Chronic stress may be a sign of a dysregulated nervous system.
This article will explore what this means and how you can heal a dysregulated nervous system to feel balanced and calm again.
The Importance of a Healthy Nervous System
Everyone feels stressed from time to time, but chronic stress can have serious effects on your health, mental capabilities, and emotional state.
Understanding the Nervous System
Your nervous system is the body’s “command center.” The autonomic nervous system regulates automatic functions like breathing, heart rate, and digestion. Two elements of this are the sympathetic and parasympathetic nervous systems.
These have opposing functions, designed to keep your body in homeostasis, which is a state of regularity and optimal functioning.
The Sympathetic Nervous System
The sympathetic nervous system is responsible for the stress response. This is the “fight or flight” reaction to real or perceived threats. Its job is to prepare the body for an instant and appropriate reaction to any potential threats.
The sympathetic nervous system is basically responsible for your survival. However, it cannot distinguish between physical threats like an oncoming bus and an emotional threat like public speaking or financial problems.
The Parasympathetic Nervous System
This parasympathetic nervous system activates once the brain perceives that you are no longer in danger. It regulates the “rest, repair, and digest” functions that bring your body back to normal and perform necessary maintenance functions.
The parasympathetic nervous system cannot operate when the sympathetic nervous system is activated. Digestion shuts down and tissue repair stops when your body’s resources are dedicated to survival.
Signs of Nervous System Dysregulation
If your body is on constant “red alert” due to hyper stress, your body enters a state of dysregulation. Some individuals are so used to it that it feels normal to be on edge all the time.
However, the body is not designed to cope with constant threat. It must be balanced by the restorative functions of the parasympathetic nervous system. When an individual remains on “red alert” (even low-grade constant stress), this imbalance affects physical, mental, and emotional functioning.
The body is constantly communicating its needs. Symptoms of a dysregulated nervous system include anxiety, panic attacks, insomnia, excessive fatigue, muscle aches, a racing heart, feeling easily startled, digestive problems, difficulty concentrating, and heightened emotions.
How to Treat a Dysregulated Nervous System
Treating a dysregulated nervous system aims to reestablish a healthy balance between the sympathetic and parasympathetic nervous systems.
Traditional treatments include a wide variety of methods to calm your sympathetic nervous system.
Exercise Regulates the Nervous System
Exercise “burns off” the stress chemicals. This doesn't necessarily have to be super intense, but using the body stimulates the healing process and is healthy for the immune system. Muscle density also tends to decrease with aging, making weightlifting an important practice if even only for strength maintenance.
Stretching
Stretching helps release tension that is being held in the muscles. Pay particular attention to the shoulders and upper back. Stiffness and knots are two indicators that stress is being held in those muscles.
Meditation
Relaxing the mind with meditation has many health benefits, including stress relief and nervous system rebalancing. There are many different ways to meditate. It can be about silencing thought and focusing. Or it can be to become a silent observer of the mind’s activity to reduce negative thoughts. Meditation can help the mind relax and depart from a stressful state.
Breathing Exercises
Taking time to engage in breathing exercises can calm the body down nearly instantly. Try two quick inhales followed by a deep sigh that empties your lungs completely.
Optimal Sleep
The immune system recieves significant benefits from sleeping deeply for seven to nine hours per day. During sleep is when the parasympathetic nervous system is most active. It will help to make sleep a priority.
Eating close to bedtime is not good for the body, because it forces the body to digest while asleep. It also helps to turn all electronics off an hour before bed, because blue light from screen exposure can lead to sleeplessness. A soothing, weighted blanket and a cool bedroom may also help improve sleep, but temperature preferences may be different depending on the individual. It may also help to block out any lights from outside as much as possible, so the room is fully dark.
Practice Mindfulness
Mindfulness can mean getting rid of distractions when you are focused on something and putting your full attention into what you are doing, thinking, and feeling at that very moment. This also means letting go of worries about the future as well as thoughts about the past, and focusing your attention on the ‘here and now.’ Another significant help to this would be to limit cell phone time.
Get A Massage
Touch is a powerful relaxation tool that improves circulation, releases tension, promotes relaxation, and helps the body flush out stress hormones. It may also help to give one’s self a few big hugs or to gently massage the shoulders, temples, and feet.
Sing, Chant, or Laugh
The vagus nerve is the main component of your parasympathetic nervous system. Stimulate your vagus nerve through laughter, singing, and chanting. Laughter and singing are also excellent mood lifters.
