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hey there everybody and welcome to this video on the vagus nerve and how to strengthen vagal tone I'm your host Dr Donnelly Snipes so let's start out for those of you who aren't familiar talking
about what the vagus nerve actually is the vagus nerve runs through your entire body it's got its
little grimy mitts in just about everything and it is typically thought of as your primary relaxation
nerve but it actually is more than that it's like a traffic cop for your stress and your relaxation
response and when there there is a stressor it should be letting the stress traffic go
and when they're the stressor is over then they should be letting the relaxation traffic go
unfortunately people with poor vagal tone have difficulty recovering after emotional upset so
their cop just doesn't alternate the traffic the stress traffic is going through and oh by
the way there may be something else that might be happening I don't feel safe so we're going
to keep the stress traffic going through and that relaxation traffic just continues to build up and
I think all of us have been at a four-way stop with a less than effective traffic cop before
so you know what I'm talking about poor vagal tone is often associated with HPA axis dysfunction the
body when it gets stressed instead of letting a little bit of stress hormone go through so
instead of that traffic cop letting like 30 cars go through and then switching it lets
200 cars go through it just dumps a whole bunch of stress hormones into the body and it takes a while
for the body to recover from that think about it the opposite way think about how long it takes 200
Cars to go through all that time traffic's backing up the other way and it's going to take a while
for all that traffic to go through once the stress hormones actually stop so it the vagus nerve is
really um on point for helping you trigger that relaxation response and stop that stress traffic
who should do this who should work on strengthening vagal tone everybody
adolescents and adults that's typically who we think about but children can do it too children
when they start feeling distressed when they start feeling upset or irritable or scared can learn
how to do some basic things to help trigger their vagus nerve to help them get into their wise mind
now they may not understand all the mechanics of it when they're two or three but they can do it
infants and you're like well you can't talk to an infant and tell it to take deep breaths no
you can't however they found that infants tend to sink with their caregiver when their caregiver is
holding them so if the caregiver is just oozing stress and hyperventilating and their heart rate
is pounding the infant is going to sync with that if the caregiver is strengthening their
vagal tone triggering their vagus nerve and down regulating the infant is going to sync with that
and pregnant people who knew
is very very intertwined with the nervous system of the parent and so it's important to recognize
when the parent is stressed it's also triggering the fetal HPA axis and so some people some babies
can be born with a HPA axis that's already dysregulated because their caregiver or their
birth parent was dysregulated was stressed out so much of the time so pregnant people can also help
nurture the nervous system of their infant by practicing and strengthening vagal tone
strengthening vagal tone means improving the cops ability to recognize when the threat is over
stop the stress traffic and let the relaxation traffic through
good vagal tone is associated with improved emotional regulation reduced inflammation
reduced pain as in a lot of people even report improved sleep and improved energy
how do you do it though how do you trigger that vagus nerve well ultimately what you're doing
is you're trying to train or retrain that traffic cop to be more alert and aware of what's going on
so when you experience stress in in real life or you can even do it where you are exposing
yourself you're thinking about something stressful intentionally and then trying
to calm yourself down for example maybe you've got to go talk to your boss tomorrow and that's
really stressful for you well you can imagine doing that and then practice down right down
regulating that stress response as you think about what that meeting might go be like
so you experience a stress reaction of some sort and well we'll talk about physical activity in a
minute a stress reaction you can use belly or square square breathing belly breathing
means breathing in letting the belly expand noticing how the belly expands and exhaling
noticing how the belly contracts as you exhale so that's deep breathing
Square breathing is breathing in for four holding for four exhaling for four and holding for four
now people who have a trauma history may have difficulty with belly or Square
breathing because it may trigger a dissociative episode so if this kind of breathing intentional
breathing like this is too triggering for you right now there are other things you can do
blowing bubbles is one of them I have yet to have somebody dissociate while they're blowing
bubbles you can do this with chewing gum and the benefit to gum is that the chewing motion itself
actually triggers the vagus nerve that has little projections into your face that recognizes when
you're smiling when you're frowning but when you start stimulating that nerve by chewing
it can help you relax we also know that when we eat our body triggers the vagus nerve triggers the
relaxation so we can rest and digest so chewing the gum itself is beneficial but then blowing the
bubble what happens when you blow a bubble you chew the gum and then you know you make a little
pocket and then you take a deep breath in there's that breathing and then you slowly blow out to see
how big you can make that bubble before it pops so you're deep breathing but you're not focusing on
breathing you're focusing on the bubble for kids you can get those little tiny jars of bubble stuff
that they sell in party supply stores and they can blow bubbles and again they have to take a
deep breath and then blow out slowly or they don't really get much in the way of bubbles
so those things can be helpful for smaller children you can make what what I call a
dragon breather and you can find instructions for how to do this online but you take a toilet
paper roll or a paper towel roll if you want and you color it wrap it up in tissue paper and then
you cut streamers out of tissue paper red tissue paper and put that at the end tape those on the
end so when the child blows through it those red streamers flutter like the child is breathing fire
and that again helps them blow and there are those annoying noise makers from parties that
you know spiral out and make the horrible noise those really aren't usually appropriate in most
situations but it is another tool singing loudly also triggers deep breathing when you're singing
loudly you're breathing and exhaling through your diaphragm so that triggers not only are
