Twig's SE Reflections

Finally, a look at the oldest branch of the Autonomic Nervous System as noted in the Polyvagal theory - the Dorsal Vagal Complex, the sub-system in us that is more akin to older, slower, less engaged critters on the family tree. This is a rambling look at a unique part of our biological heritage that has profound clinical implications for Somatic Experiencing practitioners and others tuning into the wisdom hidden in our physiology.

Summary: I needed to step sideways of the review of the polyvagal theory layout and organization of the ANS and go with a topical concern right now while wildfires are back in my area. It's an interesting opportunity to consider where we place our attention and what we focus on when we encounter repetitive dangerous events. This is about as off the cuff as it can get.

Continuing on with a little series on the Autonomic Nervous System from a Polyvagal perspective - this time focusing on the Ergotropic (mobilization) system, commonly known as the Sympathetic Nervous System. News...I'm letting go of the mini-series format. These podcasts are going back to the chat chatty pattern. I guess that's why this podcast is called "Twig's SE Reflections."

Show Notes Page with with additional commentary.

Play Episode 52 Here

2nd in a group of mini-episodes that are supposed to be limited to 5 minutes. Go figure, this one on the basics of the anatomy associated to the Ventral Vagal Complex broke the rules and comes in at 12 minutes. So it goes. Show Notes Page with with additional commentary.

Many of us think of the Polyvagal theory as challenging. Understandably so, it's kinda complex. That's necessary and appropriate for what it is, namely: a parsimonious theory that explains a multidude of phenomena with a simpler, more elegant explanation than what science had found before.

3 cheers for Stephen Porges for having changed history and opened up an entirely new understanding of ourselves and the general goings on in evolution. Unfortunately to pull that off requires some pretty big words and that can confuse us.

Here's my prediction. Soon enough it'll be completely commonplace in our lexicon and we'll rattle off phrases like Nucleus Ambiguous or Ventral Vagal Complex as though we always knew them. Soon enough.

In the meantime let's name the major physical attributes about this newest branch of the Autonomic Nervous System (both in our understanding and in terms of phylogenetic or evolutionary origin).

The VVC or Ventral Vagal Complex is a collection of associated neurological and anatomical structures in our body.  It so happens that all of the muscular and visceral components that allow us to socially engage; breath, eat and speak at the same time; and keep calm while in close proximity to others we find trustworthy (a new mammalian capacity that didn't exist before 60 million years ago) are connected by nerves that make them all work together. .

While the a study of all of this can go very deep with gradually more complex levels of distinction, a great place to start is by simply naming the anatomy that is included in this system and think about what these structures do for us.

It's also helpful to recognize that these anatomical structures are all tied together in a "complex", joined by specific kinds of nerves that are all very fast in their transmission of information and ultimately connect through the central "hub" of the VVC, the Nucleus Ambiguous -NA (ambiguous by name and by dent that it is difficult for scientist to isolate and clarify the boards of these nerve nuclei, not because the system doesn't know what it's doing).

Innervated by these super fast nerves (fast due to their myelinated sheath that helps their signal run faster along the path) is all the stuff in us that allows us to be social, like: 

Muscles of the Face. - For expressing emotion and signaling our experience to others.Muscles of the middle ear. - For tuning the ear to the frequency of the human voice so as to hear one another instead off all the other noise in the environment.Muscles of the eyes and eye lids. - For emotional communication, seeing and orienting.Muscles of mastication. - Basically for eating but think of our eating as a social species as a basically a social act where we often eat and speak together at the same time.Muscles of the neck. - Most commonly referenced for this is the sterno-cliado-mastoid muscle that turns our heads left and right for orienting to new sounds and shadows, but head bobbing is also included in this.

Additionally the VVC has major influence over the supra-diagphramatic organs like:

The heart or more specifically the sino-atrial node that acts as the pacemaker of the heart. - Active VVC influence on the "vagal break" brings the heart into a dynamic rhythm and frequency and relationship with the breath and aids to the feeling of well-being and sense of safety (i.e. A calm heart).The lungs. - VVC influence here helps us maintain oxygenation while doing complex tasks like talking and swallowing (i.e. Easy to breath).The Larynx and Pharynx. - These help with vocalization as we expel air in good coordination with the lungs when they are innervated by the VVC (i.e. Easy to speak with variation in tone and not loose breath).Esophageal muscles. - For the smooth and easy swallowing (i.e. Makes eating much more pleasurable).

Since these structures are all tied together by nerves that are all associated through the NA, to stimulate one of them is to stimulate all of them. They work in a "complex." Which is massively important to us clinically but also just really phenomenally cool to think about generally.

From here there is incredible depth to be found by investigating the inner workings of this Ventral Vagal Complex and its interrelationship with other subsystems of the autonomic nervous system.

In the next mini-episode we'll take a short look at the Sympathetic Nervous System and its major attributes.

Play Episode 51 Here

The first of an unknown number of mini-episodes from Twig's SE Reflections. This one on a hopefully unnecessary worry of creating an intellectual cultural bias favoring the pro-social or Ventral Vagal stance at the cost of excluding (and stigmatizing?) those who don't have or want it. Show Notes Page with with additional commentary.

[Note: I'm still working out some changes for the next 50 episodes of Twig's SE Reflections after recieving positive and helpful feedback from listeners. Many thanks to those who took the time for that. In the meantime I'm going to share some mini-episodes of 5 minutes or less. Here's the first, with a little written commentary in the show notes.]

