The Missing Link to Vibrant Health: A Nurse's Radical Shift

 In this thought-provoking episode, Lea Durante, a former family nurse practitioner turned integrative health coach, shares her transformative journey from the world of traditional medicine to embracing a holistic approach to well-being. 

Drawing from her decade-long experience witnessing the gap between prescribing medications and achieving true vitality, Lea dives into the profound insights offered by polyvagal theory and the profound impact of understanding our nervous system. 

Prepare to be enlightened as Lea eloquently explains how our autonomic nervous system regulates our social behaviour, emotional responses, and overall health. 

Whether you're seeking to improve communication, foster deeper connections, or address mental health concerns, this episode offers a fresh perspective on cultivating resilience, self-awareness, and a harmonious mind-body balance.

You can connect with Lea Durante here: https://www.leadurante.com

Transcript

PMD: 0:27

Today we have a special guest. Lea Durante a former family nurse practitioner turned integrative health coach. Lea's journey is a testament to the power of integrating body, mind, and spirit for true wholeness and vitality and she'll be sharing insights into polyvagal theory and how understanding our nervous system can lead to profound shifts in our lives. Lea welcome to the transcendent minds podcast.

LD: 0:55

Peter, thank you so much for having me. I am thrilled to be here and be with your audience.

PMD: 1:00

I want to understand more about your origin story, because you spent a decade as a family nurse practitioner, prescribing medications, treating patients, but you witnessed the gap between traditional medicine and true holistic wellbeing and despite your efforts, you notice that patients struggled to achieve the vibrant health and vitality they desired. So you began to question what was missing and that led you on a journey of exploration and diving into evidence-based modalities that focused on the integration of body, mind, and spirit Can you tell us more about your journey moving from the family practitioner to turning towards an integrative health coach.

LD: 1:44

Absolutely. So I went to college and got a degree, not in nursing. And as life evolves, discovered that nursing was going to be a really impactful way for me to be in people's lives, to be on the journey of health and wellness. I really saw it as an avenue to help eliminate suffering in our world and to really work with people on a daily basis. And so I went back to school and I got my RN and my NP degree so that I was operating essentially like a physician would I'm the person that you came to in the clinic when you had a cold, when you needed your well woman checkup, when you were struggling with your diabetes or your hypertension, or headaches, or unexplained stomach pain, like I was the first stop for people, and I had the opportunity because it's primary care to work with people over long periods of time. Rather than the emergency department or just a specialty where you're seeing somebody for only one condition, and because I was in family practice, I got to see kids, and then I got to see their parents, and then I even got to sometimes see the grandparents or the cousins. So I got this really interesting view of families and health across the lifespan. And when you're first in practice, you honestly you're just trying to not kill somebody like you just want to make the right decision and not order a medication that's going to give them an electrolyte imbalance. You want to not miss the headache symptom that could be that they're having a bleed in their brain like at the beginning, there is so much to know. And it a significant responsibility to have people's lives and their health in your hands as the expert. So it wasn't until probably about five or six years into my practice and I felt more comfortable in the everyday work and I was starting to reflect that people weren't really getting better. And now I had this kind of time under my belt. So I would see, Oh wait, we worked on this anxiety two years ago and it's back and it's no different and that pill didn't help and so we prescribe another pill and all of a sudden we've tried three or four different medicines for this thing and I started to question, perhaps we have the wrong ideology happening here because if we're treating the wrong root, then we're not going to get the results that we want. So there was some of that reflection coming in for me. I was in the clinic during the pandemic. And that was a very stressful and difficult time for everyone. And I know people don't classically think of primary care as the place where a lot of folks mental health is treated. But it is about 35 percent of my visits are about mental health And I would actually argue every visit healthcare visit is about mental health because our mind, our mindset, that's why I love this, podcast, looking at what is the mind, what is, how are we approaching our health, our perspectives that influence it, and knew finally, during the pandemic, it was a place of burnout for me personally, that this wasn't working. It wasn't working for my patients. It wasn't working for me. And I had, some unfortunate interactions. I'm in the United States. I live in Idaho. I was living in California at the time. We just moved to Idaho. And just some really awful experiences with health insurance and seeing how the system really isn't set up to care for people. So that's where my journey began. Really, a love for people and a desire to see people well and getting really honest with myself that the standards of care. I'm your like classic straight A student, like I follow the book, do the things exactly right, keep up to date on the evidence, do all my continuing education I'm prescribing these medications, I'm making these referrals, and It felt a little bit like that kid's story of the emperor's new clothes where the emperor's walking around actually naked and everybody is saying, Oh, you look great. Love those robes. They're so fabulous. It started to feel a little bit empty and that it was a lot of smoke and mirrors without a lot of results.

