Fight or Flight? How to Leverage the Vagus Nerve | Ep. 101 (Audio Only)

Welcome to the Holistic Inner Balance podcast with Dr. Nicole Cain and Happy Healthy Hadley.

Your go to resource for natural mental health and wellness strategies so that you can become the expert of your own emotional and physical well being.

Merging modern science with ancient wisdom. Hello.

Hello.

Welcome back to the Holistic Inner Balance podcast. I am Hadley of Happy Healthy with Hadley and we've also also got Dr. Nicole Kane.

Hey.

Hello. We're here today to talk to you about the vagus nerve. So, yeah, I'm curious to know, you know, how many people even know what the vagus nerve is. I know that in my circles at least, it's become sort of trendy to talk about and to think about and I hear people talking about the vagus nerve a lot. And so. And I've. I've had a couple questions about it recently actually as well. And so I thought that it would be nice to come on, talk to y' all about what the vagus nerve is. Dr. Kane, before we got on, was like, is it a place, is it, is it the nerve that, like, gets fired when you go to Vegas? So we want to talk a little bit about what the vagus nerve is and why it's important for your nervous system regulation for, you know, any type of, you know, mental health challenges that you might have, whether anxiety or depressive symptoms or anything like that. And so we're just gonna, we're just gonna kind of get into it and riff on it. And Dr. Kane is like a master with the vagus nerve. So we're just gonna like, flow.

Yeah, I would love to teach y'. All. And so if this sounds like something you wanna learn, this is a conversation for you is you're gonna actually learn how to measure the tone and activity of your vagus nerve. Right now all you need is a pulse and two fingers. So if you have that, then you're going to have the requirements. And then.

Wait, will you explain what, what does it mean? What does tone of your vagus nerve mean first?

Oh, yeah, you're going to learn about the strength, like think of muscle tone. So if your muscles are nice and toned, then you're going to be able to lift things without injuring yourself. And if your vagus nerve is nice and toned, then it's going to be able to work really effectively to help you combat stress and feel really balanced. So you're going to learn how to measure that. Of course, we'll talk about sort of Vagus Nerve 101 about, like, what it does, where it is, and signs that your vagus nerve needs a little bit of TLC and then some hacks for vagus nerve. And I have a whole course on this. And so if you love the information in this conversation and you want to learn more and you want a beautiful handout made by the one and only Haley, then you can go to my website, Dr. Nicole Kane, and you can get that there. It's either in the top under courses or you could just type in the word Vegas, which is different than the city. This is V A G U S. Yes.

Awesome. I'm so excited about this because I think a lot of times people have heard of the vagus nerve and they're like, I know it has to do with, with stress and I know it has to do with like, you know, how I want to feel, which is calm and. But like, what is it really? So let's get into it.

So it's your longest nerve. It's the longest nerve in your body. It starts in the brain. It's called a cranial nerve. And a cranial nerve, it starts in the brain and it's number 10. So they call it cranial nerve number 10. And it travels from the brain all the way down in your body. And the route that it takes is kind of meandering. It's a wandering route. And the word vagus in Latin actually means wandering. And so that's why they call it the vagus nerve is because of that zigzag that it takes through your body. And its job is to regulate all sorts of things. And we'll get into its many things that it regulates. But what's really the most important that we're going to emphasize today is the vagus nerve communicates. It goes straight to the gut and it goes to the nervous system of the gut. It's called the enteric nervous system. And that's the route the gut brain axis takes to communicate back and forth. And so your vagus nerve is really, really crucial for that part of your nervous system. And so there are a few ways that your vagus nerve regulates your nervous system. And so can I share five of them?

Yes, please. Is that. Are there only five or are there more?

Oh, there's so many ways. It's. The vagus nerve is super nuanced and we will actually get into polyvagal a little bit today too. And how Stephen Porges is like trying to use metaphor and analogy to make this like really complex autonomic nervous system more accessible to your non neuroscientist person. Right.

Because a lot of times we Think it's just fight or flight. And the vagus nerve has a lot to do with the fact that it's, it's, there's more than that.

There's more, there's so much more to it. But primarily fight or flight is like the most important thing for us to remember because we can leverage that and that's, that's exciting as opposed to like, oh, well, that's a bummer.

Yeah, right.

Can't do anything about it. Yes, you can leverage your vagus nerve using the hacks that you're going to get in this podcast. And so the five ways, the five primary ways your vagus nerve regulates your nervous system is one is it's a reset switch. And so if you're in that fight flight, freeze and you're really stressed and you're really anxious, you're over stimulated, you're agitated, by activating your vagus nerve, it can switch you from that high stress state into common command, which is really incredible. So it's like a light switch. It's like you walk into a room and it's like blinding you, it's too bright. You just reach over on the light switch, you turn the lights off. Your vagus nerve can work much like that. So that's number one. That's super exciting. Right?

I love that. Yes.

Number two we talked about like just briefly is that it facilitates communication between the gut and the brain. And we know that your gut regulates neurotransmitter production. Your neurotransmitters are the chemicals in your brain that regulate your mood, like serotonin and dopamine and GABA and adrenaline. And so it communicates that, it relays that. And that's like how we refer it to our gut feeling, like a gut knowing, a gut intuition. And there's actually some neuroscience and gut brain science about that that's backing it up. So that's pretty cool. Number three is that inflammation is a key cause of anxiety. And, and the vagus nerve can actually send anti inflammatory signals throughout the body. So if you have a lot of inflammation and that inflammation is causing fibromyalgia or digestive upset or anxiety or depression or hormone issues or cramps or whatever it is, vagus nerve activation can actually bring down inflammation and correct that. And an imbalance in vagus nerve or a weak vagus nerve tone can predispose you for a higher risk of inflammation. So.

Right. And when we say like vagus nerve activation, it's, it's like basically when we regulate our nervous system, when we Talk about regulating our nervous system. That's also helping to activate the vagus nerve, correct?

