Welcome to Month 5 of Wandering Around Vagus, a paid monthly subscription series exploring the Vagus Nerve + Polyvagal Theory.
I’m Tina Foster of Foster & Flourish, the creator and guide of Wandering Around Vagus.
First, a few quick notes to help you orient within our pages:
You can find last month’s post (our fourth) on sympathetic response/fight-or-flight linked here. All past posts are on the archive page. And now Monthly & Supplementary Posts + Recordings and other topics can be accessed from the navigation bar atop the Wandering Around Vagus Homepage.
A brief intro of the dorsal vagal system + what we’ll do
This month our focus is the dorsal vagal system, dorsal response and the dorsal state. The dorsal vagal system operates in the dorsal branch of the vagus nerve. The dorsal branch runs down the inside of the spine and spreads through the digestive system. (Here’s a link to an intro/ review of the three vagal branches and states including the dorsal branch/state.)
Dorsal vagal responses and states play a major role in our body’s “passive defense system” and actually make up a wide spectrum of experiential sub-responses and -states that range from the everyday “rest-and-digest” that keeps our system regulated, to the “shutdown” or “collapse” we experience during emergencies when our system’s survival is threatened by too much fight-or-flight response.
The purpose of the dorsal vagal system’s responses and states is to preserve and protect our nervous system in a process known as “conservation withdrawal.” The rest-and-digest sub-state calms our whole nervous system and supports the absorption of nutrients as regular maintenance. During more stressful times of intense or prolonged fight-or-flight, as our system becomes exhausted by too much dysregulation, dorsal response helps us survive by acting as a “kill switch,” shutting down our nervous system, protecting it from damage and preserving our energy.
This month, we’ll work with these two dorsal responses:
regulated dorsal—the downshift into “rest and digest” as regular maintenance.
survival dorsal—when we’re pulled into shutdown from fight-or-flight for the protection of our nervous system.
(NOTE: There’s also the later stage of survival dorsal response where we’re fully and deeply in shutdown mode. “Full dorsal shutdown” is very powerful and important to look at but requires more time and space than we have this month.)
This month’s practice is a chance to explore our own dorsal responses in the above situations by recalling our own lived experiences.
By the end of this 15 minute audio you’ll have a better sense of:
your individual experience of the regulated dorsal state when you rest and digest and what it feels like to your five senses and your imagination.
your individual experience of entering a dorsal survival state—how you feel, what you believe and who you are when your overwhelmed nervous system begins to shut down for protection.
how to better recognize when you’re entering dorsal shutdown from fight-or-flight.
how awareness of dorsal response can help you feel less lost or out of control as your systems begin to shut down.
Regulated dorsal response: what it’s like and how it works
Our regulated dorsal system manages our “eat and sleep” programming by slowing our other systems and softening our awareness. We enter regulated dorsal states after a nice meal, at home after a full day’s work or on vacation when there’s not much else to do but laze around all afternoon. The regulated dorsal system functions optimally when we feel comfortable and secure with our environment and present circumstances.
Our body needs to enter the regulated dorsal state to replenish itself frequently. As we enter, our brain waves, heart rate, breathing and movements slow down. Our mental focus becomes fuzzy and we want to disengage from activities. We’re aware enough to hear the phone ring with that important call we’d normally jump to answer, but in regulated dorsal, we let the call go to voicemail instead. Ahhhhh. Perhaps your eyes are starting to get droopy and your nervous system has subtly downshifted just by reading this description? (I’m getting sleepy writing it.)
In practice, we’ll imagine our regulated dorsal state as a landscape unique to us. This practice will deepen our connection to our dorsal “sanctuary,” how it lives in us and what it means to us as a “place” we can enter when we want to shift into regulated dorsal.
Survival dorsal response: what it’s like and how it works
The survival dorsal state happens towards the other end of the dorsal spectrum. It’s meant to be activated during emergencies, so hopefully we experience it less frequently than regulated dorsal.
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