From Survival to Thriving in the Nervous System

Riordan Clinic [00:00:00]:
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Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:00:56]:
Welcome to the Riordan Clinic Podcast. My name is Dr. Kirsten West. I’m a naturopathic oncologist at the Riordan Clinic, and I am so happy to be joined by Jen Nolan, the owner of Remission Nutrition, who also serves as a nutrition advisor at the Riordan Clinic. And today we’re talking about something that sits very near and dear to both of our hearts and truly is a core thread that runs through everything we do. And that’s the nervous system. And we thought that it would be better to sit down and have a real and honest conversation about it instead of a lecture, because the nervous system deserves so much more than a lecture. And we hope, and this will be part of our exciting thrivership program coming up at the Riordan Clinic. So, Jen, when did you start to see that the nervous system was showing up in your work and something that you couldn’t ignore?

Jen Nolan [00:01:48]:
You know, I feel like I really recognized it pretty, pretty soon into my work with people that are going through a cancer journey and, or, you know, people who had maybe high risk factors for cancer that were really, really in that fear place. And then even after, you know, when we’re talking about thrivership, people post, you know, and then we’re going to talk a lot about that today, but after they’ve gone through treatment, the scanxiety, that common word. So I really started to, I started to notice it and I was like, what can we do to help people? Because we can talk about, you know, food all day long. We can talk about toxins in the environment all day long. And if we’re not talking about the nervous system.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:02:40]:
Yeah.

Jen Nolan [00:02:40]:
Then how can we heal? People are in that. Such a state of angst. Right. And so it became pretty clear pretty early on. And I’ve just been really trying to round out my practice, so I can help people in that way as well.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:02:56]:
It truly is kind of like the elephant in the room. We’re so busy focusing on supplements, like you said, life, like food, all of those tangible things. But if we don’t really get to the core of what could be continuing this feedback loop of not necessarily grabbing that thriving aspect, we’re not going to get where we want to be.

Jen Nolan [00:03:18]:
Exactly.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:03:18]:
So, yeah, it’s a really important topic and one I don’t think we talk about enough so. Well, I think it’s important to talk about the nervous system and what it entails. And there are two arms of the nervous system that I think many people are familiar with. And the first is the sympathetic nervous system. And that one kind of has gotten a bad rap because it is that fight or flight stress response. But the thing about the sympathetic nervous system is it’s actually quite brilliant because it’s kept us alive. The problem with the sympathetic nervous system is when it becomes chronically activated. And that typically starts with high cortisol, which in the long run can lead to low cortisol, which can be equally an issue. But we can get into that. It causes increased inflammation, immune dysregulation, GI disturbance, poor sleep, et cetera, et cetera. The list goes on and on. Whereas you have the parasympathetic nervous system, which is rest, repair, digest, and that’s where healing happens. So the question becomes, how can we tell where we’re at? Are we accessing sympathetic? Are we accessing parasympathetic? I think we all know when we feel stressed, we’re definitely in the sympathetic. But there is a measurement we can use called, called heart rate variability, which measures the variability between heartbeats. So one way to think of this is that high heart rate variability means that we’re very adaptable to the world around us. We have more resilience. Whereas low heart rate variability means that we’re not as adaptable. We’re kind of stuck in this gear. And typically that gear is a stress gear. So this is something that’s important. I think the way that I understood this the best was we need nervous system capacity to be able to run from a tiger, but we also need the nervous system capacity to sleep at night. So if we can’t do both equally well, something might be wrong.

Jen Nolan [00:05:23]:
So. So it’s almost like getting stuck. So we don’t want to get stuck in that place.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:05:28]:
Exactly. And so in integrative cancer care, we know that people who have a high heart rate variability actually do Better, they tolerate treatment better, they manage stress, they’re more resilient. Whereas those patients who have a poor or a low heart rate variability may not do as well. They may have poor outcomes. The good news is, is that heart rate variability is trainable. We can do something. It’s responsive to lifestyle. So breathing, breathing, meditation, movement, sleep, all of these things really help to enhance our heart rate variability. So the good news is, is that it’s trackable, but most importantly, it’s trainable.

Jen Nolan [00:06:12]:
Yeah. And I think it’s just real quick to piggyback on that around the hrv, or heart rate variability. If we’re tracking it, if someone’s tracking it, there are different devices to do that that can also add some stress to the, to the person. But it can be helpful data. And then here, not to compare your age.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:06:32]:
We were just talking about this a little earlier.

Jen Nolan [00:06:35]:
So if someone has really high hrv, you’re like, oh, mine’s terrible, it’s so low. And you really want to watch your own trends.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:06:41]:
Yeah.

