Conversations on life, style, beauty, and relationships. It's The Velvet's Edge Podcast with Kelly Henderson.

Conversations on life, style, beauty, and relationships. It's The Velvet's Edge Podcast with Kelly Henderson.

Brittany Tiper is a somatic experiencing practitioner. She has a new book coming out, Body First Healing, a revolutionary guide to nervous system recovery. Hi Brittany, Hi, Hi, thank you so much for being here.

Brittany Tiper is a somatic experiencing practitioner. She has a new book coming out, Body First Healing, a revolutionary guide to nervous system recovery. Hi Brittany, Hi, Hi, thank you so much for being here.

Yeah, thank you.

Yeah, thank you.

We were talking a little bit before. I told you. My listeners are very accustomed to the trauma conversation. But I love what you're doing and what you're talking about in this book because I do think it's really helpful to break down what trauma is, how it happens, and then what it can look like in your life, and then how to kind of deal with that, because I know one of your biggest points is that talk therapy sometimes just isn't enough when you're dealing with intense trauma. So I wanted to start by just maybe telling listeners, like one of the questions I get asked by people a lot is, well, how do I know if this is a traumatic of event or if I'm just going through a hard time, Like, how do we differentiate those two things?

We were talking a little bit before. I told you. My listeners are very accustomed to the trauma conversation. But I love what you're doing and what you're talking about in this book because I do think it's really helpful to break down what trauma is, how it happens, and then what it can look like in your life, and then how to kind of deal with that, because I know one of your biggest points is that talk therapy sometimes just isn't enough when you're dealing with intense trauma. So I wanted to start by just maybe telling listeners, like one of the questions I get asked by people a lot is, well, how do I know if this is a traumatic of event or if I'm just going through a hard time, Like, how do we differentiate those two things?

So, working in the somatic world, you know soma means of the body, so we focus a lot on healing trauma through body and more specifically, though in sematic experiencing, we really focus on the nervous system. So our definition of trauma is that it's any event or experience that overwhelms the nervous system's capacity to cope. And when that happens, you can get, you know, seemingly stuck in a survival response, so fight, flight, shut down, freeze, fawn, and functional freeze. And I use analogies a lot just as a way to really simplify this work. So I always tell people imagine that it's like armor that your nervous system puts on. It's like, Okay, we're going to armor up to protect you from this event, this experience. But what can happen is that it turns into like this night suit of armor and it stays on even after after the event or the experience is over. And that's usually due to a lack of safety following the event or the experience, or because your nervous system isn't quite developed enough yet to be able to come back to safety, back to baseline and regulation. And that's where a lot of developmental trauma, you know, kind of occurs, and so then we get kind of stuck carrying around and wearing this like night suit of armor that starts. You know, at one point it was self protective, but now it feels self sabotaging. It's getting in the way of our life. It's heavy, it's annoying, it doesn't feel like us. We start to lose sight of who we are. And so I think back to your question, what is trauma. It's gonna be so relative to the nervous system that it happens too. And I can give an example, and I share this example in the book. So let's say that you got Freddy and Johnny right. They're neighbors, they're eight years old, they live on the same street, they go to the same school. Freddy comes from a house where caregivers are present. They're really attuned to his need. They also have regulated nervous systems, so they welcome and discomfort. They allow for emotional expression, and it just feels like a safe environment for him to be himself, to express. Whereas Johnny, on the other hand, he comes from an environment where one of the caregivers is maybe not around because they are working all the time, or you know, maybe there's there's separation, whatever that is. And then the other caregiver, who is physically present, is not mentally or emotionally present. Maybe they're dealing with substance abuse or you know, something like that, and so they're not regulated in their system, which doesn't allow for his nervous system to really like regulate into that safety. So it feels like a really tense environment. He can't express himself authentically. And so anyways, these two kiddos, they go to school one day, they get bullied in the same way by the same bully on the bus, same word said, same punch is thrown, and they're both obviously armored up right, they're like kind of shocked, Oh my gosh, what just happened. So Freddy goes home or Johnny, I can't remember. Freddie goes home to an environment that feels supportive. Both caregivers are there, They listen to them, They help him regulate by they loan him their calm and regulated nervous system so that he can start to take that armor off. They listen to him, they allow him to express whatever he's feeling. And then they say, we're going to go to the principal tomorrow, we're going to make sure this never happens again. He feels safe enough to remove the armor, whereas the other child goes home to an environment where one parent's gone again and the other one is asleep on the couch, passed out. And when he goes to wake up that parent, they're clearly impered or intoxicated, and they yell at him and they scold him, and they say, I don't have time to deal with your stuff. Go to your room and deal with it on your own. And so he remains armored up. And so what you have here, and this is where I don't love using the terminology of big tea little ta trauma. Yeah, is you know Freddy or Johnny, whichever one I mentioned, who goes home to the safe environment, He might look back at this moment as like a blip in the radar, whereas the other will look back as this was a traumatic moment in my life. And so really, what we often say is that trauma is not found in the story or the event. It's found in the nervous system and the nervous system's ability to move through that or not move through that.

So, working in the somatic world, you know soma means of the body, so we focus a lot on healing trauma through body and more specifically, though in sematic experiencing, we really focus on the nervous system. So our definition of trauma is that it's any event or experience that overwhelms the nervous system's capacity to cope. And when that happens, you can get, you know, seemingly stuck in a survival response, so fight, flight, shut down, freeze, fawn, and functional freeze. And I use analogies a lot just as a way to really simplify this work. So I always tell people imagine that it's like armor that your nervous system puts on. It's like, Okay, we're going to armor up to protect you from this event, this experience. But what can happen is that it turns into like this night suit of armor and it stays on even after after the event or the experience is over. And that's usually due to a lack of safety following the event or the experience, or because your nervous system isn't quite developed enough yet to be able to come back to safety, back to baseline and regulation. And that's where a lot of developmental trauma, you know, kind of occurs, and so then we get kind of stuck carrying around and wearing this like night suit of armor that starts. You know, at one point it was self protective, but now it feels self sabotaging. It's getting in the way of our life. It's heavy, it's annoying, it doesn't feel like us. We start to lose sight of who we are. And so I think back to your question, what is trauma. It's gonna be so relative to the nervous system that it happens too. And I can give an example, and I share this example in the book. So let's say that you got Freddy and Johnny right. They're neighbors, they're eight years old, they live on the same street, they go to the same school. Freddy comes from a house where caregivers are present. They're really attuned to his need. They also have regulated nervous systems, so they welcome and discomfort. They allow for emotional expression, and it just feels like a safe environment for him to be himself, to express. Whereas Johnny, on the other hand, he comes from an environment where one of the caregivers is maybe not around because they are working all the time, or you know, maybe there's there's separation, whatever that is. And then the other caregiver, who is physically present, is not mentally or emotionally present. Maybe they're dealing with substance abuse or you know, something like that, and so they're not regulated in their system, which doesn't allow for his nervous system to really like regulate into that safety. So it feels like a really tense environment. He can't express himself authentically. And so anyways, these two kiddos, they go to school one day, they get bullied in the same way by the same bully on the bus, same word said, same punch is thrown, and they're both obviously armored up right, they're like kind of shocked, Oh my gosh, what just happened. So Freddy goes home or Johnny, I can't remember. Freddie goes home to an environment that feels supportive. Both caregivers are there, They listen to them, They help him regulate by they loan him their calm and regulated nervous system so that he can start to take that armor off. They listen to him, they allow him to express whatever he's feeling. And then they say, we're going to go to the principal tomorrow, we're going to make sure this never happens again. He feels safe enough to remove the armor, whereas the other child goes home to an environment where one parent's gone again and the other one is asleep on the couch, passed out. And when he goes to wake up that parent, they're clearly impered or intoxicated, and they yell at him and they scold him, and they say, I don't have time to deal with your stuff. Go to your room and deal with it on your own. And so he remains armored up. And so what you have here, and this is where I don't love using the terminology of big tea little ta trauma. Yeah, is you know Freddy or Johnny, whichever one I mentioned, who goes home to the safe environment, He might look back at this moment as like a blip in the radar, whereas the other will look back as this was a traumatic moment in my life. And so really, what we often say is that trauma is not found in the story or the event. It's found in the nervous system and the nervous system's ability to move through that or not move through that.

