Last week, I did something I almost never do and I called in sick.

To be honest, life has been a lot lately. I know I have been sharing a lot about it on social but seriously life feels like country song. Between stress piling up, not sleeping well, and just trying to hold it all together, I hit a big wall. I got no sleep and I just couldn't handle it.

So I thought, Okay, today I’m pressing pause. I’ll rest, recharge, and just take a mental health day. 

Except… that’s not what happened.

Instead, I found myself caught in this weird cycle: open the laptop, stare at the screen, shut it, tell myself to rest, try to relax, and then… feel restless all over again. Over and over, the whole day.

And by the end of it I was somehow more exhausted than when I started.

Maybe you’ve had a day like this, too:

• You shut your laptop, telling yourself you need to rest.

• Guilt creeps in, so you open it again to “just get something done.”

• Your brain won’t focus, so you close it again.

• You try to relax, but it doesn’t feel restorative.

• Then you repeat the whole cycle… and end up even more drained than before.

We often think it is laziness or a lack of motivation but - 

It’s something deeper called functional freeze.

Functional freeze is a state of nervous system dysregulation. It happens when your body is carrying so much stress that it can no longer process or release it effectively.

Think of it like a bucket.

• First, you put in the big rocks—major life stressors like work crises, family challenges, or financial pressure.

• Then, the gravel gets added—everyday stressors like deadlines, traffic, or endless to-do lists.

• Finally, the sand pours in—small annoyances that might seem minor but still take up space.

Layer after layer, the bucket fills up. And once it’s full, there’s no more capacity. The nervous system doesn’t keep pushing—it shuts down. That shutdown is functional freeze.

The tricky part about freeze is that it can look like rest from the outside, but it doesn’t feel like rest on the inside.

You might cancel plans, take a day off work, or tell yourself, “I just need to relax today.” But instead of waking up the next morning feeling refreshed, you notice you’re even more drained, foggy, or unmotivated.

That’s because true rest allows your body to recover and restore energy. Freeze doesn’t do that. Freeze is your nervous system stuck in a kind of protective shutdown mode—like your body is saying, “I can’t handle one more thing, so I’m powering down.”

The difference is huge:

• Real rest recharges your system and gives you energy back.

• Freeze keeps you in limbo, leaving you more depleted the longer you stay there.

The good news is, you don’t have to stay stuck in the functional freeze cycle. Gentle nervous system regulation tools like breathwork, EFT tapping, and sound healing can help your body process stress instead of storing it.

If you want to dive deeper into this topic, I shared my full story in this week’s podcast episode: “Why Rest Feels Impossible: Nervous System Reset for Burnout.”

🎧 Listen to the episode here.