In this instructional video, David Brimacombe, a concussion survivor with seven concussions over 20 years, explains how post‑concussion syndrome (PCS) recovery is deeply tied to the state of the nervous system. He introduces three distinct nervous‑system conditions—functioning, dysregulated, and sensitized—illustrating each with analogies and personal experience. A functioning system smoothly shifts between sympathetic (aroused) and parasympathetic (rest‑and‑digest) states, while a dysregulated system gets stuck in arousal and requires active tools such as breathwork, yoga nidra, and full‑body scans to down‑regulate. A sensitized system is driven by pervasive fear, keeping baseline arousal high; simple breathwork is insufficient, and recovery must focus on creating a sense of safety through consistent daily routines, cognitive reframing of internal dialogue, and graded exposure to stressors. Brimacombe emphasizes the importance of correctly labeling one’s nervous‑system state to guide mindset and recovery, and he offers practical, step‑by‑step strategies to lower baseline stress, build tolerance, and ultimately heal the brain after concussion.
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If everything feels overwhelming right now— lights, sounds, even small tasks— this doesn't mean your brain is broken. What it might mean is that you have a sensitized nervous system. In this video, I want to break down the difference between someone with a functioning, a dysregulated, and a sensitized nervous system. Let's begin. Hi and welcome to the PCS Resilience Collective. My name is David Brimacombe, and after 7 concussions over 20 years, I learned a lot about how the nervous system plays a huge role in your PCS recovery. Let's talk about labeling. Why is it important to distinguish between a nervous system that is functioning, between a nervous system that is dysfunctional, and one that is sensitized? Now understand that most people who have struggles with their nervous system just feel it's broken. It doesn't function. My brain is broken. My body is broken. Okay, and that couldn't be further from the truth. So today I want to go through the 3 different levels of function, okay, how they might relate to you, and what we can do to help you bring you back to a baseline, one in which you're functioning. So why we need to have a strategy and why we need to actually understand where we are is because your nervous system runs on safety and fear. Okay, if your body feels like you're in a dangerous situation, okay, your nervous system is going to be heightened. It's going to be hyper-aroused. Okay, so if you're constantly feeling like it is broken, it is not functioning, that is creating fear in your body. That is creating a danger in your system that is only going to make things worse. So if we can correctly label, okay, what is your nervous system doing right now, it'll help you with your recovery. It'll help you with your mindset. so you understand where you are and where you need to get to. So let's start with a normal functioning nervous system. Now, this is what everyone wants, okay? And again, prior to a concussion, maybe this is where you were. Think of it as a simple car analogy. When you step on the gas, okay, much like a car is going to move forward, your nervous system is going to adjust. It's going to go into a more sympathetic or aroused state. Okay, you let off the gas, you touch the brake, your body downregulates into a parasympathetic rest and digest state. Okay, that is perfectly normal. It is adjusting to the ebbs and flows of life, and it's doing so rather quickly. That is perfectly functioning. That is what we're looking for. Okay, and the best part of this type of nervous system is that it is flexible, it is resilient. Okay, you could have a day of stress, come home, relax, And feel perfectly normal. You can hop in and out of that sympathetic or your stress state into your parasympathetic or your rest and digest state. You can toggle in and out throughout the day perfectly fine without adding extra layers of stress to your system or having to actually manually downshift from one to the next. Let's talk now about a dysregulated nervous system. What does that look like? What does that feel like? Now, A lot of you maybe are at this state, so when your body is not as responsive. So here's my perfect example. I used to go work out, okay, and I'd work out for 25-30 minutes, not super long, but then it took me hours to recover. My nervous system was stuck in that aroused state. Now, while I was working out, I needed to be aroused. I needed for my body to understand that this was a stressful state. The blood flow needed to go to my extremities, to my brain, and I needed to feel alert. Okay, but if it was a functioning nervous system, when I stopped, it would downregulate on its own. For me, that didn't happen. I had to manually shift out of that sympathetic into the parasympathetic. Breathwork, yoga nidra, relaxing— I had to tell my system It was now time to downregulate. It didn't do it naturally. Okay, could I get it back to a spot where I felt like I was relaxed and calm? Yes. It took time though. I was hourly with my kids. I was probably not absorbing the nutrients as well because my body wasn't ready to eat after I was working out. But that was a state I was in. I was dysregulated and I needed to find a way, okay, to create the tools. That I could tell my system that it was safe once I was done working out and it was time to downregulate. This is a point, if you're dysregulated, where tools like breathwork, okay, like mindset, like something like a yoga nidra, a full body scan, are going to help with your regulation, okay? Because your body is able to toggle