The Vagus Nerve, Vagal Tone and how it Works,How can we Connect with our Nervouse System.

Lee Tomlin (Psychotherapeutic Counsellor, and Energy Psychotherapist)   in London - focusing on counselling/therapy in a relaxed manner, in the hope that by talking about different areas of counselling she  will help in lifting its profile and promoting its efficacy.  Speaking about subjects around therapy, health and how we can have more of a sense of  agency around our physical and mental Health.
 She will be speaking with interesting, skilled and passionate healers as well as people from a variety of backgrounds  at times.

To contact Lee:  tomlintherapy@gmail.com  website:    www.tomlintherapy.com
Music intro by: Joe Snelgrove  jsdrumguide@gmail.com and see him on youtube
and instagram jsdrumguide

This episode is focusing on the nervous system, which lets face it has been through a tough couple of years, whoever you are!

Lee wanted to talk about the Vagus nerve and its importance to us and how it works, also how we can look after it if it is frayed or damaged.

Lee talks about the Vagus nerve and looks at self care options that are out there.

Transcript

As we come out of this difficult time around something that we never had to deal with such as COVID, I notice worries and stress being presented and it appears that we're all being more triggered by things we might have been able to deal with better in other circumstances.

 I realise that this is about things like resilience dropping down but also that there is quite a bombardment on everyone's nervous system  particularly over the last 2 years. 

I wanted to explore this and look a little bit more at the nervous system so I did some research  around the nervous system.

We may already know it is involved in almost every aspect of our well-being as humans, seemingly automatic activities such as waking up breathing thinking remembering and feeling emotions.

 It's all its job development, movement, balance, healing , rehabilitation of the physical body, thoughts ,the ageing process ,body  temperature ,sensations such as thirst hunger stress and how we respond to our bodies . Puberty and fertility and the reproduction systems, sleep and many more things. 

So the central nervous system is made up of the brain and spinal cord but there are two parts to it the peripheral nervous system which is the nerves that branch off from the spinal cord and extend to all parts of the body , this is where the signals between the brain and the rest of the body including the internal organs, in a sense communicate and then there is the vagus nerve which is the longest nerve running from the brain stem to the reproductive organs, previously it was thought that it went to the pelvic region.

New research is showing that it goes as far as the cervix and the uterus.  

 this I found the Dana Reeves foundation.

 As the Vagus nerve travels down the body, it is interacting with all the major organs on its way , giving it the  name vagus which means in Greek “ The wanderer” 

it is also known as a self care nerve.

Discovered first by 

Otto Loewi in 1920 he was he was a pharmacologist and a psych biologist, He  was the first person to discover transmission of nerve impulses and that they were, chemical not electrical He  won the Nobel prize for this in 1921 

they are often referred to as the body's chemical messengers.

Apparently was known as a bit of a dreamer, this did not mean he was vague, he seemed to be an amazing person,  Born in Frankfurt, Germany Loewi's prize-winning experiment apparently came to him in a dream.

 Then, by experimenting on frog hearts, it seems he worked out how the Vagus Nerve needs to be stimulated, to slow down the heart rate.

He named this,the ‘vagusstoff.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4291908/

So we know this is not a new theory! In fact it goes back as far as Darwin's time as stated in Bessel van der  Kolk book the body keeps the score well he writes how Darwin said

 “our heart guts and brain communicate intimately with a nerve” 

 so it was thought that the this was the pneumogastric Nerve which is the scientific name for the Vagus nerve.

This huge nerve can become under stimulated when we are over stimulated within ourselves so a whole nervous system feels the effect of strong emotions such as fear, sadness and anger and these emotions and others have  a direct connection to important aspects of how the organs are affected by traumatic experiences;

for example, a heart beating faster, our breath getting shallower and our stomach reacting with the sensations of butterflies or even in extreme case of being sick.

The reason it's called the self-care is its job is through stimulation it gains a tone which slows the heart rate which then taps into the parasympathetic nervous system calming us down. 

If  you are in constant state of heightened stress or hyperarousal due to past experiences the body needs to rest and repair so this important nerve within the nervous system must bounce back by being stimulated to bring that balance and calm, allowing the person to connect, feeling safe and open to connection.