Take A Cold Shower Or A Cold Plunge
Cold water therapy improves moods, speeds up the metabolism, improves the immune response, and regulates the nervous system.
Ground Yourself by Walking Barefoot Outside
Grounding, or earthing, helps balance the nervous system through electron transport from the earth. Walking on the beach, walking on grass, or standing barefoot on any natural surface will help ground one’s self.
Forest Bathing
Being in nature, particularly when there is an abundance of green (like a forest), has a powerful calming influence. Daily doses of greenery and natural sounds are great for de-stressing and uplifting moods.
Practice Gratitude
Gratitude helps one see the benefits and lessons in a situation, which takes away the stress.
Communicate With Others
Talking is a powerful tool for dealing with issues in addition to physical exercise. Everyone should have a trusted friend. Some may benefit from seeking the help of a therapist.
Eat Nutritionally-Dense Foods
It helps to avoid sugary foods that amp up your body. One can focus on getting the most nutrition out of every meal by adding more leafy greens and reducing or eliminating processed foods. Preferred foods include those with omega-3 fatty acids, B-complex vitamins and magnesium. Fermented foods can stimulate gut health. There is a very strong connection between gut health and nervous system health.
Avoid Caffeine And Other Stimulants
These can make you feel even more on edge. Some people microdose caffeine to improve mental clarity and energy without over-stimulating the nervous system, but it helps to know your body. Some react poorly to caffeine in general. Although green tea contains some caffeine, it also contains L-theanine, which increases levels of serotonin, dopamine and GABA. These are all powerful mood enhancers.
Practice A Calming Hobby
This could include gardening, reading, art, or playing music to calm the body and pull the mind away from distressing thoughts.
Aromatherapy
Aromatherapy activates the sense of smell, which can influence your mood. You could choose a scent like lavender, for example, if it reminds you of a pleasant weekend in the garden with loved ones. To heal a dysregulated nervous system, choose scents that make you feel relaxed and happy, not energized and alert.
Turn Off The Screens!
Many of us find it hard to unplug and be without our devices; but it’s one of the best ways to reduce stimuli to give the sympathetic nervous system a break from being on constant alert for danger.
Take A Bath
A hot bath with aromatic bath oils and epsom salts can be a relaxing and rejuvenating experience. Epsom salt baths contain magnesium. Many people are deficient in magnesium, which is important for regulating serotonin levels and regulating the nervous system.
Get Some Sun
Early morning sun exposure helps your body synthesize vitamin D which is essential for a healthy nervous system. Sunshine also increases serotonin to improve your mood.
Journal
This can help get those stressful thoughts out of your head. Putting a worry or stressful thought on paper can help you put it into perspective and help you process strong emotions.
Balance your Blood Sugar
This helps prioritise a healthy diet and lifestyle, to prevent dramatic swings in energy and mood.
Drink Less Alcohol
Though an occasional drink can relax you, long-term heavy alcohol use causes significant damage to the nervous system.
Practice Intermittent Fasting
Abstaining from food and drink for a period of time gives the body a chance to rest and perform repair functions (because it is not busy digesting). The type of stress brought on by fasting, hormesis, activates the parasympathetic nervous system and calms the sympathetic nervous system.
Supplement With Herbs
St. John’s Wort helps relieve anxiety and depression, oat straw extract to reduce inflammation and increase energy, and chamomile to promote relaxation and relieve anxiety.
Supplement With Adaptogens
These help the body adapt to stress and regulate the nervous system. Adaptogens include ginseng, ashwagandha, rhodiola, and certain mushrooms including reishi, Cordyceps, and lion’s mane.
Prioritize A Healthy Social Life
Good friends and healthy relationships are a health tonic!
Red Light Therapy for a Dysregulated Nervous System
You can also use red light therapy as a natural way to heal a dysregulated nervous system.
Red light therapy reduces inflammation, increases blood flow, and stimulates energy production in the cells which has a positive ripple effect on the body’s systems. This can improve the way the body copes with the effects of stress.
The versatile BIOMAX series red light therapy devices can be used to treat peripheral nervous system problems such as neuropathy, and central nervous system problems including traumatic brain injury or stroke.
You can discover dozens of clinically proven applications and ways to improve full-body vitality using red light therapy in the Learning Center.
