3 Tips for Recovering Your Body, Mind, and Nervous System
It’s often overwhelming to figure out the next steps to take to recover and restore yourself. Now, over 3 years later, I recommend a triad approach that includes emotional/mental, medical/functional medicine and physical/nervous system repair.
When I emerged from an extremely challenging, traumatic life experience, I was overwhelmed. I wasn’t sure who to turn to for support. I tried a bunch of different practitioners who seemed to help with one aspect of my healing or another, and although their intentions were good, I didn’t feel as though I was improving at all.
There are many different versions of “challenging life experiences” can leave you feeling the effects of a dysregulated nervous system. Whether your challenging life experience is an abusive relationship, like mine was, the devastating loss of a loved one, being a caretaker for someone who’s ill and living in fearful expectation of that next lab test result, going through a contentious divorce where you feel attacked legally, financially and emotionally, a pandemic where you’ve been isolated and fearful for a period of time.
It’s often overwhelming to figure out the next steps to take to recover and restore yourself.
I know that I personally wasted too much time trying to handle things on my own and trying piece together solutions.
Now, over 3 years later, I recommend a triad approach that includes emotional/mental, medical/functional medicine and physical/nervous system repair:
1. Emotional/mental/subconscious healing support:
Find a good therapist who has been educated in trauma AND your specific situation. Whether you experienced narcissistic abuse, death of a loved one, divorce, or being a long-term caretaker—you need to be heard and validated.
The most helpful therapist I went do didn’t have the highest credentials — she had been through and survived what I was going through.
If your practitioner doesn’t understand the specific dynamic of your situation, keep looking. Ask for an initial complimentary interview and get a sense of the person. It might take several paid visits to get a deeper sense of whether it’s a good fit. If it’s not, cut your losses and move on. It’s okay to be discerning and it’s okay to spend some money and time figuring it out.
In addition to more traditional therapy, I currently also work with someone who helps remove subconscious blocks so that I can explore what my own emotional patterns throughout my life have been that would have lead me to an experience like narcissistic abuse. This would also fall under this category of emotional/mental/subconscious healing support.
My advice is to initially seek to feel stability in yourself again. You can add on later if you’d like to continue and deepen your self study.
2. Medical/functional medicine + nutritional support:
Find a good functional medicine doctor. Although I did start with my primary care practitioner, I was told that the extreme exhaustion I was experiencing was in my head and further testing wasn’t ordered.
Two years later, I found a functional medicine doctor who believed me when I told her I could barely move. Once she ordered the proper tests and a realistic baseline was established, I had a plan to improve and I began to feel better. For me, it was important to use holistic methods to heal and this practitioner was a good fit for me. You have to find someone with whom you feel comfortable, and a method that resonates with you.
Healing from a stressful life experience can be a slow process. It took time to get where you are now; it takes a bit of time to get better.
I highly recommend that you find someone who can give you nutritional support as well. If your health care practitioner can’t give you specific support, I would hire an expert who only focuses on eating to support your nervous system, your hormones, your adrenals, or wherever you need support. See my blog post on foods to calm your nervous system.
3. Physical + Nervous System repair:
This is a critical piece of information so if you’re skimming, please back up and read this carefully….
If you’ve recently been through a challenging life event, then you’ve probably not been nurturing yourself for awhile. In fact, the idea of that might make you uncomfortable.
Pushing yourself to run or power walk or “work out” or even practice a vigorous form of yoga is NOT nurturing if you’re exhausted and your body aches.
Find a physical component that nurtures you. I was fortunate to have Feldenkrais as a practice I could rely on. I did some yoga, but at the beginning, it took too much energy that I didn’t have. Even a few sun salutations felt like too much. I craved something more nurturing for my body — something that connected me to myself, and included the physical component. Meditation is good, but it doesn’t move energy in the same way as a physical practice.
Connecting to your physical body is critical — now especially.
The main reason Feldenkrais worked for me is because it involves physical movements and works with the nervous system. I was able to regulate and release any physical tension at the same time. After each session or class I felt as if I’d had a really good massage and felt emotionally calmer and at peace. My mental clarity improved substantially.
I took group classes as well as worked with a practitioner, but looking back it was the group classes that empowered me and gave me on-going tools to calm my nervous system by myself.
