5 Signs of Nervous System Healing (That Don't Feel Like Healing!) | Dr Jacob Ambrose

0:00Dr Jacob Ambrose:Ultra running shoes are all about space. The space to go further. To feel better. To do something you never thought possible. And this space starts with Ultra Fit. Unlike traditional running shoes, Ultra Fit gives toes more room to move naturally. So every step is strong, balanced, and comfortable. Whatever you're lacing up for, stay out there. With Ultra. Shop now at ultrarunning.com. That's A-L-T-R-A running dot com. With ADHD and autism, they've been performing for the most part of their life. People say, wow, you are actually able to do something that we find worthy in our eyes. The sad thing that's happening behind the scenes is that that same individual is actually not being loved for who they are, but for what they can do.

0:46What would you say to someone who has spent their whole life believing that they're too sensitive, emotional, lazy, or simply too much? It was always your environment that wounded you, an environment that didn't understand that these gifts that you've had where things that were always meant to be blossoming into the world. A lot of people with ADHD can feel like they're too much. You were sold that story before you even knew it was true. If your whole life has been powered by fear, what replaces it? That is a really good connection to the nervous system. It is all about either. Can I have just a second of your time?

1:19If this podcast has helped you understand your brain or made you feel less alone, can you do me one favor? Can you hit the follow button? And I'll repay the favor by continuing to book the best and most exclusive conversations on this topic. Please enjoy the episode and always remember, you're not broken, just different, and you have always been enough.

1:40Dr. J, welcome back. It's good to be here. Good to be back. We see a lot online and on social media, people talk about their nervous system is healing. But as a psychologist, from your perspective, what does that actually mean? That's a fantastic question because I think a lot of people get confused when they hear about nervous system regulation. They think, does that just mean being calm? And it's not quite just being calm. It's a little bit about finding the correct prediction model for how to respond to reality. So I'll be a little more specific about that. If you're next to a bear and you feel calm, that is a big problem.

2:17But if you're trying to talk to someone on a date and you want to feel calm but you feel extremely nervous, that's also a problem. So nervous system regulation is basically finding a way to have your natural reactions to the world respond in an effective way. And that's typically what people get confused. They think nervous system regulation means calm, when in reality, it means responding effectively to reality. Wow. Okay. So this is super interesting. And if someone's listening and they're thinking, do I have a regulated nervous system or not? What does a dysregulated nervous system look like in reality?

2:51Great, great question. Yeah. Yeah. So when looking at the nervous system, you can really look at it into two separate poles. You have the sympathetic nervous system, which is all about dysregulated. You're very activated in a way. You feel as though your heart's racing, you're nervous. But when you look at the parasympathetic nervous system, that's all about rest and digest. So if you're asking, what does it look like when somebody has a dysregulated nervous system? Their nervous system is basically in a state of go when it needs to rest and stop. And it's feeling as though it needs to, you know, slow down when it needs to speed up.

3:25And a lot of people run into that issue when they're dysregulated in social situations, when it comes to relationships, when it comes to work. So trying to find that balance really looks like trying to recreate experiences. Because one of the things that I think helps clients the most when they're trying to navigate their nervous system is learning that the nervous system is something that responds based on experiences. We have two parts of the brain. We have the rational brain that's all about the present moment. It's kind of like this whiteboard in our head that we use to manipulate information, go about our day.

3:57But we also have this very reptilian side that's connected to the nervous system. And that's the part of us that learns based on experience. If I touch a hot stove and I learn that the hot stove is not going to feel good when I touch it, you're going to physiologically feel unwell as your hand approaches it. But if you're finding that you're feeling unwell in the wrong circumstances, that's where the problem starts. That's where the dysregulation happens. What are the knock-on effects, like the consequences of someone who might have a dysregulated nervous system but not realizing? In practical reality, what does that life look like for someone?