Yes. Thank you for saying that. That's really good.

I just want to make sure everyone knows like, what that means is like is doing the practices that we, that we've talked about in the nervous system episode, that can help too. And we'll about other practices or more practices as well. But that's going to help to activate the nerve. The vagus nerve. Yes.

And you're. One of the ways that it does this is it regulates your vitals. And so when you go to the doctor, you see your primary care doctor, they'll feel your pulse, they'll take your blood pressure, they'll look at your heart rate and the vagus nerve when it's activated, that it sends your body into a relaxed state, causing your heart rate to slow down, your blood pressure to go back down, your respiratory rate will slow down, slow, as opposed to when you're in sympathetic activation or that fight, flight, freeze. Your vagus nerve is less activated and then everything is the opposite. Right. Your blood pressure is higher, your pulse is faster, your respiration rate is faster. And so your vagus nerve is an important part in that. Kind of like, as I'm talking, I'm doing this like left and right kind of gesturing and bouncing because it helps you be able to pivot left and right to have that kind of fluidity. So you're not just flatlined, but you're also not just like through the roof cruising and fight flight.

Right. Because if our vagus nerve is over, like over functioning, it can also lead to more of that, like collapsed.

Yeah. System state.

And so we want it to be tonified enough so that we can actually, you know, we can feel calm, but then we can also. We talked about in the emotional agility episode, we want to be able to respond to things as they come up as well. We don't want to be, you know, just like, so, so calm all the time, even when like we need to be activated.

Yes. Like, have you ever had a. Hadley, have you ever had a vasovagal reaction? Are you familiar with that?

I don't know. I probably.

Yes, I definitely had those. So, yeah, the vasovagal reaction can happen when you're like giving blood or if you get really stressed. This is when your blood pressure crashes and you pass out.

Yes, I have never actually passed out.

That's amazing. I haven't like gone unconscious, but I've definitely been like, like, oh, yeah, gonna throw up. Like pulse crashes, body temperature Crashes.

Yeah. Oh, that's so interesting. Yeah, I've never, I've never. I don't think I've ever experienced that, but I will. What happens for me is if I am in too high of a. Like, like in that fight flight response, my body will just kind of shut down and I will just like stop moving. Like, I'll just be like, I'm. I'm just still now and I'm just, I'm just not gonna do anything. I'm just gonna sit here and I'm just gonna wait. And that's a freeze. Yeah, yeah, yeah, for sure.

Instead of collapse because there's. Yeah, yeah. That vessel bagel collapse where it's like we see sheep do this when they get stuck to fences.

Yes, totally. Yeah. Can you explain the difference between freeze and collapse? Actually, do you want to do that first or do you want to explain the rest of the five ways that we can.

The last one of the five is like a quick one. It's just, it just something small called neuroplasticity.

Oh, just that, Just neuroplasticity.

And so the vagus nerve contributes to growth, change, healing of the brain. It's stores, it retrieves, it promotes memory formation and concentration and focus and.

Well, and that's huge because we talk about, I mean the fact that like our vagus nerve, it starts in the brain, but really it goes throughout the body. And we talk about how like our subconscious mind is stored in the body vagus nerve.

Right.

So it's like our vagus nerve is actually communicating all of those like subconscious things that we've got that are just stored throughout the body and not necessarily even stored in the mind. It's sending those signals. So that's where that comes in.

Can we do self reflection?

Yes, please.

All right, so we're going to put up 10 fingers and this is going to be a self reflection of. How do you know if your vagus nerve is not working properly? For every one that you resonate with, drop a finger. Okay. Sign number one, hoarseness or loss of voice.

No way.

Yeah, because your vagus nerve goes through your pharynx. Right?

I used to lose my voice all the time as like in high school.

Stop it. Are you serious?

Literally all the time. That was like such a thing.

I lost my voice all the time.

Of course you did. We're the same.

What? I'm getting full body goosebumps like for the entire month of November. I would lose my voice every year from fifth grade until I went to medical school and took out Food allergies.

Okay. It was November for me too. Too. That's really crazy. Yeah. Because I would do. I would be in theater and I would be in swimming at the same time and I would get sick and then I would lose my voice and it was like every November. Yes.

I could never do Opus in Allstate because I was a singer.

Because I was singer too. I couldn't do State.

Yeah. You guys, we just recorded another episode where we were like, what? You.

Did you do that same thing too, so. Or the same. It's weird.

All right. I put my. So maybe back in the day. That would have been a yes. Because I would get a phonia for like, no reason at all. Totally.

Yep.

Number two, difficulty swallowing. Or your uvula, which is your hanging ball thingy in the back of your throat that leads to one side of your throat instead of pointing straight down. So go look in the mirror and look at that hanging ball thingy. Is it pointing to one side or the other? Is it difficult for you to swallow? Do you find that you swallow and it gets stuck and you, like, gotta cough it back up? Could be a sign of vagus nerve. All right, number.

That's so interesting. That's like my. I feel like my grandma probably had that cuz she would always, you know, like, she would just like not be able to swallow things.

So I run into this so frequently with people who are like 70, 80, 90 years old. Yeah. Which. Yeah, which it's like all. Autonomic nervous system.

Yeah.

No, but a lot of it.

Okay. Yeah.

How many fingers do you have? You still have 10 up, don't you?

I still have 10, yes.

Yeah. Currently we're both doing pretty good. Okay, well, this is our job. Number three is irregular heart rate or heart palpitations. And I'm going to put a finger down for that because when I get really anxious and I'm in autonomic arousal, I do get heart palpitations. And then number four is digestive options. Upset, nausea, bloating, abdominal pain, often mistaken as ibs. I'm going to put that down too. Yeah.

Because if I get really stressed, it goes straight to my gut. Yeah, yeah.

