S E22: Ep 22 – Stress? I’m not stressed! (but if you are this will help)

Hello and welcome to the Pain Free Living Podcast with me, Bob Allen.

I'm an osteopath.

And let me introduce you to my co host.

Hello, I'm Claire Elsby and I'm delighted to be here with Bob.

Oh, we're so friendly together.

Yes.

So today we are going to be talking about stress, the joys of stress and what to do about it, why it happens and how you can manage it.

So without further ado, as a therapy.

Coach, I see clients quite often come saying that they're either suffering from stress or stressful situations and what can they do about it?

And there are things, thankfully, that we can help.

Yeah.

How do you see it in terms of a physical?

As an osteopath, I can talk about how I see it in a physical manifestation, but I think it'll be quite important to, to talk about where stress comes from in terms of how the body generates it.

To do that, we need to talk a little bit about the nervous system.

And the nervous system is incredibly complex.

It manages all 11 of our body systems.

So circulation, digestion, respiration, and a whole host of other things.

And I don't want to go down to that depth because that'll take more than one episode of the podcast to talk about.

So what we're going to, what I'm going to focus on a little bit more is about the central nervous system, which everybody's heard of, and the autonomic nervous system, which people may not have heard of.

So we're going to keep it really, really simple.

The central nervous system is the brain and spinal cord.

The autonomic nervous system is the parasympathetic nervous system, the sympathetic nervous system, the enteric nervous system, and then the somat somatic system.

So narrowing that down even more.

The somatic system is all about muscles and sense and physical sensations and stuff.

So that's how our bodies move.

The autonomic nervous system is the bit which we have no direct control over.

So there's actually three elements to that, but people only ever talk about two of them.

So we've got the sympathetic nervous system, which most people will have heard of, the fight, flight, freeze.

Then we've got the parasympathetic nervous system, which is rest, digest and repair.

And then we've got the enteric nervous system, which has been known about for the last couple of decades, but most people don't really talk about it, even though we're understanding more how important it is.

And we're understanding more and more now.

If I were to talk about the gut microbiome, most people will have heard of that.

So think when you talk.

When I talk about enteric nervous system, think we're talking gut microbiome and how that can influence the body.

But again, rather than talking about that, we may talk about that another time.

We're going to lump the enteric nervous system in with the parasympathetics.

Yeah.

So we've gone from nervous system, narrowed it down to sympathetic parasympathetic autonomics.

Yeah, yeah.

So as I said before, we've got the sympathetic nervous system, which is fight, flight and freeze, and we've got the parasympathetic nervous system, which is rest, digest and recover.

Now, when we're talking about stress, stress is.

Stress is a good thing, which I know is hard to believe, but.

Because we always talk about stress in a very negative way.

But, but stress can be positive.

It is positive in that if you've got a deadline coming up, if you're going to appear in a show, if you've got.

If you're the star player in a Premier League football team, they will be stressed before they go out on the field or before they do that event.

And that just heightens all their senses.

That makes them feel better, that makes them ready to perform whatever that performance is.

Where it tips over into a problem is if we have chronic stress.

So you've got a very demanding boss and you hate going into the office and just the thought of going into the office makes you feel sick, or you've got a big performance coming up in six months time, but actually you start worrying about it now and that just builds up to the point where it can cause problems.

And then.

So that's where stress goes from being a good beneficial thing into something like that can cause issues.

And I know that before the cameras were rolling, we were talking about stress from a mental health perspective as well.

That's right, yes.

So what's your take on it, Claire?

Well, like you say, we're meant to be able to cope stress in terms of we need stress in our lives, we need stress to make us do things and be able to function.

But actually when, as Bob says, when it tips over and it gets beyond what we can manage or what we feel we can manage, then it starts to become a problem.

And I see that manifesting in body language and I'm sure you as well, so you can see it with people with either you start to get chest, really tight chest, particularly People complain of pains in their stomach, in the gut.

So actually manifests itself headaches.

That's again where people can start to feel and they can feel their blood pressure rising, they can feel their heart start and their breathing gets faster.

And so there is a really physical effect to being stressed.