4:32Oh, yeah. A lot of people can have just this chronic experience of feeling overwhelmed, so much so that overwhelm starts to feel like the norm. You might go about your day and you might be scanning. You might be vigilant to make sure that nobody can either hurt you, reject you. You might feel as though, oh, wait a minute, I need to be on all the time. So in real day-to-day experiences, a dysregulated nervous system can look like one where you feel as though the stakes are always high. You feel like things are urgent at the wrong times. And for other people, that can look like a state of burnout.

5:09You feel overwhelmed to the point where now you no longer feel on edge, but you feel like you can't get out of bed the next day. And a lot of people have clicked on this episode with the title promising that you can heal your nervous system. but this was fascinating when researching this episode, you can get healthier, but also feel worse. How is that possible? Yes. Yes. When you can, you can start to feel worse as you get healthy, because in a sense you're trying something new. So, um, if you're someone that needs to learn how to respond well to reality and you're finding that your nervous system is off, then it's very likely that you'll run into issues when you're trying to figure out the new and correct thing to do.

5:54So, so trying to find that nuance is really tricky because if you're also doing something wrong, you're feeling as though you're, you know, overwhelmed, you're holding in a lot of your negative responses to the world. Then you can also have this chronic experience of being overwhelmed in other spaces, but also when you're trying something new, that can also feel uncomfortable. So a lot of the work that I do with my clients is trying to find the right kind of discomfort to push you forward. And finding that you can look at the different kinds of nervous system reactions, fine tune it and really figure out the right direction to go.

6:27Yeah. So, so interesting. I mean, it blew my mind, Jay, when I was researching this episode, because I've got seven ways here that people can use to heal their nervous system. But when I was going through the list, like a lot of these look like the opposite of healing, but actually when you dig a little deeper and you get into the nuance, which is what we're going to do, like actually you realize that what you have to do you have to go through some short-term discomfort to get to a better place the first one is you have to feel more like why might getting healthier actually make you more emotional oh yeah i love that question a lot well well one of the reasons that getting healthier might make you feel more unwell is because oftentimes there's past wounding you know and so I can't emphasize this enough but our nervous system is making a prediction for how to respond to reality so again if you touch a hot stove and then you start to feel overwhelmed that's a really healthy thing because your body is telling you not to do that again it's sending you energy and reminding you that this was unsafe so a lot of people who need healing have had childhood experiences of rejection repeated experiences of shame and they're going back into these states with their nervous system as an adult because there's some event in reality that's reminding them of the pain that, oh, wait, I need to avoid this.

7:45So part of the reason that healing can start to open up some of those old wounds is because healing requires vulnerability, allowing space for something good and bad to happen and hoping that something good happens because the nervous system learns based on experience. So if you can get new positive experiences where you're feeling as though, wait a minute, this was unsafe the last time this happened. But now I spoke with someone and made eye contact and it felt good, you know, and they responded well that you might still feel weird in that process. But that's where the learning happens is when you do something new, you feel the anticipation of the bad, but then you allow the good to happen.

8:24And so it's a gamble because bad things can happen again that can re-trigger the trauma, right? So that's a lot of the reason why trauma can kind of well up to the surface when you're trying to learn how to heal. And is it possible that somebody could experience big emotion as they are healing, perhaps anger, grief, resentment, because they have been suppressing those emotions for so many years? One thousand percent. Yes, yes. I know a lot of people who have had to overcome past trauma, experiences of emotional abuse, neglect, they were so severely punished when they released those emotions in childhood that they've learned, if I release this, then a hammer is going to drop and really hurt me.

9:09So when you're in the process of healing, a lot of the work that I do with clients is you can be in the room in a very safe place talking about something that you never had the opportunity to release. so if you're releasing this and you're processing it a it's very healthy because now you're not going to get the hammer's not going to drop um ideally this is a safe place but the big emotions will still intensify and surface because your nervous system doesn't know that you know and so you have the rational brain that is in the present that's hearing the therapist say hey this is the path towards healing allow space for vulnerability you're like okay that sounds great but the nervous system needs more support.