So if your vagus nerve was kicking in and taking names like it that you would want it to be, then it's possible that maybe that wouldn't happen. And then number five is fluctuations in blood sugar. So do you find that your blood sugar spikes or crashes? Do you wake up in the middle of the night and you feel like, ravenous or sweaty or shaky? Right. Number Six is an overactive vagal response. We just talked about this. Passing out. And you get your blood drawn like a vasovagal response. Do you get really sick or lightheaded or dizzy from standing too long in the heat? Like, if you're out in the heat for too long, which, like, too long is too long for anybody, but you're more sensitive to being in the heat.

I would say that's definitely me. That's my pitta.

That's your pitta. So pitta Vegas. Yes. Also, trying to have a bowel movement that's called valsalva, is when you bear down to evacuate your bowels, and that activates vagus nerve, which is really interesting. Like, have you ever seen a kid get really angry? Like maybe some. Something is taken away from them, and then you hear like, the silence before the scream. And they're like. And their face is getting really red. And then like the same exact thing as pooping. The same thing as pooping. So they're actually trying to regulate their nervous system. Maybe they don't know it, but that bearing down. So if you're feeling really anxious or stressed, like, you might actually try that, like, hold your breath and kind of push and bear down like you're trying to poop. And that can actually activate your vagus nerve. But if you have an overactive vagus nerve, if it's not working properly, that can cause it to spike too much and then you can crash. You could feel dizzy. Oh, interesting. Yeah. So number seven is if you deal with headaches, especially cluster headaches or migraines. Thankfully, I don't have that. Number eight is emotional distress, like anxiety, depression, stress. But it's been ruled out that there aren't other main things that are causing it. Like if you're in the midst of a pandemic or a crisis or a trauma or a really high stress job, or you're in a relationship, that may be better if you had a relationship act to me kind of a thing. Of course, we can't blame the vagus nerve for that. It may be environmental, but could be that.

Well, and I want to. I want to also make clear that the things that you're saying are not just, you know, if you don't have enough tone in your vagus nerve. Right. Like, sometimes it's. If your vagus nerve is being overactive.

Yes. Yes. It's not working properly, which could go in either direction.

Yeah.

Thank you for clarifying that.

So if your vagus nerve is strong, is, you know, is. Is activated, that means that it can put you into the like parasympathetic nervous system state, which is that rest and digest, which most of you have probably heard about at this point instead of the fight or flight. But when it is overactive, so still it's not working properly because it's over activated. That's when the collapse can come in where it's like I'm so. Basically it's like I'm so calm that I'm like collapsing and I'm not functioning. My body isn't functioning anymore. Does that. Is that a good way to explain it? Okay, cool.

That's a really.

Make sure everyone's clear.

I love your zoom outs. Because I'm like so zoomed in. And then we gotta. It's like that ebb and flow, that sine wave that you and I talk about. So it's like zoom in, zoom out, zoom in, zoom out totally. The last two are sleeping changes, which is. We can kind of categorize that. Like you said, like too much and I'm exhausted and I'm over parasympathetic or the opposite. I can't sleep or I wake up because I'm in fight flight. And then the last one, which comes from Dr. Porges and this is feeling disconnected from others, like a lack of intimacy or feeling like a lack of connection. He calls that the social engagement system being shut off with vagus nerve suppression. Interesting. Okay, how many do you.

I'm gonna say the sleep one. I'm gonna say I put the sleep one down too.

Oh, I should, because.

Yeah, because I mean, I haven't experienced this in a long time, but I used to like oversleep if I was stressed. So there you go. My nervous system was like, bye, bye. Shut down.

Yeah.

And all of that has to do with like, that's like Kapha coming in and protecting us. Right. So we've talked about that in the past with some of the like types of anxiety episodes. It's like our nervous system is like over activated because we've got either too much pitta or vata going on. And then kapha comes in with that, that nerv system like collapse state and is like, no, you, you can't do anything right now. Like here, let's just like put, put it all down. So it's very much aligned with the doshas.

I love that. I love incorporating it with the doshas. And before we did that self reflection. Oh, by the way, how many did you have? I had three.

Oh, I had four, I think. Yeah. Four.

Four. Yeah. So it could be that our vagus nerves need just, like, a little bit more TLC for, like, toning and flexibility and balancing. Or it could be the other chicks, and we call them, like, ticks and fleas. You know, maybe it's an. An itchy tick of Vegas, but it's a flea of yeast or something. Right? Yeah.

Yes, yes. Mold exposure can. Can do it for sure, too, which I have. So.

And that's actually a good point is let's say that you do resonate with that. The question that always comes is, well, what next? And the question of what next is, will you have to figure out why what could be interfering with autonomic nervous system? So it could be anything that your vagus nerve is communicating with, is providing a feedback loop that's affecting its behavior. So your nerve goes to your gut, and then your gut is sending a signal back up the nerve. That's going to change how the nerve behaves, and then it's going to change how the brain behaves. Totally. Yeah. So there's a lot of deeper digging, which this whole podcast is all about that. So listen to every episode, please.

Right? Yeah, totally. And take the vagus nerve class, too.

Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah, take that class, too.

Also that.

So do you want to learn to measure vagal tone?

Let's do it.

So vagal tone, as we just talked about, it's a biological process that represents the ability of your vagus nerve to regulate your nervous system. So more tone is. It's more effective at helping shift, shift you from fight, flight, freeze, or autonomic arousal back into parasympathetic so that you can run from the bear and then go take a nap and then get up and, like, run from another bear and then go take a nap. It allows you that flexibility. So you go up on the treadmill and you run and you get yourself into the orange zone, if you're an orange theory person, which I love. And then you can, like, go back. You can start walking, and then you go back into the green zone, and then you have a panic kind of feeling. You're on an airplane and it's really bumpy, and you're in the red zone, and your nervous system is fight, flight, freeze. But then it can easily shift back into calm. So that flexibility is what vagus tone is all about. So let's talk about how to measure vagus nerve tone. So this requires that you find your pulse. And so I'm holding my hand up. I wish you could see this. But imagine that you are looking at the palm of your hand. And then I'm looking at my left hand, and so my thumb is on the left. And we want to find the place in your wrist where your doctor feels your pulse. And so what that's going to look like is if you follow the. The thumb down, there's going to be a bump in your wrist. And so then you find that bump in your wrist. That's your radius. So it's where the base of your thumb kind of connects to with your forearm bone there. And then you're going to slide into the cracks where there's, like, little tendons on the palmar side of your. This is so hard to describe.