To conclude, anyone who has recently moved on from an emotionally and mentally stressful life experience may find themselves continuing to feel unexpectedly depleted. Begin with a triad of support — the right expert who can support you mentally/emotionally, the right expert who can support you medically but in a way that is all-inclusive and resonates with your values, and some sort of gentle physical or somatic method that addresses your body and regulates your nervous system so that you can reconnect with your body and feel stable and safe again.
Here is a beautiful nurturing audio lesson that will give you a taste of what it feels like to calm your nervous system while making small, gentle, slow movements of your body. Lie on the floor or your bed, remove distractions, and enjoy.
What If You Could Change Your Muscle Tension Patterns for Good?
All of these therapies are amazing and all of them help us feel better … temporarily. But addressing chronic muscle tension via the muscles is like trying to clean a dirt spot off your face by wiping the mirror.
Emotional tension — better known as stress, anxiety, worry, and fear — actually BECOMES muscle tension.
Most of us agree with this statement, to varying degrees.
We have a general sense that our bodies and minds are connected. We know or have heard that meditation helps calm our blood pressure. We all understand to some degree that chronic stress isn’t good for us and that it causes physical symptoms that aren’t pleasant.
We try a myriad of therapies and practices to alleviate the muscle tension at the area of the tight muscles.
Massage helps us feel better for about 3 days. I know this because I’m a massage therapist and I love helping people feel relaxed and restored.
Physical therapists give exercises to redistribute the responsibility of the overworking muscle. I know this can help, depending on your practitioner, but for how long?
We do yoga and stretch out our muscles and feel good.
But have you noticed how the tension comes back if you miss your regular practice schedule?
All of these therapies are amazing and all of them help us feel better … temporarily.
“But addressing chronic muscle tension via the muscles is like trying to clean a dirt spot off your face by wiping the mirror. ”
What if we were to address the muscle tension at the root cause of the tension? What if we could change our habitual muscle tension patterns for good?
In order to make lasting change in muscle tension or pain, you have to go to the source of the problem.
I propose that working with the nervous system directly is working with the root of chronically tight muscles.
The brain and nervous system are where the instructions to tense and contract the your muscles originate, and that’s where they can be turned off.
Here’s an example of how mental tension — in this case, extreme worry and anxiety — might play out in your body.
Let’s say you went through a pandemic.
You spent over a year worrying about your health, your family’s health, your job, your kids’ school and social situation, your family’s mental well being. You felt isolated because you weren’t seeing friends and you lost your usual way of managing your stress.
When you left the house, you were on high alert — scanning the grocery store for who was nearby, did they have a mask on, are they too close to you? When you brought groceries home you felt worried because you didn’t know if you were washing them well enough….and this went on for awhile.
Your nervous system was in survival mode pretty consistently for 6-12 months.
When you’re stressed for a period of time, you practice certain familiar muscular contraction patterns throughout your body.
Nerve cells continue to wire in a certain predictable stress pattern called neural pathways. The stressful feeling happens and then its corresponding habitual muscle contraction happens. Over and over and over again.
This means that if your habitually take on stress by clenching your jaw or grinding your teeth, you end up worsening your jaw tension, TMJ symptoms, and headaches.
If your tendency is to round your shoulders, then you practice your habit and create more neck and shoulder tension or pain.
If you tend to contract your belly, you probably also are not taking full deep breaths because your abdomen is contracted, your diaphragm is not moving freely, and your shoulders are rounded forwards. It’s a predictable stress muscular pattern.
We can’t control or change these patterns by forcing ourselves to have “better posture.” These become habits of contraction that happen unconsciously each time we feel anxious or stressed.
The way to unwind these patterns for good is through your nervous system — the same way they were formed in the first place.
To conclude, it’s no secret that our physical bodies are directly affected by chronic stress that we experience emotionally and mentally. We can find temporary relief by working directly with the muscles involved, but relief only lasts for a short time. To find long term relief, we have to unwind the habitual unconscious muscle contraction patterns through the same path tension was created in the first place — through our nervous system.
