"7 Key Signs Your Nervous System is in Fright Flight"

AND What You Can Do About it

Your body is amazing, even if you don’t think so. Even if you feel like it doesn’t like you, it’s still amazing. Your body is always doing its best to keep you functioning as best it can despite;

·         What you do or don’t eat

·         Working crazy hours and getting home late

·         Whether you exercise or not

·         If you take time to connect with friends or family, or not

·         If you stay up late repetitiously

·         Drink soft drink, energy drinks, coffee or alcohol and the list goes on.

Your body is always accommodating or adapting to your choices to keep you going. Some of these choices are of your own choosing, others happen to you. These ‘choices’ or ‘happenings’ when they pile up can tip your system into ‘Fright – Flight’ mode, also known as sympathetic dominance, or overload. This is your body’s way of keeping going and pressing onward. Unfortunately, there are consequences of continually pushing and pushing and getting wound up.

Understanding the “3T’s” That Lead to Sympathetic Dominance, Fright Flight

The physical, chemical, and emotional stressors that build up in the body, we call “The 3T’s” of nervous system stress. Also known as: Trauma (physical stressors); Toxins (chemical stressors); and Thoughts (emotional stressors). It is when these stressors accumulate over time that your sympathetic nervous system is overloaded and you begin to notice seemingly insignificant signs like crankiness, diarrhoea or insomnia.

Physical Stressors: Motor vehicle collisions, repetitious sitting for work or recreation, carrying children one sided, concussion/s, birth intervention or a multitude of traumas can create tension patterns that interfere with healthy nervous system function and energy regulation.

Chemical Stressors: Packaged foods, Seed oils, fragrances, mould, sugar, caffeine, alcohol and even cortisol (the stress hormone) from the stress overload of your body’s detoxification pathways itself.

Emotional Stressors: Relationship pressures, family concerns, job worries plus more all add to increasing our levels of firing of the sympathetic nervous system leading to sympathetic dominance.

Technology, now adds an extra dimension of stress, capturing your brain’s focus and further dysregulating your nervous system.

The Signs that You Are in Sympathetic Dominance - Fright Flight

Our central nervous system is the master control system and is composed of our motor, sensory and autonomic nervous system (ANS). The autonomic nervous system is made up of our sympathetic, fright flight, and the parasympathetic, rest, repair, reproduce, calm and chill nervous system.

Both should be working in harmony and balanced, so we have either one ready to go at any moment. The problem is the ‘3Ts’ can overload the sympathetic nervous system and cause a multitude of problems for you.

These 7 signs below are key in being able to recognise if you have tipped over one side TOO MUCH, meaning you are in SYMPATHETIC Dominance.

1.      High Blood Pressure: You may not know even your blood pressure is high, however you may experience, headaches, migraines, light headedness, dizziness or tiredness as a result

2.      Anxiousness: Small things that don’t usually or shouldn’t cause you to worry, cause you to fret or be over-concerned about them

3.      Sleep Disturbances: Hard to get to sleep, hard to stay asleep, hard to get back to sleep, not waking refreshed, vivid dreams, not dreaming at all, hard to get comfortable in bed

4.      Bowel Changes: Bloating, diarrhoea, constipation, tummy pain, intermittent runny and hard poops

5.      Tired, but Wired: You are super tired but still have every tab open in your brain, it feels like you are forever running from one thing to the next or charging into life like a rhino and can’t slow down AND just so tired all at the same time

6.      Indigestion / Heartburn / Reflux: That burning feeling in your chest, it may feel like an anxiety attack or acid in the back of your throat

7.      Difficulty Focusing: Staying on task is tough, you read the same sentence multiple times without it sticking, you can’t see a project through, maybe it’s even difficult to remember what you were just talking about.

Unfortunately, if Sympathetic Dominance remains STUCK, if the accelerator pedal remains pushed down, then NEUROLOGICAL CONFUSION results. This can look like; fatigue, difficulty in getting or staying asleep, mood swings, decision making is hard, instability, clumsiness, frustration, poor motor tone and poor coordination.

It doesn’t stop there. When the body is out of gas, when it’s tanked, then it falls of a cliff. The sympathetic cliff. The result is NEUROLOGICAL EXHAUSTION. This is where things get bleak. Depleted immunity and susceptibility to all sorts of cold, flus and infections, brain fog, little to no concentration, exhausted, depression, lack of empathy and loss of social connection.

It’s Likely the ROOT CAUSE is Your Nervous System Is STUCK

If you’ve tried every vitamin, supplement, mineral, sleep hack, energy drink, and fitness trend out there and still feel wound up and anxious, you’re probably stuck in survival mode because your nervous system is stuck there, too.

No amount of caffeine, Vitamin B12, or slaying early morning workouts can override a chronically stressed and subluxated nervous system. If your accelerator is always “stuck on” and your “brake pedal” isn’t working, neurological exhaustion and burnout is inevitable.

We Can Now Accurately Measure the Health of Your Autonomic Nervous System

At House of Chiropractic, we have state of the art INSiGHT Scanners. One of these scanners is called the Neuropulse and it can measure if you are in Sympathetic Dominance, Neurological Confusion or Neurological Exhaustion. It’s safe, quick and reliable. Our team is highly trained in how to use the scanners and have spent countless hours learning how to report on the findings. We can find out quickly if your nervous system is stuck and what stage of overdrive or fatigue it is stuck in.

You CAN Get Your Nervous System Back in Balance

Neurologically-Focused Chiropractic Care addresses the root causes of dysregulation in your nervous system, restoring your body’s natural rhythms and reducing dependency on external stimulants, like caffeine and energy drinks.

This approach recognizes that your nervous system is the master regulator of your emotions, energy, focus, hormones, sleep, and digestion, literally everything. When it’s in sympathetic dominance no amount of vitamins can override it.

Chronic stress, birth trauma, technology overload, relationship rifts, carrying babies on the hip, it all adds up. These are the “3 T’s” we talked about above: Trauma, Toxins, and Thoughts. Without you even realising, they quietly drive your nervous system into overdrive and then exhaustion.

Moving from Wound Up to Thriving

If you’re sick of being tired and wired, it’s time to go deeper. It’s time to look to the nervous system. That’s where Neurologically-Focused Chiropractic Care comes in, and at House of Chiropractic, this is our jam. It’s the missing link to finally getting you back in balance.

If you’re ready to stop chasing surface-level solutions and get to the real root cause of your tired and wired state, reach out to us today.

You deserve brain clarity, emotional balance, and vitality that allows you the life you were created to live.

If you’d like to know more or to see if we can help, simply call us in Albury on 02 6009 0999.