Okay, that makes so much sense to me. And I love the example of the two different situations but going through the same experience, because I've found often in life that I'll look at two people and they'll go through the same situation and they have completely different reactions or responses. One person it completely derails, and the other person seems like, wait, that wasn't that big of a deal, So why is this impacting.

Okay, that makes so much sense to me. And I love the example of the two different situations but going through the same experience, because I've found often in life that I'll look at two people and they'll go through the same situation and they have completely different reactions or responses. One person it completely derails, and the other person seems like, wait, that wasn't that big of a deal, So why is this impacting.

You so much?

You so much?

Over time? Does that build up or can that build up within our nervous system to then make things that happen later more impactful if maybe we'd didn't have all that things built up.

Over time? Does that build up or can that build up within our nervous system to then make things that happen later more impactful if maybe we'd didn't have all that things built up.

When your nervous system goes into a survival response, which is those those states that I listed fight, flight, shut down, and so on, there's something that happens within the body, within your physiology. So adrenalin in cortisol is released into the body to mobilize you. These are your mobilizing stress hormones to mobilize you to fight or flee. And what happens is if fighting or fleeing is not an option or from an emotional perspective, we don't allow anger, which is our fight emotional response, or we don't allow fear and anxiety and worry, which is the flight emotional response. If we push those down, then what happens is that adrenaline in cortisol gets suppressed or essentially what we call stuck within the system, and over time, those stress hormones that the body is only built to metabolize through short periods of time, when they get stuck, it turns into chronic stress, which then turns into yeah, then chron mental, physical, emotional health problems. But again another analogy. I love analogies. You can think of like a pressure cooker, and what you're talking about here is like you have this pressure cooker of stress hormones and survival hormones that have been built up over time. We call this allostatic load. And if we haven't had the opportunity or the chance to really process those experiences and to remove or express or what we call discharge that adrenaline cortisol from the body, then what happens is the smallest things, because our pressure cooker is so full, are going to really activate us and can feel more intense. And so that's like, you know, the pressure cooker either explodes, which is like now we're lashing out at people, we have rage, we're violent, we're angry all the time and we're just irritated by life, or we explode in the sense of flight, which is like panic attacks, worry anxiety attacks. So we either explode or we plode. And fload is more of that shutdown or that freeze response, where now we're in depression, we're in chronic fatigue, we're in burnout. And so I see both of those in my practice, and that's usually the accumulation of stress, chronic stress from usually unresolved trauma that's built up over time.

When your nervous system goes into a survival response, which is those those states that I listed fight, flight, shut down, and so on, there's something that happens within the body, within your physiology. So adrenalin in cortisol is released into the body to mobilize you. These are your mobilizing stress hormones to mobilize you to fight or flee. And what happens is if fighting or fleeing is not an option or from an emotional perspective, we don't allow anger, which is our fight emotional response, or we don't allow fear and anxiety and worry, which is the flight emotional response. If we push those down, then what happens is that adrenaline in cortisol gets suppressed or essentially what we call stuck within the system, and over time, those stress hormones that the body is only built to metabolize through short periods of time, when they get stuck, it turns into chronic stress, which then turns into yeah, then chron mental, physical, emotional health problems. But again another analogy. I love analogies. You can think of like a pressure cooker, and what you're talking about here is like you have this pressure cooker of stress hormones and survival hormones that have been built up over time. We call this allostatic load. And if we haven't had the opportunity or the chance to really process those experiences and to remove or express or what we call discharge that adrenaline cortisol from the body, then what happens is the smallest things, because our pressure cooker is so full, are going to really activate us and can feel more intense. And so that's like, you know, the pressure cooker either explodes, which is like now we're lashing out at people, we have rage, we're violent, we're angry all the time and we're just irritated by life, or we explode in the sense of flight, which is like panic attacks, worry anxiety attacks. So we either explode or we plode. And fload is more of that shutdown or that freeze response, where now we're in depression, we're in chronic fatigue, we're in burnout. And so I see both of those in my practice, and that's usually the accumulation of stress, chronic stress from usually unresolved trauma that's built up over time.

It also would make sense to me why we saw so much start happening maybe externally as far as people fighting or losing it or mental health breakdowns after the pandemic, because it was almost like we were all collectively going through something traumatic and so then anything additional maybe sent us into the exact place that you're talking about exactly.

It also would make sense to me why we saw so much start happening maybe externally as far as people fighting or losing it or mental health breakdowns after the pandemic, because it was almost like we were all collectively going through something traumatic and so then anything additional maybe sent us into the exact place that you're talking about exactly.

It was like that for a lot of people. It was a straw that broke the camel's back. And you know, in my book The Body First Healing, there's a big old chunk that talks about the pandemic and how I really think, Yeah, how I feel like that was kind of an awakening for a lot of people because we've gotten so so good in our very modern world, you know, fast paced modern world of being really detached from anything necked down yep, And we have all of these wonderful behaviors in these you know, I'm gonna use air quotes trauma responses of you know, overworking, overachieving, avoiding, running away, you know, fawning people, pleasing, and so these are great distractions from trauma. But really it is is it's just stress being dressed up in a different way and used in a different way. But it's these states, the same stress hormones of adrenaline and cortisol. They're just seeking and trying to find someplace to you know, be be experienced. And so people had to sit in isolation and I feel like, come face to face and quarantine with their pain, like there's nothing you can do to run from this now.

It was like that for a lot of people. It was a straw that broke the camel's back. And you know, in my book The Body First Healing, there's a big old chunk that talks about the pandemic and how I really think, Yeah, how I feel like that was kind of an awakening for a lot of people because we've gotten so so good in our very modern world, you know, fast paced modern world of being really detached from anything necked down yep, And we have all of these wonderful behaviors in these you know, I'm gonna use air quotes trauma responses of you know, overworking, overachieving, avoiding, running away, you know, fawning people, pleasing, and so these are great distractions from trauma. But really it is is it's just stress being dressed up in a different way and used in a different way. But it's these states, the same stress hormones of adrenaline and cortisol. They're just seeking and trying to find someplace to you know, be be experienced. And so people had to sit in isolation and I feel like, come face to face and quarantine with their pain, like there's nothing you can do to run from this now.

So and you're not getting the validation because the things you described are so praised in our society, and so you wouldn't necessarily associate that with stress or trauma or anything bad, even if that's what your body was feeling.

So and you're not getting the validation because the things you described are so praised in our society, and so you wouldn't necessarily associate that with stress or trauma or anything bad, even if that's what your body was feeling.