in and out of that sympathetic stressed and the parasympathetic state. But a lot of times you have to coax it. You have to give it that gentle nudge to start the process. The last one is the sensitized nervous system. Now, this isn't something that many people talk about. A lot of people talk about it's either working or it's not. It's dysregulated or it's functioning properly. Okay? Very few people are talking about a sensitized system. Now, here's the difference. In a sensitized system, My body could be dysregulated, okay? And then I go to try to regulate it through breath, through somatic movements. Doesn't work, okay? You want to know why it doesn't work? Because in a sensitized system, the greatest driver of your erratic nervous system is a sense of fear. It's your body and your nervous system have this irrational fear and this sense of danger that your whole environment Okay, you're constantly under threat. So by just adding breathwork, my body still thinks that there's danger out there. It hasn't changed that. I need to change the internal talk. I need to change the way my nervous system perceives my environment if I want to get out of that sensitized state. Okay, so there's the big difference. A lot of times people Who I've talked to have said, I just, I can't breathe out of a highly sympathetic state, no matter how much breathwork, no matter how much downtime and calm time. My heart rate is pounding, my thoughts are anxious and moving throughout my mind. I can't control them. Okay, it's because you're sensitized. It's because your body feels fear everywhere. It feels danger everywhere. And until you can create that internal dialogue that can convince your nervous system, that can tell your nervous system that you are safe, that you are supported, that will continue. Now, one of the other things that makes a sensitized nervous system tough is that the stress tube or the stress beaker is already half full when you get up. I get up in the morning and I am already close to tipping over to the edge. Okay, so a small stress here, another stress there, and I'm already dysregulated. I already feel anxious and irritable and out of sorts because my baseline is higher. Okay, where I'm starting from is higher. So 2 things I need to work on as a— with a sensitized nervous system. Number one, that feeling of safety in this system, convincing my nervous system that it is okay. The world around you isn't inherently evil, isn't inherently dangerous. Okay, and the second thing is slowly trying to bring that baseline down so that I don't have such a weak tolerance for any kind of stress and stressors in my life. So how am I going to go ahead and do this, right? How am I going to go ahead and create a system that is no longer sensitized? Okay. The biggest thing is I need consistency in my life. Consistency is going to tell your body that things are safe. So if from day to day my body doesn't know what to expect, I get up, some days I go to my phone, some days I go and I start work, or I go try to work out, there's no consistency. It doesn't know what to expect. Your body needs routine. It needs some kind of consistency. So Having a morning routine, an evening routine, is going to help with that consistency. It's going to help create safety in the system. Okay, the next thing you need to do is you need to create a system when anytime you have those automatic negative thoughts creep into your mind, okay, that are telling your body, telling your nervous system, this is not safe, this is not a good place for me to be. Okay, it's not that we have to try to block it out entirely. Acknowledge that that is not Who you are. Acknowledge that that is not a true statement. Not everything that goes on in your mind is what you actually believe or aligns with who you are as a person. Okay? So acknowledge, yes, in that moment, okay, those are the thoughts in my mind, but that's not what I believe. Okay? Those anxious thoughts, those thoughts of disbelief, okay? Yes, they're here, but guess what? I know I can do that. I know this is a safe environment. Okay, and then the last thing you need to do is exposing yourself to the things that are causing you harm, okay? Doing so in a way that's not going to create more symptoms. So if I know 5, 10 minutes into walking into a store I'm going to feel symptomatic, I start with 3 minutes, okay? And after those 3 minutes, I leave. What am I— what am I doing is I'm convincing my body that that is not an inherently dangerous situation. If I do that multiple times, I've now trained my system to say, wait, if I go into that store, into, into work, I'm not automatically going to be symptomatic. And over time of building up that tolerance, you're actually going to create safety in the system. You're going to create a feeling that the world around me isn't inherently dangerous. Okay, and again, these are small steps. It will take time, but by doing so, you're now drawing down that baseline so you have more tolerance for stress, more resilience in the system. Okay, but it starts by telling your system, okay, I'm okay here, I'm okay through small repetitions. And just remember, you have to think anytime I'm doing something, am I trying to push a sensitized system? Or am I trying to support it? Okay, you are coddling the system. You're providing a lot of support. It needs support right now. It can heal. You will heal, okay? But it will take time, okay? Remember, small steps now equals big recovery later. I appreciate you showing up and taking the time and the effort to put into your body, to put, put into your nervous system, so that you can and will heal. Okay, just remember, your brain is not broken. I appreciate you. Thank you, and have yourself a great day.