Jen Nolan [00:06:42]:
Which HR with hrv. And there are ways, like you said, with lifestyle and all the things, to be able to train and increase it like a muscle.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:06:50]:
And I think it always comes back to in my practice and your practice is that numbers are numbers we can’t get attached, but they give us information to be truly empowered by what they’re giving us to make the changes that we need to make. What is that saying? Comparison is the. Not the root of. There’s a. There’s a saying, like comparison is the root of evil or something like that. Like don’t or something.

Jen Nolan [00:07:13]:
Maybe. Yeah, Makes sense.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:07:15]:
Just don’t compare.

Jen Nolan [00:07:15]:
Just don’t compare in general.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:07:17]:
In general.

Jen Nolan [00:07:18]:
Right. Yeah.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:07:19]:
Just a life lesson.

Jen Nolan [00:07:20]:
Exactly. I like it. Yeah. No, that’s good. Yeah. So if someone were, you know, like wide awake, jazzed in bed at night, and they can’t sleep, is that the sympathetic nervous?

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:07:32]:
That’s the sympathetic nervous system. The parasympathetic’s kind of hanging out and the sympathetic is on board.

Jen Nolan [00:07:38]:
Right.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:07:38]:
And so you can’t calm down, you can’t get to sleep.

Jen Nolan [00:07:41]:
Got it. And then there’s things you can do to help bring it down. Right. And that’s what we’re going to talk about. So if, you know, if we are somebody who has like a, maybe compared to ourselves, a very low hrv, we’re chronically stressed, you know? You know, what is that chronic stress actually doing to our terrain? We talk about the terrain all the time. Right. All the systems of the body what is that doing?

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:08:06]:
Well, we’ll get there. We’ll talk a little bit more about the physiology, but we actually know that that chronic stress response will increase inflammation, decrease immune function, all things that we don’t want, not only to in disease in general, but especially with cancer, because it’s going against the very nature of what we’re trying to do for the terrain.

Jen Nolan [00:08:25]:
Right, okay. Definitely.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:08:27]:
Yeah.

Jen Nolan [00:08:28]:
Is there. Is it possible to be living in, like, sympathetic overdrive? You’re just. And not knowing it. Can you not know it?

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:08:38]:
Yeah, it’s kind of like that. That story about the frog in boiling water, when you put it, for those of you who aren’t familiar, but when you put a frog in boiling water, if you put him in, or she or whatever, you put the frog in the water and you gradually increase it, the frog will stay because it doesn’t realize what’s happening, and it will eventually die once it hits boiling. Whereas if you put a frog straight in boiling water, it’s going to experience it right away and want to get out. So it’s the same thing. It’s these things, and it happens a lot of times, just the longer we’re alive, these things become insidious where we don’t even realize how we’re operating until we get it out of operating that way.

Jen Nolan [00:09:20]:
I can feel that in my nervous system, what you just said. Good. Yay. Good.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:09:27]:
So I think the key is that the body really doesn’t distinguish between running from a tiger or a bear or whatever giant animal it might be that we were evolved for that sympathetic nervous system to use versus having a difficult conversation or having poor scan results.

Riordan Clinic [00:09:45]:
It.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:09:46]:
The nervous system experiences it all the same. So we already know that cancer patients are in this chronic fight or flight response as it is. They’re, you know, the second you’re diagnosed with cancer, fight or flight, and then you have issues with sleeping, you have poor digestion. You’re contemplating what the future holds. We now know that 80% of women with breast cancer have PTSD, like, symptoms. And I’d even go as far as to say that they have ptsd. But because it’s this constant feeling of running from danger. There is something at your back, and when is the next shoe going to drop and when are things going to be okay? And if you’re in that chronic sympathetic state, you’re going against the terrain that we’re really trying to cultivate because we want to prevent disease. We want to make the body inhospitable to cancer or disease in general.

Jen Nolan [00:10:38]:
Right? Yeah. Yeah, so true.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:10:42]:
So, Jen, most of us were taught a simple two part nervous system as I talked about with the sympathetic polysympathetic. But there’s a man named Dr. Stephen Porges and he has this polyvagal theory which gives us a more complete and clinically useful map. I know you’re trained in trauma informed somatic work. Can you walk us through the polyvagal theory and what it means for people in our program?

