Is Your Gut Trying to Tell You Something?

[00:00:00] Pete Waggoner, Podcast Host: Hi there, and welcome to Beyond the Checkup, brought to you by Stellis Health, where Neighbors Care for Neighbors. I’m your host, Pete Wagner. Have you ever felt nervous or instantly lost your appetite or had a stomach ache before a big event?

[00:00:12] Pete Waggoner, Podcast Host: Well, today, Stellis Health, Mental Health practitioner, Tom Hawkins, joins us to unpack the powerful link between stress, emotions, and your gut. If you’ve ever wondered how mental health shows up in your stomach or how to manage that anxious swirl. This episode is for you, Mr. Hawkins. It’s a pleasure to see you again.

[00:00:32] Pete Waggoner, Podcast Host: You as well. Great to be here. I had an absolute blast on our last one. Mm-hmm. So let’s let her go. You doing well? Yes. Yeah, you it couldn’t be better. It’s the holiday season and, you know, we’ve got a month’s worth of this stuff, so yeah, let’s go for it. Absolutely. It’s great. So, let’s get into this whole topic, which is so fascinating.

[00:00:49] Pete Waggoner, Podcast Host: I think it impacts just about everybody. Is that fair to say? Yeah, no, absolutely. Yeah. 

[00:00:53] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: Yeah. 

[00:00:54] Pete Waggoner, Podcast Host: When something most people don’t realize about, their emotions that it’s connected to the stomach, [00:01:00] how does that all fit? 

[00:01:01] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: Yeah. Like you said this, this affects everybody. We all eat. We all eat, you know, optimally, three meals a day, snacks in between.

[00:01:09] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: And so just as other mental health symptoms can show up in increased heart rate, headaches, that kind of stuff, your mental health symptoms are embodied. Your stomach is a part of your body, just as your brain is. This is something we talked about a little bit in the previous episode.

[00:01:24] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: And so we don’t just feel that sadness or anger or anxiety in our thoughts, right? We feel that in our blood pressure or in our pulse rate, and our digestive system is a really important part of our metabolism, of our homeostasis. And so it’s just as important to our survival as something like our heart.

[00:01:44] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: So it’s often infected just as much by mental health 

[00:01:46] Pete Waggoner, Podcast Host: symptoms. So how the rest of the machine is functioning. That is dependent upon it. Correct. I mean, like Exactly. It’s not just a standalone thing that does its deal.

[00:01:54] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: It’s all gears that are interconnected and it’s not like your brain is just one gear that’s [00:02:00] spinning on its own.

[00:02:00] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: It’s connected to the whole rest of your body. 

[00:02:02] Pete Waggoner, Podcast Host: I’d love to know how many people listen to this podcast be included. I never even considered it, never even thought of it. That’s, that’s really interesting. And, and you know, when you hear someone say. You know, how’d you make that decision? Or like, how did you know I had a gut feeling about this?

[00:02:15] Pete Waggoner, Podcast Host: Is there an actual science behind that or is that just a saying? 

[00:02:19] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: Well, most sayings are backed up by, by some kind of fact or some kind of real happening and so having a gut feeling is absolutely something that can happen. We as human beings are intuitive. Our brains are hardwired to keep us safe, right?

[00:02:33] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: Survival is kind of the number one goal of our, our body and our brains. A place that we can often feel anxiety is in our stomach. Stomach ache. And we’ll talk about that more in, in a moment about kind of why that happens. But since our brains are constantly taking in information about the world around us that we’re not aware of, we can’t be consciously saying, oh, you know, there’s blue chairs in this room and, uh, I’m sitting across from two other people.

[00:02:57] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: If we were consciously attending to that, we would be exhausted [00:03:00] right within minutes of waking up. So our brain does a lot of that without us realizing it takes in those connections. It makes it figures out patterns in order to try to keep us. Safe. Those patterns might get to our stomach before we are even aware of them.

[00:03:15] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: Hence that gut feeling about something that might not feel right. If you’ve ever felt like the hair on the back of your neck stand up mm-hmm. Um, that. Kind of goes in line with that gut feeling where you’re kind of intuiting that something doesn’t totally feel right here. And usually my advice is to trust your gut.

[00:03:32] Pete Waggoner, Podcast Host: You hear that a lot, on different programs and things, and it’s a really fair thing to say. Yeah. Uh, no question. Mm-hmm. This next question, it’s kind of a two-parter. And I find it really interesting in that. I think in a lot of things you do, whether it’s, giving a speech, getting in front of people, playing in a big game mm-hmm.

[00:03:49] Pete Waggoner, Podcast Host: Something that matters can bring on butterflies, that sort of weird feeling in the nausea. Mm-hmm. You lose your appetite, you get nervous, shaky sometimes. Yeah. Obviously [00:04:00] something’s physiologically going on from the mental of the, of. The situation. Yeah. How does that intertwine what’s going on there?

[00:04:08] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: So this could be complicated. Let’s go bear with me we’re gonna get into a little bit of, neuroscience stuff here. So, in your brain and in your body, there are two modes that your nervous system can be in. Your nervous system being like, your nerves, your brain, your spinal cord, how you feel things, and how you interact with the world.

