Autonomic Nervous System and Stress On Our Body

In this video, Dr. Paul Canali and Jim Fazio discuss the Autonomic Nervous System, stress, and how it impacts our physical well-being.

Key Points In The Video

• The Autonomic Nervous System is responsible for our day to day function.
• Controls things like heart rate, blood pressure, hot, cold, sexual intimacy.
• Almost every function of the human body is under Autonomic Nervous System control.
• We're not always aware of it until something goes wrong.
• Negative impacts of stress are expressed through the Autonomic Nervous System.
• Sympathetic Nervous System
• One part of the Autonomic Nervous System (ANS).
• It increases and expends energy to meet the demand of the moment.
• Increases
• Blood Pressure
• Heart Rate
• The stress response
• The survival response
• Still in the "danger mode" so your body doesn't waste energy on digestion, sleep, rest, healing.  Even dangers that have long past gone away.
• Parasympathetic Nervous System
• Helps slow things down and bring things back into balance.
• If the threat, real or perceived, is still there, this will not engage.
• Parasympathetic helps in
• Sleep
• Digestion
• Rest
• Healing
• The longer we stay in stress or survival, the longer these systems will stay shut down and lead to constipation, inflammatory disease, and illness of all types. 
• Majority of doctor visits are due to stress or the maladaptation to stress.
• Treatments will only do so much unless you deal with the stress.
• If you don't correct your ways to adapt to stress, nature will take you out of the picture.
• Re-regulate stress by dumping allostatic load, which is how the body adapts to a stressful stimulus.
• Stress happens and it impacts the body, but in a short period of time, we should return back to a baseline called homeostasis.  Unfortunately, we don't always do this.
• Stresses can accumulate and keep us out of balance which ends up in situations where we are in severe pain, physical illness, and conditions that impact the body.

For More Information

1. Dr. Paul Canali, Evolutionary Healing Institute of Miami, Florida
2. Jim Fazio, Integrative Bodywork

Healing Piano Music

WOW – no let’s make that a DOUBLE WOW! This CD, Healing Piano by Steven Cravis, really surprised me. I was expecting the sounds that I had come to know in Steven Cravis’ other CD’s but when I heard this one, I was surprised and amazed. I think this is one of Steven’s greatest works that he has done. Here’s why I say this.

The music is gentle but has flowing ripples of musical notes, as if you were staring across a rippling brook flowing gently through a lush meadow. The songs have delicately placed pauses in them, as if they just knew where exactly to be located to give the mind an opportunity to absorb all that it is receiving. The sounds range from more dominant tones to more mellow, with some tones just following one another in single file that is full of dimension, time, and space. The music is so deep and vibrantly full of life and energy that I find myself wanting to immerse myself in it, as if I’m soaking in a relaxing bath. To say this music is amazing is limiting my description by a vocabulary that can not explain the fullness of the sounds, tones, and inflections.

So I put this music to the test using my pulse meter to measure just what impact it would have on me. Using my iPod and noise canceling headphones, I laid on my massage table and just played the music as I closed my eyes. I took my pulse with the pulse meter and it was around 80-85 before I started. After listening all of the way through to the end of the music, I once again took my pulse. My pulse had gone down to around 69-74. It definitely dropped my pulse rate down about 10-15 points and that is an indicator that the “relaxation response” or parasympathetic mode is being reached, which offers the body a chance to heal through rest and repair.

This music is not only beautiful but so relaxing and inviting that I know you’ll want to check it out. I’m sure my clients will enjoy having relaxing massages to this music and I’m sure I will also be using this in my own relaxation and meditation times. This CD, Healing Piano by Steven Cravis, is truly a piece of art and Steven is going to have a difficult time creating work that outdoes this CD, but knowing his creative ability, I’m sure we will see many more great things in the future.

You can learn more about Steven Cravis at:
http://www.stevencravis.com

You can download music by Steven Cravis on:
iTunes

*For more articles, check out the Mind Body Thoughts Blog

Startle Reflex

How many times have you been sitting there minding your own business when some sound brings you up out of your chair? Or maybe some quick movement past you stops you dead in your tracks. Even a sound such as an explosion or fireworks or a moment in a song could ignite something deep within you. It could be a flash of light or about anything but whatever it is, you stop and try to determine what is going on.


What Is The Startle Reflex / Startle Response
The startle reflex is something everyone knows about. We've all felt it at one time or another. It is the response of our mind and our body from a sudden unexpected stimulus. It could be a sound, a flash of light, some event, a touch or a quick movement around us. There are many ways we are startled.

When started, our bodies go through many physical changes including contraction of muscles of the arm and leg, blinking, increase in blood pressure, respiration and breathing rate. While the muscles contraction responses generally resolve themselves in a matter of seconds, it often takes our breathing, respiration and blood pressure much more time to normalize.

Startle Response and PTSD
If there is an exaggerated startle response, it is called hyperplexia and is often seen in people with PTSD (Post Traumatic Stress Disorder).

Startle Response Video
Here's a great video depicting what happens in a person when a startle response is encountered. The video is about self protection but the beginning of it really shows in a simplistic way, just what the startle response does.

Startle Response from James Marwood on Vimeo.

My Startle Reflex Experience
One of the things I am learning through the Evolutionary Healing Institute with Dr. Paul Canali is just how important the "startle reflex" is to the healing of trauma. Through pendulation of the autonomic nervous system, one is able to begin moving through trauma that is stored in the body without becoming overwhelmed and shutting down. The startle reflex is one of the ways used to do this because the startle reflex kicks the system up into sympathetic mode and once dissipation has been allowed to complete, the body can then come back down into a more relaxed or resting mode (parasympathetic). By doing short bursts of stimulation and rest, the person is able to move through much more than if they were just brought into the trauma stimulus full force. Of course, it greatly helps the person going through this to be safely supported by someone that is able to be there in a grounded way without judgment.

One good way to measure the state of the nervous system is by use of a pulse meter. I use the one pictured to the left. There are times that a person feels one way but when you measure the pulse, you can quickly see if the person is in sympathetic or parasympathetic mode. If the pulse is going high and not dropping down, you are still in sympathetic and there is still arousal or stimuli within the body. Until that arousal or stimuli is released, the body will not be able to go completely into parasympathetic mode. This of course may not happen all at once and may take time to go further and further into it. With the pulse meter, there is no guess work as to what is going on in the body. The pulse of the body is real where what one may experience may not be truly what is going on.



Other Sources of Information

1) Wikipedia - Startle Reaction

2) Evolutionary Healing Institute: Autonomic Nervous System

3) US National Library Of Medicine - National Institutes Of Health: Fear Appears Fast

4) How Stuff Works: Startle Response

5) Trauma, Biology And Hyperarousal

6) Hope And Possibility Through Trauma

*For more articles, check out the Mind Body Thoughts Blog