Jen Nolan [00:11:05]:
Yes, and this gets a little bit, you know, sort of technical. And we all know my technical brain is a little bit different. But what I really try to do is explain this theory as a theory. First of all, every single person is still very individualized. And this was, this was sort of created this theory back in like 1994. So it’s been around for a while, but we still often hear just the fight or flight, you know, the gas pedal, the brakes. Right. And so what this tells us is that there are these three different areas of the nervous system. So we’ve got the sympathetic, which we’ve been talking about, and then we’ve got this dorsal vagal and ventral vagal. Wow. System. So it’s really neat. So the ventral vagal is kind of that rest. That’s where we want to spend a lot of our time. In that kind of. I wouldn’t say rest. Like we’re just like on the, on the floor. Not in all Zen doubt, but we’re just in that place of we’re good. Like our safety. Yes, safety. So we’re pretty calm. And then we might end up in that sympathetic where we’re like fiery, we’re getting fired up and then we go into. If we stay there a long time, we kind of get stuck. We may wind up in that dorsal vagal area. And that is where we’re like freeze. We’re frozen. And while sometimes that can be an advantage for some situations, it’s really, really a scary place to be. When we are just. We’re just kind of. We’re frozen. We can’t. We’re. We’re just shut down.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:12:50]:
Yeah.

Jen Nolan [00:12:50]:
We can’t communicate. We can’t be in community with people. We can’t have conversations. We’re just shut down.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:12:57]:
Yeah.

Jen Nolan [00:12:57]:
And what we do when we’re working with folks that are in that zone or in the sympathetic zone is that we might work on some of these calming practices or, sorry, not calming, but you know, these different practices to bring them out of that frozen spot that freeze into. They need to maybe go into sympathetic, so they kind of need to go the way they came. So they go into sympathetic. And they might get fired up. And we have to be very supportive of them during that work. And then we bring them down in. Yes. And it’s a wave. So there’s this wave that’s ridden. So what I like to see is if someone’s in that sort of. That really good ventral vagal place, they can socially engage. They are waving in that. Right. It’s not just they’re waving in that, but we. I’m sorry, I just lost my train of thought with that. So they’re. They’re there. They’re waving. They might dip into that sympathetic place. They might go way up here. So there’s different places to be, but where we want to be is down here. Again, the point is, that’s where healing can happen.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:14:09]:
Well, and it makes me think of, in the past, our sympathetic nervous system. That response was to. We’d have that stressor and get over it so we could return to the. To the parasympathetic. So that sounds like what you’re speaking about. Like, you can’t just all of a sudden go, well, I’m gonna stimulate. I’m gonna just get into my parasympathetic. You have to overcome the stressor before you can actually get there.

Jen Nolan [00:14:34]:
Yeah, yeah. And sometimes, you know, I think this is really a good thing to say right now is that we’re not trying to get rid of stress.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:14:41]:
No, we can’t.

Jen Nolan [00:14:43]:
Right. It’s just how does the body sort of react to that, you know, And. And how can we listen in and not worry about, like, push the stress away. Push it away. But feel it.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:14:54]:
Feel it, work through it.

Jen Nolan [00:14:55]:
Yeah, but if you’re in freeze mode, you can’t. You know, if you’re so angry, you’re so filled with rage, you can’t.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:15:04]:
Yeah.

Jen Nolan [00:15:05]:
So we need to bring it into that place where you can. And again, that might. You’re still having emotions.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:15:10]:
Yeah.

Jen Nolan [00:15:10]:
You’re still stressed, but you can move through it. And you’re not getting stuck in that

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:15:14]:
feeling and giving yourself grace.

Jen Nolan [00:15:16]:
Huge.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:15:17]:
And giving yourself grace to help you

Jen Nolan [00:15:19]:
get out of it. And so we see this as something that can. It’s. It. To me, it’s really empowering. You know, I would agree. Like I said before, we can talk about food all day long. And sometimes people are in that really sympathetic place when they’re talking about food. I hear that all the time. Yeah. And then they’re stuck. And then it’s like, then it really doesn’t matter. Yeah, right. So let’s get you in a different place. And that takes, you know, I think community.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:15:47]:
Oh, community is big because I think these patterns leave to lead to isolation. And a diagnosis of cancer is already so isolating.

Jen Nolan [00:15:55]:
Yeah. And if somebody’s in that freeze place, they’re. They’re often.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:15:58]:
You can’t socialize.

Jen Nolan [00:16:00]:
Yeah, yeah, exactly. So, so interesting. It’s. It’s wonderful. So back to like that safety piece. You know, what we’re always going back to is, can we tell the nervous system we’re safe? We’re safe, we’re safe. And sometimes even if you don’t believe it, I’m safe. Yeah, I’m safe. And that can really help. There’s so many things we can do that can really help. Tell the nervous system we’re safe.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:16:25]:
Yeah, yeah. And we’ll tap. We’re gonna. We’re gonna talk about some of these things in just a little bit. And so. Yeah, that’s. That’s really wonderful. I was thinking too about the fact that the connection is so important. And I was reading a little bit earlier about this thing called interpersonal physiological synchrony. And it’s a phenomenon where the biological rhythms of two or more people align when they’re together, fostering social connection, empathy and binding. So it’s almost this place where you do feel really isolated or you’re stuck in that. Did you say dorsal vagal place that you need to get out of and actually.