Here’s a free audio lesson that will help calm your stress and relax your muscles overall. Simply lie on your back on the floor or your bed and eliminate any distractions for 15 minutes. You’ll find that by doing these small, slow, gentle movements as instructed, you’ll feel mentally AND physically relaxed and calm.
How to Cultivate Inner Strength with Being Easeful
When I was younger I was able to power my way through anything — I was physically strong and was proud of this quality. I was mentally strong and when challenges arose, I met them head on. I started 3 separate businesses–two while raising 3 children and taking care of my family while my husband at the time traveled internationally frequently for his job.
When I was younger I was able to power my way through anything — I was physically strong and was proud of this quality. I was mentally strong and when challenges arose, I met them head on. I started 3 separate businesses–two while raising 3 children and taking care of my family while my husband at the time traveled internationally frequently for his job. We moved across the country 3 times in six years and I managed each move from start to finish, practiced vigorous sweaty yoga 90-minutes/day, 6 times/week. I was strong and efficient and capable and could handle anything!
But in the past few years I’ve been brought to my knees.
Besides being older and having less energy, I’ve been through some pretty darn challenging life events that left me holding relentless tension in my body from anxiety and chronic stress. I’m slowly recovering from adrenal exhaustion and I’m having to find a new way to live and to be — a way where I don’t have to force my way through challenging physical and emotional situations.
It’s a scary proposition to not be able to rely on my own ability to power through life.
Perhaps you can relate to some of this.
And although, I can’t say I like having to change my ways, this is what I’m discovering….
Being easeful is actually powerful
In my Feldenkrais practice—as a teacher, practitioner, and student—I’ve learned to make very slow, small movements within my own range of comfort. I pay attention to my physical sensations as I move.
I’ve learned to observe where I feel muscular resistance and effort or thoughts that tell me to “try harder” or “do more,” to make the movement I’m practicing “happen.”
When I sense I’m contracting muscles to make these small, gentle movements, then I do even less and go more slowly.
And the paradoxical thing that happens is, within a few minutes, the ease of this movement improves and the range spontaneously becomes bigger. On it’s own. With no help or forcing or managing or “pushing through” on my part.
In fact, if I do “help” or “force,” the improvement doesn’t happen.
This is the same principle applies when a client is on my treatment table. I’m listening with my hands for what range and trajectory of movement is completely easeful for the person. And as I join her nervous system, with no agenda on my part, she suddenly has more movement and mobility available. Muscular contraction melts away almost spontaneously.
The work is easeful and the results are powerful.
In other words, in order to have a powerful result, I must practice ease.
Last weekend on a hike in Boulder, I felt my energy was low. My legs felt heavy and my breathing felt forced. Initially I walked quickly and was pushing myself, berating myself for not going faster.
And then I remembered the process of Feldenkrais and thought “Is it possible to create power ease-fully?”
I slowed my steps way down, to the point where I was breathing easily and my pace felt effortless. I started to look at the flowers and my surroundings. I stopped for water breaks frequently and to breathe in nature. I didn’t allow myself to feel tired or as if I was pushing myself at all.
And I gave myself this leeway without judgement or it needing to be different.
At around my turn-around point, 45 minutes into my hike, I noticed that my pace had become much faster — effortlessly. I wasn’t tired at all and I was breathing evenly. I had energy and my hips and legs felt light and loose.
I can only conclude that this phenomenon is somehow related to what happens on the treatment table— that the nervous system is involved in all aspects of life, movement, thinking, and manifesting.
In other words, ease creates power in more areas than the physical.
My practice this week has been to notice when situations arise that cause me stress (which is multiple times each day in the world of an entrepreneur).
Initially, I observe myself automatically go to: overwhelm, anger, fear of not being able to handle something, self pity, forcing my way, overexerting, overworking, and so on.
And then I remember to ask myself: how can I create the possibility of ease and power?
I want to spread this quality of ease into my daily life and trust it in the same way I trust this process when I work with people in my practice.
So, the next time a stressful situation comes up for you, try noticing what your habitual thoughts and emotions are. It’s likely that you, like me, respond this way every single time you face a stressful situation.
It’s an opportunity to ask yourself how you might create the possibility for ease in this situation? Where might you do less? And observe if somehow, a sense of power arises that you never expected or could have anticipated while doing things your habitual way.