And, you know, you can tell it, you can see it when people are sat in front of you and literally they will tighten up, muscles will tighten up.

Yeah.

And it's an evolutionary thing because back in the days of the dinosaurs, being stressed was a good thing because it gets you either ready to fight that saber tooth tiger or it gets you ready to run away from it, or it gets you to freeze and hide in a corner somewhere, hoping that whatever that predator is won't see you.

So, yeah, as we said, stress originally was a very, very good thing.

Even today, stress is a good thing in preparing you for an event or something like that.

But when it tips over into those physical manifestations, then stress becomes less good and we need to address that.

So like you said, it, you know, from your perspective, you can see the signs of it.

From my perspective, it manifests in things like increased, increased tension in the shoulders, people wearing their shoulders for earrings, because the muscles in the neck get tight.

The muscles in the neck get tight because they are what we call accessory muscles for breathing.

The main muscle for breathing is a diaphragm, which is down here, just around ribs 4, 5.

But also when you're active, the accessory muscles in the neck and shoulders start to work because they help to expand the chest and get more air into the lungs.

But if they're constantly under tension, then that can cause pain itself.

Also there's a little group of muscles at the base of the skull which is, which can be responsible for headaches.

Again, it's more to do with increased muscle tension, which then can affect other muscles, which can then manifest as pain and headaches or migraines, all those sorts of things.

And the pain and that butterfly feeling in the stomach, which we can get, again, that can tip over into being really uncomfortable to the point of being painful, because again, the gut, the gut is part of the autonomic nervous system, gut microbiome.

So the things about the sympathetic and parasympathetic nervous systems are that they affect all those things that you would need to be able to run away.

So it affects the muscles, affects the gut, it affects the ecopex vision, it affects the heart rate, affects the level of adrenaline.

All of those things that get you ready to, to do something.

So that's the sympathetic nervous system.

And then as a counter to that, we have the parasympathetic nervous system, which is arrest, digest and recover, restore.

So our bodies are constantly in a battle of sympathetics, parasympathetics.

In situations where we've got chronic stress, sympathetics are up here, parasympathetics are down here.

What we need to do is we need to bring them into balance or preferably tip them over into more parasympathetic stimulation, less of the sympathetics.

So, Clare, how do we do that?

Just from what you were saying, another aspect that I see potentially is extremes.

So you've got hyper arisal or hypo arisal.

So hyper arisal is the fight, flight or fawn response.

The fawn response.

Most people will know what fight and flight are.

But what's the fawn response, Claire?

That's basically where you try.

It sounds a bit ridiculous, but it's where you people please.

So you just want things to stop.

So you will fawn.

But it's much more common, the fight and the flight response.

But fawn is there.

Yeah.

That must be quite a modern one, then, because I can't see an evolutionary benefit of being able to fawn.

I know that freeze is more of an evolutionary one because, like I said, so some animals will freeze and hold their position.

Position in the hope that whatever predator is doesn't see them.

But I've not heard of fawn before, so that's quite.

That's must be quite a new one.

And then you've got the hyper arousal, which is part of the frieze.

But you mentioned in yourself about being small, hiding.

And I have, you know, I have had clients say to me that when they reach a point of hypo arousal, they literally got to find a small space.

Yeah.

And hide and hold.

Yeah.

And so what is.

For me, it's about trying to bring yourself back from those extremes.

So avoiding extremes is the best situation in the first place.

But if you got there, how do you bring yourself back?

And then in terms of psychology, there's something called the window of tolerance, which is this bit in the middle, which.

If your window of tolerance, which can move at any point in time, during any day, depending on what you're being faced with.

But if generally your window of tolerance is quite wide, that basically means you can cope with things, whereas if your window of tolerance is very narrow and we all know what it's like to feel, I just can't cope anymore, I've had enough, I've had It up to here.

And that basically means your window of tolerance is very narrow.

So what techniques, what can we do to stretch that window and make sure that window stays as wide as possible so you don't hit the extremes.

That's a lot for work I do in terms of working with the clients and looking at their particular situation.

Okay.

