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When Life Goes Sideways: What Nervous System Regulation Actually Looks Like in Real Life | Episode 24 · The Brain Dump

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_00: Hi, I'm Sandy Boone, therapist, coach, and nervous system educator with 30 years in the health care and mental health fields.
• 0:06
  SPEAKER_00: I built two practices, got diagnosed with ADHD at 50, and learned the hard way that healers need healing to.
• 0:12
  SPEAKER_00: I help female therapists and healers regulate their nervous systems, reclaim their lives, and stop being everyone's everything.
• 0:18
  SPEAKER_00: Welcome to the brain dump with Sandy Boone.
• 0:35
  SPEAKER_00: Not the nice clean tidy version or the Instagram version where someone has a hard week and comes out the other side with a beautiful lesson and a five-step framework and everything wrapped up in a bow.
• 0:46
  SPEAKER_00: The real version.
• 0:47
  SPEAKER_00: The version where you're recording this in the middle of it, still tired, still not fully back, and still going, because that's where I am right now.
• 0:56
  SPEAKER_00: And I think you need to hear what it looks like when someone who teaches nervous system regulation has her nervous system tested by real life.
• 1:04
  SPEAKER_00: Here's what happened.
• 1:05
  SPEAKER_00: Monday night, my husband and I were at the doggy emergency room with our dog Rudy.
• 1:10
  SPEAKER_00: We didn't get home until five in the morning on Tuesday.
• 1:14
  SPEAKER_00: Rudy is still not feeling great.
• 1:16
  SPEAKER_00: Sleep since then has been interrupted because when your dog is sick, you're aware of every sound he makes at two in the morning.
• 1:22
  SPEAKER_00: And I still had a full week to show up for.
• 1:28
  SPEAKER_00: Not from a place of having it all figured out, but from a place of being a person with a nervous system who got knocked sideways on a Monday night and has been managing the aftermath ever since.
• 1:38
  SPEAKER_00: And I think there's actually more use to that than the tighter version.
• 1:42
  SPEAKER_00: Let me tell you what happened in my body first, because this is the part that matters the most.
• 1:47
  SPEAKER_00: I went numb, not panicked or activated and spinning, numb, which is a very common nervous system response to something unexpected and stressful that happens in the middle of the night when your options are limited and your brain is already tired.
• 2:03
  SPEAKER_00: Numb is protective.
• 2:04
  SPEAKER_00: It's your system going, This is a lot, and we're going to dial down the emotional processing right now because we need to function and we can't do both simultaneously.
• 2:14
  SPEAKER_00: A lot of people experience that numbing response and interpret it as something is wrong with them.
• 2:20
  SPEAKER_00: They say it's evidence that they don't care enough or that they're broken or that they should be feeling more.
• 2:25
  SPEAKER_00: Your nervous system knows exactly what it's doing.
• 2:29
  SPEAKER_00: Sometimes numbing is exactly the right response.
• 2:32
  SPEAKER_00: It gets you through the ER waiting room at two in the morning, it gets you through the conversation with the veterinary and it gets you home.
• 2:39
  SPEAKER_00: The feelings come later, and that's okay.
• 2:42
  SPEAKER_00: Here's what the rest of Tuesday looked like.
• 2:44
  SPEAKER_00: I got home at five in the morning.
• 2:47
  SPEAKER_00: I assessed as honestly as I could from the inside the fog of no sleep what actually had to happen that day.
• 2:53
  SPEAKER_00: And I canceled my first two clients of the morning.
• 2:56
  SPEAKER_00: I want to pause on that for a second because the version of me from several years ago would not have done that.
• 3:02
  SPEAKER_00: The version of me who was seeing 30 clients a week and white knuckling everything would have pushed through, would have shown up, run on adrenaline and caffeine, done the sessions, and paid for it later in ways that weren't visible in the moment.
• 3:15
  SPEAKER_00: I didn't do that.
• 3:17
  SPEAKER_00: I canceled.
• 3:18
  SPEAKER_00: Not all of my clients.
• 3:20
  SPEAKER_00: The ones I could reschedule, I rescheduled.