Yeah, it is really hard to describe.

But you could Google how to find your pulse, and ideally, you'll find your pulse here. But if you're, like, really struggling to find it, then just put your finger on your neck and you could find your pulse in your neck or put your hand on your chest. So those are easier places. But there's so much more we could do with, like, Ayurveda pulse diagnosis, and that could be really fun. And we can, like, teach you some of that here, because I know that's like, Hadley's zone of genius is, like, all that is Ayurveda. And so if you can find your pulse in your wrist and you want to just start noticing the speed of the beat, and then this is bonus. But try to figure out, like, if you were to close your eyes and imagine what the pulse would look like, what is. What would you see? So, like, mine feels kind of like a guitar string being plucked, so it's, like, thick and kind of wiry. And if you kind of allow three fingers so that you have more space that you're feeling so up close against your wrist with maybe one finger, then the finger next to it, and then the third finger, and you might find that your pulse feels different. If you're struggling to find it in your wrist, don't worry. Just notice the pulse in your neck. And so then what you're going to do is you're going to take a breath in, and we're going to breathe in together for four. We're going to hold at the top, and then we're going to exhale for six. And through these three steps, I want you to notice the speed of the pulse. You ready? Okay, so take a breath. Four, three, two, one. Hold two, three, four. And then exhale. Five, four, three, two, one. Now that we kind of have the flow, let's do it one more time. So Keep feeling your pulse and then inhale. 2, 3, 4. Hold at the top, 2, 3, 4. And sigh. 4, 3, 2, 1. Heads. What did you notice? Were you able to find your pulse?

Yes, I was able to. And it's so interesting because I always thought that this was like a weird thing when I, when we would have to like, you know, find our pulse or whatever in school and, you know, measure our heart rate. I was always like, but I feel like my heart rate is like different when I'm breathing out versus breathing in. But no one ever talked about that. But like breathing out, my pulse is so much slower than when I'm breathing in. Like, it, it speeds way up and then it slows way down, like immediately when I'm breathing out. And I've always noticed that and I've always been like, like, why doesn't anyone talk about that? So I love that we're bringing this into the conversation.

That's exactly what happens with a healthy and tonified vagus nerve. Yeah, that's really.

Maybe that's why no one was talking about it, because no one else is experiencing it.

They're all stressed. Yeah. If you're so what you. What ideally you would experience with a healthy toned vagus nerve is exactly what Hadley said, is that you inhale. And when we inhale, we activate sympathetic nervous system. That's again that autonomic arousal, fight, flight, freeze. And then when we hold at the top, that's kind of like getting ready for the sigh. And then when you sigh out, that's parasympathetic. That's vagus activation. That's feeling rest and calm.

And it's the same that goes with that pulsation that we always talk about of like, we're activating and then we're resting and then we're activating and we're resting and we're getting out of our comfort zone and then we're coming home to ourselves and all of that stuff. And same with the breath. It's so cool.

And that's interesting in terms of leveraging that information. Like, you take your breath everywhere that you go and just in this simple exercise that took us less than two minutes to do is Hadley, on your exhale, you activated your vagus nerve. And by doing that effectively, you are able to calm your nervous system in one single exhale. And the more that you practice that, the more your vagus nerve is going to become tonified and the more effectively it will work at calming you down. Like, have you ever encountered someone and they're really Frustrated with you. And then they're just like, they just like breathe out really hard in frustration.

Yes.

Their body trying to calm.

Yes. Well, and it's so interesting because a lot of times we, we say like take a deep breath if you are like not calm. But really what we should be saying is like breathe out, like sigh.

Yep.

Because that's what's actually going to regulate our nervous systems. And the breathing in is actually, is going to bring us deeper into, you know, sympathetic. But we're always going to breathe in after like, you know, like after you breathe out, you're going to breathe in and so you might as well just try it. Try like the sigh instead of, you know, you know, like beforehand.

Yes. That is my number one hack, like the, the most helpful thing I can do. And I, I've learned that that works so well for me. I can almost do it automatically and I catch myself doing it is like I'm exhaling and I may get this like little blip of anxiety or stress because of what I'm thinking or doing. And then I just catch myself almost like forcing out whatever's left in my lungs to extend the exhale and almost valsalva like, like really get it out. Yeah. And then that's like immediately much more calm.

Totally.

Oh, that's so good.

I love it.

So can we talk about other ways to stimulate the vagus nerve to get us calm?

Yes. So is there a way to, you know, if we do these, these practices, these exercises? Because I know that people are going to be thinking like, well, I don't want to over tonify my nervous system because I don't want to get into collapse state. But that's not really how it works. Right. So can you want to just explain that a little bit?

Yeah. It's like if you're walking every single day and your heart rate is picking up, you're not. It would be almost in. It's very uncommon that you would walk yourself into like a heart rate that's like way too high, way too long and cause like a heart disease. Right. Your body is able to balance itself and you'll have a healthy, a healthy heart. And it's the same thing with vagus nerve is like by practicing that, that pendulum swing of I'm going to exhale and then I'm going to breathe normally and then I'm going to exhale. Or maybe I'm going to do one of these other exercises and then I'm just going to go back to my normal resting state. It's Just a pulse where you can rehearse it. Now, if you spend like all day doing vagus nerve breathing, you're going to lose a lot of life. But I haven't seen any literature that says like, oh, you should only do deep breathing for X amount of hours a day because you're going to make your vagus nerve overpower everything else. That won't happen. Right?