[00:04:27] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: Those two modes have to do with being, uh, with the system, being activated, with being stressed out, uh, in like a fight or flight mode, right? Mm-hmm. Your, they’re called your parasympathetic and your sympathetic nervous system. Parasympathetic processes are often said to be your rest and digest state.

[00:04:46] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: So that’s kind of your chill. I’m all right. I’m good. That’s parasympathetic. Okay. Sympathetic nervous activation is fight, flight, or freeze responses. It’s a stress re [00:05:00] response, sympathetic for stress. They both start with S. That’s how I remember it. So as the description implies, when your parasympathetic nervous system is active, that rest and digest, then your body is able to do things like sleep, relax, digest food.

[00:05:14] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: Your sympathetic nervous system isn’t interested in that kind of stuff, right? It’s interested in keeping you alive and keeping you outta danger. That’s, like I said before, your brain is hardwired to keep you safe. It’s in survival mode pretty much all the time. So what this means, I’ll call your sympathetic nervous system, your SNS, just for short.

[00:05:32] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: Mm-hmm. I’m gonna be talking about it. So when your SNS is activated, digestion goes out the window. That is not seriously, that is not a core process to keep you alive in the moment, right? If you’re running away from a tiger, the last thing you want to do is. Digest the taco that you ate for lunch enough.

[00:05:48] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: You want to fair enough run. Right, right, right, 

[00:05:50] Pete Waggoner, Podcast Host: right. 

[00:05:50] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: So if you’re experiencing something like a generalized anxiety disorder or PTSD in the long form, or if you’re nervous for something, your [00:06:00] brain doesn’t discriminate between, I’m nervous about a test and I’m nervous about a tiger trying to hunt me down.

[00:06:08] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: Your brain just simply can’t. Those are both feel dangerous, right? Those are both stressful. I know. It’s one thing 

[00:06:14] Pete Waggoner, Podcast Host: nervous. What, what the meaning of the nervous is is doesn’t matter. 

[00:06:17] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: Yes. 

[00:06:17] Pete Waggoner, Podcast Host: Okay. Exactly. 

[00:06:18] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: All your brain knows is that I’m scared for this. 

[00:06:20] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: Okay. 

[00:06:21] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: And so, those situations that affect the SNS basically tape down neon switch for that sympathetic nervous system for that stress response.

[00:06:30] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: That’s why anxiety chronically can be associated with things like nausea. Vomiting, diarrhea, that kind of stuff. So if your brain thinks that you’re actively in danger, like I said, the last thing is focused on is properly digesting your meal. Use another good example that I’m sure everyone can relate to.

[00:06:46] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: Have you ever had like a close call in your car you’re driving and someone like swerves in front of you, or like a deer runs out? Yeah. Yeah. What does your stomach feel like when that happens? 

[00:06:54] Pete Waggoner, Podcast Host: I would say a bowling ball is in it. Yeah. You know, and it kind of comes up to your throat. It drops or [00:07:00] rises.

[00:07:00] Pete Waggoner, Podcast Host: Yeah. Yeah. There’s that, those butterflies. Strange. Yeah. Yeah. 

[00:07:02] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: Exactly. Yeah. That is adrenaline. That is your sympathetic nervous system. Redirecting blood flow within your body to your muscles in order to make a quick reaction to swerve the wheel or to jump out of the way or whatever it might be that makes blood go away.

[00:07:22] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: From parasympathetic processes like your stomach, so that literal, that jump that you feel, that is the shock of adrenaline in your system, sending resources away from your stomach. Crazy. So it’s, it’s literally a physical feeling that you feel in your stomach. Yeah. That’s not just something that’s in your head.

[00:07:38] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: With your anxiety on the on switch, if you have PTSD or like a generalized anxiety disorder that is happening all the time. More often than we might even realize. Really? So if you have an untreated anxiety disorder or a trauma stress response, your sympathetic nervous system is working over time.

[00:07:57] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: Would you, 

[00:07:58] Pete Waggoner, Podcast Host: in that, if I may, would you in that situation be [00:08:00] feeling that because it’s always, or is it 

[00:08:02] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: something you get used to? That’s an excellent question. Typically, you don’t even really realize that it’s happening. Mm-hmm. Because it just kind of becomes your normal. Which is why it’s important if, and we’ll talk about this more a little later, if things change, if people notice that things are changing, we listen.

[00:08:19] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: Right? If someone says, Hey, you’re not acting yourself, you’re not eating as much, whatever, that might be a cue to be like, maybe this has actually been happening for a long time and it’s not healthy, it’s not good for me, but I’ve just kind of gotten used to it. 

[00:08:34] Pete Waggoner, Podcast Host: What I think is interesting is there’s things that can be happening there that you don’t know of course. Mm-hmm. Um, and then it’s knowing it is, and then hopefully this sparks some thought process there. Yeah. We hear a lot about gut health, always.

