I named my business Spirit Mender because it fits so perfectly with my skills, training and intention. My goal is to help people along the road to finding inner peace and balance on three levels; body, mind and spirit. As I continue to do the work I notice more and more that these three things are inner-connected. You can help the mind learn and understand why it is reacting in a traumatized state. If the body is not considered as part of the equation, then one who is highly traumatized is unlikely to be able to reach the neutral place that a balanced individual lives in. The same thing with spirit. If we don’t nourish all three aspects of ourselves it never quite comes together.

 People may have been in psychotherapy for years and understand why they react the way they do but it doesn’t change what they feel. When a client reaches me in this place it is quite helpful. We can then start to pay attention to the sensation of the reactions and see what the body has been trying to complete in order to reach homeostasis within the autonomic nervous system. Already knowing the cognitive aspects makes it easier to focus only on the physical reactions.  From there one can discover deeper meaning and a deeper settling of the autonomic nervous system.  Spirituality assists in discovering what the body and mind need as well. Finding whatever resources will help one feel safe and having a strong spiritual system is of great benefit in settling trauma out of the body.

The author makes no claims, promises, or guarantees and does not make medical or psychological diagnoses.   All writings are the opinion of the author. 

When one experiences trauma in a preverbal state and it never gets a chance to complete it’s cycle, you are likely to end up experiencing feelings that you cannot explain with words.  Healing this type of trauma takes time and needs to be done in a similar state.  The body needs time to figure out that it is safe to go ahead and experience some of those very uncomfortable feelings and see that they are no longer relevant to the present.  Then it can take some time to figure out what else it might be able to do and let those experienes become a part of the past, where they belong. 

Finding out that now is different than it was then and doing it through sensation rather than words will help things to shift.  I believe that humans need to do things like this in the presence of a trusted companion.  Someone who can monitor where you are and who can maintain a solid energetic presence to help your body learn what it is like to feel safe.

I had to take a break for a while. A lot of things have been popping up and have piqued my interest so I have ideas for more posts. Stay tuned…

The author makes no claims, promises, or guarantees and does not make medical or psychological diagnoses.   All writings are the opinion of the author. 

Once the ANS chooses a response to a threat, it learns something it can do to help the body survive.  In a regulated system, that experience is then filed away to use for future reference along with the rest of the “successful survival files”.  In a disregulated system, it can become the default choice in any threatening situation.  This is what I was talking about in the fight response post.  The disregulation comes from a thwarted threat response; something that was not neutralized in the amount of time allocated to the ANS response program.  This can come in any form – fight, flight or freeze and can be present at all times in some people.  

If this becomes established, the autonomic nervous system then begins its job of hunting for situations where it knows it can keep you safe.   In some way you may consciously know that these are not always the best choices, yet the ANS may seek them out anyway on an unconscious level.  So  the ANS organizes around what makes it feel safe even though other systems may be extremely uncomfortable with that choice.  

The good news is this doesn’t have to be irreversible even though it may feel like it could never change.  To create new possibilities the body needs to begin to feel out other ways it might be able to survive.  First and foremost, it needs to know that it can try these things out in a safe atmosphere.  It also helps for it to happen in a slow, titrated way.  Once it starts to gain more possibilities, it becomes easier to try new things.  The body also begins to realize that the old way of surviving is not necessarily the best way to go in every situation.  It takes building up those ”successful survival files” with more types of sensation and many more options.  This helps to create that neutral place where regulated people spend most of their time.  

A Good Choice

The author makes no claims, promises, or guarantees and does not make medical or psychological diagnoses.   All writings are the opinion of the author.

 

One of the most difficult things for a disregulated nervous system to understand can be the concept of then and now.  This is because it is dealing with what is perceived as a constant threat even when the threat is long over.  So, when a new threat appears the ANS looks through its files and the thing that has been active and used in survival will be the first and sometimes only choice.  The body needs to have a chance to look at what is really happening right now as opposed to what was happening then.  The goal is to allow the past event(s) to finally end and thereby discharge the energy that was made available to handle it.  Once this happens one can literally start to live more in the present moment and the nervous system is once again set to learn new ways to handle perceived threats.

The author makes no claims, promises, or guarantees and does not make medical or psychological diagnoses.   All writings are the opinion of the author.

Anger and rage are part of the body’s sympathetic nervous system.  A person who is stuck in a fight response might find themselves becoming extremely angry in situations that don’t warrant it.   When the body perceives a possible threat, your autonomic nervous system calls up this well-known response that helped you survive a threatening situation in the past.  Even if you were unable to resolve the threat at that time, the primitive brain still thinks that “We survived when we used this response.  In order to survive again, we have to use what we know worked before.”  If this is the case, the nervous system never got to complete the original response through pendulation between the sympathetic and parasympathetic systems.  This may also have created one of those 24/7 hypervigilent states in a sympathetic response.   The ANS could have lost track of what it is like to be neutral in between threats.  

When you feel so much rage,  it can feel too scary to even think about trying to change the pattern.  Using SE, you can work with it in small bites so that the ANS can handle the amount of activation without going into another trauma response.   A skilled SE practitioner has protocols and tools that can help that huge amount of energy start to move so that the body can discover that there are other ways to deal with threats.  Once the anger has a chance to mobilize in a safe environment, it can then figure out how to discharge the energy it has been holding onto for so long.  It can then realize that fight is one of several choices, not the only choice.

The author makes no claims, promises, or guarantees and does not make medical or psychological diagnoses.   All writings are the opinion of the author.

 

Moving easily and effortlessly.