To learn more about how The Feldenkrais Method® works, click here.
How to Harness the Power of Food to Regulate Your Nervous System
What you eat makes a difference in your mood.
If you’re stressed or anxious, then it’s even more critical to nourish yourself in a healthy way. But unfortunately, many of us use our chronic stress as an excuse to overindulge in foods we know are bad for us.
What you eat makes a difference in your mood.
If you’re stressed or anxious, then it’s even more critical to nourish yourself in a healthy way as part of your regular self care practice. But unfortunately, many of us use our chronic stress as an excuse to overindulge in foods we know are bad for us.
Holistic chef and food for life coach, Cheryl Rojic is an expert in creating individualized healthy eating plans to lower stress and improve immune function.
Some foods Cheryl highly suggests avoiding food with the following, especially if you’re experiencing chronic long term stress:
Highly processed foods,
Foods loaded with sugar,
Artificial flavors and colors
Non-food substances or chemicals
She says that these choices are linked to poor gut health, which plays a critical role of the healthy functioning of the nervous system. The gut strongly influences the functioning of the brain and how we handle stress, both physically and mentally.
“Let’s use sugar for an example,” says Rojic. “Many of us indulge in sugary processed carbohydrates in times of stress – a candy bar, baked goods, alcohol. High levels of cortisol, the stress hormone, usually result in an amino acid deficiency which in turn causes those cravings for sugary, as well as fatty, foods.
“To further the negative affects of cortisol, it leads to the body creating new fat cells, enlarges fat cells, and even increases how much fatty tissue your body stores, especially belly fat.
“This stubborn belly fat in turn releases cortisol – if someone is chronically stressed, it’s nearly non-stop. And this cortisol causes even more cravings for sugar and fat.”
Rojic suggests that choosing foods to support gut health and blood sugar will help to balance cortisol (the stress hormone) levels in the body.
She recommends these foods that can help put an end to the rise in cortisol and control blood sugar spikes:
Complex carbohydrates: sweet potatoes, quinoa, beans, nuts, oats and seeds. These “comfort foods” actually promote production of serotonin, the “happy hormone.”
Foods rich in Vitamin C, such as red or orange bell peppers, strawberries and cauliflower.
Dark leafy greens are loaded with protein, calcium and magnesium, a mineral that promotes a relaxed state. Folate, in those leafy greens, as well as in asparagus, is essential for a calm feeling.
Berries are rich in phytonutrients and antioxidants that fight free radicals and help to balance mood. Even one square of high quality, pure dark chocolate (72% cacao or higher), reduces cortisol and increases serotonin.
In conclusion, the connection between food and stress and anxiety is a vicious cycle. We tend to eat the worst when we’re chronically stressed, but what we eat is essential to managing our stress, lowering stress hormones, and regulating blood sugar.
Cheryl Rojic is a holistic chef and food for life coach, serving up inspiration to change the way we nourish body, mind and heart. From simmer to boil, she will help sift out and render key ingredients to create a recipe for better health. As a thriving two-time cancer survivor, Cheryl has been dishing up plant-strong deliciousness with classes and gatherings for nearly 20 years.
3 Ways to Regulate Your Nervous System When You're Stressed
It can take less than 20 minutes to feel calm, relaxed muscles, easy breathing, calmer mind, at peace, and balanced emotionally.
It can take less than 20 minutes to feel calmer, have more relaxed muscles, breathe more freely, have a calmer mind, feel at peace, and feel more balanced emotionally.
Three of the most effective ways to come back into a parasympathetic (rest and digest) state involve your hands, your mouth and your breathing.
Your mouth, tongue, and jaw take up 35% of real estate in the sensory part of your brain and your hands take up another 35%. (It’s surprising to learn that the entire rest of your body only takes up the remaining 30%!) This means that these areas have the most influence over your mood and sense of well-being.
So it makes sense to work with one or both of the areas of your body that are the most sensitive, or available to sensing, in order to make the biggest improvements to calm you down, in the quickest and most efficient way.
Below are 3 self care practices for you to try. See if one of these helps you feel grounded, calmer, more physically relaxed, and able to breathe more naturally and freely. To learn more about what constitutes a “self care practice,” click here.
