Brain Function

How Stress Makes Us Ill

Published: 19 July 2023
Written by Jocelyn Olivier
1 Comment
Categories: Brain Function, Hacking Your Nervous System, Handling Stress, Sympathetic vs Parasympathetic

Sympathetic vs Parasympathetic Functions of the Nervous System:

Our nervous system has 2 interweaving sides: excitatory and vegetative. The excitatory side takes care of emergencies and the vegetative rest and regeneration. When we are stuck in a chronic tension pattern from a past accident or incident or a prolonged period of unremitting stress our ability to heal ourselves is seriously impaired. A new client came in for a free neuromuscular assessment/consultation. She’d been such a hard driving producer that her whole nervous system collapsed into chronic fatigue and inability to heal. The result was systemic infections that wouldn’t heal. The antibiotics further destroyed her gut biome and compromised her ability to take nutrition out of her food. She put on weight and had no energy for exercise. The end point was extreme: bed ridden for 2 years, too weak to walk, with PTSD from all the attempted interventions. This sketch of her situation (many details have been left out) is a perfect description of the failure to thrive that is marked by a fixation in the sympathetic side of the nervous system.

What the Parasympathetic side of the Autonomic Nervous System does:

  • Meditation; enables you to reach states of at oneness.
  • Relaxation; the ability to calm the mind.
  • Digestion; secretion of enzymes and moving of the bowel
  • Restoration; the efficiency and priorities of our body’s cellular metabolism are directly affected by whether we are at ease or anxious
  • Sleep; the ability to access the deep sleep states of youth.
  • Cell regeneration; all the metabolic chemistry that is used in healing and making new tissue.

What the Sympathetic Nervous System does:

  • Constricts blood vessels; raises blood pressure
  • Shortens breath and limits it to the chest muscles
  • Contracts pupils and produces focused “tunnel vision”
  • Reverts to reactive responses based on past experience
  • Inhibits higher brain functions (conceptual, integrative, problem solving and creativity)
  • Suppresses immune response
  • Disintegrates learned, refined movements and smooth muscle tone (colon)
  • Produces physical awkwardness resulting in loss of self esteem
  • Difficulty focusing and concentrating
  • Difficulty falling or staying asleep or waking up still tired

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Chronic Stress creates Sympathetic Hyper-arousal or Hyper-vigilance.  Muscles are tight constantly in an overall hypertension ready for the need to fight, flight or freeze; always “at the ready.”
Areas expressive of the “the startle reflex” such as the back of the neck and elevation of the shoulders, sub-occipitals, eyes, low back, calf muscles, psoas and iliacus maintain the most tension.
The end result:
  • Chronic tension and pain in muscles, especially those expressive of the startle reflex
  • High levels of stress hormones and tension over time create high fluid levels in the tissue.
  • Stiff, sore muscles, poor circulation, taut, pale and thick skin
  • High fluid levels produce poor cellular nutrition, sluggish energy metabolism, poor recovery time from activity, and cell wall fragility.

We teach you how to shift your clients from the sympathetic to the parasympathetic in NeuroMuscular Reprogramming. NMR is a practical tool to include in your practice including and not limited to: physical therapists, massage therapists, physical trainers or movement educators. A new 4-part series to becoming a certified NMR therapist starts September 29th. Get 16.5% off when you sign up for all 4 classes! Sign up here.

Looking for more new NMR content? Come connect with us on Facebook or Instagram!

Sympathetic Dominance

Published: 23 February 2023
Written by Jocelyn Olivier
No comments
Categories: Brain Function, Hacking Your Nervous System, NMR Efficacy, On The Path, Sympathetic vs Parasympathetic

How do you know that someone is Sympathetic Nervous System Dominant?

There are lots of signs that you are Sympathetic Nervous System (SNS) dominant: Muscle tics in the eye lids, rapid blinking of the eyes while responding to movement instructions, labored or quick breathing, chronic tension in muscles, especially those in the back/extensor side of the body, and cognitive delays in response to instructions just to name a few. A person with SNS dominance will apologize and tell you they did not understand what you wanted them to do.

 

How do you measure ‘Sympathetic Tone’?

I look for common clues that indicate problems with the fundamental coordination system such as the inability to rotate the T/L junction with reciprocal ease in both directions, cognitive confusion, orientation confusion such as not knowing the difference between right and left, looking confused or misunderstanding simple directional instructions, with 2 out of 3 reciprocal rotator functions ‘off’ or inhibited.

 

Signs that your client’s ParaSympathetic Nervous System (PNS) is coming back online:

Gurgles and squirts in the viscera; yawning; spontaneously swallowing, dropping into a sleep state instantaneously, twitching in peripheral muscles, softening of formerly tight muscles.

Why work so hard to get muscles to relax when you can just get the ANS (autonomic nervous system) to slow down? Sympathetic Dominance may be contributing to your client’s muscle tension and inhibiting corrections in stored movement patterns. Clients with Sympathetic Dominance need Brain Function Facilitation in order to shift into the ParaSympathetic.

 

From the NeuroMuscular Reprogramming Instagram.

How Do We Know if Someone Needs Brain Function Facilitation?