The vagus nerve takes readings within different parts of the body and then sends them back to the brain. The flight or fight, the sympathetic nervous system is essential, but it was not designed to last over long periods , it just needs a response which is immediate and associated with danger once this passes it should be able to return back to neutral place so that it is ready to respond to any danger that, might come again 

Almost like an elastic band.

It is also thought  it could be responsible for providing the gut instinct.

In a situation of fear or anxiety, when we feel sick  to your stomach.

 so the sympathetic nervous system can't differentiate between physical and physiological distress.

Modern stresses are not as temporary as the imminent danger like the tiger analogy.

 These days we are bombarded with one thing after another,  for example there are more people in our way, there is traffic in our way ,then our manager with high expectations and deadlines might be putting pressure on us, then there's technology constantly bombarding us with, information we would have not known about.   This all causes us to be more in a position of  constant  or persistent, flight or fight or flight mode. 

 We now know this leaves us with a  lower Vagal tone, Which  can stop us being able to socialise or feel safe, this is damaging to our nervous system which then can have an effect on our organs causing us to be highly stressed and possibly ill.  

Taken from being a brain wise therapist, Bonnie Badenoch. 

So helping the vagus nerve means managing our nervous systems.

There are ways to do this such as energy psychotherapy techniques or anything that helps you relax coming back into the parasympathetic rest and digest state. Things life EFT, tapping, working with chakras and breath are a few.

People working in the trauma area talk about , “putting on the Para sympathetic brakes” on your arousal state by practising breathing meditation so that you can emotionally regulate, this is so important in  managing effects of trauma on the body.

 If  dealing with traumatic, emotional memories in therapy, there  is a need to regulate the breathing, again , using humming or tapping to support the body as it processed the traumas by self-regulating .

Some people may never have learned to do this if they've grown up in a chaotic home or experienced a lot of abuse or never felt safe.

In 2010 researchers discovered a positive feedback loop between the high vagal tone positive, emotions and good physical health. In other words; 

 the more you increase your vagal tone the more that your physical and mental health will improve and vice versa the vagal response reduces stress. It reduces our heart rate and blood pressure ( my understanding here is ) ‘making the body feel calmer’ . 

It changes the function of certain parts of the brain stimulates digestion and all those things happen when we are relaxed .

(quoted by doctor Madden golobic MD medical director of the Cleveland Clinic).

 He goes on to talk about mothers and babies which I also read about in being a Brain wise therapist.

Very  interesting in some of the studies have shown that the vagal tone is passed on from mother to child. Mothers who are depressed anxious and angry during their pregnancy  will have lower vagal activity. 

Once they give birth to their children the new-born also has a low vagal activity and low dopamine and serotonin low levels.    

Bonnie Badenoch ; speaks of  Lower Vagal tone in babies, can leave them open to feeling unsafe and highly stressed;  at worst this can lead to damage to the brain structure and function. Then this can lead to insecure attachment, possible depression, anxiety and other emotional problems later in life.

New research done by the Christopher and Dana Reeve 

foundation some of you will remember the original Superman the actor Christopher Reeve he fell off his horse and was paralysed at 42 with severe cervical spinal injury.

 He died 10 years later in 2004 but before this he became heavily involved in campaigns supporting handicapped children and paraplegics even though he was paralysed from the neck down .

Their foundation is now looking into the stimulation of the Vagus nerve as a way of treating migraines, tinnitus, inflammation bowel syndrome, hiccups, stroke, diabetes, and brain injury but also multiple sclerosis and spinal cord injury.

The nervous system is made up of many parts the most important is the autonomic nervous system this controls functions over which we have very little or no conscious control such as breathing heart rate blood pressure sweating and digestion.

Within this system we have the Sympathetic nervous system fight or flight 

 Para- sympathetic system which is the rest and digest the calming part and the 

Enteric system this one's not talked about much this is associated with the intestine function. 

Known as the ENS and  is said to be similar to the brain in structure function and chemical coding and has been described as a brain within the gut.

 It serves as the intestinal barrier that regulates processes and deals with immune response finding nutrients that the body needs there are now new studies talking about the role of the microbiota which is a range of organisms including bacteria and viruses which are symbiotic which means that they live together and are crucial to their host in this case the human being.

 the studies discussed how the microbiota influences depression and anxiety this is a new and fascinating area.