Right.

Yeah, Your brain won't let that happen. So if there's danger, there are so many stop gaps that will override vagus nerve. Like your, your brain will override vagus nerve totally.

I do see though, sometimes like people get into like, you know, you know, they're super into yoga and super into, you know, meditation and all of that kind of thing. And then like, they might not get aroused enough for something that is like actually happening, that should be changed in. And they're like, it's, it'll be fine. You know, like that kind of thing. So be, be aware of that. Like, we don't need. We. When we talked about the emotional agility episode, we don't need to be calm all the time. So be aware of that too, because.

That, that could be bypassing. It's like, exactly. I don't want to feel pain. And you know, Hadley and I just did an episode about how to suffer. And so we don't want to suffer. We don't want to do things that make us really uncomfortable, but that's where we grow. And so, yes, these are really good and helpful tools, but I think you're not going to have light unless you also have darkness. And so, yeah, use these tools, but then don't use them in a way that makes your world smaller. Yes.

Ooh, I love that. Yeah. So don't. It doesn't need to be something that you're like, oh, no, I'm feeling this emotion. I better go do a nervous system, like practice that like gets me out of the emotion. Right. It's like, okay, can we actually like feel the wave of the emotion? And then once the emotion has like come through us, then it's like, great to do a practice like this. But okay, I just wanted to, to bring that in. Oh, and then before we move on too, will you explain the difference between freeze and collapse? Because I mentioned that before and I want to make sure that we don't forget to, to say that, you know.

I was actually studying this because I wrote about it in my book and the body is what really differentiates it because on the outside it can look really similar and so forth freeze is you come upon a deer, and that deer is, like, standing in the clearing. And the deer observes that you're there. And the deer will freeze. Yeah, like, their eyes are really big. Maybe they're. I don't. I don't know deer physiology. At least she's like, doing all the deer gestures right now.

And I love it.

I wish you could see it. Maybe their pupils dilate and they're like, bringing everything in, but they're frozen. And so then humans will do that same thing too, is we freeze. And our nervous system is really attuned to, okay, what's my next step of action? So you'll see autonomic arousal. You'll see the heart rate speeds up, the body temperature increases. You may sweat, you may find that your breathing increases, and all sorts of symptoms that are unique to you that come with fight, flight, freeze. And so then collapse, which they call it flop, which I don't love that word, but they wanted an F. I think a better word may be fold. Like, you know, you just, like, give up. You just fold your hand. You just fold over and fall. And when we see someone go into flop, that's when the nervous system has discerned that there's no getting out. We are going to die. And it just starts to reduce your blood pressure, it reduces your heart rate, it reduces your pulse, and the body starts going into an actual state of physiological collapse.

And because essentially you wouldn't be in as much pain if you're like, getting eaten by a lion. Right. Like, it's like our body's just gonna go into that state so that we don't have as much pain when we die.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. And. And learned helplessness can really be behind that. And so if you've been in a situation where you haven't been able to reclaim agency or get free, then it just feels like there's nothing I can do and you just flop. And so you might notice that. And I've seen that they call it conversion disorder in the DSM Diagnostic Statistical Manual, where extreme emotional distress can cause changes in the nervous system. And so people may go temporarily blind from acute stress, or they may pass out when they get really anxious or stressed or, you know, all of these, like, unexplained nervous system symptoms that haven't been better diagnosed as something else. And the nervous system can do funny things when it's feels like it's in danger.

So the difference is it looks. It can look similar in a person, but what's going on on the Inside is like, like with the freeze is that you're just super aroused internally. Like you can, you can feel the difference because it's like I feel so activated. I feel like everything is buzzing versus the collapsed nervous system state is like everything feels dull. And I've definitely been there. So.

Yeah, it's like that's so vagal. It's like it's just collapsed.

Exactly. And that's how I feel. That's. That's what I have seen in some people who have practiced a lot of like calming practices, yoga. Like all of these things that are supposed to get us into like acceptance of things. Like we can like over accept things. Right. And then not actually make changes in our lives. And then we have. And then we're in a, in that state of collapse because we're, we're just like. The only way for me to handle this is to just like not feel anything at all and be totally numb.

So there's like you're kind of describing like a dissociative element to it.

Totally. Yeah. It feels like. It feels like everything is just dull is kind of how I think of it.

Yeah. Which is. So there's another F that I haven't like put out into the real world yet. But it might be interesting at one point to kind of distill the nuance, which is really actual dissociation where sometimes we get hijacked by different parts of ourselves. Like somebody says something and it reminds me of an injustice when I was 14 years old. And then suddenly my 14 year old self is like, ah. And like I'm like having a tantrum and I'm like angry or whatever, having all these thoughts. That's like my adult doctor self is like, what the heck was that? Right. Yeah, the hijack. And I call that fracture. And so when we go into fight flight freeze. We could also fracture where part of ourself may take over and run the show. And then the other parts of ourselves, we don't have access to those resources, which is substantiated by neuroscience. Because we do see that parts work, especially in internal family systems. It's the group of parts work researchers that are doing the most in terms of neuroscience. But the fracture response would be interesting to see the different ways that could show up in your neuroscience. Like is there.

Yeah. Like is that parasympathetic or is it sympathetic or does it depend on the ego state?

And yeah, but like how can we, how can we objectively measure, oh, someone's going into a fracture. So if you guys are Listening. And you're sciencey. This would be a fun study. Let's do it.

Yeah, for sure. And so I. Another distinction that I want to make is that fight, flight, and freeze are all in the sympathetic nervous system state, whereas the collapse or the flop is in the parasympathetic nervous system state. Yes.

It's a result of sympathetic overload. And then we. We do see. Yeah, we do see that the nervous system in the flop or fold or collapse, the same things that we do see, sympathetic collapse. So we see that parasympathetic taking over. So that's a really good distinction. It's rooted in extreme fear and terror and danger. And then the nervous system just like, well, we're gonna die like the sheep. The sheep on the fence.

