Your body loves you - so should your nervous system

I’ve been posting a lot on social media recently about our nervous system and in particular the fight/flight response (also called sympathetic arousal) in our autonomic nervous system.

The response has been huge - people have really connected to what I’ve been saying and have found comfort in finally understanding that nervous system dysregulation is at the core of most of our emotional and mental struggles.

You’re not crazy, you’re not losing your mind, you’re not ‘too sensitive’.

When we have nervous system dysregulation it feels like things can get very personal, very overwhelming and out of the blue we can go into a reactive spiral that feels out of our control.

There is nothing wrong with you.

In fact, your nervous system is doing exactly what it’s meant to do - keep you safe.

It’s just that it can be reacting to things in the present moment through the filter of things that happened in the past that were just too much for you to handle.

For example, imagine as a little child you were shamed for being too exuberant - perhaps your parents were stretched to their limit and you raced into the middle of them having a deep discussion about finances, which you were not to know, to excitedly tell them about a caterpillar you found outside. You were told to find your manners, not interrupt and keep you voice down and go to your room. You walk away feeling like you are a bad child and sit in shame in your room.

Fast track 30 years and, as an adult, someone tells you to ‘shush’ or ‘tone it down’ when you are excitedly communicating something you are happy about. Mentally, you might not recall the shaming you received as a child but your nervous system does and it goes into full fight mode: you find yourself angry and defensive at the person who had told you to ‘shush’ because your nervous system is connecting this experience to the past experience. Both become enmeshed and the fury that you weren’t able to express as a child (because you were small and relatively powerless) comes out in the present moment.

Later when you’ve settled you think back on the ‘shush’ incident with remorse, bewilderment and more shame.

That is nervous system dysregulation.

You can’t think yourself out of it; you can’t talk it away. It happens within your body. 

This can happen over and over again with so many different stories and in so many different contexts.

As a parent myself, I’d like to quote something that really resonated with me: “Two things can be true at the very same time: 1 Your parents did the best they could when you were little. 2 You didn’t get what you needed when you were little.” Dr Alexandra H. Solomon.

Being a parent can be really difficult - you bring all your own nervous system dysregulation into the parent-child relationship and not matter how conscious you are or how hard you try, you will get triggered and sometimes you will behave in ways that you wish you hadn’t.

So I can assure you there’s no blame or judgement coming from me about how parents may behave and what might stick with children. What I’d like you to understand is that nervous system dysregulation happens very easily and can last a lifetime if we don’t heal it.

The good news is, each and every one of us can heal, relatively quickly!

Healing changes our lives. Imagine not being triggered. Imagine being able to stay relatively calm in most situations. Imagine being able to meet someone else’s dysregulation with compassion. Imagine having very clear and loving boundaries. Imagine feeling free to live the life of your dreams.

Don’t wait any longer. Heal your triggers. Live in freedom.