Yeah, exactly. And I share a lot about this nervous system state called functional freeze. It's a blended state. I feel like a lot of us are experiencing this right now. But you know, the nervous system has a couple of different primary states. So that is, you know, your rest and digest, which is what we call ventral. And I always like using the nervous system ladder for people to visualize. I am a somatic experiencing practitioner, but I'm trained in a lot of other modalities as well, and one of them is called Polyvagel theory, and so that's the newest kind of the upgraded science of the nervous system. But porgis Stephen Porges who developed the theory. He created something called the Polyvagel or the nervous system ladder, to illustrate what the nervous system looks like. So it's a ladder with three sections. So at the top, you're like in rest and digest, which is what we call ventral, your ventral bag state. It's your state of safety and connection. But when you're activated in other words, triggered. Okay, when our system is triggered or activated, we come down that ladder and in the middle that section is fight or flight. That's your sympathetic response. This is where the adrenaline cortisol comes into the body. And if fighting or fleeing again isn't an option, or we suppress the anger and fear, which you're really good at, then we end up at the bottom of the ladder, which is our dorsal vagel state, otherwise known as shut down. It's kind of like freeze, but freeze is more funded state. But it's important to know that again, just like that pressure cooker, when you're down in dorsal, which is not your state of mobilization, this is your state of immobilization, you still have all that adrenaline cord is al still trapped within the system. So to come back up into regulation, you have to move back up through fight or flight to discharge that. And I also want to add people would assume that regulation means being at the top of the ladder all day long, but regulation is actually like a healthy bio rhythm is being able to go up and down that ladder roughly one hundred times a day, a hundred times yep, yep. So even like stressful moments like yeah, and it can be micro moments. So for instance, when you and I were getting on and you were pulling up your notes and then yeah, I was rushing to put on some lip cloths and I'm like, oh my gosh, I have to brush my hair. Yeah, I was experiencing stress and activation. Right, So these are little moments that we don't notice. Some of them are you know, think of like like waves. Some of them are small, and then some of them are bigger. So anyways, regulation is not staying at the top. A regulated nervous system was what we call a flexible nervous system, one that moves up and down the ladder with fluidity. The reason I'm sharing this is because I feel like it just gives a really good visualization for you know, the nervous system. But also this functional free state that we're talking about isn't one of those primary states on the ladder. It is what we call a blended state, so it's a mixed state of a little bit of this and a little bit of that. So function freeze is a little bit of flight. So we have that flight response, right, adrenaline, cortisol, mobilizing. Usually there's maybe fear anxiety, but there's also a freeze. There's a bit of a shut down response. And so what we can think of as the functional free state is going through the motions without emotion.

Yeah, exactly. And I share a lot about this nervous system state called functional freeze. It's a blended state. I feel like a lot of us are experiencing this right now. But you know, the nervous system has a couple of different primary states. So that is, you know, your rest and digest, which is what we call ventral. And I always like using the nervous system ladder for people to visualize. I am a somatic experiencing practitioner, but I'm trained in a lot of other modalities as well, and one of them is called Polyvagel theory, and so that's the newest kind of the upgraded science of the nervous system. But porgis Stephen Porges who developed the theory. He created something called the Polyvagel or the nervous system ladder, to illustrate what the nervous system looks like. So it's a ladder with three sections. So at the top, you're like in rest and digest, which is what we call ventral, your ventral bag state. It's your state of safety and connection. But when you're activated in other words, triggered. Okay, when our system is triggered or activated, we come down that ladder and in the middle that section is fight or flight. That's your sympathetic response. This is where the adrenaline cortisol comes into the body. And if fighting or fleeing again isn't an option, or we suppress the anger and fear, which you're really good at, then we end up at the bottom of the ladder, which is our dorsal vagel state, otherwise known as shut down. It's kind of like freeze, but freeze is more funded state. But it's important to know that again, just like that pressure cooker, when you're down in dorsal, which is not your state of mobilization, this is your state of immobilization, you still have all that adrenaline cord is al still trapped within the system. So to come back up into regulation, you have to move back up through fight or flight to discharge that. And I also want to add people would assume that regulation means being at the top of the ladder all day long, but regulation is actually like a healthy bio rhythm is being able to go up and down that ladder roughly one hundred times a day, a hundred times yep, yep. So even like stressful moments like yeah, and it can be micro moments. So for instance, when you and I were getting on and you were pulling up your notes and then yeah, I was rushing to put on some lip cloths and I'm like, oh my gosh, I have to brush my hair. Yeah, I was experiencing stress and activation. Right, So these are little moments that we don't notice. Some of them are you know, think of like like waves. Some of them are small, and then some of them are bigger. So anyways, regulation is not staying at the top. A regulated nervous system was what we call a flexible nervous system, one that moves up and down the ladder with fluidity. The reason I'm sharing this is because I feel like it just gives a really good visualization for you know, the nervous system. But also this functional free state that we're talking about isn't one of those primary states on the ladder. It is what we call a blended state, so it's a mixed state of a little bit of this and a little bit of that. So function freeze is a little bit of flight. So we have that flight response, right, adrenaline, cortisol, mobilizing. Usually there's maybe fear anxiety, but there's also a freeze. There's a bit of a shut down response. And so what we can think of as the functional free state is going through the motions without emotion.

Oh okay, Yeah, And as.

Oh okay, Yeah, And as.

You were saying, what it looks like on the outside is like wow, like they're just strong, or like they just.

You were saying, what it looks like on the outside is like wow, like they're just strong, or like they just.

Handling all that.

Handling all that.

Yeah, they handle it so well, or they're so right now, what is it? Like? Hashtag unbothered they're so unbothered by things. But it's really just a defense mechanism of shutting down or dissociating from the somatic parts of us our emotions, our sensations, our feelings, and so part of us still kind of stays tethered down in the bottom parts of that that ladder. And that also means that we might show up in relationships with very little emotion or have a hard I'm handling other people's emotions. But that also means that we are dimming down the emotions that feel good too, you know, so like we're kind of just on autopilot and we're not really living. We really are just surviving. So I think a lot of people are there right now without maybe even even recognizing it.

Yeah, they handle it so well, or they're so right now, what is it? Like? Hashtag unbothered they're so unbothered by things. But it's really just a defense mechanism of shutting down or dissociating from the somatic parts of us our emotions, our sensations, our feelings, and so part of us still kind of stays tethered down in the bottom parts of that that ladder. And that also means that we might show up in relationships with very little emotion or have a hard I'm handling other people's emotions. But that also means that we are dimming down the emotions that feel good too, you know, so like we're kind of just on autopilot and we're not really living. We really are just surviving. So I think a lot of people are there right now without maybe even even recognizing it.

Yeah, as you just said, the part about not experiencing the good feelings too, I could immediately think of so many situations where I was seeing that where you're going, How have you gone through all this stuff and so such a short amount of time and you're still alive and functioning. But like you said, maybe they're not happy or even presenting happy. It's almost like a going through the motions kind of thing. Yeah, and it looks like, Wow, that's kind of crazy, and that's impressive. But ultimately, if you really kind of analyze what's happening, it's not happiness. It's not joy, it's not ease or comfort. I'm curious if we are suppressing all that cortisol but it's still in our box bodies, what does that end that manifesting into, Like it can't it has to do something right if it's still sitting in your body.

Yeah, as you just said, the part about not experiencing the good feelings too, I could immediately think of so many situations where I was seeing that where you're going, How have you gone through all this stuff and so such a short amount of time and you're still alive and functioning. But like you said, maybe they're not happy or even presenting happy. It's almost like a going through the motions kind of thing. Yeah, and it looks like, Wow, that's kind of crazy, and that's impressive. But ultimately, if you really kind of analyze what's happening, it's not happiness. It's not joy, it's not ease or comfort. I'm curious if we are suppressing all that cortisol but it's still in our box bodies, what does that end that manifesting into, Like it can't it has to do something right if it's still sitting in your body.