Jen Nolan [00:17:08]:
Yes.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:17:08]:
Be with people.

Jen Nolan [00:17:09]:
That’s right.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:17:10]:
Because that’s one of the first things you can do.

Jen Nolan [00:17:11]:
Yeah, that’s right.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:17:12]:
People that make you feel safe.

Jen Nolan [00:17:13]:
Yeah, yeah, yeah. And that’s what, you know, what Dr. Porges said about that ventral vagal place is that’s that community place. That’s that, you know, being able to be like, in like society. Being able to operate. Right. So if we’re in a big place of rage, we might also be isolating too. Right. Or we just might not be very fun to be around. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. That’s awesome.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:17:39]:
Yeah.

Jen Nolan [00:17:39]:
So the vagus nerve.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:17:41]:
The vagus nerve.

Jen Nolan [00:17:42]:
Just to tee that.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:17:42]:
Yeah. Let’s. Let’s talk a little bit about the physio physiology of the vagus nerve. So the vagus nerve is Cranial Nerve 10. It is the longest parasympathetic nerve in the body. It starts in the brainstem and it wanders down through the heart, the lungs, the gut. So it’s often termed the wandering nerve. So I kind of just think of it as like, I don’t know, I lived in Arizona for a while, so I think of it as these long roads going through the hills. So it is incredible because 80% of its fibers are actually sensory. So the nerve actually gets all of this feedback from the environment about it around it and brings it back to the brain. Interestingly enough, several of those nerves endings innervate the gut. So if we are stressed, it’s no wonder that we don’t digest well. And likewise if we don’t feel well, digestively at least. I notice I don’t feel well mentally, emotionally, all of those things. So it’s really hard to function in that way. The other thing we know about the the vagus nerve is that it innervates. Well, it innervates all those things, but it also controls heart rate, breathing and digestion. So it acts as a two way communicator between our organs and our brain. So if we can get that vagus nerve harmonized, we’re harmonizing the entire body.

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Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:20:04]:
We can also think of it, and this is where I just think this is so cool. But we can think of it as a neural break on inflammation. So there was a landmark study they did and they took two groups of animals. One group, they cut the vagus nerve, the other group, they kept it intact. And then they injected inflammatory signals into both of these groups of animals. So like cytokines. So in the group of animals that had the intact vagus nerve, they had all of the symptoms of being sick. They were like, something’s not right, something’s going wrong. In the animals where the vagus nerve was cut, they didn’t have any symptoms, any feedback. And this made me reflect on the Fact that it is not uncommon for me to have a patient come into my office, diagnosed with cancer who says, I never got sick. I’m never sick. I’ve been so healthy, and all of a sudden I’m diagnosed with cancer. And I can’t help but think, what if they’ve been in this sympathetic place for so long and their vagal tone is so low that their body’s just not getting the feedback that there is something that needs to happen. There’s a virus that we need to tackle. There’s something going on, and they’re just not getting the signals. So that’s, like, so interesting to me.

Jen Nolan [00:21:22]:
Yeah, we all like disassociation.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:21:26]:
Maybe. Maybe. I mean, I think it’s almost like feeling like just truly not being in your body. And I think that can happen so much in our society because we’re so up here with social media and stress and all these things that we forget what it really means to be here. We also know that people who have had a vagotomy or have had their cranial nerve resected actually have increased risk of disease and disease progression. Whereas people who actually start working on their vagal tone, there’s different devices to do this, but they’ve scientifically done this for some people. They have overcome intractable colitis, Crohn’s disease, endometriosis, and we’re now seeing this in some cancer research. So it’s pretty incredible.

Jen Nolan [00:22:14]:
That’s really neat. And I think that it’s interesting that there’s devices. You mentioned devices out there. And I know we’ll get to what to do if you’re kind of in one of these states, but, you know, these devices, I’m always like, gosh, it’s like, you don’t even have to have one. You can do these things for free. Like yesterday, I was on the airplane, and it was pretty choppy. It was also delayed, and so I could tell that my nervous system was pretty wonky, and I just started humming. I was on the plane, and I’m like, nobody can hear me because the. The plane is.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:22:46]:
Oh, yeah, yeah.

Jen Nolan [00:22:46]:
And I was just humming, and I was like, whoa. That actually really helped. So just the simple things that we can do for the.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:22:53]:
Exactly, exactly. I think we do get caught up in the fact that, oh, is there a device or is this. Is there a pill or is there something that I can take just to make it better? But we’re already gifted with these things that we can use.