• 3:23
  SPEAKER_00: The ones I couldn't, I showed up for.
• 3:25
  SPEAKER_00: But I made a triage decision based on what my system could actually hold, not based on what I thought I was supposed to be able to do.
• 3:33
  SPEAKER_00: I also had a meeting at lunch.
• 3:36
  SPEAKER_00: It was a meeting that, if I'm being honest, was not going to fall apart if I wasn't there.
• 3:40
  SPEAKER_00: So I skipped it.
• 3:41
  SPEAKER_00: It wasn't because I didn't care about it or that it didn't matter to me.
• 3:45
  SPEAKER_00: It was because I needed the brain space more than I needed to be in that room.
• 3:49
  SPEAKER_00: And I have learned finally to make that calculation without drowning in guilt about it afterwards.
• 3:56
  SPEAKER_00: The afternoon clients I did, and I did okay.
• 3:59
  SPEAKER_00: Not brilliantly, but okay.
• 4:02
  SPEAKER_00: Which is what okay looks like on a Tuesday when you haven't slept and your dog is sick and you're running on the particular kind of determination that comes from knowing you made it this far, and you can make it a few more hours.
• 4:12
  SPEAKER_00: After that, I ate dinner.
• 4:14
  SPEAKER_00: An actual dinner, not whatever was easiest, not fast food junk, an actual meal.
• 4:21
  SPEAKER_00: I hydrated and I did nothing that wasn't necessary and I went to bed.
• 4:26
  SPEAKER_00: And then Rudy had a rough night, so I had a rough night.
• 4:30
  SPEAKER_00: And I woke up on Wednesday, still tired, still in it, but still managing.
• 4:35
  SPEAKER_00: I haven't caffeinated yet today.
• 4:37
  SPEAKER_00: Here's what I want you to notice about the sequence of events.
• 4:41
  SPEAKER_00: I did not crash, I did not spiral, I did not push through everything on adrenaline and collapse in a heat on a Friday.
• 4:49
  SPEAKER_00: I made small, consistent decisions to protect my capacity, one decision at a time, based on what my system was actually telling me, not based on what I thought I should be able to handle.
• 5:00
  SPEAKER_00: That is a nervous system literacy applied to a Tuesday.
• 5:04
  SPEAKER_00: That is what 30 years of learning to listen to your body looks like in practice.
• 5:09
  SPEAKER_00: And also, pro tip, always have extra bleach in the house.
• 5:13
  SPEAKER_00: You just never know.
• 5:15
  SPEAKER_00: I want to talk about what was actually different this week compared to how I would have handled something like this in the past, because I think that's probably the most useful part to my listeners.
• 5:24
  SPEAKER_00: The biggest difference was that I was more willing to call it a day than I would have been before.
• 5:29
  SPEAKER_00: And while that sounds simple, it's not simple when you've been training professionally and personally to equate showing up with value.
• 5:36
  SPEAKER_00: To believe that pushing through is character and resting is weakness.
• 5:41
  SPEAKER_00: To run the calculation where canceling something means you failed rather than it means you listened.
• 5:46
  SPEAKER_00: I used to run that calculation the wrong way almost every time.
• 5:51
  SPEAKER_00: What changed is not that my life got easier or that I stopped having hard weeks.
• 5:56
  SPEAKER_00: What changed is I stopped treating my nervous system signals as obstacles to override and started treating them as information to act on.
• 6:03
  SPEAKER_00: When my body went numb on Monday night, I didn't fight it.
• 6:07
  SPEAKER_00: I played games on my iPad while we waited for hours in the vet ER.
• 6:12
  SPEAKER_00: I let it do what it needed to do to get through the immediate situation.
• 6:16
  SPEAKER_00: When I woke up on Tuesday morning, having not slept, I didn't ask myself what I was supposed to be able to do.
• 6:23
  SPEAKER_00: I asked myself what could I actually do?
• 6:26
  SPEAKER_00: Those are different questions and they lead to very different days.
• 6:30
  SPEAKER_00: I also want to name something that is so easy to say and hard to do.