Yeah, there is a very very very strong correlation between emotional suppression and disease and illness. There is a very very very strong correlation between emotional suppression and disease and illness. Okay, so the adrenaline cortisol is still it's still there and it's still being used, and you can see this show up in the body, in our musculo skeletal system, you can see it in our viscera, in our joints, in our fluid system. It affects our endocrine system, our hormones, our cardiovascular system. Right, So you'll notice that when someone has increased chronic stress, they usually have increase inflammation. How that show ups in the viscera is I might have digestive issues, ibs, gut issues. How that shows up in the body and the musculoskeletal system is they might have chronic pain and certain pain points so TMJ migrains, shoulder tension, back pain. You might notice that from an emotional perspective, this shows up as anxiety depression, you know, OCD, phobias, and there's some of the research out there is you know, autoimmune disease. So, for instance, when you're in this place of chronic survival, all of those other kind of organ systems that I just talked about and then some they're all put on the back burner because survival is most important, right, And so everything gets disrupted and everything is governed by the state of the nervous system. If we're in a state of rest and digest if we're in a state of presence and safety and connection, then every kind of operates fine, and the nervous system operates from the brain stem, which governs which is you know, the neck and the cerebellum here at the bottom of the brain. But this is like the orchestrator of the body. So when the nervous system, though, is in survival mode, everything about those systems I talked about changes. So our heart rate is different. Our blood motility, for instance, is different. So like when we're in a state of rest and digest we have a regular regulated circulation, but when we go into a fight or flight response, our blood motility goes to our limbs. And that's why we feel when we're anxious that we're like really fidgety, or we're moving around all we're eating, we're hot, or we're sweating. When we go into shut down, it goes opposite. So the blood motility and circulation gets we're kind of in a hibernation state, so that goes to the core and that's why we have very little circulation and we're cold, you know, when we're in these states. So anyways, it increases our likelihood or you know, cardiovascular autoimmune diseases, and a lot of that is because again the body is working in priority for survival, not in priority of rest and recover and you know homeostasis if you will.

Yeah, there is a very very very strong correlation between emotional suppression and disease and illness. There is a very very very strong correlation between emotional suppression and disease and illness. Okay, so the adrenaline cortisol is still it's still there and it's still being used, and you can see this show up in the body, in our musculo skeletal system, you can see it in our viscera, in our joints, in our fluid system. It affects our endocrine system, our hormones, our cardiovascular system. Right, So you'll notice that when someone has increased chronic stress, they usually have increase inflammation. How that show ups in the viscera is I might have digestive issues, ibs, gut issues. How that shows up in the body and the musculoskeletal system is they might have chronic pain and certain pain points so TMJ migrains, shoulder tension, back pain. You might notice that from an emotional perspective, this shows up as anxiety depression, you know, OCD, phobias, and there's some of the research out there is you know, autoimmune disease. So, for instance, when you're in this place of chronic survival, all of those other kind of organ systems that I just talked about and then some they're all put on the back burner because survival is most important, right, And so everything gets disrupted and everything is governed by the state of the nervous system. If we're in a state of rest and digest if we're in a state of presence and safety and connection, then every kind of operates fine, and the nervous system operates from the brain stem, which governs which is you know, the neck and the cerebellum here at the bottom of the brain. But this is like the orchestrator of the body. So when the nervous system, though, is in survival mode, everything about those systems I talked about changes. So our heart rate is different. Our blood motility, for instance, is different. So like when we're in a state of rest and digest we have a regular regulated circulation, but when we go into a fight or flight response, our blood motility goes to our limbs. And that's why we feel when we're anxious that we're like really fidgety, or we're moving around all we're eating, we're hot, or we're sweating. When we go into shut down, it goes opposite. So the blood motility and circulation gets we're kind of in a hibernation state, so that goes to the core and that's why we have very little circulation and we're cold, you know, when we're in these states. So anyways, it increases our likelihood or you know, cardiovascular autoimmune diseases, and a lot of that is because again the body is working in priority for survival, not in priority of rest and recover and you know homeostasis if you will.

Yeah, well, I think we're getting a picture of some of the work and in what the topics of this book are about. And I want to dive into more of that in a minute, but I want to give the listeners a little bit of a backstory of you, because I know you're not just a practitioner of these things, you've actually lived them yourself. Can you talk through a little bit about just what your life looked like that led you to the understanding of like, talk therapy isn't going to be enough for me on this one, and I need to maybe take some different steps. Yeah.

Yeah, well, I think we're getting a picture of some of the work and in what the topics of this book are about. And I want to dive into more of that in a minute, but I want to give the listeners a little bit of a backstory of you, because I know you're not just a practitioner of these things, you've actually lived them yourself. Can you talk through a little bit about just what your life looked like that led you to the understanding of like, talk therapy isn't going to be enough for me on this one, and I need to maybe take some different steps. Yeah.

So I didn't realize it until I got into more somatic work, but looking back now, I know where everything kind of started for me. So at birth, I was actually I was taken from my mother forcibly, taken from my mom and put into foster care because there was methanphetamine found in our system. And I was reunited with her after a few months when she seemingly got her life back on track. But that really set the foundation for my nervous system. Sure, and when we work with sematics, you know a lot of what we're working with is body memory. Again, it doesn't come back necessarily. Trauma isn't found in the body, I'm sorry. In the story, It's found in the nervous system, and that shows up in body or what we call implicit memory. So the ways that we contract, the ways that our muscles, you know, kind of clench when someone gives us a certain look, the way that we chase, the way that we run away, the way that we shut down. This is all muscle memory that was usually learned in our first three years of life, and body memory starts forming at seven weeks in the womb. And so I know that when my mom was pregnant with me, she was going through very traumatic time. She was homeless, living off of food stamps. Her and my brother slept in her car, and obviously my first few months in the world, I was separated from her, and it was a really pivotal time, you know, in infancy. And so anyways, that kind of started the patterns of really intense anxiety around relationships, this fear of abandonment, this feeling of I'm not enough of you know, feeling of unworthiness. And I then lost my brother when we were in high school. He was killed in a car accident. My older brother, Dominic, and I kind of grew up in an environment where you take all the hard stuff and you just toss it under the rug, right like out of sight, out of mind, And we were very much so that family that just muscled through, and you just my mom's not a very emotional person. I know why. I learned a lot about her and writing this book, and we had some really long, overdue but also very healing conversations in the pursuit of creating this book. But that was the template that was given to me, is when times are tough, you just muscle through. And I was very dissociated for a lot of my upbringing, didn't really know what emotions were, didn't know how to feel them. And then when I was twenty, I was sexually assaulted by a stranger who helped me change my flat tire. And I work a lot in the sexual violence prevention space now, so I've worked with survivors for many years, both home and abroad, And what most survivors will tell you is that there is the trauma of the event, and then there's also the aftermathea and for a lot of survivors, the aftermath can sometimes be more traumatic or more debilitating, and that was my experience. They caught this man, they apprehended him, and after the assault, there was a two year trial process, which was really unforgiving and horrible to have to go through. But our trial was postponed or continued nine times. Nine times. And that's often like a strategy that defense teams will use when they know that they're, you know, the perpetrator doesn't have a case to stand on. They'll postpone as a way to like emotionally wear down the victims so that they will drop the charges. And because every time that happens, you essentially have to do a dress rehearsal for trial. You know, you don't find out usually until the day before that they're postponing, so you have to meet with your legal team. I had to go through the depositions again. I had to listen to my tape statements. I had to practice being on the witness stand, which meant that like nine times I had to relive every graphic detail of that night and I'm even feeling my feeling, my breath, and that was really hard. And what was interesting is that what people saw on the outside. I remember people saying, you're just you're really handling this so well, you know. And even after he was sentenced, the trial finally happened, he was sentenced to sixty years behind bar. Yes, And I remember the day after the trial watching on the news, the news anchors talking at the newsdesk about my case, and one anchor said to another, he said, twenty years of covering court trials, I've never seen a rape victim who was this poist, this composed who was able to look her rapist in the eye and said you did this, and you're going to pay. And what people didn't know is that I was in such a bad place that I was completely dissociated and completely shut off from myself and when people weren't around, what was happening behind the scenes is that I was struggling with severe alcohol abuse, eating disorders, suicidal ideation, pill addiction, and not even thirty days after that sentencing, I actually ended up in a jail cell myself. And I'll give quick context to that. So I was at with my boyfriend who was drinking and driving, and I always say, that's a really clear picture of where I was at at the time in my life. This was also like fifteen years ago. So he was pulled over and arrested, and when the police officers went to pull me out of the car, I had a flashback of the night of my assault of a man touching me in a car, and my nervous system went back into a fight response. I had actually originally tried to fight him off, but I was overpowered so that I went into a freeze response. And so again this was all that accumulated and trial and cortisol that was trying to, you know, stick on to any experience to get this out. And so I ended up in a jail cell with two counts of battery on an officer with injury. And I remember going before the judge after a couple of days because my parents did not bail me out. You know, this this tough love moment, and she knew who I was. She said, I know who you are from that sexual from the sexual assault case. And she said, we're going to drop the charges. But she said, but you need to learn to live with your pain better, with your trauma better. And that was kind of the turning point for me because she didn't say get over it, get past it, which is what I'm accustomed to, and so that's kind of where things changed. I should also state that while I was in that jail cell, there was no alcohol, no pills, no crappy relationships, no distraction, there was nothing kind of like quarantine. I was in a literal prison, and for a lot of people, they felt like, you know, the pandemic was like a prison. But I was forced to sit in isolation with this decade's old grief and trauma and the things that were never spoken and never talked about and therefore never felt as well. And my body experienced something in those two days that I had never experienced before. There was trembling, there was shaking, There was a lot of sweating, a lot of tears, and it felt almost like a purge. And looking back now, I know that it was my body just finally discharging a lot of you know, because in my life, I know I ever gave myself time to sit down and do nothing or to be in silence. It terrified me, and so I got really curious about why I felt so differently in my body. When I left that experience, I felt very different, and I remember talking to my therapist about it. I was seeing a talk therapist at the time, and I had for years, and she recommended maybe you start doing a little bit of work with a somatic therapist. And so that was back in twenty eleven, twenty twelve, and so that just took me down the rabbit hole of you know, kind of this body body first approach.