Jen Nolan [00:23:06]:
Yeah.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:23:06]:
So it’s just the innate. Yeah, that innate Wisdom. So just coming back to it.

Jen Nolan [00:23:11]:
Yeah. And so if somebody’s, like, on. You mentioned, like, being on the phone, being on the computer, being on, you know, whatever, social media, those are newer things to us. And so it’s harder to find those innate things in us and connect to

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:23:27]:
our nervous system is just trying to do the best it can with what it’s been given.

Jen Nolan [00:23:30]:
That’s right.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:23:31]:
So, yeah. But the thing. The thing about all of this is that what we realize is that that vagus nerve is a direct lever into the nervous system and into our health. So it’s pretty. Pretty phenomenal that we can utilize.

Jen Nolan [00:23:47]:
Really? Really is.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:23:48]:
Yeah.

Jen Nolan [00:23:49]:
That’s neat. And with the, you know, that polyvagal theory that I was talking about, too, I mean, that’s the basis of that theory is the vagus nerve theory. So just to kind of button that up. But, yeah, it’s. Yeah, it’s really, really powerful. Yeah.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:24:06]:
So I think we can say in a nutshell that people with a strong vagal tone, which is reflected in that good heart rate variability, tend to have a better prognosis. The vagus nerve is one of the best ways to influence the tumor microenvironment by decreasing inflammation and increasing immune function. And then we also know that a lower vagal tone tends to correspond with poorer outcomes. Yeah.

Jen Nolan [00:24:33]:
So powerful, you know, to think a little bit about the mental health connection and all of what we’re talking about in a cancer diagnosis, I think it’s really important to touch on that. You know, there’s such a aftermath. Right. And again, it goes to this, like, what we said before, too. It’s like, have they been just diagnosed? Are they post diagnosis, post treatment? Where are they on their journey? Really important to use some of these things that we’re talking about. So that low vagal tone, again, it’s like a muscle. So if you can improve vagal tone, you can hopefully improve your experience, your journey. The way that your body reacts. How incredible is that? And that’s that empowerment.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:25:25]:
And it probably becomes most important when you’re done with treatment and you’re done with, like, when people tell you, oh, you’re in remission, well, there’s always that fear. Right. And I feel like there’s always that kind of. You know, I keep saying tiger, but something that is like, is it still there or am I good? And so that’s where I think really harnessing this and really working to strengthen that vagal tone is most important.

Jen Nolan [00:25:52]:
Yeah, I agree. I agree. Yeah. That tiger. I was thinking about something that is talked about a lot when somebody is. And back to going through treatment,

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:26:03]:
you

Jen Nolan [00:26:03]:
know, they talk about this poison that they’re. I’m going in for my.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:26:08]:
Oh, yeah, that’s a reframing.

Jen Nolan [00:26:10]:
Yeah, that’s a reframing. So if we can even change the way that we’re speaking, remember that the vagus nerve is also listening. So that’s this like, you’re in trouble signal. You’ve got poison coming in. So how can your nervous system be okay and feel safe? So I’m always like, you know, can we reframe it? And I know. I love this. Like, this is your healing love potion.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:26:31]:
Yeah.

Jen Nolan [00:26:32]:
You know, and I know that’s maybe like, sounds ridiculous for us to sit here and say when we’re not sitting in that chair, but really, like, this is your healing love potion. Just like, you know, IVC or something else. I think people think of that as healing love potion, because it is. But, you know. Yeah, it’s really. It’s really important that reframe. And just the signals that we’re sending through our thoughts, through our words.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:26:57]:
Exactly.

Jen Nolan [00:26:58]:
Our eyeballs, you know, what we see. Oh, one of my Favorite quotes by Dr. Wynn Dyer is when you change the things you look at, the things you look at change.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:27:08]:
I love it.

Jen Nolan [00:27:09]:
You do. So if you’re looking at the pretty things, that’s what you’re going to see and what your nervous system is going to see.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:27:15]:
It’s kind of like that. Man, we could go off. But, you know, like, the secret. What is it? There was that documentary about the secret attraction or how what you think about is what you draw towards you. So, yeah, we’re powerful beings. We just. Yeah, I think we forget.

Jen Nolan [00:27:34]:
I agree. So I think, you know, just knowing that emotional resilience, that’s one of my favorite words, is that resilience. You know, when our vagal nerve is toned and we’re using it and aware of it, that’s part of it. Right. The awareness. Then, you know, we’re in that resilience place of resilience. And that means we can heal.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:27:56]:
We can heal. And we’ve got. It’s like this empowerment. There’s that word empowerment again. And then we’re in it together.