PMD: 5:52

What were some of the initial signs or moments that made you realize there's a gap between traditional medicine and holistic wellbeing?

LD: 6:00

I think it was this ability to watch over the lifespan. So it almost became archetypal. I would see a child at seven years old with a stomach ache, and she was afraid to go to school or didn't want to go to school. And we would check for the organic causes for her stomach pain and that would be okay. And really, it would come down to kind of anxiety or stress, and we might. recommend something or not. But then I had this bird's eye view to be able to see I knew who that seven year old was going to be at 14. When she started having drama with her friends, and stress with tests, and thinking about getting into college and university, and what that stress and anxiety was gonna look like in her. Then, again, I didn't see that particular patient because I wasn't in practice that long, but you see these patterns across people. Then I saw the 38 year old woman who's got two kids, working a full time job, holding all the responsibility, and the stress and the anxiety, and how that manifests in her inability to sleep. And taking care of people in their 80s knowing, Oh, this anxiety doesn't go away with the way that you've been treated, right? Because as I'm treating the 80 year old, I'm listening to her backstory of all the therapies she's tried, medications she's tried, and I'm like, so this whole life of this woman, from 7 years old to 80, 90, we haven't been able to fix this? You're still suffering with this same stress, anxiety, overwhelm, fear that manifested physical symptoms like back pain and stomach pain and headaches and hormone imbalances. And I just knew we were missing something like we had to have a better way. And I couldn't keep doing that. I couldn't keep pretending to the seven year old that this is the solution. Here's the thing. We'll just try this. Some families are starting seven year olds on medication, but certainly by 14, parents were asking for anti anxiety or anti depressive medication for the 14 year old. And in my mind's eye, I'm like, but I know where this train goes. And that place isn't a destination that actually results in relief and healing and vibrancy and what you want and so many people really sincere, right? We see the classic thing at new year's eve, you know in pop culture new year's eve and into new year's day people making the new year's resolutions and okay this is the year i'm going to exercise i'm going to eat healthy I'm going to not scroll my phone at 10 o'clock at night and be up till two o'clock in the morning I'm going to get sleep. I'm going to start that meditation practice And In medicine, that scenario of the New Year's resolution happens all the time. Like every day, they're like, Okay, I got my blood sugar back. This is the time I'm gonna change and I'm gonna start doing, creating different habits in my life. And there was sincerity. People were truly motivated, it was an intentional desire, it was an authentic desire, it was sincere, they really wanted it, they really believed in themselves and knew the reasons why they wanted to change, but people couldn't change. And I'm like, there's gotta be a way to help us move from what we identify as a goal, or a vision, or a habit, or an ideal that we want for ourselves. And actually get us there because what I saw and what the research says is, 98 percent of those things fail.

PMD: 9:33

Yeah. One of the key things with this is that just look at the weight loss industry the recidivism rate is 95%. But it's a billion dollar industry I would imagine. And one of the key things we have to look at as an example with weight loss, or I say weight release is the subconscious mind and we have to understand what people do or say at new years is that they have a habit. They think they're going to change that. So what do they do. They flare into an initiative but what happens is that come January, come February, March you can see the attrition rate in gyms. Oh, by the third week of January, over 50. Yeah. Yeah. Then they go into over and under compensation between habit and initiative. What happens if you've got 20 to 30 years of habit it's just not going to happen because you decide to flare into initiative. Because you take that initiative habit reclaimes you, and then you look for the next shiny object syndrome or the next weight loss product. And again, you get reclaimed by habit and then you go into blame and avoidance, cause you say didn't work because of X, Y, or Z.

