transparent. Their actions align with their words, and they don’t leave you feeling confused or like you need to “fix” the relationship. 

- They respect your “no” as a full sentence - and don’t continue to try to wear you down through pleading, guilting, or demanding you change your mind. This applies to all “no’s” - emotional space, privacy, time, physical space & intimacy. 

- If you create new boundaries with them, they respect them. They may need a reminder of the new boundaries if this is an existing relationship, but pushing back on your boundaries does not become a pattern.

- The care you show them feels reciprocated - they check in on you when you are having a hard time, not just when they are having a hard time. They don’t exploit your kindness or generosity. 

- They show empathy by listening to and validating your feelings- even the negative ones, without criticism or judgment. They don’t attempt to make you feel guilt, shame, or overexplain when they have done something to hurt you, and they don’t utilize what you share with them against you later on. 

- They allow your relationship to form authentically and organically - they don’t rush emotional or physical intimacy or attempt to “trauma bond” without trust being established. They let their true selves show gradually as opposed to trying to impress you or one-up you when sharing about themselves. 

- They encourage you to form healthy relationships with others and with yourself. They are genuinely happy for you when you have healthy relationships with others, and when you do things that are good for you - even when it means they do not get to see or talk to you as much as they would like. 

As you begin to work on creating healthier relationships with others, it’s just as important to create a healthier relationship with yourself. When you are a chronic people pleaser, you chronically self-abandon. Although you might do it out of fear of abandonment or rejection, in the process you are abandoning and rejecting your own wants and needs. So, you’ll need to work at improving this relationship with yourself - especially the parts you’ve abandoned the most. Just like in relationships with other people, you have to build trust. Trust is built through consistent, honest and reliable action. 

Choose one way you can show up for yourself consistently and authentically each day, and start there. It doesn’t have to be a big change - it can be something as small as eating breakfast each day, being more consistent with your skincare routine, or taking 2 minutes each day to stretch or journal. Start with a very small goal, one that feels realistic that you can easily accomplish. Each time you are able to accomplish it, you will build more confidence and trust in yourself, until you 

are ready to expand. Once you have built that confidence, you can begin to explore hobbies or interests you stopped prioritizing because of all the time you spent self-sacrificing for others. 

Maybe you have self-abandoned so much that you aren’t even sure what interests you anymore. The best way to get to know yourself is by reconnecting with your body, so that you can more easily identify and connect with your emotions - because emotions are a physical process, which we then ascribe labels to, once we become cognitively aware of them. Chronic people pleasers are usually taught to ignore how they feel, so this could be a slow process. You can start by setting a reminder at different points throughout the day to take 30 seconds to check in and bring attention to your physical sensations with curiosity. 

As you get more comfortable identifying your emotions, these will direct you to your wants and needs, because every emotion has a purpose. For example, confusion - an emotion that often comes from being in relationships with manipulative people - is one people pleasers often feel. Instead of trying to fix the situation to make the feeling go away, welcome it as a signal that

something is not right, and that you are picking up on an inconsistency. This combination of building trust in yourself and comfort with your emotions will begin to allow you to more easily identify when a relationship is harming you, and keep you rooted in your values when you begin to seek out a community that better aligns with the truest version of yourself. 

If you feel shame or guilt about your chronic people pleasing behaviors, it is NOT your fault. The fawn response is meant to protect us, so thank your nervous system for doing this important work. Although it can happen when we don’t need it, we have the ability to choose to change our responses and the people we create relationships with. 

Bio 

Nicole Sonnefeldt (she/her) is an alternative relationship coach & consultant & the founder of Freeform Coaching: Relationship Coaching for Conscious Non-Monogamy. A former trauma & couple's therapist with a Master's in Counseling Psychology from the Chicago School of Professional Psychology, Nicole started Freeform with the mission to help the various non-monogamous and queer communities she is a part of, without having to step away from her participation in the ways helping the community as a professional counselor would have required. 

Nicole blends her personal experience in the lifestyle, non-monogamy and kink with her professional training and expertise to assist singles, couples and polycules create intentional and equitable relationships of all shapes and sizes. Additionally, Nicole participates in activism supporting sex workers, by giving presentations about affirming care to Counseling Psychology Graduate students, guiding research in mental health aimed to support sex workers, and providing discounted services to all sex workers, regardless of income.