So I didn't realize it until I got into more somatic work, but looking back now, I know where everything kind of started for me. So at birth, I was actually I was taken from my mother forcibly, taken from my mom and put into foster care because there was methanphetamine found in our system. And I was reunited with her after a few months when she seemingly got her life back on track. But that really set the foundation for my nervous system. Sure, and when we work with sematics, you know a lot of what we're working with is body memory. Again, it doesn't come back necessarily. Trauma isn't found in the body, I'm sorry. In the story, It's found in the nervous system, and that shows up in body or what we call implicit memory. So the ways that we contract, the ways that our muscles, you know, kind of clench when someone gives us a certain look, the way that we chase, the way that we run away, the way that we shut down. This is all muscle memory that was usually learned in our first three years of life, and body memory starts forming at seven weeks in the womb. And so I know that when my mom was pregnant with me, she was going through very traumatic time. She was homeless, living off of food stamps. Her and my brother slept in her car, and obviously my first few months in the world, I was separated from her, and it was a really pivotal time, you know, in infancy. And so anyways, that kind of started the patterns of really intense anxiety around relationships, this fear of abandonment, this feeling of I'm not enough of you know, feeling of unworthiness. And I then lost my brother when we were in high school. He was killed in a car accident. My older brother, Dominic, and I kind of grew up in an environment where you take all the hard stuff and you just toss it under the rug, right like out of sight, out of mind, And we were very much so that family that just muscled through, and you just my mom's not a very emotional person. I know why. I learned a lot about her and writing this book, and we had some really long, overdue but also very healing conversations in the pursuit of creating this book. But that was the template that was given to me, is when times are tough, you just muscle through. And I was very dissociated for a lot of my upbringing, didn't really know what emotions were, didn't know how to feel them. And then when I was twenty, I was sexually assaulted by a stranger who helped me change my flat tire. And I work a lot in the sexual violence prevention space now, so I've worked with survivors for many years, both home and abroad, And what most survivors will tell you is that there is the trauma of the event, and then there's also the aftermathea and for a lot of survivors, the aftermath can sometimes be more traumatic or more debilitating, and that was my experience. They caught this man, they apprehended him, and after the assault, there was a two year trial process, which was really unforgiving and horrible to have to go through. But our trial was postponed or continued nine times. Nine times. And that's often like a strategy that defense teams will use when they know that they're, you know, the perpetrator doesn't have a case to stand on. They'll postpone as a way to like emotionally wear down the victims so that they will drop the charges. And because every time that happens, you essentially have to do a dress rehearsal for trial. You know, you don't find out usually until the day before that they're postponing, so you have to meet with your legal team. I had to go through the depositions again. I had to listen to my tape statements. I had to practice being on the witness stand, which meant that like nine times I had to relive every graphic detail of that night and I'm even feeling my feeling, my breath, and that was really hard. And what was interesting is that what people saw on the outside. I remember people saying, you're just you're really handling this so well, you know. And even after he was sentenced, the trial finally happened, he was sentenced to sixty years behind bar. Yes, And I remember the day after the trial watching on the news, the news anchors talking at the newsdesk about my case, and one anchor said to another, he said, twenty years of covering court trials, I've never seen a rape victim who was this poist, this composed who was able to look her rapist in the eye and said you did this, and you're going to pay. And what people didn't know is that I was in such a bad place that I was completely dissociated and completely shut off from myself and when people weren't around, what was happening behind the scenes is that I was struggling with severe alcohol abuse, eating disorders, suicidal ideation, pill addiction, and not even thirty days after that sentencing, I actually ended up in a jail cell myself. And I'll give quick context to that. So I was at with my boyfriend who was drinking and driving, and I always say, that's a really clear picture of where I was at at the time in my life. This was also like fifteen years ago. So he was pulled over and arrested, and when the police officers went to pull me out of the car, I had a flashback of the night of my assault of a man touching me in a car, and my nervous system went back into a fight response. I had actually originally tried to fight him off, but I was overpowered so that I went into a freeze response. And so again this was all that accumulated and trial and cortisol that was trying to, you know, stick on to any experience to get this out. And so I ended up in a jail cell with two counts of battery on an officer with injury. And I remember going before the judge after a couple of days because my parents did not bail me out. You know, this this tough love moment, and she knew who I was. She said, I know who you are from that sexual from the sexual assault case. And she said, we're going to drop the charges. But she said, but you need to learn to live with your pain better, with your trauma better. And that was kind of the turning point for me because she didn't say get over it, get past it, which is what I'm accustomed to, and so that's kind of where things changed. I should also state that while I was in that jail cell, there was no alcohol, no pills, no crappy relationships, no distraction, there was nothing kind of like quarantine. I was in a literal prison, and for a lot of people, they felt like, you know, the pandemic was like a prison. But I was forced to sit in isolation with this decade's old grief and trauma and the things that were never spoken and never talked about and therefore never felt as well. And my body experienced something in those two days that I had never experienced before. There was trembling, there was shaking, There was a lot of sweating, a lot of tears, and it felt almost like a purge. And looking back now, I know that it was my body just finally discharging a lot of you know, because in my life, I know I ever gave myself time to sit down and do nothing or to be in silence. It terrified me, and so I got really curious about why I felt so differently in my body. When I left that experience, I felt very different, and I remember talking to my therapist about it. I was seeing a talk therapist at the time, and I had for years, and she recommended maybe you start doing a little bit of work with a somatic therapist. And so that was back in twenty eleven, twenty twelve, and so that just took me down the rabbit hole of you know, kind of this body body first approach.