LD: 10:53

And we are sold that there is an expert outside of us, if I just have this pill, if I just have this program, if I just had this gym membership, even if I just had support. There's so much focus externally on either what do I need to do, what product do I need, what service do I need, or what do I need to have in order to start behavior change. So yeah, I work a lot with the nervous system, but also the subconscious mind, because 90% 90 percent of what we think, what we feel, what we do, our attitudes, our habits, are stored in that subconscious and if we are not including the subconscious mind in any health endeavor, physical, mental, emotional, you're not going to get results. And it's going to feel hard, and some people do have that kind of gripping force and willpower to make some things happen. But like you alluded to, there's the kind of the slide back into what was before. Understanding the subconscious is huge and the work I do is how our nervous system is perceiving the world around us influences how our subconscious mind selects for the important material. Through our senses both internal and external, we are exposed to 11 million bits of information at every second. That information comes through our nervous system, right? Comes through touch, through eyes, through ears, through heartbeat. And as our nervous system takes in all of this information, it's the subconscious mind that filters those 11 million bits every second and delivers the most relevant 40 to 100 bits to our conscious mind. That's all our conscious mind can process at any one moment. And so if we're not understanding how the nervous system and the subconscious mind feed together to create this filtering system of how we see the world, how we perceive the world then we miss the opportunity to use the power of these systems. If we just I joke sometimes it's like chat GPT. If you put in a poor prompt into chat GPT, you get out like word salad that sounds very much like a machine. But if you put in a good prompt, you get out different result. And that's similar when we can utilize the power of this subconscious mind to really screen for and direct our attention and our behaviors towards what we want, now we have congruence and things actually can move quickly and be easier and change and have those results that people want with a lot more ease.

PMD: 13:37

Environment plays a crucial role in our journey towards behavioral change. No matter how strong our willpower might be as an example on new year's day or any other day, motivation tends to ebb and flow. That's why it's essential to cultivate an environment that supports the changes we want to make. As an example, if you're trying to quit smoking or cut back on drinking, but you're constantly surrounded by friends who smoke and drink, it's going to be a constant battle of willpower. And they might say, oh, just one more drink or just one more cigarette won't hurt. Come on. Let's have another round. And before you know it, you're right back where you started. So it's crucial to intentionally shape our environment to align with the promises that we make. But here's the thing it's not always easy. It takes effort. It takes dedication and you've got to gradually build up the support systems and structures that reinforce the changes you want to see, but it is really about consistency. It's building density, putting the work day in and day out. Because when you cultivate and create an environment that fosters constructive habits and behaviors, it sets you on a trajectory towards your desired outcome. You're cultivating a sense of self-mastery where your inner circle and surroundings are working in harmony with your goals and that's where the real sustainable transformation happens.