• 6:34
  SPEAKER_00: I ate well and I hydrated intentionally.
• 6:38
  SPEAKER_00: Certainly not because I felt like it.
• 6:40
  SPEAKER_00: Certainly not because it was convenient, but because I know in my body and my brain that food and water are not optional supports when your system is under stress.
• 6:49
  SPEAKER_00: They are the foundation.
• 6:51
  SPEAKER_00: If I skip them, everything else gets harder.
• 6:54
  SPEAKER_00: My thinking gets cloudy, my emotional regulation gets worse, my capacity to hold space for other people drops significantly.
• 7:02
  SPEAKER_00: This is not wellness culture talking, and this is basic biology.
• 7:06
  SPEAKER_00: Your brain needs glucose to function, your nervous system needs hydration to regulate, and when you are under stress, you burn through both faster.
• 7:15
  SPEAKER_00: So you have to replace them more intentionally, not less.
• 7:19
  SPEAKER_00: Not a protocol, it's a non-negotiable.
• 7:22
  SPEAKER_00: Let me give you something you can actually use the next time life goes sideways on you.
• 7:26
  SPEAKER_00: And it will.
• 7:27
  SPEAKER_00: That's not pessimism, it's just math.
• 7:29
  SPEAKER_00: Here's what I actually did this week distilled into something you can reach for when you need it.
• 7:35
  SPEAKER_00: Step one, assess what's actually happening in your body right now.
• 7:39
  SPEAKER_00: Not what you think you should be feeling, not what you felt the last time something hard happened, because unfortunately with Sweet Rudy, this is our third ER visit in three years.
• 7:49
  SPEAKER_00: What is happening right now?
• 7:51
  SPEAKER_00: Are you numb, activated, flooded, flat?
• 7:56
  SPEAKER_00: The answer to that question tells you what you need next.
• 7:59
  SPEAKER_00: You cannot skip this step to get to anything useful.
• 8:02
  SPEAKER_00: Step two, triage ruthlessly.
• 8:05
  SPEAKER_00: Ask yourself what actually has to happen today, not what's on the calendar or what you committed to three weeks ago when you had no idea this week was coming.
• 8:14
  SPEAKER_00: What if it does not happen today will cause actual harm?
• 8:18
  SPEAKER_00: Everything else is negotiable.
• 8:20
  SPEAKER_00: Step three, meet your basic needs first, not last.
• 8:24
  SPEAKER_00: Eat something real, drink water.
• 8:26
  SPEAKER_00: If you can sleep, sleep.
• 8:28
  SPEAKER_00: A dysregulated body on no food and no water cannot regulate itself out of stress.
• 8:33
  SPEAKER_00: It's not a mindset problem.
• 8:35
  SPEAKER_00: It's a resource problem.
• 8:37
  SPEAKER_00: Give your system the resources it needs before you ask it to perform.
• 8:41
  SPEAKER_00: Step four, do what is necessary and call it a day.
• 8:45
  SPEAKER_00: Not what's impressive or what proves you're okay, what is absolutely necessary, and then stop.
• 8:51
  SPEAKER_00: The version of you that shows up at 60% and calls it a day is not failing.
• 8:56
  SPEAKER_00: That version of you is protecting your 60% so it can be 80% tomorrow.
• 9:01
  SPEAKER_00: Pushing to 100 today and having nothing left tomorrow is not strength.
• 9:06
  SPEAKER_00: It is math that does not work.
• 9:08
  SPEAKER_00: Step five, reassess tomorrow.
• 9:11
  SPEAKER_00: Not tonight, not at two in the morning when Rudy is restless and you're lying there catastrophizing.
• 9:17
  SPEAKER_00: Tomorrow, when you've had at least some sleep and some food, and you can reassess where you are and what the next day needs.
• 9:23
  SPEAKER_00: That's it.
• 9:24
  SPEAKER_00: That's the whole framework.
• 9:26
  SPEAKER_00: It's not elegant and it's certainly not sexy.
• 9:29
  SPEAKER_00: It's not a trademark system.
• 9:31
  SPEAKER_00: It's what actually works when you're in the middle of something real and you need to keep going.