The nervous system is made up of neurons which are nerve cells apparently around 100 billion of them!

One you might recognise is the motor neuron this regulates the movement and senses

The nervous system  is so similar to a computer sending messages with this huge nerve like the main cord and plug… managing the whole human system if any of this shuts down, so does the body, that's how important the nervous system is to us as humans.

Without it we don't function so when it gets frayed and damaged we can shutdown at worst or on a lesser level feel exhausted or stressed.

Even  just knowing this much we can see how important it is to have a healthy nervous system and to look after it.

Here are a few ways that we can stay healthy and help support a nervous system, which also helps the vagal nerve be stimulated so that it can go back into its natural state.

·     Eating fresh unprocessed food, very processed food, can affect our glucose levels which then affects our nervous system so by helping the body not have to fight toxic chemicals in very processed foods we support that whole system

·     Exercise is another one physical and mental to keep the neurons firing. Mental exercise might be puzzles engaging in conversation socialising dancing things like Tai chi singing aikido reading yoga even things like kickboxing.

·     Sleep is another one also very important to the nervous system apparently a healthy sleep pattern will strengthen circuits within the system helping it remain very healthy. It also we need that rest to restore

·     Meditation we now know through empirical studies that meditation can support the nervous system and also will stimulate the vagal nerve it does this by regulating your breathing and your heartbeat slowing things down which helps repair the nerves which may be a bit frayed

Van der Kolk quotes Jon Kabat Zinn 

“one way to think of this process of transformation is to think of mindfulness as a lens, taking the scattered and reactive energies of your mind and focusing them into a coherent source of energy for living, for problem solving, for healing”. 

So I am thinking  mindfulness and meditation are as you can see intertwined so both will help support the nervous system. 

·     Sunlight is another one providing the body with vitamin di even just 10 minutes a day can give you all parts of your nervous system a huge boost

·     Walking barefoot can give your immune system a boost and also help you sleep better at night

·     Green tea has amino acids that can aid digestion an increased serotonin levels because it contains caffeine as well it can help boost concentration and cognition green tea can give your body an instant boost

·     Stopping smoking and alcohol or cutting down it known, cigarettes can disrupt the ways that messages reach or general activities around your nerve cells.

·      Excessive alcohol intake brings into the body potentially harmful toxins which our nervous system has to work very hard to get rid of.

Info  taken from https://sass.uottawa.ca/sites/sass.uottawa.ca/files/how_to_stimulate_your_vagus_nerve_for_better_mental_health_1.pdf

Ways of supporting the vagal vagus nerve:

 I found some information

 from Jordan fallis;

 How to stimulate your vagus nerve for better mental health done in 2017

He talks about deep and slow breathing is another way to stimulate your vagus nerve been shown to reduce anxiety and increase the para sympathetic system by activating the vagus nerve. 

He also talks again about  how important socialising laughing  and Connections between the increase of positive emotion and the vagal tone.

Laughter increases the heart rate stimulates the vagus nerve .

In terms of practical improvements and practising self- care around the vagal vagus nerve

Meditation as we talked about before but also there's a couple of unusual ones that I wanted to mention here which was humming so humming apparently really helps to calm the system down ,also  I was thinking then mantra's might do the same.

 People suggest;  Humming while doing yoga meditative breathing can really help and when you hum, you actually should focus on the vibration in your ribs in your throat in your mouth this just helps to make you feel relaxed.

 So give that a go might be interesting

The next one which is a slightly more extreme but also something that's very pertinent at the moment, and everybody is talking about with people like  Whim Hoff, 

This is, to use cold water to stimulate the vagus nerve and bring the heart rate back down.

So you do this by putting your face apparently it plunge your face for 30 to 60 seconds into icy water and this in turn promotes the diving reflex which helps the vagus nerve to slow the heart rate to slow down in order to conserve oxygen and the dive reflex originally noted in cold water diving is a first rate vagus nerve stimulating method so that's one to try

These this is a huge area of information and I what I really wanted to do was just help you maybe by doing my research understand it a bit better and look into it if you like it's a really interesting area and I think something that's going to become more and more talked about and more and more used within systems of mental and physical support