LD: 15:14

Yes, so I would argue the cool thing about the nervous system is, I agree with you, let's make it easier on ourselves let's put ourselves in environments where we can make the choices that we want to make, and let's also recognize that we can't live in a bubble, and we live in the real world, and there's always going to be situations and experiences that you can't control, and you can't have that kind of direct manipulation of what's around you or who's around you, which is why the power of the nervous system is so great, because understanding how our nervous system is reading environments. So the first part is understanding your nervous system state, understanding polyvagal theory. This idea that our nervous system, we classically think about things like fight or flight. We're pretty good at identifying what a trigger is and shifting into fight or flight. But our nervous system actually has three states, not just sympathetic fight or flight and parasympathetic as we're classically taught. There's the sympathetic activation. But on the parasympathetic side, there's actually two different circuits of that vagus nerve, and one of the circuits goes to something called dorsal vagal, which is that shutdown place, that place where you can't think straight, you're confused, you could have lacked confidence, yeah, your brain fog, there's no energy, you're shut down, and really, that's the very primitive very first in our evolutionary biology and development, that was the first place that developed for protection. So that's the being stuck in the back of a cave and getting into the fetal position and shutting down and preparing for an attack. Then the sympathetic nervous system evolved about a hundred million years later after that, and we got this fight or flight ability. But then what's so cool about humans is So dorsal vagal was 500 million years ago. Sympathetic nervous system was 400 million years ago. And then 200 million years ago, as mammals evolved, an additional circuit got added in the parasympathetic nervous system. And that is the ventral vagal state. So this is where the nerve. innervates our heart and into our vocal cords, into our ears, into our face. And it's what has allowed us to become social creatures. It's what has allowed us to move from the asocial crocodile who's you're going to bite me if I come near you, to if I smile or my tone of voice, or there's a softness around my eyes, I can perceive and see that you other creature are safe to come into proximity with and we can move into tribes and communities and ultimately a global society where, on the whole we do pretty well living with each other. I know there's still a lot of violence and things that happen, but it's quite remarkable to think about the society that we've built by becoming social creatures. And no matter what environment you are in, whether you are placed yourself in a physical location that might not support the goals or the vision that you have for your life or the habit that you're trying to create, your nervous system is going to be the same no matter what environment you're in. And so when you start to know what my body feels like when I go into sympathetic activation. What my body feels like when I go into shutdown. What my body feels like when I'm in ventral vagal and safe and connected and social. And I can make those empowered choices. Now, even if you can't control the outside environment, because the reality is we can't, you have the inner wisdom to shift your nervous system state. And again, shifting our nervous system state is it's always state before story. So as we shift our nervous system state, that's almost like to continue our analogy of the chat GPT prompt. When we shift our nervous system state, we give a different prompt to the subconscious mind. So now when we're in ventral vagal at the top of the nervous system, where we're playful and connected and grounded and confident, and that is the place where our physiology is optimized. Remember our bodies know how to heal. Our bodies know how to create exactly the amount of thyroid hormone you need, it knows how to create the cells that you need to regenerate your bones and build new blood cells Our body knows we don't have to think about this. We're so grateful but this is all unconscious yeah, we can create all kinds of neurochemicals and hormones and endocannabinoids. All kinds of different chemical messengers within our body. Our body knows it's designed, it's got this incredible intelligence within it. When we are in ventral vagal, that is optimized biology. And we get the optimized biology, and that is the prompt, again, if we're going chat GPT, that signals to the subconscious mind to bring up the patterns of thought that are going to serve, again, whatever goal that we have. Rather than, this is impossible, it's never going to work, or just give up, all those self defeating stories that are also stored in our subconscious. But which one we access is influenced by the nervous system state first.

PMD: 20:24

It's also the impressions we take in because you bring up a fascinating point about how our brains process and filter the immense amount of information that we are bombarded by every single day. And we have this intricate system of sorting through millions of pieces of data, deciding what's important and filing it away for later use. But when I think about it the impressions we take in through our conscious mind gets filtered through our semi-conscious almost like a filing cabinet organizing everything, when you're trying to recall something and it feels like it's on the tip of your tongue and that's your brain rifling through those files, trying to find the right one. But here's the thing, what we don't neutralize in the semi-conscious or process consciously ends up getting expedited or stored in the unconscious where all our programming and conditioning reside, and that's why it's vital to have a dialogue with our subconscious whether it's through journaling or hypnosis or other methods. And we need to unpack those belief systems and filters that shape our perception of the world. It's like having a conversation with what I call my inner superhero team, where each part of the body represents different situation. What is your superhero team? So green part is for calmness, a yellow part is for dealing with stress and a red part is for reacting to danger. So when it comes to listening to our bodies and understanding, what is it trying to tell us? It's about tuning in and practicing self-awareness, but we need to wake up that self awareness and pay attention to those subtle signals. Maybe it's a tightness in the chest when you're stressed or a fluttering in your stomach when you're nervous. But once you recognize these cues, you can start to implement techniques to calm yourself down and that could be breath, work, mindfulness practices or finding comfort in familiar routines, like snuggling up with a favorite blanket. The key is to cultivate that inner dialogue. That inner tuition to listen to what your body's telling you and to respond with compassion and care and it's a journey of self discovery and self mastery, but with practice and patience, you can learn to navigate the ups and downs of life with greater ease and resilience. How can people start to learn to listen to their body and help them understand what their body is feeling and why, in terms of listening to the body signals, and how can they learn to calm themselves down when they're feeling stressed or scared?