Yeah. So it goes through. It's basically like. It goes. So I've seen a graph before where it's like, there's parasympathetic nervous system state and then there's sympathetic nervous system. Stay on top of it, and you have flight, fight, flight up, like, on top. And then once you get to a place where you are in that, like, collapsed nervous system, say, it's almost like there's a whole nother one above. Above the, like. It's like a parasympathetic state sandwich. So you're like, there's like, another state that's still. It's parasympathetic, but it's, like, not, like, feel, like, feel good parasympathetic state. It's like. It's like I've bypassed that sympathetic, like, activation feeling, and now I'm in another level of parasympathetic state.

You're actually getting into polyvagal in a little bit because Stephen Pork has talked about this because there's so much nuance and complexity to it. It's not just, like, autonomic arousal and then, like.

Right. Because I think that's what people think is that it's either you're either stressed and, like, have this, like. Like, buzzy, like, really feeling thing, or you're just, like, calm and good and everything's fine. But there's that other level.

So you just read about polyvagal theory, right?

Yeah, it was like, a. Like a year and a half or two years ago. But, yeah, I've. I've read about it sort of recently.

And so I'll introduce it just, like, briefly, because I was looking at it before this conversation, because I actually prepared for this conversation. Yay. Yes.

Love that.

And I were joking about. Sometimes we just, like, riff and record our conversations. And other times we like, really prep for it and like, look up research and stuff. And so I did look up some stuff about this and kind of like add what. What you know, because I know you studied it quite a lot too. Is that so. Polyvagal theory is a theory in the field of psychology and neuroscience, is developed by Stephen Porges. And he's trying to explain the relationship between the autonomic nervous system, the stress responses. And because there is so much nuance, he's trying to make it a little bit more clear. And he uses a lot of metaphor. And so it can be kind of confusing because he talks about there's the ventral vagus complex and then the dorsal vagal complex. But anatomically there isn't a ventral vagus. Ventral. Usually anatomically, it means the front, like ventral is like your chest, the front of your body and dorsals, like the back there.

Think of like a dorsal fin on like a. Like a fish or something. It's on their back, right?

Yeah.

Or a. Like a dolphin.

Yeah, that's good.

Yeah, that's what I've always thought of, like in high school biology, I was like, dorsal fin. Got it. Dorsal.

That's why they call it that. Yeah, you're. That's brilliant. And that it's really confusing theory because the vagus nerve doesn't branch off like that. Like, there are tons of branches on the vagus nerve. There are like more than 10 branches off of the vagus nerve, but they. They don't get categorized into dorsal and ventral. They just have lots of different activities. But he's trying to describe more how the vagus nerve can create nuance in our responses to stress. And so there's generally there's. He talks about three of them. And so do you mind if I kind of go over the three?

Yes, please do.

So he describes the ventral vagal complex as the social engagement system. And so one of the signs that we talked about when we had our hands up and we had the ten fingers up was that feeling of being disconnected from people. And so this complex is all about how we recognize facial expressions, cues, connections, social interactions. It allows us to interact with each other or engage with each other kind of in a calm, emotionally regulated manner. And it is associated with more parasympathetic because if we're in fight flight, freeze, we're not in our thoughtful, higher level thinking brain state. We're more in that, like, reptilian brain. Brain state. So this. That helps us remember, like that social engagement system when we're able to interact and be empathetic. That's more from our parasympathetic. And he calls that the ventral vagal complex. And so his theory is that when the environment is perceived as safe, we can go into vagus dominant states, relaxed states, that. That system, that social engagement system is activated. So that's the first one. And then the second one is. He calls it that sympathetic fight or flight response. And that gets activated when our environment is perceived as challenging or threatening and our body is preparing to deal with that stress. And so those are all of the sympathetic autonomic arousal things like your heart rate increasing and all of that. Your brain is thinking more quickly and rapidly and all of the blood flow is being redirected to your muscles. And so he talks about how the vagus nerve is all about that dance back and forth between autonomic arousal and that relaxed state. And then the third one is, he calls that the dorsal vagal complex, which is essentially the freeze response, which we were just talking about.

The collapse. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

I think it's more collapse. He says it's freeze. I think, at least in the literature I was looking at.

Yeah, I think it is more collapse because freeze. You still feel aroused.

You still feel aroused. You still feel aroused.

Yeah. Yes.

And so what he's describing is that this complex shows up when the environment is feeling really dangerous or inescapable, that that dorsal vagal complex sex can be dominant. And that's associated with parasympathetic nervous system shutdown and immobilization, which, again, that's more flop. Collapse, fold, kind of defeated state. And we see this more in extreme trauma or fear or helplessness, like learned helplessness. And so it's. It's kind of like you were saying, though, Hadley, is that there's so much complexity and nuance to it. And so then we have these different great thinkers that are trying to like, wrap our brains around it and. Right.

And.

And, you know, I think his theory is really good. There's a ton of research. You know, he's brilliant. And I just think that the language is a little bit confusing. And I imagine it's going to continue to evolve as we learn more about this.

It's fairly new. Yeah, it's a fairly new theory. So, yeah, I think also just being aware that. So, you know, like I said it was. It's like there's like these. These three different stages, and I'm showing it with my hands, but I hope you can all understand what I'm saying where, like on the bottom rung is parasympathetic state. Everything is like hunky dory. Yes.

Great.

Awesome. And then sympathetic nervous system state is on top of that, where we feel really activated, like, you know, fight, flight, freeze, but feeling that activation. And then above that is like the. That dorsal vagal complex that is. Is that collapse state of. Oh, my God. I. You know, I feel that learned helplessness is kind of how I learned about it in school, like, way back. Not way, way back, but, you know.

How old are you?