9:48It needs more experience in order to really believe that to be true. I need to touch the burner and see that it's actually not hot. I need to do that over and over again until it starts to feel safe. I've spoken to people, Jay, who have been to therapy and they've gone through a lot of the stuff that we're talking about and they've come out and they tell me that they're actually even more confused about how they feel inside. And they've asked me, how can you tell the difference between healthy emotional processing and genuinely getting worse? How can someone tell the difference between those two things?

10:21You have to really identify, am I moving towards health in this pain? If someone has dealt with extreme rejection in childhood, and it was not their fault that they were hurt, and then they go on to practice these new interventions and therapy of trying to be their true authentic self. And then the moment they try it, the people around them again, reject, reject them in a very, very harmful way. You know, that is not really healthy healing because your nervous system is not getting new data for the better. But if you are practicing new interventions and you're seeing that, oh, wait a minute, this is a new experience that feels good.

11:01That is going to lead to a lot of positive change. I use a lot of the example of someone that is going into a swimming pool. Let's say they have a trauma of, you know, they tried to swim and they didn't know how to. And so now they're afraid of water, you know. So part of the intervention is getting you back in the water. But what if that therapist toss you into the Atlantic Ocean where the waters are really tossing you around? Well, your nervous system is not going to get anything new. It's actually going to be re-traumatized in a way. And so that's something you want to avoid, which is why therapy is supposed to be gentle.

11:33But if you never get in the water at all and you never learn how to re-engage with the water, if there's a value within the water that you need, then you're also not going to do the healing. So therapy shouldn't feel too comfortable, but it also shouldn't feel too uncomfortable. Have you seen this process happen with somebody that you've worked with? Oh, yeah. This is kind of almost every person that I've worked with. There's some sort of experience that they have a value. And unfortunately, they're unable to re-engage with that value because of some trauma. And so I've worked with a lot of people that deal with rejection in relationships.

12:13They feel as though, well, I've had dealt with narcissistic abuse in childhood, for example, or my needs weren't met. And so now they try to go into the world of dating, for example, and they feel as though, wow, I can't seem to figure this out. I'm either extremely locked in and hyper-focused on another individual, or because I'm trying to suppress my natural reactions because I know that I got hurt before, I'm very standoffish. And so a lot of cases that I've worked with have felt just this feeling of being re-traumatized and lonely in relationships, starting off with a past of narcissistic abuse, and then going on to this experience of, I still can't connect with humans.

12:53Is it possible to lose your drive and motivation as you go through this process of healing? Because you might discover on that journey of healing that what is driving you and making you motivated and productive is anxiety and panic and dread. And actually, as you go through the process of unwinding and working out where that anxiety and panic is coming from and hopefully reducing it, can that, at least in the short term create a reduction of productivity. Yes, yes. It can truly look and feel as though you're failing in the process of healing. And that's true because a lot of people will be, they've been performing for the most part of their life.

13:40Let's say they experienced the shame in childhood and they feel as though they've been hurt or rejected because of who they are or who knows their neurochemistry. And then they go on to try and get that acceptance. It works for a while because at first the shame goes away when you start to perform well. People say, wow, you are actually able to do something that we find worthy in our eyes. But the sad thing that's happening behind the scenes is that that same individual is actually not being loved for who they are, but for what they can do. And so you see a lot of people who've been performing since childhood fall into what I call this cyclical maladaptive pattern where they engage in a behavior, receive praise, and then that is what regulates them.

14:27And they're no longer regulating because of who they are, but because of what they do. So what happens when you engage in reality and you have this pattern of making sure that you perform in order to receive acceptance, then that just snowballs into this process where you always feel on edge unless you're performing well. and you do feel calm from time to time, but it's only because of your performance. You, in a sense, only feel safe within a panic room. So interesting, Jay. I met this woman who was a high flyer in many areas of her life. She had her own business, but she came to the realization that much of her life was a mask and she was putting so much effort into maintaining this caricature of normal and perfection.