LD: 23:17

Those are two great questions. Let's separate them into two separate places because I want to be conscientious of even using the word calm. Because the goal with nervous system health is really resiliency and flexibility. So I don't actually want you to be calm all the time. If you are in an emergency and you need to skedaddle out of there, I want you to have full capacity and understanding of what your body's doing to protect you or if you are in a awful experience and kind of need to emotionally shut down because there's not another way for you to get out so calm is the place of ventral vagal which is great and we want to be able to spend more of our time there again it's where our physiology is optimized and mentally and emotionally we feel well, but the goal with this work is really flexibility and resiliency. So that leads to what you first ask is like, how can people start listening to or understanding their bodies and the best way is to map your nervous system. So even if you have never heard of this, or done any work around your nervous system before the cool part is you've been living with it your whole life and so you do have direct access to the messages it's been giving you your whole life and simply with a little bit of direction, I've done this with hundreds of people, you can create a map of what dorsal vagal feels like, sympathetic activation feels like, and ventral vagal feels like for you. And once you have a map once we have that ability to know, now we can move, now we have directionality, now we have the ability to see where I am in a particular situation and respond to that situation. So it might be sympathetic stress activation and then I really like to use body based tools that neutralize the trigger, whatever it is, to get you back to the place where you can shift nervous system states. But we have the ability to shift states. And it's not so much that we need to be calm or thinking positive thoughts all the time or anything like that, but that, internally you have the resiliency and the ability to recognize where your nervous system is at, when your nervous system is at in that place, what is your subconscious mind filtering for, and now how do I shift states so that I feel better and my subconscious mind filters for the congruent thoughts, beliefs, feelings, attitudes, habits, to have my outcome. I actually have a cool quiz that people can take to find out your nervous system type. We tend to get stuck in one of those places more often than the other and then a way to map it beyond the scope of what we can do in the podcast because it takes about 20 minutes. But it only takes 20 minutes. And once you have it done, and again, your physiology is going to be with you whether you're in a boardroom, whether you're having a challenging conversation with a partner, whether you're raising a child, whether you're venturing out and trying a new hobby or a new activity that is always going to be a map that you can use to understand where you are right now in this moment, and then where do I want to be.

PMD: 26:38

So I've got this straight in terms of characterizing what you're saying. So really we're talking about regulation.

LD: 26:45

Yes.

PMD: 26:45

In terms of understanding our physiological responses to stress and emotions, and by recognizing the different states of arousal, whether it's safe or to be on alert because we're threatened, we can learn to regulate the nervous system much more effectively, which then leads to better emotional regulation and resilience and physical health.

LD: 27:12

Yes. Yes. Because heart disease is in sympathetic activation, depression, chronic pain constipation, there's so many physical aspects when we don't have the flexibility our system is designed for us to be moving throughout the day through all these different states. It's not meant to just be in one place and when you even think about like sympathetic activation, that little bit of cortisol is great when you need to get up and start your day and get going on a new project. It's not that there's one state that's better they all serve our purpose. It's when we get stuck in one that it starts to create both physical and mental health challenges and so learning that regulation, learning that ability and what I so appreciate is after spending 10 years, quote unquote, being the expert and saying you need all these things outside yourself in order to be physically healthy, mentally healthy, manage stress, you need to do 10 things a day, and you gotta journal, you gotta exercise, you gotta be outside in the sunshine, make sure you're putting your feet in the ground, make sure you're having green juice and 14 different supplements don't forget to spend some time in silence, make sure that you have good relationships with your friends, that your home is organized, all of these things that we're told that you have to do these 17 things in order to quote unquote manage stress is, really harmful to all of us because it's not possible. When do we work? When do we be in relationship? it takes all 17 of those things to be calm or not reactive to our triggers how realistic is that for any one person?

PMD: 28:52

Because it keeps people delusionary busy, not efficiently busy and there's a huge distinction between the two, because in the machinery of distraction, it inculcates people to be delusionally the busy not efficiently or effectively busy.

LD: 29:08

Agreed. Yes. And so again,, once we know our nervous system, you can switch out of stress in an instant. I teach people do it in a minute. It requires nothing more then your awareness of what's actually happening inside your nervous system, and you do that. That's all you, right? That doesn't take an expert. That doesn't take new yoga pants. It's so funny, like all the things that get marketed as like the way.