I mean, from my perspective.

So I see people who have physical stress potentially through.

Yeah, because they've got a big event coming up or because they've got really tight neck, shoulders, those sorts of things.

So I can deal with the physical stress side of things.

But that's one of the advantages of having you on the podcast, is that you can talk about the mental aspects of it and I can talk about the physical aspects.

So for the physical aspects, for me, if I get somebody who is really stressed, I will, when I'm treating them, we'll also focus a little bit on the breathing and we will focus on not quite mindfulness, but, you know, taking them out of that stressful situation.

They've got me for 45 minutes to an hour where they don't have to worry about the stress.

I can deal with the physical side of things and that can help with the mental side, mental health side of things as well.

So.

And I know so from your perspective, you're dealing more with the mental health aspects of it.

So I know I got the hands on, I've got those physical techniques.

What would you do from mental health side of things to help calm people down?

Very similar.

I mean, breathing, being able to manage your breathing and being in control of your breathing, which is very difficult in an unment.

If you initially have an episode, it's really difficult to do.

But the whole thing is to practice it so that when you need it, it's there.

So you can have things like box breathing, you can have things like grinding technique.

So for example, in that moment, think of something.

Look at something you can see, name something you can see.

Fear, something you can touch, know where you are, bring yourself back into the actual moment where you are.

And that is known as like a grinding technique.

Another one is literally where you put your hands.

This is called the butterfly.

So you put your hands like that and you do this.

And just even the act of doing that is very calming.

One thing I will say is that if you're listening and not watching, you won't know what we're talking about.

But what we can do is we can put a link in the show notes to some of these techniques, the grounding and the butterfly.

Etc.

So if you're not watching, why aren't you watching?

If you're listening, then we'll put some of the information in the show notes for you.

Sorry Claire, carry on.

Another technique is tapping.

Okay.

So tapping is known because that is touching certain points and it's associating being safe with points over various points in body that you can tap.

I know for certain people it doesn't work for everyone.

Certain people it's incredibly effective and you can use it literally in the moment.

Another one.

And I realized now that and not everyone is watch.

Take one of your hands and then breathe in and breathe out as you move the index finger of your other hand round your fingers and that literally just starts to bring your breathing back.

Because you're controlling, you're focusing on something else.

Yeah.

Okay.

Breathing is a major one.

Getting out of the situation, taking five.

So getting up, walking around and get yourself out of the situation.

And again, just take five minutes.

A very simple thing to do if you possibly can.

I know that works, works compliance and just.

Yeah, just breathe.

Breathing.

I always find breathing very, very helpful.

Yeah, yeah.

I like all of my clients to breathe.

I found that's a real benefit.

But yeah, I mean so I think we've pretty much covered everything regarding stress from giving everyone a definition of what stress is to how to manage that stress.

We mentioned about somatic.

Was it the somatic nervous system?

I know it as the somatic therapies.

And again this is particularly relevant for neurodivergent individuals because the process is different.

So with the neurodivergic individual they tend to.

The environment is always important and we take in extra stress via the environment.

And so somatic therapy is actually a really good treatment.

Again, it's a long term treatment and it's a practice that would help in moments when you need to Cornish.

Would this be equally beneficial for people who were not neurodegen neurotypical as we.

Call it neurotransmitter beneficial for everyone.

Right.

But it's possibly more effective for someone or something to go to from neurodivergent individual and then we can get into the whole realm of mindfulness.

We do not have time to go into the whole realm of mindfulness.

Being able to get in the moment, that's the thing.

Okay, brilliant.

Thank you Claire.

And so there end another podcast.

Thanks for listening.

If you like the show, tell all your friends, drop a comment, leave us a 5 star rating if you really liked it and what we will do.

So we've talked about quite a few things, things on this podcast today which you may or may not know much about.

So things like nervous system, things like grounding, tapping, various other aspects that Claire was talking about.

What we'll do is we'll put links in the show, notes to all of those, so if you weren't watching, you'll.

You'll be able to click on the link and work out what.

What we meant.

So that's all for now.

And that's goodbye from me and bye from me.