Does the Body Heal in Parasympathetic?
How to Get Out of Stress and into Relaxation
Have you been told that the Nervous System heals in the “parasympathetic” state, but you can’t seem to relax? The parasympathetic state is where we feel calm and either restful or resting, from here the body can repair any damage or disorder that might be present. The truth is, if you have a lot of sympathetic activation (think stress, fight or flight), it can be hard to relax. Even near impossible. Your mind may be going way too fast, bouncing from thought to thought, or your body may physically feel very energized and restless.
Sympathetic Stress
If your Nervous System is stuck in this “sympathetic” survival stress state, you can’t simply relax, but you can work through it to relaxation. First, you have to release the charge of stress to be able to fully relax. There are many ways to do this from acupuncture and other treatments to things as simple as breathing, stretching, or going for a walk or run. Depending on what’s going on more specifically, I recommend different things, for different people, at different times.
Easy Ways to Move Through Stress:
Breathing: there are many different breathing techniques out there. Lately I’ve been using this simple technique to reset stress: I breathe in fully + out fully at least 6 times, audibly, deeply, filling the abdomen up like a balloon. Followed by a “balloon breath” = breathing in 3 times (quick, sharp breaths) then holding for as long as comfortable and exhaling. I also like this breathing technique: breathe in for 4 seconds, hold for 7 seconds, and exhale as much as possible. I repeat this one for 2-5 minutes or as much as needed, making sure to allow my lungs to breathe how they want to after.
Fascial Maneuvers: basically stretching, moving and breathing together. Check out the Human Garage’s Total Stress Reset for more info. I recently completed the 30 day challenge where I felt the cumulative effects of doing these maneuvers daily.
Going for a walk, jog, or run depending on the level of energy mobilized. I haven’t been running lately, but when I did run, I would run to exhaustion (to be honest, which wasn’t much) and then find somewhere to collapse and stretch and breathe, soaking in that amazing oxygen. It’s the feeling after running which really did it for me. Depending on energy levels, running can burn or move too much energy, so just be aware of what actually feels good for you, and don’t push a stressed body too hard.
Any other form of leisurely fitness including weight training, dancing, Pilates, some forms of yoga, and martial arts, or even sports so long as they’re not too competitive. The goal is to release stress, not add more!
Getting acupuncture or bodywork. This one is obvious! Acupuncture can quickly and deeply relax the body. Actually, when I’m too tired to “move” through stress physically, I just throw in a few pins and let them do the work.
Shutdown
On the opposite end of the spectrum, you might be experiencing a lot of “shut down” or immobility. In this case, you need to mobilize that energy in order to “heal your nervous system.” Shutdown is what we do when we either don’t have the resources to fight back, flee, or fawn, or there’s not enough time. It’s an emergency break kind of situation. This is what possums do when they “play dead” to avoid being eaten. So when we get stuck in a shutdown state for longer than we should, it can look like extreme exhaustion and inability to function normally. Getting out of the shutdown survival response can be a slow and arduous process, but some simple techniques include:
Slow and gentle movement. Like rocking from side to side or following a dance, yoga, qi gong, or other gentle movement class.
Hot baths or showers.
Slow walks.
Listening to music and attuning to the space around you.
Self massage or acupressure.
Acupuncture, bodywork treatments, massage or other forms of somatic therapy.
Freeze
Finally, if there’s a mix of the two opposites, called the Freeze Response: you need to complete the response by releasing the mobilized stress and thawing the frozen energy. Think of warming up your cold hands with friction. Movement warms up frozen energy. Warmth melts ice. So with the “freeze” response, I like a combination of gentle movement and breathing, with the warm and nourishing practices. This state can be tricky to know how much is too much, because there can be a super high level of stress in the body and not a lot of energy available to handle it. So, to add to the gentle movement, warmth, and breathing, it’s really important to nourish with good nutrition and a safe and comfy environment. There can be underlying nutritional deficiencies, which make it harder for the body to gather its resources and “get it together”. One final recommendation for the Freeze response, is to channel that pent up energy into something creative. By engaging in a creative outlet, you are moving the stuck energy and healing the underlying emotions to the survival / trauma response. A person stuck in freeze can’t handle too much stimulation, so go slowly.
So, while the body heals, repairs, and reorganizes itself when it is resting, true rest might not be accessible without first moving through overwhelming sensations. I know there’s a lot of buzz around the phrases “trauma healing” and “nervous system regulation”, and often they are paired with these simple techniques like breathing and shaking (another good one), but in my opinion, the buzz is a positive thing. While adopting one technique probably won’t fully repair a nervous system stuck in a survival response, by using the simplest of methods, we can complete the stress response, and come back to homeostasis. When stress finally resets, it feels like returning home to ourselves and starting fresh. Sometimes this needs repeating over and over again, and woven in and out of different approaches. Other times it’s a quick process. If we all learn how to get out of stress, the world will be a much more harmonious place!
Thank you for reading! Was this article helpful at all? Leave me a comment below, and let me know which technique you’re going to give a try :)
Stay well!
— Morven