PMD: 29:32

Yeah, that's a whole, and the conversation marketing, but. Delving into the intricacies of our nervous system and its impact in our relationships. I find that a fascinating topic. So understanding concepts like polyvagal theory. I can see that it can offer profound insights into how we navigate social interactions and relationships. Let's break it down because polyvagal theory essentially explores how our autonomic nervous system regulates social behavior and emotional responses and it suggests that our nervous system has evolved to respond to various cues of safety and threat in our environment. How does this apply to improving communication, empathy, and connection in our relationships because we all want improve communication and empathy and connection.

LD: 30:33

Yeah, I love it. I love it. That's a great question. Yeah, so again, it's understanding that whether you intend to or not in every interaction you are having your nervous system is communicating what nervous system state you are in. The fake it till you make it doesn't work. You can't pretend to be calm and empathetic and connected and really want to have an intentional conversation with somebody if on the inside you are revved up in sympathetic activation. Our physiology has evolved to be really sensitive to the clues that we give. So the best way to improve relationship and communication and empathy and being able to have a challenging conversation with somebody and stay connected, not have that rupture happen, even within a challenging conversation, is learning this skill of regulation so that you can stay anchored in ventral vagal, which is the safe and social and playful and connected and caring place. And when you engage in relationship from that place, you're not having what I see a lot in relationship and conversation. So two things that happen, and again, it's a moment to moment adjustment, right? Let's say we're having a challenging conversation. Your nervous system is going to respond to the tone of her voice of the partner you're having the conversation with. So if the tone of voice comes off sharp or dismissive or something like that your nervous system is going to respond to that. Maybe that shuts you down a little bit because you want to protect yourself. You're not quite sure if that tone of voice is something that you are able to, engage with. So it is the moment to moment awareness to go, oh wow, the way he just spoke to me started to move me into shutdown. And then I can ask myself the question, but am I okay? Yeah, again, nervous system, millisecond, instantaneous, these are the things that are going to protect us from the predators it's been, evolving over millions of years to respond in an instant. But this is where we can use our conscious mind to go, Oh, I just started to shut down based on his tone of voice. Am I actually okay? Was it actually a tone of voice? Do I know that he actually loves me and cares about me and that was a tone of voice reaction. Now I can take a deep breath and reorient back to, I'm safe. We're connected. And hey, that tone of voice, when you speak to me in that tone of voice, it's difficult for me to stay open and engaged in this conversation. Rather than what I see is the tone of voice happens, again, it's all so automatic. We just shut down, say, I'm fine, whatever, move on, whatever you want, and you've lost the moment of connection. Is that helpful?

PMD: 33:29

Yes. That's very helpful. You're absolutely right. But when we experienced triggers that activate our historical mechanisms, we often respond with reactive patterns that stem from past experiences and these patterns can manifest in a variety of ways, such as sulking or withdrawing from a conversation during an argument, it's like a default response that's ingrained in us often without us realizing it. And in situations like these one person silence can dominate the conversation it's like becoming their way of winning or exerting control and this behavior may be rooted in past traumas or conditioning where silence served as a coping mechanism or a means of self protection. But I see this is where polyvagal theory comes into play offering a valuable framework for understanding the impact of trauma on the nervous system. Because trauma essentially disrupts our body's natural response to perceived threats, leading to dysregulation in the autonomic nervous system. And it also helps us understand how trauma can affect our physiological responses particularly in terms of how we navigate states of safety shut down because I see in trauma survivors this dysregulation manifests as heightened reactivity, hypervigilance or even disassociation. So the question that comes up in me is what kind of framework does polyvagal theory offer for understanding the impact of trauma in the nervous system because I'm really looking at how does the body respond to perceive threats because I've seen trauma survivors can develop strategies for healing and recovery.