That long ago? I'm not that old, but. But that was kind of. It was called learned helplessness when I was learning about it then, which it sounds like is like, basically the same thing.

Yeah.

And so what we need to do to get back to, like, the hunky dory parasympathetic state is we actually need to pass through. Back through the, like, the sympathetic state. So that's the really interesting part is, like, we actually have to allow ourselves to, like, get angry or, like, feel really intense emotions in order for us to get back to the calm state, because otherwise we're going to just be stuck in that collapse, collapse state. We need to reactivate, especially with. When it comes to trauma and allowing ourselves to, like, activate some of the emotions that we didn't allow ourselves to feel when we were in that trauma state. So it's just so fascinating.

What.

Yeah, so it makes. It makes sense with what we always talk about, which is that we do need to feel our emotions in order to move through them. Right. Otherwise we get into the shutdown collapse state that we were just talking about. And that, like, that learned helplessness that we were. That we were just talking about. And so we have to move back into those. Those states that we didn't allow ourselves to feel with trauma. Yeah. Obviously we. We have talked about how you need to allow yourself to, you know, go in and out of the feeling state in order to actually heal the trauma. Which is why, you know, EMDR works so well, is like, we're. We're moving things.

Right.

We're moving things around rather than being in that collapse state. Right.

I'm having a few reactions. One is that I don't like it because I don't want to feel the things. And so if. If I had an incredible stressor and then went into sympathetic arousal and then went above that and a parasympathetic, I feel like parasympathetic is preferable. And I don't want to have to backslide through all of the yucky sympathetic Fear in order to get better. So that's my first reaction number.

But it's not backsliding also. I want to, like, make that clear too, because it's not actually backsliding back into it. You're moving forward through it.

Yeah. You're unwinding it.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Okay. I still don't like it, but it. But my second thought is it feels like very. Right. It feels very trauma informed. It feels. It feels like pretty accurate and I don't have to like it. And so then number three is, that's the other thing for me that's coming up is, like, excitement, because I think that we can speed up that transition process and relieve some of the suffering of that transition process back through that sympathetic state. And in emdr, oftentimes when we're processing things, it isn't as difficult as it was when you were back in. You know, sometimes for people it can be, but there's. There's quite a lot of relief that can come even through the process, like when you're in it and then. Right.

And we don't want to, you know, just like, be like, oh, okay, well, I just need to, like, go back into it and like, feel all the feelings of it because that also can just, like, re. Traumatize us. And we don't. We don't want that.

We don't.

We want it to be that. That pulsation that we always talk about, where it's like going in and then coming back to rest, coming back to, like, you know, feeling resourced, feeling good in our. In ourselves and in our bodies, and then go back into, like, that depth of like, okay, I'm gonna go back in. And then like, being like, okay, I can be with myself again, and all that kind of thing. And that's. And so it doesn't have to be this big, scary, horrible thing that we have to go through in order to come out the other side.

Yes. That's you leaving. Thank you. So in the vagus nerve hack class that I have is I give 14 ways to activate the vagus nerve, but I thought we could go over five of them today. Yes.

Oh, my gosh, that sounds great. Thank you.

Number one was the feeling, the pulse breathing thing that we just did together earlier is you can do breathing and different schools of thought will tell you, oh, you need to breathe this many seconds on this, this part and that part. But, like, really, if you're elongating the exhale, then you're doing it right.

I sometimes find that that actually puts Me into a fight flight, like a sympathetic nervous system state when I'm trying to like control it too much.

So trying to quote, do it right.

Yeah, right, exactly.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And so if you could just like simply extend your exhale and just make that a little bit harder and longer. That can be money. That's good. And then the other thing that can work really well for people and I'm mentioning this one in particular because had you're a musician and we know that the vagus nerve goes through the voice box and you. We know that when there's a problem with the vagus nerve, there's often vocal hoarseness or you lose your voice or like trips or something. And so humming the. Or just like singing a song activates the vagus nerve and tonifies the vagus nerve and can make you feel more calm. That's actually what I did on that plane flight. Hadley and I were talking about in a different episode about a really bumpy flight that I was on from New York and I just like hummed under my. Hopefully nobody heard me, but I was just like, just like that's awesome. It works.

And that might be the thing that helps me the most. Well, touching my body and then humming is like, like humming or singing or you know, whatever. Like. Yeah, yeah, my vocal cords. That's awesome.

It works really well. And you have your voice box with you wherever you go.

You can, you don't have to be a singer.

You don't have to. Yeah, you just make a sound, vibrate it. And so then that's number two. Another one that you may have heard before is the cold water on the face.

Yeah. So that's like a super trendy tick tock like. Yeah. That people are hearing about the vagus nerve because of that, that freeze. Freezing water on the face.

Are people sticking their faces in buckets of ice water?

Yes, they are.

Oh, that's fun. So you don't have to have a bucket of ice water. Go on Amazon or wherever you shop and get those like those like chemical freezer things that when you shake them up they get really cold and then just put that on your face and so then you know to like ruin your makeup or like run around with a bucket of ice water just in case you get stressed. Yeah.

How do you feel about like the like freezing like a jade roller or like one of those face roller things. Would that help too?

Whatever floats your boat, man. The, the place that's going to get you the best results is around the orbit of the eye. And so as long as you don't, like, injure your eyeball by. By smashing it, but, like, kind of going around the eye. And if it's, like, cold enough, that could be. Sure. I love that. And it's cool massage. Like, who doesn't want that?

Is this why we do cucumbers on the eyes when we're doing. When we're at a spa?

That's why I need cucumbers on my eyes. It makes me calm. I think they do it for aesthetic reasons because they're like, oh, it reduces puffiness and inflammation. But I need it to feel calm.

Yeah. I mean, it probably does both, right. Because it's like, it's always chilled. So.

Yeah.

Oh, yeah.

I don't know if I want actually something. I'm so vata. I don't know if I'd actually want something cold there. I feel like I'd want a roasted cucumber on my eye.