Yeah, well you touched on something. This was going to be my next question anyway. But when I hear the part about you fighting the police officer, it's so interesting how you literally ended up in a jail sale because of your skills that kept you alive possibly in the first situation, or they were used for an attempt at survival when you were going through the actual assault. And isn't that so often what happens to us. It's like it's needed at the beginning, Like these tools that we pick up or figure out as a kid to keep ourselves alive end up being the thing that later comes back to put us in either a literal jail or a figurative jail. And I love that you also say figuring out what those skill sets are for you isn't a place of shame, Like that's the place to find the biggest kind of compassion for yourself. So can you talk through that a little bit, because I know in my journey I used to really go to the shame place first of like why do you do that? Or you know, this is whatever, and it's like, no, that actually served me for a long time, that skill set. It helped me through very toxic situations or relationships or whatever it was, and it kept me alive. It's just not serving me anymore. And so even when it comes up now, because it's not like you start this work and you just figure it out and it gets perfect, you know, but like when it comes up now, I can go, oh, I'm just doing that thing again, or what's happening in my body to like make me feel so unsafe right now? It's actually an indicator for me. But can you speak to that a little bit.

Yeah, well you touched on something. This was going to be my next question anyway. But when I hear the part about you fighting the police officer, it's so interesting how you literally ended up in a jail sale because of your skills that kept you alive possibly in the first situation, or they were used for an attempt at survival when you were going through the actual assault. And isn't that so often what happens to us. It's like it's needed at the beginning, Like these tools that we pick up or figure out as a kid to keep ourselves alive end up being the thing that later comes back to put us in either a literal jail or a figurative jail. And I love that you also say figuring out what those skill sets are for you isn't a place of shame, Like that's the place to find the biggest kind of compassion for yourself. So can you talk through that a little bit, because I know in my journey I used to really go to the shame place first of like why do you do that? Or you know, this is whatever, and it's like, no, that actually served me for a long time, that skill set. It helped me through very toxic situations or relationships or whatever it was, and it kept me alive. It's just not serving me anymore. And so even when it comes up now, because it's not like you start this work and you just figure it out and it gets perfect, you know, but like when it comes up now, I can go, oh, I'm just doing that thing again, or what's happening in my body to like make me feel so unsafe right now? It's actually an indicator for me. But can you speak to that a little bit.

I often refer to them as management strategies or survival patterns, like these old patterns that we enlisted back then in order to survive. They started off as self protective and now they might becoming self destructive. And these management strategies, it's like they just need a little bit of updating, some rewiring because they're outdated. But in the book, the body keeps the score. Bessel vander Kolk. He says, you know that trauma comes back as a reaction, and that's kind of what you're talking about here, is these reactions are these impulses of the body. It's a certain kind of body memory called procedural patterns or procedural memory, and it's essentially the procedures that our body uses in order to move through a distressing moment. You know, whether that is you can see it in posture, the way that we close down that we open up again, the fidgetiness. But the question that you asked is like, what is it that's going on inside that that's then causing the behavior, Right, So those are the impulses that we work with to try and create new memory, new responses. And one way that I you know, you can kind of again go back to like the whole night suit armor thing. Yeah, people often think that like, Okay, this armor isn't serving me anymore, it's getting in the way of my life, it's sabotaging me. I need to do away with it. And it's actually not about doing away with it. In the book, I use that analogy and I said, imagine that it's like you're taking that night suit of armor and you're like melting it down into a shield. Like we're not discarding it, We're just we're not being consumed by it anymore. And in moments when we need it, it's still there because it still has purpose, it still has intention, And I think that that is such a much more compassionate way of looking at it. And also the shame thing too, I mean, yeah, I can definitely feel that. I feel that for myself because not only was I hardwired into shame from a very early age, you know, that internalized belief of I am bad or I am wrong, other my mom wouldn't have done this, or my dad wouldn't have left me, or you know all those stories that we tell. Working with the shame, and this is where a lot of like the younger child or the internal family system somatic parts work. We do a lot in my Body First healing program and when that comes up. Actually, there's a do you know who doctor Russell Kennedy is the anxiety MD.

I often refer to them as management strategies or survival patterns, like these old patterns that we enlisted back then in order to survive. They started off as self protective and now they might becoming self destructive. And these management strategies, it's like they just need a little bit of updating, some rewiring because they're outdated. But in the book, the body keeps the score. Bessel vander Kolk. He says, you know that trauma comes back as a reaction, and that's kind of what you're talking about here, is these reactions are these impulses of the body. It's a certain kind of body memory called procedural patterns or procedural memory, and it's essentially the procedures that our body uses in order to move through a distressing moment. You know, whether that is you can see it in posture, the way that we close down that we open up again, the fidgetiness. But the question that you asked is like, what is it that's going on inside that that's then causing the behavior, Right, So those are the impulses that we work with to try and create new memory, new responses. And one way that I you know, you can kind of again go back to like the whole night suit armor thing. Yeah, people often think that like, Okay, this armor isn't serving me anymore, it's getting in the way of my life, it's sabotaging me. I need to do away with it. And it's actually not about doing away with it. In the book, I use that analogy and I said, imagine that it's like you're taking that night suit of armor and you're like melting it down into a shield. Like we're not discarding it, We're just we're not being consumed by it anymore. And in moments when we need it, it's still there because it still has purpose, it still has intention, And I think that that is such a much more compassionate way of looking at it. And also the shame thing too, I mean, yeah, I can definitely feel that. I feel that for myself because not only was I hardwired into shame from a very early age, you know, that internalized belief of I am bad or I am wrong, other my mom wouldn't have done this, or my dad wouldn't have left me, or you know all those stories that we tell. Working with the shame, and this is where a lot of like the younger child or the internal family system somatic parts work. We do a lot in my Body First healing program and when that comes up. Actually, there's a do you know who doctor Russell Kennedy is the anxiety MD.

No, I don't, but that sounds interesting to me.

No, I don't, but that sounds interesting to me.

So he's a colleague of mine, but he's an author, neuroscientist, he's a medical doctor, okay, and he wrote a book on anxiety. But one time we were doing a workshop together and he said, a trigger is just an emotional age regression.

So he's a colleague of mine, but he's an author, neuroscientist, he's a medical doctor, okay, and he wrote a book on anxiety. But one time we were doing a workshop together and he said, a trigger is just an emotional age regression.

We're good, yes, when are.

We're good, yes, when are.

Triggered, when we're activated, we are just taken back in time to this emotional stamp, this emotional younger version of ourself. And so rather than being like, you know, scolding that younger version of ourself, yeahing it, it's like, how can we actually meet that version of ourselves with so much more clarity, compassion, understanding and when that happens, and while also at the same time creating new choices, new areas, new reactions. So yeah, I just randomly thought about that.

Triggered, when we're activated, we are just taken back in time to this emotional stamp, this emotional younger version of ourself. And so rather than being like, you know, scolding that younger version of ourself, yeahing it, it's like, how can we actually meet that version of ourselves with so much more clarity, compassion, understanding and when that happens, and while also at the same time creating new choices, new areas, new reactions. So yeah, I just randomly thought about that.