LD: 35:24

Yes, for resiliency. We're built for resiliency. And if you really think about the human race has gone through a lot of trauma it's a traumatic experience to be a human and so our evolution and our biology has been, preparing us for this. I think there's a lot of therapists that work with polyvagal theory for people who have gone through significant trauma, and it is really helpful because it connects them back to their body to understand what the response is that they're having and then again, the whole beauty of this is once you have the map you can now move to the other place. Yes, awful, horrible, horrific things happened. What I like to remind people is, even if you can't touch that state right now of feeling really relaxed and connected and empathetic and playful and social and safe, It always exists in your nervous system. It's always a possibility to be there. Our body wants us to get back to there. We don't have to stay stuck in the shutdown place. We gently, and that's why I work with people, working in the moments of your day, working moment to moment, day to day, that when you start to notice that shift, again, maybe it's just the change of a tone of voice of somebody, or the email that you get, or the traffic that you're stuck in, or the concern that your child isn't reading at the level that they should be reading at. Our environment is going to give us ample opportunity to be reading our nervous system state, as well as ample opportunity to connect to ventral vagal. So we focus so much on the trigger and what I really help people to identify is if we can get really good at recognizing what's called a glimmer, which is these environmental cues that everything is okay, then we can regulate and keep a home base in ventral vagal. And we can visit the other places and we can have access to the other places when we need them, but we can spend the majority of our time in that ventral state. The reason it's so helpful for people who've been through really awful things is knowing that place still exists within them where things are okay. And like bit by bit, we can get you back to there. This is not a final sentence.

PMD: 37:47

I want to understand how the nervous system regulates arousal levels, because I think that's critical in addressing mental health concerns and what I can see is that polyvagal theory offers valuable insights into this process because it suggests that individuals with anxiety may have a dysregulated autonomic nervous system thereby leading to chronic activation of the sympathetic fight or flight response. And by recognizing this dysregulation then therapeutic interventions can focus on restoring balance to the nervous system through techniques such as deep breathing, mindfulness, grounding exercises. And my question here is with polyvagal theory, what are the implications for various mental health conditions such as anxiety,PTSD autism,spectrum disorders.

LD: 38:54

What's really interesting to see is when your nervous system is in ventral vagal, you aren't experiencing anxiety. I'm very careful with the labels of diagnoses because I think diagnoses they can be helpful for explaining some things, but then they can also become an identification let's just take anxiety for example. So anxiety is actually the state that lives within the sympathetic nervous system, we would consider it actually adaptive, like it warned you if something is problematic or could be troublesome. It makes you like reexamine is this something I need to be worried about? Sometimes it makes you move into action, right? That can be a good thing. If you're looking at habit change and it's so interesting the way that they define anxiety, right? It's six months of generalized anxiety disorder, six months of perpetual worrying that's impacting your daily life and it's why is it six months and not four months or nine months? It's a very arbitrary number and the way I would say it is a place where we are stuck in the sympathetic place, like you described, distracted, busy, chronically conditioned to see, worry, and perceive threat, and to be concerned about what other people are thinking about us, or how to use that subconscious mind and that imagination to fear the future rather than the reality that we don't know exactly what's going to happen in the future. But when those things get repeated over and over, then that's where it moves into the neural networks of the brain and the subconscious and it just becomes the record or the tape that gets played. But we always have the different nervous system states. So I think it can be really hopeful for people that just because you're stuck looping in the sympathetic place of anxiety, your nervous system, ventral vagal still exists and you can learn how to shift out of those loops and back into ventral vagal. So it's not a life sentence, if you will because again, what I experienced with my clinic is we just labeled people as anxious and put some band aids on there, and then put band aids on the physical, because it is uncomfortable, and it's difficult, and it's hard to have a productive life if you're feeling anxious all the time, and I can't tell you the amount of quote unquote look very successful on the outside, but on the inside are really struggling. We always have the potential to move out of that stuck place So that's where I talk about resiliency a lot in that flexibility.

PMD: 41:31

Yes, that's a very important aspect of it and I wish we had more time to go into it because I think resilience is a huge topic to talk about. And here I'm thinking about parents and parenting and educators and caregivers and in education because I can see that they can all benefit from understanding polyvagal theory too creating or facilitating environments that can promote psychological safety and support healthy, nervous system development in children. But how do we do that?