Jen Nolan [00:28:02]:
Exactly. Community. We talk about that so much. And that’s another one. I think that’s probably more than anything, not spoken about, like community.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:28:11]:
Community is so important. And I remember that whole adage of the. The concept of that herd and that if we stay together as a herd, it’s very unlikely you know, it’s that one, the one stray, I don’t know, antelope that gets separated, that has the greatest danger and that’s isolation. So if we can remember that we’re in it together. It takes a village.

Jen Nolan [00:28:33]:
It does. Safety. Safety in numbers.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:28:36]:
Exactly.

Jen Nolan [00:28:37]:
Right. Yeah, exactly. That’s really cool.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:28:40]:
So what are some things that we can do? My favorite part, this is the fun, like rubber to the road. What do we do for this? Amazing vagal tone and incredible heart rate variability.

Jen Nolan [00:28:53]:
Love it. So one thing that I’m going to show you that I just learned the other day and I actually did this on the airplane too, is, and this is really great for kids too, when they’re feeling like super stressed. And make a little butterfly with your hands. So you hook your thumbs and then you just tap, alternatively alternate on your chest.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:29:14]:
Oh, that’s easy.

Jen Nolan [00:29:15]:
Isn’t it lovely? And it just is really nice. It just calms and tells. It’s. It’s about telling the nervous system, hey, I’m safe, I’m here. You know, there’s also tapping on the sternum. That can be a really helpful thing. We know breath. Breath is huge. Huge, huge, huge.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:29:32]:
One of the best things about breath and anyone can do this, but the most important piece about breathing is to make your exhale longer than your inhale. And I used to do this in medical school with my stethoscope. Used to put my stethoscope here and I take a breath in and my heart rate would speed up. So your breath, your heart rate always speeds up when you’re breathing in. And then as you breathe out, it starts to slow down. So it’s almost like you think of breathing in as your sympathetic and breathing out as your parasympathetic. So just make sure that your exhale is longer and you’re tapping into it right away. Exactly.

Jen Nolan [00:30:07]:
Right. You’re practicing right there and then this exact bump. Bump, right. I love that practice. Yeah, that’s really good. There are so many different people are like, oh, you have to breathe way. You have to breathe this way. And you know, that’s great that a lot of people are talking about it. Find what works for you. But, you know, I love the longer breath. The other one that I do is I’ll breathe in through my nose and I’ll breathe out like I’m. Yep. Through my straw. Yes, like I’m blowing through a straw. And I love that one too. Just. I mean, anybody can do that anytime.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:30:39]:
No, breathing is just great.

Jen Nolan [00:30:41]:
Like.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:30:42]:
Yeah, but we just like, we Know, we do it all the time, but I think if we can actually hone our intention into actually the act of breathing, it just brings us back.

Jen Nolan [00:30:54]:
It’s so true.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:30:55]:
We’re all alive.

Jen Nolan [00:30:56]:
Yeah. And even like singing is another thing. Hugging, like I was mentioning earlier, Dancing, like, I think sometimes people think, oh, if I’m gonna go love on my nervous system, I have to go meditate for six hours. No, it’s not the truth. Right? Like, meditation’s amazing and there are so many things it’s not always about. Like, like I said, zenning out.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:31:18]:
Right.

Jen Nolan [00:31:18]:
It’s about being safe. And we can be safe out in the, on a trail, in the mountains. We can be safe driving in our car. We can be safe coming into a meeting. You know, we can’t always be in meditation all day.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:31:33]:
No, we cannot. Yeah, but I think you bring up a good point about being in wilderness because trees actually put off phytoncides. I always say it wrong, but those I think are direct communicators to our vagal nerve. So just the act of being in the forest, which is what they actually prescribe in Japan. They prescribe forest bathing is probably a direct lever into stimulating the vagus nerve.

Jen Nolan [00:31:57]:
Well, and think about nature and think about what. I just got goosebumps. Think about what those trees look like and what the vagus nerve looks like.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:32:04]:
Oh, yeah.

Jen Nolan [00:32:05]:
Like there’s this.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:32:06]:
The law of colors, right? Yeah.

Jen Nolan [00:32:08]:
It’s so cool. It’s so cool. That’s beautiful.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:32:11]:
Yeah.

Jen Nolan [00:32:11]:
I just received a book from a girlfriend that was how to be more tree. Oh, isn’t that cool? So, yeah. How can we connect to nature? Yeah, huge. That’s cool.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:32:22]:
That’s really neat. There are a couple. So we talked about the deep breathing, the humming. Gargling. Yes, gargling. So enjoy your mouthwash or just water or whatever. Just take advantage.