But well, and if you do it that way, I mean a lot of times I think that's called reparenting yourself, right, But you're giving your nervous system the thing that you didn't get that has now created this whole survival skills, coping mechanisms, whatever you want to call it, programming within you. So it does actually work. I often go to my teenager, I mean, and she is like very sassy, but that was the that's the one that I would go to first, or then my my inner child, Like the younger version was more weepy and kind of just like wanted to be held, you know, those kind of things. But the things that I've learned about how simple actually the rewiring can be. Once you start learning about this stuff and doing the kind of practices that you're talking about. I mean, it's changed my whole life, like the entire thing. But I want to ask for the listeners who might be hearing this and thinking, Okay, I'm identifying with what they're talking about. I've maybe had some experiences. I'm starting to see it manifest in my life, like they start doing this work. But then we're also still living in this world, you know, and there's a lot going on right now. How do we keep ourselves from continuing to just add trauma to the plate and like survive this kind of world that we live in right now.

But well, and if you do it that way, I mean a lot of times I think that's called reparenting yourself, right, But you're giving your nervous system the thing that you didn't get that has now created this whole survival skills, coping mechanisms, whatever you want to call it, programming within you. So it does actually work. I often go to my teenager, I mean, and she is like very sassy, but that was the that's the one that I would go to first, or then my my inner child, Like the younger version was more weepy and kind of just like wanted to be held, you know, those kind of things. But the things that I've learned about how simple actually the rewiring can be. Once you start learning about this stuff and doing the kind of practices that you're talking about. I mean, it's changed my whole life, like the entire thing. But I want to ask for the listeners who might be hearing this and thinking, Okay, I'm identifying with what they're talking about. I've maybe had some experiences. I'm starting to see it manifest in my life, like they start doing this work. But then we're also still living in this world, you know, and there's a lot going on right now. How do we keep ourselves from continuing to just add trauma to the plate and like survive this kind of world that we live in right now.

So I think that first of all, reminding ourselves that our biology is incredibly adaptable, Okay, incredibly like the cell. And I know this is this maybe not woo woo, but it's real science, right Our happiatics, the history of ourselves has survived and resiliently made it through some of the worst conditions of this world, and that is a part of our makeup and I think sometimes we forget that, like, the genetic inheritance that we have is remarkable, right, yeah, and somatic experiencing it is a it's considered a naturalistic trauma recovery modality. A lot of that is the word naturalistic, is that what we're doing is instead of showing people that external factors and resources that can help them heal, we're turning people. We're kind of posturing them to turn inward and be like, you actually have everything within you. You have the capacity to heal on your own, to self heal. You were actually wired for it. And so I know that sounds very wishy washy and can be hard to take in when you're like, my life just freaking sucks right now, right, It's really hard. So I just want to give people that encouragement. Is I think sometimes we forget where we came from as a species and how much we have endured and survived.

So I think that first of all, reminding ourselves that our biology is incredibly adaptable, Okay, incredibly like the cell. And I know this is this maybe not woo woo, but it's real science, right Our happiatics, the history of ourselves has survived and resiliently made it through some of the worst conditions of this world, and that is a part of our makeup and I think sometimes we forget that, like, the genetic inheritance that we have is remarkable, right, yeah, and somatic experiencing it is a it's considered a naturalistic trauma recovery modality. A lot of that is the word naturalistic, is that what we're doing is instead of showing people that external factors and resources that can help them heal, we're turning people. We're kind of posturing them to turn inward and be like, you actually have everything within you. You have the capacity to heal on your own, to self heal. You were actually wired for it. And so I know that sounds very wishy washy and can be hard to take in when you're like, my life just freaking sucks right now, right, It's really hard. So I just want to give people that encouragement. Is I think sometimes we forget where we came from as a species and how much we have endured and survived.

For sure.

For sure.

Yeah, really cool to think about. So the answer is probably simpler than you might think. Okay, when you have a nervous system that's stuck in survival survival mode, which by the way, makes so much sense based on the conditions of our world, the divisive political climates, the air that we breathe, the food that we eat where you know, like we live everything. Yeah, we live in a very disconnected society. We are always on our phones. I mean, it makes a lot of sense. And we're also taught let's not be with our emotions, which makes things ten times worse. Let's pretend like we're okay. So what do you do if those are things that you can't really change? So think of your nervous system and other analogies. Think of it like a security system that is always working in the background consciously, and it operates through the subconscious brain and the body, more specifically, the senses it is sensing into am I safe or am I not safe? Safe or not safe? And this is called neuroception. This is your brain's ability to detect or your body's ability to detect for safety or threat without using your mind's awareness. Okay, And this scanning, the security system is scanning in three places internally in your body, so inside, externally, in your outer environment, outside, and then between you and other nervous systems. We call it inside outside between Okay, So internally that might feel like, oh, what doesn't feel safe? Is that my stomach is really upset right now, or my heart is pounding out of my chest, or oh, what does feel safe is I have access to breath, and my diaphragm feels really nice and open, and I feel settled in my seat. Right we're not thinking these things, but these scans are happening, millions of scans per second, same with your outer environments, with your internal So what can happen is that when you become chronically dysregulated or stuck in survival mode, it's like your nervous system is constantly alarming for danger even if it might not be there, or it's not alarming for danger even if it is present. So what we can do is we can start to intentionally scan for things that feel safe, So things that don't feel safe for what we lovingly call triggers. Right in the sematic space, we call it activation. Okay, we don't use the word triggers, but what feels safe is what we call glimmers, So things that deactivate the nervous system or deactivate that alarm. And so when you start to do like se work, for instance, the foundational work that we do with the client is helping them to build what we call that felt sense of safety. So it's rewiring and teaching the body and the nervous system instead of just scanning for danger all the time. Can we scan for what might feel good, what might feel okay? What and what not necessarily what brings you joy and gratitude, Like what just brings a sense of okayness or like betterness to you? And so something as simple as like orienting what we call exploratory orienting, orienting with the sensory motor system. It's using site, sound, smell, touch, taste as a way to just explore your environment. And when you do that, you actually slow down the nervous system, which kind of counteracts some of that adrenaline and cortisol. You start to become more present and you realize, wow, there's actually cues, neuroceptive cues of safety all around me. Like even right now, there's a mirror in front of me, and I'm seeing the way that the window in the reflection, the way that the light is on right here, and I'm thinking to myself, wow, it's really beautiful outside.