LD: 42:06

How do we do that? You learn how to live in ventral vagal. When you are in ventral vagal, you are communicating to all the nervous systems, whether they are four years old or eight years old or 14 years old or 18 years old, that this is a safe place. I'm a safe person. This is a safe place. And again, safe, that word is so used in pop culture, I feel like today so this is a connected place. This is an easeful place. This is a grounded place. This is a place where you are worthy and loved and seen but the challenge is this really tricky line. Cause if you're a teacher, let's just use a teacher for example, and you're stressed out. Because you're worried about your bills. You've got something going on with your kid. You have got that annoying email from the principal and you disagree with the way that what they're doing at the school. You can smile, you can put a smile on your face and stand in front of that class and teach, but if your body is in sympathetic activation. If you're anxious if underneath, again, we're talking about millions of bits of data all the time that those children are perceiving through how they listen, how they see the facial muscles on your face, even the heart capacity that you have in that moment, you can't fake it. You can't pretend, you can't want to be a, quote unquote, safe place for the children in your classroom, unless you are truly that yourself first.

PMD: 43:36

And here you have to cultivate a safe space, a psychological safe space in order for it to be a brave space so those children can be fully self-expressed because in effect they are reading your lights, just like animals do.

LD: 43:52

That is the nervous system. Again, it is perceiving everything in the environment all the time. And then the kid is going to do something in the class that totally triggers you because you get to be a human too. So it's about recognizing, Oh, that child. Again, I don't know where it came from, I don't know why I react that way, but something in the way that this interaction with this kid made me start to get angry, right? Start to move into sympathetic. Before I go have a conversation, I have to re regulate myself. I have to move back into ventral vagal, as the responsible adult in this situation, to have a truly connected, empathetic, supportive, and helpful interaction with that child, rather than just, you didn't do your homework and we need to see you do better.

PMD: 44:43

So it's compassion, connection conversation and it's all within.

LD: 44:48

And it's all within. So it's all within.

PMD: 44:52

Yes, but so there's a fine line between facilitating a process and manipulating a process because one explores and the other exploits. So we have to be careful where that fine line is. So how can you have empathy or recognize empathy to assay and develop that environment for those children given the state you may be in.

LD: 45:21

The nervous system is what we call neuroseptic. It's reading these bits of information that you don't even have conscious control over. You don't realize, but our nervous systems are constantly co regulating. We're constantly reading. This is how we survive. This is how we moved into being come social creatures. Is constantly reading the nervous systems of other people around us to know we're okay. That's why I like the phrase, am I okay?

PMD: 45:47

So, is there a mutual co shaping that goes on and a co-regulation.

LD: 45:51

Yes.

PMD: 45:52

And in terms of clinical practice and for mental health professionals, counselors and therapists, how can they apply polyvagal theory in clinical practice to inform assessment, treatment planning, and interventions?

LD: 46:08

Lots of them do. So it's very popular within mental health and therapy, and I would actually encourage if you're going to do, especially as you alluded to the patterns of thought that we get into, if you're looking at therapy, make sure that you are working with somebody who understands the physiology in the body, because just repetitive talk about your problems. It's not going to help you change or solve. It's not going to take into account the subconscious mind or the nervous system. So I think anyone looking at any sort of modality for change, so important to include someone who understands the subconscious mind. It's 90 percent of us. I know it seems so hard to believe, but it's 90 percent of our behaviors and our feelings and our thoughts.

PMD: 46:52

I know we're up against time. Cause I know you had another meeting, but to conclude, do you have any parting words and where can people find you?

LD: 47:00

One, I would just like to offer your audience, because I know folks who listen to podcasts are interested in learning and curious. I have a great two minute quiz on my website leahduranty. com forward slash quiz. Two minutes, super illuminating, and it will give you your nervous system type. So where you spend the most of your day, and then what follows is a way to Learn these processes for mapping your nervous system and shifting your state so that you can be empowered with this information and again, that's on my website I'm on instagram at Lea dot Durante dot NP and LinkedIn Lea Durante NP and folks who are looking for support with stress burnout, overworking, anxiety, loneliness. I have a signature four month program that supports this work of your subconscious mind, your nervous system and we do it together virtually in a group because we are social beings. And it's been really impactful to see people take ownership of their health and make dramatic changes in both physical and mental health.

PMD: 48:08

Beautiful. Would you like to come back at some time?

LD: 48:10

I would love to come back. I'm sorry we've a shorter for time today.

PMD: 48:14

Because I think this has formed the basis for a much deeper conversation and I would love to have you back on the show at some point. I know you've got to scoot cause I heard the ping. So you have someone waiting and we'll connect again.

LD: 48:27

We will okay. Take care.