Jen Nolan [00:32:38]:
Your clean mouthwash.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:32:41]:
Yes, yes. Cold exposure. So. And then yoga. And there actually was. And I actually read this, it was, I think it was a medscape article. And I was like, oh, interesting. Like this is on like a, you know, a medscape article I’m getting in my email. But they did a study and they saw that people who did more high intensity interval training actually had increased resilience to stress, so that if something happened during the day, they were able to overcome it that much quicker. And I think that that absolutely goes back to that heart rate variability. We’re training our heart. Like we are giving ourselves that stressor so that we can come back down. But we’re giving ourselves. It’s like that hormetic. We can use this to be better off later on.

Jen Nolan [00:33:28]:
Yeah. And you know, different from like that high intensity interval training. Different from that. Like I’m going to go run for. On a treadmill for 60 minutes and never change the variation. Right. We’re just cruising right along. So giving your.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:33:43]:
Those bursts are really cool, really important because it helps to train. Okay. We’re here and then we’re here. So we’re. We’re ping ponging back and forth.

Jen Nolan [00:33:51]:
Yeah, yeah.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:33:52]:
So.

Jen Nolan [00:33:52]:
And speaking of ping ponging, we could play. I’m just kidding. We could do yoga too.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:33:57]:
Yoga.

Jen Nolan [00:33:58]:
We’ve got this one thing and then we’ve got this other thing and it’s really important.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:34:02]:
So I have to read. We got to talk about some of this, these statistics just to get a little bit more scientific for a second. But they actually did a Yoga study over eight weeks and they found out that it had a 72% people had a 72 decrease in depression, 75 decrease in anxiety, 75% decrease in anxiety, 82% decrease in insomnia, 77% increase in quality of life. There’s no drug that does that.

Jen Nolan [00:34:30]:
Nope, no drug. Do I have to go to a yoga gym if I don’t really like to or can I? No.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:34:37]:
I think of truly just stretching and moving your body and not just laying in Shavasana the whole time, but like actually. I know. But actually moving and. And in the beginning it might be helpful if you haven’t done yoga to like have somebody to help teach you.

Jen Nolan [00:34:53]:
Yeah. To make sure you’re.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:34:55]:
Make sure you’re doing it safely and you’re. Yeah, yeah.

Jen Nolan [00:34:58]:
And I think too like thinking about like sun salutations are one of my favorite because it’s something to do in the morning. Then you can get that early morning light. But always doing everything within your obviously ability. Because if you’re pushing, which is what I end up doing because I’m comparing. I go to a yoga class and then I’m like super sore when I get back and I’m like, was that really good for me?

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:35:19]:
Yeah. Was that ego? Was that like what I was not trying to do for ego?

Jen Nolan [00:35:24]:
Yeah, exactly.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:35:26]:
Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Jen Nolan [00:35:27]:
Yes.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:35:27]:
And they did they actually. And just to piggyback on that, there was a study and they looked at yoga and stretching actually increases gaba secretion. So that could be part of the reason why we get into more of that Zen.

Jen Nolan [00:35:41]:
Yeah.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:35:43]:
Feeling.

Jen Nolan [00:35:44]:
That’s cool. The other thing I’m thinking about is with, you know, if I’m in a really, like, not so great state, I’m in that state of like rage, that sympathetic, or I’m in that freeze mode, you know, getting out of that. I’m not going to just, you know, do one of these practices right off the bat. I’m going to be gentle and get myself out of like kind of moving.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:36:10]:
Exactly.

Jen Nolan [00:36:11]:
That’s super important.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:36:12]:
Coming back to what you were saying, like, we have got to work with the rhythm here instead of being so. Well, I just have to do this right now.

Jen Nolan [00:36:20]:
Totally. And I think it’s back to like that, you know, assessment model. So if we have somebody just like when you do, or we do at remission, you know, like we’re. We’re assessing, we’re seeing where they are and then we are meeting people exactly where they are.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:36:33]:
Yeah.

Jen Nolan [00:36:34]:
And then we move gently out of that place if we can. Yeah, that’s. That’s kind of how I look at it. And I think that’s really important.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:36:41]:
It’s a co learner philosophy, Right?

Jen Nolan [00:36:43]:
That’s right.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:36:44]:
Being together.

Jen Nolan [00:36:45]:
Yeah.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:36:45]:
Working together. We are all teachers to each other.

Jen Nolan [00:36:49]:
That’s right. We sure are.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:36:50]:
Yeah.

Jen Nolan [00:36:51]:
And our body is teaching us too.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:36:53]:
Exactly.

Jen Nolan [00:36:54]:
So.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:36:55]:
Exactly.