15:10And she didn't realize how much effort she was putting in to keeping up appearances. And she went to therapy after a diagnosis of ADHD, and she really worked through how much anxiety and panic was driving her to achieve the results in her business. And after about two or three months of successful therapy for her, she said she actually experienced a huge reduction in her productivity because she, in her words, had lost the anxiety and panic that was driving her and she really felt bad about herself like she couldn't understand why she couldn't get off the sofa on a particular day and she actually in her words said that she started feeling really bad and she actually started drinking alcohol again after she had been sober for many many years and that's heartbreaking and she now she has come out of that and she's doing the work but can that period after healing where you perhaps have worked out that anxiety and reduce that panic.

16:07And therefore, you're having a lower period of productivity. Can that look like burnout or even depression? It can. Yes, yes. Because what you see with a lot of people is their values can be really connected to what they're doing, right? With their work. If you've had to perform for several years in order to make sure that you got this acceptance, of course, it would be more healthy if you were just love for who you are. But what if that was your only coping strategy for 30 years? And then you take that coping strategy away. That can make you fall on your face even though you're doing this healthy behavior.

16:43It can lead to other strategies of distraction, substances, something to lift you back up. And so that's part of the reason why the healing process has to be so gentle. And I know a lot of people with ADHD, for example, they've experienced so much shame growing up because your natural way of engaging with the world has been a way that was not seen as regular to the people around you. And so you learn very early, I need to move in a way that's at odds with who I naturally am. You have more impulsivity. You learn through trial and error more often as somebody with ADHD. But then for some people, they fall into the corporate box that says, we need you to be very critical and polished before you enter a workspace, for example.

17:25So when you have that mindset, you slowly start to adopt the mindset of the environment around you that's at odds with your own neurochemistry. So now you're at odds with your neurochemistry too. And then you start to be very detail-oriented. And that is just the cognitive stress happening underneath the radar that nobody else sees. So over time, that can look like extreme burnout. That can be depression. And that can look like people on the outside wondering, what happened? You were doing fine. And that can even be surprising to the individual who does not know that. Well, part of the reason you're falling into the stage of burnout is because you've been working harder than the next person since you could breathe.

18:06Gosh, this is such an important conversation, Jay. And I think this is the most important question. If your whole life has been powered by fear, what replaces it? If your whole life has been powered by fear, then shame is what replaces it, I think. And that is a really good connection to the nervous system because the nervous system, it is all about either urgency in a negative way, or it can be about reaching your hand out in a hopeful way. So our heart rate can elevate for good reasons, and it can also elevate to avoid threat. But our heart rate can also decrease for good reasons, and it can decrease because we're in a state of learned helplessness.

18:51So learned helplessness is a state where our nervous system goes into what's called this dorsal vagal mode, where we don't want to move, not because we want to rest, but because we feel as though there's no hope. And basically your nervous system is pumping this anesthesia into your body and it makes you move slower. Everything feels heavier. So when somebody is operating in a state of urgency since childhood, and then they finally gets to this point where they realize, I can't keep this up, right? Fear has been motivating you. And you've been in this state of urgency. And the thing about being in a state of urgency is that you don't realize how much you've been moving and how hard you've been working until your body finally slows down.

19:32You've been running through the woods at full speed and you've got cuts and scrapes on your body. And you don't feel that pain because there's adrenaline pumping in your body. But the moment that you get home and you put hydrogen peroxide and you start to heal the wounds and you start to rest, you're like, what has been happening to me? Yes. Oh, this is such a critical part of the conversation. And you hit the nail on the head. You can be exhausted so badly, but without actually realizing it. If we just zoom in on that particular point, how is it possible for somebody to be totally exhausted, but without realizing it?

20:09That's the adrenaline. You know, the adrenaline is so pumped into your body because what your nervous system is doing, it's basically being a good caretaker. It's looking at your environment. It's creating this prediction for how to respond to it. And if your environment demands that you're in this state of urgency and you're moving quick, then your nervous system does not want you to know that you're tired yet. It wants you to feel as though you can move quickly until the threat is gone. But what happens when the threat never leaves? What happens when you're navigating life and it feels as though you could always fail if the other shoe drops?

