Nervous system first aid⚕️
I’ve been sitting here, staring at my laptop, trying to find the words to write on this Friday morning in July.
I thought about offering you a womb-tending practice. I thought about writing another piece on sensuality and how deeply it’s related to healing. I thought about writing more about our inner system of parts.
But none of that felt true to what’s alive in me right now.
So I scrapped it all… and decided to be really real with you.
Because that’s part of my promise here, no b.s.
I’ve been in the midst of some big changes and challenges, both personally and professionally, that have knocked me off my feet and brought me to my knees.
I left a clinic I’d been at for 7.5 years.
I let go of teaching vinyasa yoga, after 10+ years of teaching it.
And about a week and a half ago, I had an accident that resulted in a concussion.
Concussions aren’t new to me. I had a difficult one about three years ago. And in my recent injury, I hit my head in the exact same place, in the exact same way.
If you’ve ever had a concussion or traumatic brain injury, you know how volatile the nervous system can become. Emotions swell and surge. The smallest things feel massive. The ground beneath you doesn’t quite feel like ground. Your nervous system is in disarray.
Frustration. Anger. Disappointment. Helplessness. Fear. Tenderness.
I felt it ALL.
I’m still struggling to look at the screen as I write this. My vision and focus are compromised. But something in me needed to share this with you today.
Just a few days before my accident, two women in my community reached out for support in the midst of acute crisis. I gently held their systems and offered tender care to help them stabilize.
And then, suddenly, I found myself needing that same type of support.
It got me thinking about how little we’re taught about nervous system first aid. Unless you work in this field (and even then, it's not always easy to find someone who truly knows how to tend a dysregulated system), it's not something most of us have been given language or tools for.
It’s something that I think should be part of our basic human toolkit, so we’re able to help a dear loved one or even ourselves in an acute time of need.
So today, I want to offer a few simple yet powerful nervous system first aid tools. They might serve you or someone you love during a time of overwhelm, panic, crisis, or deep emotional activation.
Not to fix, but to tenderly hold and support.
And maybe one day, I’ll even make this into a free online class… because I truly believe that this type of care should be accessible to everyone. In the meantime, I offer these few tools here, in hopes that they will be supportive to you.
Nervous System First Aid: Supporting Someone in Acute Distress
Space: Ask them where they are, be sure that they are in a supportive space (ideally in their home). If not, gently support them in relocating if possible, or finding a space that’s “safe enough.”
Orienting: Ask them to look around and name a few things that feel “pretty okay” in their environment (e.g. a vase of flowers, the colour of the walls). Include looking behind them, and noticing exits in the space (doors/windows), which can help soothe overly-active survival responses.
Containment: Encourage them to place a pillow in front of their belly and press/hug it gently. Make sure they have back support. This helps the body register containment and grounding.
Use their name: Say their name throughout the conversation, as many times as organically possible. Hearing one’s own name spoken out loud with care can bring the nervous system back online in moments of disorientation.
Engage the brain: Invite them to say out loud one name they know of for each letter of the alphabet, A to Z (ex: A is for Alice, B is for Brianna, C is for Chase). This helps re-engage the frontal lobe of the brain, responsible for higher thinking, voluntary movement, and emotional regulation. The frontal lobe is often suppressed when in an acute crisis or a panic state.
Movement task: If you are in person, giving them a “movement task” can also be very supportive, such as gently passing a ball back and forth. This helps get the motor cortex back online (which is located in the frontal lobe), and brings a sense of rhythm and presence.
Co-regulation through contact: If you are with them in person, gently squeezing their hand or asking them to squeeze yours can be very supportive.
What NOT to do: Avoid saying “just breathe” or “just calm down.” In states of panic, this often increases distress or hyperventilation. Instead focus on orienting, containment, and co-regulation.
Whether you use these tools for yourself or someone else, I hope they remind you that compassionate care doesn’t have to be complicated to be powerful. It’s tender work to be in the mess of distress, to hold ourselves or another in the complexity of it all. I hope these tools meet you with care, should the need arise.