Jen Nolan [00:36:56]:
So, I mean, I think, gosh, I feel like the quote that, that we were talking about is, is. It’s neat. It’s not quite a quote, but there’s a woman named Deb Dana who wrote the polyvagal theory in therapy.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:37:15]:
Okay.

Jen Nolan [00:37:16]:
So this is used a lot in, you know, various forms of therapy. Said the job of the autonomic nervous system is to ensure we survive in moments of danger, like you were saying, and thrive in times of safety. So survival requires threat detection and the activation of a survival response. So we need this. Thriving demands the opposite. Thriving demands the opposite. The inhibition of a survival response so that social engagement can happen back to the community.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:37:54]:
Exactly. And I think that is a very important distinction between surviving and thriving. Because the word surviving connotates that we’re fighting something and we’re running from something, whereas thriving means that we’re safe, we’re already where we need to be.

Jen Nolan [00:38:13]:
I love it.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:38:14]:
So.

Jen Nolan [00:38:14]:
And that is, you know, something. I keep getting goosebumps. And again, that’s just the body. Like if you’re feeling those goosebumps, it’s hitting you. Right.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:38:23]:
It’s your vagus nerve.

Jen Nolan [00:38:24]:
Yeah. But I think it’s so beautiful that that thriving word. And I know that there are a lot of people out there that talk about the word survival or survivorship you know, it can be a little bit triggering.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:38:38]:
It can.

Jen Nolan [00:38:38]:
And so that thrivership is like.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:38:41]:
It takes a lovely word. It takes the weight off. Yeah. And it empowers, it’s empowering.

Jen Nolan [00:38:46]:
It’s, it’s, it’s in us. And so there’s so many amazing things we can do for our nervous system and we kind of scratch the surface.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:38:56]:
We have. Well, and I think it’s also important for people watching this or listening in to know that, you know, these are all I remember I used to read self help books. Like that was like the aisle I would be in in Barnes and Noble or when bookstore. Bookstores were more of a thing. But I remember just spending all the time in the, in the self help books. And I actually would get these books and feel more depressed reading them because I’m like, man, I am really failing at this. So I think it’s a really important distinction that people who are in sympathetic overdrive and they’re trying to do these things and they just feel like they’re coming against a wall. You’re not flawed. It’s your sympathetic nervous system doing what it needs to do. And so it’s just really working with it to get past that.

Jen Nolan [00:39:42]:
Yeah. Instead of against it. And like what you said. So one of my rules is no self help books in the bedroom. Also not the computer. Right. Our self help books now have become the Internet.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:39:53]:
Oh yeah.

Jen Nolan [00:39:54]:
And so it’s just these constant rabbit holes and stress, stress, stress. The light from the computer, the light from the phone, the EMFs, all the things, stress, stress, stress. So reading books for pleasure at night, before bed can be really, that’s like foundational to our nervous system health.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:40:13]:
Well, and an important thing here that I’m going to, that just made me think of is that anything that we read before we go to bed is what our subconscious sticks with. So when I have patients who are like, I just read these true crime novels before that I’m like, well, maybe we should try something else, you know? But like I used that in medical school when I couldn’t remember something. I would be like, all right, I’m going to read this and take it. It was a great excuse to take a nap all to all the time. But I would read something and then take a nap and then I remembered it.

Jen Nolan [00:40:42]:
That’s amazing.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:40:43]:
So I think that’s really important for people to know that before you go to bed, expose yourself to something that’s not on a screen that is positive because that’s what your, that’s what your subconscious is going to take with you as it repairs at night.

Jen Nolan [00:40:56]:
Yeah. And there’s so many, like, sleep, you know, meditations we can listen to. And also that simple act. We could go on about this for hours right now. That simple act of gratitude. Totally. What are three things that I’m grateful for. Yep. And why. Yeah. Go to bed with that. Share it with your, you know, sleeping partner or your kids or something like that.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:41:17]:
Exactly.

Jen Nolan [00:41:19]:
Yeah. It’s really beautiful.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:41:20]:
Powerful. Powerful.

Jen Nolan [00:41:22]:
Yes.

Kirsten West, ND, LAc, FABNO [00:41:24]:
So I think the thing here that we need to really say about all of this is that we survive in danger, we thrive in safety, our immune, our nervous system is working so hard that it’s time that we work with it gently, curiously, and with a whole lot of compassion. And that’s really what we’re building here. Yes. Yeah.

Jen Nolan [00:41:49]:
Thank you.

Riordan Clinic [00:41:51]:
Thank you for listening to the Real Health Podcast. If you enjoy this episode, be sure to subscribe and leave us a review. You can also find all of the episodes and show notes over at realhealthpodcast.org also be sure to visit riordanclinic.org where you will find hundreds of videos and articles to help you create your own version of Real Health.