1. Natural Breathing
Many people recommend breathing deeply when there’s stress, to calm your nervous system and send the message to your brain and body that all is well, but I recommend natural, easy breathing.
If you think about it, deep breathing is what we do when there’s a big task to accomplish or when we have to prepare for action or have to exert ourselves. But natural, relaxed, easy breathing signals the body and brain that all is well.
Practice:
Lie on your back either on the floor or on your bed, and get comfortable. You can bend your knees and stand your feet or put a bolster underneath your knees.
Rather than having your head on a pillow, see if you can rest your head on a folded flat towel or folded yoga blanket so that your forehead and chin are on the same horizontal plane, and your throat is open (rather than your throat closed and your chin tilted lower than your forehead).
Relax your tongue and your jaw.
Follow your breathing. Notice if you’re breathing at all or if your breath is shallow. Simply follow your breathing. Don’t worry if your breath is shallow or uneven or if there are long gaps between each breath. Simply allow your body to inhale and exhale at its own pace.
Your brain knows how much oxygen your body needs at any given time. You’ll find that your breathing isn’t always even. It varies. Sometimes you may need more breath and sometimes it will be shallow. Sometimes you’ll notice a big space between breaths and sometimes your breath will quicken.
At first it will feel difficult and you’ll be tempted to control your inhales and exhales or do a pranayama breathing practice or yoga breathing that you’re already familiar with. But see if you can come back to your natural, uncontrolled breathing. You’re only observing — not forcing or making anything happen.
2. Hand Movements
As I mentioned above, because your hands take up 35% of your sensory brain space, your hands are extremely effective in lowering stress generally throughout your body.
Rolling your hands practice instructions:
Lie on your back either on the floor or on your bed, and have your legs long or bend your knees. You can also place a bolster under your knees — whatever you need to do to feel really comfortable. See #1 for recommendations regarding a pillow.
These movements are to be done very, very slowly, very small, only in the range that is completely comfortable (no stretching or straining or forcing), pause between each movement before doing the next, and rest as often as you like.
3. Mouth and Tongue Movements
As I mentioned earlier, your mouth, jaw and tongue also take up 35% of your sensory cortical space. Many people hold tension in their jaw, tongue, face and neck. This practice will not only help you release any unconsciously held tension in your mouth and jaw, but generally, throughout your entire body, as well.
In conclusion, these three, very efficient and effective ways to immediately relieve stress and regulate your nervous system involve observing your natural breathing, and sensing yourself as you make gentle, small, slow movements with your hands and mouth.
The above two audio recordings are from The Feldenkrais Method®, a somatic practice that helps people regulate their nervous system and let go of unconsciously held muscle tension patterns. To learn more about The Feldenkrais Method®, click here.
If you enjoyed these practices, and would like more information about online classes or working together, please email me.
Empower Your Body: Understanding the Sympathetic and Parasympathetic Nervous Systems
We have two main aspects of our autonomic nervous system that both perform very different functions.
We have two main aspects of our autonomic nervous system that both perform very different functions.
Sympathetic Nervous System
The sympathetic nervous system is responsible for the stress response. We commonly know it as fight, flight and freeze. It’s a survival mechanism. When you experience a threat, your body tells you to take action in one of these ways.
Some ways your body creates energy to deal with this perceived or real threat is:
Quickened breath and heart rate
Tensing muscles
Sweat
High blood pressure and more blood flow to your organs
Expanding blood vessels to allow you to get more blood flow and oxygen
Heightened senses
Release of blood sugar and fats from the body’s stores to be used for energy
Increased Cortisol levels (stress hormone)
If we remain in this sympathetic state longterm, we’re then in a chronic stress state, and this has longterm effects that we definitely want to avoid.
This is where the parasympathetic nervous system comes into play.
Parasympathetic Nervous System
The parasympathetic nervous system is responsible for the rest and digest response.
It tells your body to:
slow down
breathe and relax
the danger is over
cortisol levels falls back to normal
your body conserves energy
your heart rate slows
your digestion increases
You can literally “rest and digest” again.
One aspect of the autonomic nervous system is not better than the other — we want to be able to have access to the sympathetic nervous system when circumstances call for us to run or fight. But we’re designed to be able to go back and forth as needed–to take action and to recover.