Yeah, really cool to think about. So the answer is probably simpler than you might think. Okay, when you have a nervous system that's stuck in survival survival mode, which by the way, makes so much sense based on the conditions of our world, the divisive political climates, the air that we breathe, the food that we eat where you know, like we live everything. Yeah, we live in a very disconnected society. We are always on our phones. I mean, it makes a lot of sense. And we're also taught let's not be with our emotions, which makes things ten times worse. Let's pretend like we're okay. So what do you do if those are things that you can't really change? So think of your nervous system and other analogies. Think of it like a security system that is always working in the background consciously, and it operates through the subconscious brain and the body, more specifically, the senses it is sensing into am I safe or am I not safe? Safe or not safe? And this is called neuroception. This is your brain's ability to detect or your body's ability to detect for safety or threat without using your mind's awareness. Okay, And this scanning, the security system is scanning in three places internally in your body, so inside, externally, in your outer environment, outside, and then between you and other nervous systems. We call it inside outside between Okay, So internally that might feel like, oh, what doesn't feel safe? Is that my stomach is really upset right now, or my heart is pounding out of my chest, or oh, what does feel safe is I have access to breath, and my diaphragm feels really nice and open, and I feel settled in my seat. Right we're not thinking these things, but these scans are happening, millions of scans per second, same with your outer environments, with your internal So what can happen is that when you become chronically dysregulated or stuck in survival mode, it's like your nervous system is constantly alarming for danger even if it might not be there, or it's not alarming for danger even if it is present. So what we can do is we can start to intentionally scan for things that feel safe, So things that don't feel safe for what we lovingly call triggers. Right in the sematic space, we call it activation. Okay, we don't use the word triggers, but what feels safe is what we call glimmers, So things that deactivate the nervous system or deactivate that alarm. And so when you start to do like se work, for instance, the foundational work that we do with the client is helping them to build what we call that felt sense of safety. So it's rewiring and teaching the body and the nervous system instead of just scanning for danger all the time. Can we scan for what might feel good, what might feel okay? What and what not necessarily what brings you joy and gratitude, Like what just brings a sense of okayness or like betterness to you? And so something as simple as like orienting what we call exploratory orienting, orienting with the sensory motor system. It's using site, sound, smell, touch, taste as a way to just explore your environment. And when you do that, you actually slow down the nervous system, which kind of counteracts some of that adrenaline and cortisol. You start to become more present and you realize, wow, there's actually cues, neuroceptive cues of safety all around me. Like even right now, there's a mirror in front of me, and I'm seeing the way that the window in the reflection, the way that the light is on right here, and I'm thinking to myself, wow, it's really beautiful outside.

Yeah, it's a beautiful day.

Yeah, it's a beautiful day.

Yeah. But what's important is that as you're doing this and as you're exploring, you also want to notice when we call this track, how does that feel in your body? So like, how is your body experiencing this? What small shifts are you noticing? So you might notice like, oh, my shoulder diaphragm just dropped, or the root or my tongue just dropped open a little bit, or I feel like i'm my heart rate is regulating, or oh, that's interesting, my hands feel a little bit more neutral and warm they were really cold earlier. I feel more present, or maybe there's an emotional experience, And so we call it kind of stupid simple because when people start the work. The Body First Healing Book is based on the Body First Healing Program, and it's a program I've had for many years. But it's six months, and in the first three months of the program, we actually don't even get into people's trauma, yeah, which some people love and some people hate. Some people are like, I want to get to it now, but we don't do core wounds until month three because the first three months we spend time building this foundation for your nervous system in your body to learn the language of what it feels like to be present, what it feels like to be with your body, which can feel really foreign, but you'll be surprised that by just doing daily tracking every day, like taking just ninety seconds to be like, what feels pleasant right now for me? What can I notice?

Yeah. But what's important is that as you're doing this and as you're exploring, you also want to notice when we call this track, how does that feel in your body? So like, how is your body experiencing this? What small shifts are you noticing? So you might notice like, oh, my shoulder diaphragm just dropped, or the root or my tongue just dropped open a little bit, or I feel like i'm my heart rate is regulating, or oh, that's interesting, my hands feel a little bit more neutral and warm they were really cold earlier. I feel more present, or maybe there's an emotional experience, And so we call it kind of stupid simple because when people start the work. The Body First Healing Book is based on the Body First Healing Program, and it's a program I've had for many years. But it's six months, and in the first three months of the program, we actually don't even get into people's trauma, yeah, which some people love and some people hate. Some people are like, I want to get to it now, but we don't do core wounds until month three because the first three months we spend time building this foundation for your nervous system in your body to learn the language of what it feels like to be present, what it feels like to be with your body, which can feel really foreign, but you'll be surprised that by just doing daily tracking every day, like taking just ninety seconds to be like, what feels pleasant right now for me? What can I notice?

Yeah?

Yeah?

How is my body showing me that that consistent somatic experience we say, the experience creates creates new evidence for the body and the nervous system that Okay, I can have moments where I feel safe and present, and that evidence then creates new expectation. So experience creates evidence, which then creates new expectation where when I'm out in the world now it's like I'm expecting that I'm not going to be triggered all the time, and we start to look for safety subconsciously more rather than always being so armored up.

How is my body showing me that that consistent somatic experience we say, the experience creates creates new evidence for the body and the nervous system that Okay, I can have moments where I feel safe and present, and that evidence then creates new expectation. So experience creates evidence, which then creates new expectation where when I'm out in the world now it's like I'm expecting that I'm not going to be triggered all the time, and we start to look for safety subconsciously more rather than always being so armored up.

Or believing their safety even Like that's an interesting and so that's so interesting. You brought up tracking because when you were describing the moment you had in jail, the very first time I did somatic kind of work, the first time they had me do tracking, it freaked me out so much because it involved me having to be present in my own environment and I didn't realize how disassociated I actually was. Yeah, and that kind of it was such an interesting experience because I almost like blacked out but then would like cry and then it became something that was a very helpful tool. But it was almost like I had to reteach my body and nervous system this is okay to be here now first ye, which was crazy.

Or believing their safety even Like that's an interesting and so that's so interesting. You brought up tracking because when you were describing the moment you had in jail, the very first time I did somatic kind of work, the first time they had me do tracking, it freaked me out so much because it involved me having to be present in my own environment and I didn't realize how disassociated I actually was. Yeah, and that kind of it was such an interesting experience because I almost like blacked out but then would like cry and then it became something that was a very helpful tool. But it was almost like I had to reteach my body and nervous system this is okay to be here now first ye, which was crazy.

And that's that's kind of the biggest stumbling block for most people at the beginning is realizing like, oh, I have a body and I'm allowed to be in.

And that's that's kind of the biggest stumbling block for most people at the beginning is realizing like, oh, I have a body and I'm allowed to be in.

It, right, Like this thing that's connected to me all the time, I'm actually not even living in it's.

It, right, Like this thing that's connected to me all the time, I'm actually not even living in it's.

Where you know. And then that's where we go into like when we override, Like and I can ask the the question to someone in the program of like how does your body show you? Yes, how does your body show you know? And they'll be like I don't know, and I'm like, okay, So when you set a boundary, how do you know that that that that's a boundary that you want to set And they're like, wow, I guess I don't set boundaries. I have a hard time, yeah. Or we allow our boundaries to be overridden because we're not in touch with and that's what intuition is, right, Our intuition is part of our gut instinct, and that is literally our body showing us what we want to prioritize, our authentic wants and desires. I know there's so much conversation right now around authenticity and like how do I know if this is really me and really not? And a lot of that starts with learning this somatic language. And one of the things we didn't mention at the beginning, but I think could be important here is when you talk about like conventional like talking about our trauma versus like the feeling part, there's what we know and then there's what we feel, and oftentimes those are two very different things. And so with the trauma work, what we're doing and working with the nervous system is we're helping the nervous system to catch up with what the mind already knows. Right cognitive therapy, where we know, yes, the trauma is over, we can we can we have that perspective that this is something that happened in the past, but the nervous system in the body doesn't feel that way and it doesn't have cognition to really understand that. And what's also important though to note is that we have this great thing, this great thing. We have this wonderful thing inside of us called the vagus nerve. I'm sure you're familiar with it. It's really popular now, you know, vagus nerve stimulation in order to regulate your nervous system. But the polyvagal theory came from all of the study of the vagus nerve, and the vagus nerve it's the longest longest cranial nerve in the body, but it's a bi directional nerve, so it sends information from the body up to the brain and from the brain down to the body, and it's known as the information super Highway. And what's important to note is that eighty percent of the messages of the vagus nerve go from the body up to the brain and only twenty percent go from the brain down to.