I love you.

And then I would eat it.

If you. If you all are like, I don't know what she's. What? We've been like, just kind of like, dropping little pieces of Ayurveda in here. If you don't know what we're talking about, go back to the types of anxiety episodes. And we talk a ton about each. Each type of anxiety based on the doshas. But, yeah, I think that makes a lot of sense.

So you can.

I mean, you could even just take a bag of frozen peas.

Totally. I just read a book, like, it was this, like, lovely romance novel where the one character is having panic attacks and she's like, I got a bag of frozen broccoli. And I was like, good for you, author knowing about that.

Yeah. Wow, that's awesome.

That's impressive. I liked it. And then we've been practicing a voga, a vagus tonifying activity today together. We've been laughing.

Yeah, there you go.

And some people, really interesting. Some people who have an overactive vagus nerve response or vasovagal reactions, laughing can make them pass out.

Oh, so interesting.

Yeah. Laughing stimulates your vagus nerve. Nerf.

That's so cool. Yeah. So.

And of course, laughing does all sorts of other wonderful things with, like, happy chemicals. And it's just great to laugh. So laugh with me. And ads. There's this really fun video that Paul was watching where the practitioner was like, repeat after me. And she was like, ha. And then they said, do it. Do it, Hadley. Ha, ha, ha, ha. You can't not laugh. We could have gone back and forth like, 86 times.

Laughter Yoga is like a thing.

Yeah.

And it always seems like, well, how are you going to make yourself laugh? You can't really force yourself to laugh. But like, honestly, we just did. Lie down on your back and try and like, do the hahas. And you tell me that you can't laugh because that's just like you. It's like you immediately laugh. It's so funny.

I feel like that would be a good tick tock trend. It's just like walk up to people and say, repeat after me and then just see how long it takes for them to laugh.

I love that. Yeah. Make them lie down on the ground though. Then they'll really. They'll really. Do you know why that's a thing? Because, like, whenever I'm like lying in bed, like I at night before I like fall asleep and I'm talking to my husband or like when I was, you know, I shared a room with my sister until I was a junior in high school and we would just laugh and laugh and like, everything's more funny when you're lying on your back for some reason.

Why is that? I have ideas, but it would just be theorizing.

Yeah, just.

But it's true. I always noticed that when I lay on my back, I tend to giggle more.

I'm like, yeah, it's so funny. Yeah.

I'm like in Shavasana. I'm like, yes, yes.

And you're like, not supposed to laugh.

But you're like, this is serious. Yeah.

Yeah.

So the last one is gargling and so that's just great. Your vagus nerve goes through your pharynx. You can hum. If you feel nervous about humming, then you could gargle. Just. You can make it more effective by gargling teas and then swallowing them like, like chamomile or lavender or lemon balm tea and just a little gargle. Gargle and swallow it.

But you want to make it aggressive gargling. So you're not just doing a little, like, wimpy little gargle. You're like, grr.

I feel like I pretended to gargle once on this podcast and it just came out really not good sounding. That. That makes me feel like I want. Don't want to lean into the rough draft for that. Redo it. So perfect. We.

We don't want the perfection.

No. No. So that was, that was Vegas Nerve. And I learned something new today that Hadley brought to the table about having to move back through the stinkum. So I'm not happy about that. But I'm grateful for it, and I hope you are too, my lovely listener friends. Yeah. And what questions do you have? What did you guys think? Any last thoughts, Hadley?

Yeah, I mean, let us know. And. And if you just Google, like, polyvagal theory and you look at the images, you should be able to find this graph that we were sort of referring to a little bit where I was talking about, like, from the bottom to the top, or maybe we can put it in the show notes. But essentially there's like, the social engagement that Dr. Kane was talking about, and then it goes up into the sympathetic state, and then it goes up into that, like, collapse state. And there's a. There's a great graph that shows you, like. Like how. How activation happens and then how it deactivates after. After that, and how you have to move through the fight flight in order to deactivate. And so if you're curious about that, you could totally Google it. And if you're curious about it, you can also just reach out to us and we can, you know, we can explain it further or we can send you the. Send you the graph or whatever. And so just reach. Reach out to us on Instagram is probably the best way for both of us. I'm just at Happy Healthy. Had Hadley spelled H A D L E E. Do you want to say yours as well?

Oh, and I'm Dr. Nicole Kane. D R, N, I C O L, E, C A I N. Perfect.

Yeah. So reach out. And if you have any other podcast requests, topics that you want us to cover, let us know. We love hearing from you. This came from a request from someone on Instagram, so if you have requested requests, let us know. And if you love the podcast, please make sure that you rate and review us on Apple Podcasts. It helps us so much to be able to get this to other people, and we've just been loving all of your. All of your awesome feedback. It's been really, really fun to be able to. To see that this is actually impacting people. You know, we're just sitting here, like, chatting and stuff, but we really want to bring you into the conversation as well.

Oh, thank you so much for being here. And thank you, Hadley.

Yes, thank you so much. This was so fun.

See y' all later, guys.

Bye.

The recording you just listened to consists of the personal opinions of Dr. Nicole Cain, a naturopathic doctor with a master's in clinical psychology, and Happy Healthy Hadley, an Ayurveda expert with a master's in health, behavior, and health education. While these Opinions are based upon literature, counseling education, medical training, and clinical experience. This content should not be viewed as the definitive opinion on these subjects. Listening to this podcast is not a substitute for any sort of medical, psychological.

Or other form of of treatment.

If you are in a Crisis, please call 911 or call the National Suicide Prevention Line at 1-800-273-8255. If you are in need of counseling, don't hesitate to make an appointment with a counselor in your area. Dr. Nicole and Hadley are passionate about you becoming the expert of your own emotional and physical well being. If this resonates with you and you think this podcast would help someone you love, please share it with them. We look forward to seeing you on the next episode of the Holistic Inner Balance Podcast.

Sam Sa.