Unfortunately many of us spend much more time in a sympathetic state than in a parasympathetic state and are chronically stressed.
And furthermore, some of us can’t feel we’re in an activated state because it’s become so “normal” to us, except we feel certain effects and aren’t sure why we have them.
For example, some of us are so used to chronically tense muscles or jaw, neck and shoulder tension or pain, but we don’t connect that chronic stress has caused this.
After a period of months or years, this chronically stressed state becomes “normal.” We sort of adjust and just live with the discomfort.
Some muscular tension patterns associated with a chronically stressed state are:
Contracted jaw
Small muscles in face are contracted
Eye tension
Neck and shoulder tension
Back tension and pain
Tension in hands or arms
Tension in pelvis, glutes, hips and thighs
Link here to learn more about what the physical symtoms of stress and anxiety look like in the body.
And our posture reflects this chronic muscle tension:
Head forward and down
Lack of mobility in our back, neck and shoulders
Contracted abdomen which restricts our breathing
Fortunately our brain and nervous system are capable of change.
They only need to be reminded of a healthier way. And not only can they change the unconscious muscular tension patterns, but the habitual patterns of reacting to the stress will also change through focusing on the body.
But we can’t over-ride the old, unhealthy habitual muscle patterns with force or muscular effort. We must use our brain, literally, to change our muscular patterns and relieve our own stress response.
The Feldenkrais Method® offers the way out of chronic stress-induced muscular tension patterns. In this method, either working one-on-one or in group classes, you’re guided into small, gentle movements while you pay attention to what you sense and feel in your body as you do these movements.
As you slowly move, you observe where you feel resistance or tension, or where you feel the quality of each movement go from easy and comfortable to resistance or forcing.
It’s through this focused attention, that you take in this sensory information, and your brain processes it, and then comes up with the most efficient, easy way to move.
And often, almost spontaneously, the tension is released.
This often happens within the first session or class. However because chronic tension has been reinforced for many months, and in some cases, years, it takes several sessions or a series of sessions or classes to maintain these new, healthier muscle patterns. But the end result is often lasting and provides people with tools to maintain this new healthier way of functioning comfortably on their own, without needed an “expert” to help them manage their pain forever.
So, in conclusion, when you’re chronically emotionally and mentally stressed, chances are you’re living mostly in a sympathetic nervous system state. In that state, muscle tension — skeletal muscles, smaller muscles of the face and eyes, muscles of the digestive system, and muscles of the neck that cause migraines as well, can contract. But fortunately, because your nervous system is always working on your behalf, these chronic habitual contraction patterns can be released. (Link here to learn more about how to improve chronic pain symptoms.)
How to Balance Your Nervous System with Biodynamic Craniosacral Therapy
Biodynamic Craniosacral Therapy is a gentle, non-invasive hands-on treatment for the whole body where the practitioner listens to the system through her hands for any patterns of inertia or congestion.
You can get a massage for your body, but can you get a massage for your nervous system?
Biodynamic Craniosacral Therapy is a gentle, non-invasive hands-on treatment for the whole body where the practitioner listens to the system through her hands for any patterns of inertia or congestion. The treatment is focused on supporting the health of the whole being, in particular the nervous system -- that system of the body that dictates all the functioning.
CST helps to relieve stress, tension and physical discomfort and brings the body back into balance. It supports the body’s innate ability to balance, restore and heal itself, as well as reduce stress. During or after a treatment, clients report feelings of calmness and often increased energy, with renewed clarity of mind and a feeling of well-being.
This type of therapy can stand by itself, but I love how it works alongside massage, which has it’s own set of physical, mental and emotional benefits. And because it is so gentle and non-invasive, crasniosacral therapy is suitable for everyone, including pregnant mothers and newborns. In fact, many midwives and doctors recommend craniosacral therapy during pregnancy because it calms the nervous system of both mother and child. When Mom's system is soothed and balanced during pregnancy, baby gains huge benefits.
Craniosacral therapy with massage is like receiving a massage on the inside and out!
Did you enjoy this post?
Make sure you sign up for our newsletter below to get other tips sent to your inbox.