• 9:36
  SPEAKER_00: I want to give you explicit permission to do what I did this week.
• 9:40
  SPEAKER_00: Permission to cancel things you do not absolutely have to do.
• 9:44
  SPEAKER_00: Permission to skip the meeting that isn't essential.
• 9:47
  SPEAKER_00: Permission to go numb when the situation calls for it and not interpret that as evidence that something is wrong with you.
• 9:54
  SPEAKER_00: Permission to eat dinner and go to bed instead of pushing through the evening to prove you're okay.
• 9:59
  SPEAKER_00: Permission to show up at 60% and call that enough.
• 10:02
  SPEAKER_00: Permission to still be in it, not have it resolved, and yet show up anyway because the being in it is the most useful thing you can offer someone who's in it also.
• 10:12
  SPEAKER_00: Here's what I want you to understand.
• 10:15
  SPEAKER_00: Nervous system regulation is not something you do when things are calm.
• 10:19
  SPEAKER_00: It's something you practice so that when things go sideways, you have a reservoir to draw from.
• 10:24
  SPEAKER_00: You have responses available that aren't just push through or collapse.
• 10:28
  SPEAKER_00: That reservoir takes years to build.
• 10:31
  SPEAKER_00: Trust me, I know.
• 10:33
  SPEAKER_00: It is built in exactly the moments I described this week.
• 10:36
  SPEAKER_00: The small decisions, the canceled appointments, the skipped meetings, the actual dinner, the early bedtime, and the willingness to call it a day.
• 10:46
  SPEAKER_00: None of those feel like regulation in the moment.
• 10:48
  SPEAKER_00: They feel like giving up.
• 10:50
  SPEAKER_00: They are not giving up.
• 10:52
  SPEAKER_00: They are the practice.
• 10:53
  SPEAKER_00: And for those of you who say I should have canceled my whole day, maybe I should have.
• 10:58
  SPEAKER_00: However, I'll tell you, I felt like I showed up just fine for my clients.
• 11:03
  SPEAKER_00: We still had breakthroughs.
• 11:04
  SPEAKER_00: And if I had to do it again, I would have done the same thing.
• 11:09
  SPEAKER_00: I was checking in with myself every moment before every one of those sessions.
• 11:14
  SPEAKER_00: And I encourage you to do the same.
• 11:16
  SPEAKER_00: Rudy is still not a hundred percent, and neither am I this week.
• 11:20
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm recording this anyway because I think there's more value in hearing what an off-kilter week actually looks like for someone who teaches this stuff than in hearing another polished episode from a place of having it all figured out.
• 11:34
  SPEAKER_00: I certainly don't always have it figured out.
• 11:37
  SPEAKER_00: What I have is a set of skills I've built over a long time that help me navigate the weeks when I don't.
• 11:42
  SPEAKER_00: And that's what I want for you too.
• 11:45
  SPEAKER_00: Not perfection or immunity from hard weeks.
• 11:48
  SPEAKER_00: A nervous system that has enough resources and enough trust in itself to get you through them without destroying everything you've built in the process.
• 11:57
  SPEAKER_00: Always have extra bleach, always have a vet you trust, and always, always be willing to call it a day.
• 12:04
  SPEAKER_00: Thanks for being here.
• 12:06
  SPEAKER_00: If something resonated, check the show notes.
• 12:09
  SPEAKER_00: You'll find a link to grab my free guide, 50 Things I Do to Calm My Freaking Nervous System, which is essentially the longer version of everything I just described.
• 12:17
  SPEAKER_00: And if you're curious about neurofeedback and what it can do for your own nervous system resilience, that information is in the show notes too.
• 12:25
  SPEAKER_00: Come find me on Instagram at the Sandy Boon.
• 12:28
  SPEAKER_00: And if you're a healing professional looking for a community that actually feels good to be in, come join us in the Rooted Calm Collective on Facebook.
• 12:35
  SPEAKER_00: It's a space built for support, nervous system tips, and building your best life as a healer without the drama.
• 12:42
  SPEAKER_00: Links for everything are in the show notes.