Here's something I don't think is an active problem but something we need to be cautious of as SE Practitioners develop an intellectual community with a common language of what we like and what we don't like.

We don't want to become so attached to the idea of being Ventral Vagal oriented that we become exclusatory or inadvertently enforce stigmatization of people who are not currently - or may never want to be - very "pro-social."

Let me explain.

Humans, as with our primate relatives, have a tendency to make social groups that reinforce our clan's preferences. This is part of what makes being part of "the in group" feel so good - our behavior and choices are championed. We feel a part of something bigger than ourselves and are encouraged to think that we're correct in our assumptions.

This is also why it feels so bad to be on the outside, shunned or not included - it suggests that we're doing something wrong and that we are, in some sense, actually wrong.

As you and I grow more and more fond of the langauge associated to the Polyvagal theory (wiki) and begin using it as a short hand for naming beneficial features and calling out challenging ones, we'll want to remember this basic tendency in human nature and try to avoid creating a "this is better than that" duality.

Of course it can be argued that mammals have a tendency toward Ventral Vagal dominance in their nervous system when they feel safe enough. That the resulting "pro-social" nature is spontaneous and a functional attribute of nervous system state is one of the great insights to be found in the - very cool and parsimonious - Polyvagal theory.

However, the exact same principle suggests that tendencies toward Sympathetic or Dorsal Vagal type behaviors such as high activation or desire for isolation are also informed by the autonomic nervous system and often describe the burden of accumulated stress and chronic neuroception of danger or life threat, even if we're unaware that this is part of what's going on. Ultimately this probably explains ourselves more than common cultural or psychological explainations of the associated expressions of personality (i.e. Type A or Extreme Introvert amongst others).

In this way, we can probably assume that many people would express more spontaneous pro-social behavior if they experienced less accumulated stress in their lives. Thus a bias toward signs of Ventral Vagal innervation are an understandable desire of ours as trauma focused helping care professionals.

At the same time, when we cheer the "that's so Ventral" moments, in and out of sessions, we'll want to remember that we live in a puralistic society of people, many of whom have experienced challenges that have led to the accumulation of stress - and personality formation around that stress - which makes social engagement itself a challenge or even truly undesirable. For that matter, on any given day even the most social of us might find seclusion the ideal state.

All that to say, people expressing SNS or DVC tendencies are no less human and no less worthy than those of us who have found the comforts to be gained by reinforcing pro-social experience.

While all of this is more a cultural concern far beyond the scope of being an SEP and I'd personally encourage everyone to feel free to choose their associations as they please, this does have a cricitally important session element given the nature of our work to provide a specialized conversation to our client's suffering the impacts of accumulated stress, which often requires accurate joining and adjustment of our own behavior, if maybe only while we're in service.

If we enter sessions with the notion that VVC expressions are somehow "good" and SNS or DVC expression somehow "bad" - whether we recognize this bias or not - than we surely miss the opportunity to provide the appropriate attunement to some of our clients - while inadvertently asking them to participate in activities that they're simply unwanting or unwilling to do (such as orientation or chronic conversation) which is another way to help them fail at meeting our requests.

Yes, orientation and social engagement are a direction we're trying to help people move toward and they have dramatic relevance clinically as interventions or therapeutic stance. Still, meeting people "where they're at" is part of our game and creating a "good/bad" dichotomy will only get in the way.

So Yes indeed, let's champion - as I surely will - the pleasures and opportunities of a pro-social life. And when our friends, colleagues, clients and even ourselves aren't interested or able to join us in that "ideal," let's also remember that in the end we're all in this together and one more good-bad mindset split isn't going to help anyone.

Sleep well SE Land. "I hope you have good dreams with Adventures and Things More Simple." I'll see you again soon. -Twig

Play Episode 50 Here

In this unique episode I share a my gratitude and a bit of transparency boarding on T.M.I. followed by an announcement that this podcast is going to take a publishing pause while I assess whether it should continue beyond episode 50? There are now 15 hours of SE Reflections available for you in the archives and perhaps this is a good place to change course or stop. You can give your feedback on this page at www.liberationispossible/gratitude-transparency-podcast-050.

Play Episode 49 Here

Referrals are critical to our work. They bring us new clients, expand our reach into different populations and pre-establish rapport with prospective clients. They also create some challenges of their own, like unmanaged expectations for the rare magic SE session. Without being formulaic about how to deal with these challenges I open up some things for us SE practitioners to be thinking about in relationship to referrals and referral sources.

Play Episode 48 Here

When preparing my land for a big fire, a small fire nearly got out of my control. Similar to working with Global High Activation and other patterns that quickly lead to a conflagration, we often need to put in buffers or fire lines before working with flammable stuff. Here's a little metaphor story from my own fire and encouragement to you to create those contracts and buffers with your clients before things get out of control.

Play Episode 47 Here

What can an SEP do when a "Natural Disaster" comes to their backyard? It's happened to a lot of us already, it will surely happen to more in the years to come. Here's some background on what I did when the largest wildfire in Washington State History, the Carlton Complex, started 5 minutes walk from my home in July, 2014 along with what I was able to offer my community as things started to cool down. I hope this will encourage other SEP's to think proactively about such things for the future.

You can find the StressLess Series Here

My first night of relief after the fire passed. Eventually I slept for 20 hours straight. So sweet.

Play Episode 46 Here

When is crying productive? When isn't it? When do we encourage it? When do we avoid it? Those are good questions. None of which will be answered for you in this episode. Instead you'll feel more informed as you continue to search for more and more ways to answer those questions on when crying is helpful, when it's not and how to support it best.