you moving your mouth but it also triggers the vagus nerve it triggers the relaxation response
now I have or even screaming some people just get to that point where they're just like oh
screaming is not always appropriate wherever you're at but if you're at home and you can
go scream into your pillow for a second just take a big deep breath and scream into that
pillow for a minute sometimes you feel a little bit better and that's okay that's triggering
that vagus nerve there is nothing wrong with it when it's done in an appropriate setting
and not screaming at people screaming into a pillow
laughter and this is more than just a giggle a giggle where you're like yeah whatever that's
not going to do it you need a good belly laugh and that will trigger the relaxation response
physical activity also helps the vagus nerve learn how to rise in response to a physical stressor and
relax when it's over when you do something like running you know your heart rate and everything
rises in response to that stressor and as you get better conditioned your heart rate should drop
much more quickly when you're finished it takes less time to recover that's the vagus nerve going
okay I know what to do here uh with yoga for example it can combine physical activity where
you are holding a pose and it gets to be a little uncomfortable after 5 10 30 seconds depending on
the pose that is going to cause your vagus nerve um to be activated it's going to cause the stress
stress response to be activated and in yoga one of the things that we practice is slow breathing
in order to work against that response so your body wants to raise its heart rate and wants to
raise its blood pressure but you are intentionally controlling your breathing and that will help keep
the heart rate down and the blood pressure down so you're reprogramming if you will that traffic cop
and the ear which is the tragus or the temple massage and I've done other videos on tragus
massage I find it most helpful to put my middle finger on my tragus the little flap of ear and
my index finger behind my ear because there's other projections there and gently rub you're
not pressing it's not like you're trying to give yourself a you know muscle massage
you're just gently rubbing that area to stimulate the nerves underneath the skin
the same thing can be done with a temple massage
so there are a lot of different ways that you can trigger your vagus nerve
other tips heal and don't overload the HPA axis don't don't overload your stress response system
if your vagus nerve is already weak or vagal tone is already weak which means her traffic
cop isn't doing a very good job then putting him out in the middle of Rush Hour on spring break
isn't going to be a good idea so when the roads are suddenly flooded with traffic the vagus nerve
has a harder time maintaining balance identify and eliminate as many unnecessary stressors as
possible and I call them Pacer stressors your physical stressors things that cause you pain
or physical distress your emotional or affective stressors your mental stressors what things are
you overwhelmed about right now or pessimistic about that you can just put on the back burner
for a little bit your environmental stressors this can include temperature noise generally feeling
safe and your relationship stressors now not all those things are going to be able to be eliminated
but if any that are possible to eliminate work on eliminating them so your HPA axis can heal and
your traffic cop can have time to get trained and before it is flooded again with rush hour traffic
plan for what I call high traffic times high stress times whether it is the holidays or a staff
meeting or whatever it is plan for those times recognize that you need to eliminate as many other
stressors as possible and anticipate this high stress time that's going to take energy it can
also be helpful when you're planning for that high traffic time that stressful experience envisioning
successfully going through it so you're telling yourself ahead of time in your
mind you're rehearsing it saying I've got this I can go through this and there's not
going to be a problem for me busy malls and stuff Christmas shopping was one of my worst
nightmares until we started being able to do most of it online I don't like shopping malls I don't
like large crowds and so going to places where there's large crowds I know that's going to be
a high stress time or a high traffic time so I need to bolster as many reserves as I can
ahead of time as well as Envision the benefits what I'm what's going to be good about it like
going to Disney World for example when I went with my kids you know 20 some odd years ago
uh that's a kind of stressful environment to be in it's hot there's a lot of people but
I focused on seeing the excitement in my kids faces and that helped me change my
direction if you will that helped let some of the the relaxation traffic go
through because I was focused on them and not the stressors
address stressors as they arise instead of just you know building them all up and saying okay I'll
deal with that next week I'll deal with that next week and then next week comes and you've got a
butt load of stuff to deal with try to deal with stressors as they arise if you get into
an argument with your best friend address it then don't just sit on it and stew on it
and develop positive social connections people that are supportive that are loving that are
encouraging that are consistent they don't have to agree with you all the time but they are secure
and you know you can count on them to support you when things get tough because we are not intended
to handle life a hundred percent by ourselves a hundred percent of the time we all need help
occasionally and when you know you've got those resources it can help you feel less stressed when
my husband was out of town one time he's usually the one that handles the plumbing issues and we
had a plumbing issue and I knew my best friend's husband was a plumber and I called her I'm like
hey would you mind you know having your husband help me out here I'll pay you whatever but I knew
I had that resource I knew I had someone I could call that could help me figure out what to do
strengthening vagal tone can be helpful for most people and can be taught into children as young
as infants strengthening vagal tone has many health benefits the more effective your traffic
cop your vagus nerve the easier it will be to get into your wise mind when you're under distress if
you're able to you know call into that traffic cop and say Hey Joe you need to let the stress
make the stress traffic stop for a minute so we can get into our wise mind it's going to be easier
to get into your wise mind and make fact-based rational decisions as the length of time your
stress decreases the HPA axis will also heal and may lead to a reduction in inflammation and
Improvement in your immunity Etc so triggering your vagus nerve and strengthening your vagus
nerve is part of healing that HPA axis and healing your nervous system and healing your body