20:46Well, then there's always this sense of this adrenaline being pumped into your body, this cortisol, this stress response, right? And your body just can hold on to that and put that performance up for a period of time. But at some point, you can't keep going. And some people either hit burnout at a point where they don't realize it and they've just been carrying so much weight. Some people finally try to rest for the first time and then, oh my gosh. So there's a couple of places to get to burnout. It just takes a while to get there for some people. This sounds like, I mean, it's a risky territory because on the one hand, you can suddenly realize that you're exhausted and you think, okay, I need some time to rest here.

21:29I need some alone time. But that could potentially maybe come with a loneliness if you start separating yourself from those around you. But that's the next question, really. Like, what is the difference between restorative solitude and unhealthy isolation? Yes, yes. So when you're thinking about restorative time alone versus this experience of just this isolation and you're kind of falling into, there's two things to really consider. Well, one, with the nervous system, there's this theory called polyvagal theory where they realize at some point that you don't just rest, you know, with your nervous system.

22:08There's two kinds of ways the nervous system slows down. One is ventral vagal, you know, rest where you're restoring and you don't feel like it's because you're in the state of learned helplessness. It feels good. The other kind, though, which is called dorsal vagal, that's when you feel as though you are in a state of learned helplessness. and your nervous system does not see a way out. And so like a good caretaker is saying, let's put some anesthesia into your body. Some people who are finally finding the time to rest and restore are not feeling like they're in a state of learned helplessness.

22:41They feel as though life is good. I've got goals. I have values and I want some time alone to rest, which is great. But some people are in a state where they feel as though I don't want to see tomorrow. I don't want to wake up tomorrow. I want to just stay in my bed and no longer face all my responsibilities. Everything feels heavier. And these are the people that are more in that state of dorsal vagal. Those are the people that are isolating when they actually need people. So if you're finding that you're feeling extremely heavy and you're finding that you don't really feel like getting up in the morning the next day and you don't feel up to things, things feel too daunting, that's how you know you're probably more in that state where you need people, even though you want to isolate.

23:23I want to show you something, Jay. I bought this item and it actually really helped me understand the concept of healing in particular overwhelm and I feel like overwhelm if I press down on this car pedal can feel like going from zero to a hundred but do you think we're actually missing 20 40 60 and 80 yes I mean in a way it's meant to be that way with our nervous system because the nervous system creates a prediction for how to respond to reality. And the reason that prediction is not always 100 % accurate is because it needs to be fast. If you see a stick when you're on a hike and you think that it's a snake, you don't have the time to really see if it's a snake or a stick perfectly.

24:12So your nervous system sends that jolt of energy. It skips the 20, the 30, the 40. And I think a good point here is that with ADHD, that skip is oftentimes much faster. So sorry to interrupt your hyperfocus, but I promise it's worth it. Our sponsor is Timo, the best organizational tool for neurodivergent people. Timo wasn't named iPhone app of the year in 2025 by Apple for no reason. It's the ultimate planning partner, gently helping you turn the chaos in your head into a day that actually feels doable, a day you might even look forward to. Timo is designed by Neurodivergent Brains for Neurodivergent Brains.

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25:36Give it a go and use the link in my bio for 30 % off. Just a note though, the code only works in the web browser, not in the smartphone app. Back to the episode. When you do become dysregulated, because I feel like so many people do, and they don't realize that they've actually reached a point of dysregulation and they just carry on having that conversation. They carry on with that work day and then things can really derail quite quickly. What do you think are the earlier signs that someone is dysregulated? Oh, the earlier signs are, they're there and oftentimes really hard to see, especially if you're someone that's used to suppressing a lot of your natural needs, you know?

26:15So I think a lot of people, if they're trying to find the signs that begin, you need to really look at your very, you know, bodily needs, those bodily focused needs, you know, and not ignore those. Because if the nervous system is making prediction for how to respond to reality and you're ignoring the need to use the restroom or to drink water, you know, and you're not paying attention to those signs, then your nervous system is going to generalize that same message to other interactions socially. Oh, I should forego my wants and needs in order to please this person I'm talking to. So if you're trying to identify what's happening underneath, how do I make sure that I'm able to speak to these in the moment?