If a person has been in a traumatized state for a long time, there is an innate sense of urgency to fix things and fix them now (go for the gusto and get it done!).  The autonomic nervous system has a job to do which includes regulation of the parasympathetic and sympathetic nervous system responses.  When working correctly they balance each other out by pendulating from one to other when either one has been activated to solve a perceived threat.  When the initial response to this threat doesn’t solve it within a few seconds, the system can become fixated in the original response.  It doesn’t always happen that way but it can if there is a continued threat that isn’t neutralized quickly or if it is a long-term or repetitive situation.  This can create a life where one ends up in a constantly hyper-vigilant state.  Where the body perceives the threat occurring 24 hours a day 7 days a week even after it is no longer present.  In this response, the ANS is constantly trying to do its job.  It’s job is to neutralize the threat and then regain regulation and to find that neutral place where it is again ready to deal with whatever should come up.     

When one has been trying instinctively and consciously to achieve this balanced state without success over time, things start to get more complicated.  Sometimes just the telling of the particulars of an incident can create problems.   Instead of fixing things it can create a new trauma reaction or the repetition of an old one.  Also if one does too much at one time it can overwhelm the system and flip things into another trauma response.  When this type of situation is present, the body has got to have time to figure out what a different response might feel like.  Then the ANS can begin to pendulate between sensations and start the balancing process.  Once a settling experience takes place, the body needs plenty of time to integrate this newer sensation and then it can restructure its responses to fit this new paradigm.     

Given enough time to figure it out, the body is able notice what the sensations are like – both activated and less activated.  It is important to slow things down enough so that the body and mind can work together in recognition of what regulation might feel like.  This is important in regaining what we were designed to do in the first place – titrate, pendulate and re-regulate.  Our bodies are brilliant.  They know exactly what to do.  Sometimes they just need some help to figure out how to attain that instinctual goal.

The author makes no claims, promises, or guarantees and does not make medical or psychological diagnoses.   All writings are the opinion of the author. 

In a long-term trauma reaction the body may literally feel that the traumatic event has never stopped happening.  The ANS (autonomic nervous system) remains in a  hyper alert state.  In reality and consciously/intellectually one may know that this is not the case, but the body doesn’t understand.  The fear that is often part of the reaction can be so overwhelming that it easily overcomes any other sensation.  By bringing curiosity into the equation, things can begin to shift.  Just the act of being curious lessens the fear. 

Coyote and Cows in Harmony

SE (Somatic Experiencing ®) protocols could give the body a chance to discover in a titrated and safe way how it might be if the high alert status was to start to diminish.  As it takes the time to notice what safety it may have felt in other situations, or just by slowing things down and letting them settle,  it becomes more willing to apply that to the post traumatic reaction.  Things begin to expand and constrictions start to loosen up.  The ANS can then start to do its job of finding balance and resilience.  This in turn allows safety to become an established pattern that can be accessed to use as a reference point.  Whatever systems get sidetracked can start to re-establish a more realistic reaction to what is happening in the present moment.

The author makes no claims, promises, or guarantees and does not make medical or psychological diagnoses.   All writings are the opinion of the author. 
  

Clarification – in my writing ANS stands for autonomic nervous system. 

I am not by any means an expert on psychology or an MD, but I have some thoughts on what might be taking place physiologically during what is called a bipolar reaction.  Some people who are experiencing this may be in a trauma loop where the autonomic nervous system is in an extreme swing between sympathetic and parasympathetic responses and is unable to access anything in the middle.   The manic phase may be the sympathetic nervous system on high alert which involves extreme mobilization.  The depressed phase could be an acute parasympathetic response which is like slamming on the brakes instead of slowing things down gradually.  

In this type of reaction the ANS may just be trying to regulate itself through pendulation and somehow has gotten stuck on the extreme end of both systems.  Somewhere along the line, middle ground became unattainable.  It could be very important for the body discover that there is a grey area between the two systems where integration happens.  Mobilizing the excess energy that was made available to handle the original traumatic event(s) could allow it to move out by shaking, trembling, discharging heat, yawning, crying or whatever it needs to do.   The autonomic nervous system has then learned new choices it can make when faced with activating events and thereby re-established some middle ground.  

After the Storm

The author makes no claims, promises, or guarantees and does not make medical or psychological diagnoses.   All writings are the opinion of the author.

Digestion

As things continue to move while your ANS (autonomic nervous system) is reacting to a threat, the heart and lungs pump up to provide whatever the muscles need.  The digestive tract also gets involved.  It may need to keep things available so that the muscles can be ready to fight or it will eliminate things to lighten the load if flight is the best idea.  So the digestion either slows or it quickly contracts and eliminates everything that is in the system.  We watched a film clip of a gazelle running from a predator in our training and you could see the elimination as it sped off as fast as it could from the threat. 

The methods the body uses to move the excess energy out during SE sessions can be many different things.  I’ve seen people shake, tremble, yawn, feel heat coming out of various areas in their bodies, burp, cry, yell, get up and jump or run – whatever the body needs to complete the threat response that was thwarted.  Then the nervous system can restructure itself to understand that the threat no longer exists.  The body knows what it needs, it really does.  The challenge is getting past the anxiety, disorientation or pain created by the initial response and slowing the system down enough to listen to it and, most importantly, to trust it to let us know what it needs.

 

Suggested Reading

1. Waking the Tiger, by Peter A Levine, Ph.d
2. The Trauma Spectrum, Hidden Wounds and Human Resiliency, by Robert Scaer, MD (geared toward the lay person)
3. The Body Bears the Burden, by Robert Scaer, MD (geared for medical professionals)