Published: 14 February 2023
Written by Jocelyn Olivier
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Categories: Brain Function, NMR Classes, NMR Efficacy, Sympathetic vs Parasympathetic

In my intake forms I look for signs of Multi-System Breakdown.

When there is a history of trauma and visceral or cognitive effects ongoing Sympathetic Dominance may be a contributing factor. For some people the hindrance is cognitive and for others it’s structural/functional and for others it has evolved into metabolic disturbances disrupting digestion, absorption, elimination, and healing.

40 plus years ago I studied Educational Kinesiology and have incorporated what I learned into my work with clients’ structural problems…

The inclusion of approaches to shift clients toward the Parasympathetic side of the nervous system is part of Mod 1 Intro to NeuroMuscular Reprogramming.

 

How Do We Shift a Client Toward the Parasympathetic?

Actually, it’s the clients who must do the work. I introduce a few breathing practices, and the incorporation of a couple of simple techniques from Educational Kinesiology which have become very popular with Chiropractors in the last decade as they choose to expand their clientele to work with kids who have cognitive processing problems.

NeuroMuscular Reprogramming NMR® incorporates some of the basics of Brain Function Facilitation and teaches it at a level that can make a big difference to clients progress toward their goals of reduced structural pain and improved ROM.

 

Lesson 1: First Important Consideration in Corrective Bodywork

 

3 is The Key to Learning

Published: 28 November 2022
Written by Jocelyn Olivier
No comments
Categories: Brain Function, Handling Stress, NMR Efficacy, Self Help Techniques

3 is the Key to New Learning.

The Body Learns Through Repetition.

The first level of learning is getting the message through to the muscles. This involves neurological learning. Neurological learning boosts the brain’s learning facility which is usually knocked out by stressful experience, accident or trauma. When you try something new for the first time, your coordination system doesn’t know how to do it. When you try it again immediately there may be a glimmer of ‘almost’ understanding. It is only on the 3rd try that your coordination system begins to really ‘get it’; and OWN the new movement possibility. Sometimes it takes even longer than 3 repetitions to get it, but 3 is the maximum number of ‘trys’ that should be engaged on the first time around.

Repetition Exhausts the Nervous System.

Unlike the muscles, the nervous system becomes quickly exhausted when pushed too hard to do new activities. It is important to understand and expect that anything you just tried, your body intelligence will continue to integrate even as you sleep. (This has been validated in movement physiology research). When you perform the same activity the next day you may find it much easier.

First you have to prepare the body for new learning.

This is where NMR starts.  

The 1st Important Consideration in Corrective Bodywork: https://vimeo.com/395854829:

New NMR Trainings begin January 13 – 15th 2023 in-person or Live Streaming via Zoom. 

Find them at NeuroMuscular-Reprogramming.com/events.

For more information on our upcoming trainings, you can visit our Facebook Event Page, and remember: 

3 is the Key to Learning. 

Conditions the Medical Profession Cannot Help

Published: 1 May 2018
Written by Jocelyn Olivier
1 Comment
Categories: Brain Function, Handling Stress, Self Help Techniques
I thought to share this email exchange with a student from the east coast as it contains tips on handling abnormal conditions that clients can’t find solutions for in the medical world….
Hi Jocelyn-
I had a quick and sort of random question. I have a client who has hyperacusis in her left ear which is basically a super sensitivity to sound. She’s had it ever since she got in a big car accident in her twenties (she’s in her seventies now). She really has never found any solutions for it and it interferes with her ability to do everyday things.
I was wondering if you know anything about it and if neuromuscular work could be any benefit? She has told me she’s had trouble with that entire side since the accident.
Just curious if you’ve ever encountered anything like that!   A

 
Hi A
As far as the whole left side being ‘different since the accident’, that sounds like shock/trauma shutting down communications between the hemispheres. Don’t underestimate the power of Brain Buttons. Sometimes I use them for a good 10 minutes of the session along with a lengthy teaching about how stress turns off communication between the hemispheres and has some VERY predictable shifts that it does in our metabolism.
 
One word of warning: People who have had a condition for a long time may argue with your assessment and resist the work and so, often they get to keep the condition, because they find the therapist wrong or simply stop seeing them. I worked with a woman just like that at a Triathlon. Because I am so sure of what needs to happen I am able to command attention to what I am saying instead of allowing the recycling back through trauma experiences and remembered pain over and over again. She retold parts of the story to me repeatedly during a 1/2 hour tune up. Remembered tension recreates the tension.  Putting one’s attention on the space around you is another way to get away from being trapped in the trouble. 
 
I’ve never encountered anything like hyperacusis after an accident, but I encounter things I’ve never encountered most days these days. Trust your instincts. I listen carefully and imagine how the body shuts itself down and stores information as pattern recognition in what Milton Erickson would call ‘Compelling Personal Reference Experiences’.  These are the imprints the body/mind takes at moments of great danger to our survival.
 
Since she’s had this condition a long time and is now fairly old, my solution for the hyperacusis would be to wear a good sound modulator earplug such as drummers use. They are fitted to your ear. If I were her, I would wear it whenever I was in an environment with noise or even while watching TV.
 
Be well, stay happy, Jocelyn
For a FREE NEUROMUSCULAR ASSESSMENT to see if NeuroMuscular Reprogramming would be useful to you, call 415 388 9945.