[00:08:46] Pete Waggoner, Podcast Host: Mm-hmm. You know, we’re, we’re hearing about, uh, probiotics, stomach enzymes, all kinds of things that, that’s going on or mm-hmm. Things that matter and, and whatnot. Yeah. What’s happening in your gut that can actually, on a daily [00:09:00] basis impact your mood and 

[00:09:02] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: or 

[00:09:03] Pete Waggoner, Podcast Host: mental health? 

[00:09:03] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: Initially I said your, symptoms, your mental health is embodied, right?

[00:09:07] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: It’s a two-way street. Your mental health can affect your gut health and your gut health can affect your mental health. I’m gonna talk about two, two different kind of approaches to thinking about therapy and thinking about emotion.

[00:09:20] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: I’m gonna simplify these complicated concepts, but the relationship between emotions and bodily sensations has two schools of thought or two ways of thinking about it. There’s top down and bottom up. So it’s.

[00:09:34] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: A relationship between your emotions, your thoughts, and your sensations. And it can be simplified just to talk about how our bodies feel physically as, as well as our brains. So top down processing that will happen when we have a thought or a perception first, and then we feel an associated bodily sensation.

[00:09:54] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: In therapy, top-down approaches are things like cognitive behavioral therapy, which you might have heard of. That’s a pretty popular one where [00:10:00] we do a lot of thinking about thinking, kind of that meta thinking, what are my thought patterns? Trying to make connections and find patterns. But an example in terms of sensation.

[00:10:09] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: So talking about that big game, big presentation, things like that. If we start thinking about that, we get anxious, then we get those butterflies that’s top down. So we can think about bottom up processing as when a physical sensation happens first, and then we kind of associate a meaning with it.

[00:10:30] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: This can happen pretty much instantly and without us even really being aware. So a bottom up approach to therapy, for example, might use something like yoga or exercise or mindful movement to create a sense of calm or to process trauma. And there are theories in general just of emotions that hold, that emotions are meaning that we ascribe to a physical sensation.

[00:10:53] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: So if you’ve got gut stuff going on that’s chronic, that. Absolutely can contribute to your [00:11:00] mental health. Some, of the people that are at the, highest risk for mental health disorders are people with chronic pain. That’s often associated with things like depression and anxiety.

[00:11:09] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: So all this is to say that top down is kind of like a head first process. Bottom up is like a body first process, so that if there’s something wrong in our bodies that’s causing pain or causing dysfunction, including, and especially in our gut. That can absolutely relate to and directly affect how we feel.

[00:11:25] Pete Waggoner, Podcast Host: Holidays can be wonderful. Mm-hmm. We know. 

[00:11:27] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: Yes. 

[00:11:27] Pete Waggoner, Podcast Host: But they’re also, for many, of us, overwhelming. I mean, it’s, it’s a different flow. Mm-hmm. I mean, things just change. Mm-hmm. What, might be someone’s digestion feel off, or why would it feel different during that time of the year?

[00:11:40] Pete Waggoner, Podcast Host: And, and is it usually something that just sort of like sorts itself out, or is that something to worry 

[00:11:44] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: about? Well, the holidays can be a really fun time. They can also be a really stressful time. There’s a lot of logistics that go into meeting up with family, to making food to buying presents.

[00:11:57] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: There, there might be a financial stress that happens around this time of [00:12:00] year. Not to mention the fact that not everyone’s family dynamics are fun or healthy. And if that’s the only time of the year that you are. With a particular family member or a particular group of people that is stressful then that absolutely can cause that stress top down.

[00:12:19] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: I’m stressed out and then I’m feeling that nausea or those butterflies, even if I’m just anticipating what this Christmas or, or Thanksgiving or, or whatever might look like. Also is it’s a change in routine. There’s a lot of time off of work, a lot of time off of school. Things are just different and.

[00:12:38] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: Our bodies like patterns. I’ve said the word patterns a lot. 

[00:12:42] Pete Waggoner, Podcast Host: Yeah. 

[00:12:43] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: Our brain is really good at recognizing patterns and getting used to them. That’s because our brain wants to be really efficient. We burn through a lot of energy and a lot of nutrients just with our thinking, with our brain power. So always our brain is looking for shortcuts to try and make things easier and simpler [00:13:00] for us if we break a routine.

[00:13:03] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: Our brain is now working overdrive to readjust. Well, you 

[00:13:05] Pete Waggoner, Podcast Host: for 

[00:13:05] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: sure feel 

[00:13:06] Pete Waggoner, Podcast Host: like you get knocked off the tracks. Yeah. Like whether you like it or not. Exactly. So it’s interesting. Exactly. You ask a holiday question mm-hmm. Of feeling some different digestion or things are different. Mm-hmm. And then it all plays into what you said before.

[00:13:18] Pete Waggoner, Podcast Host: It’s all part of that process, which, yeah. Which is interesting. And then, as far as, some small realistic things people can do at holiday gatherings to support their emotional digestive wellness, 

[00:13:28] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: what would those be? Yeah. So. Another thing that happens at the holidays is we eat a lot of really good food that might also be different from what we’re normally eating.

[00:13:37] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: That could be a big bacon wrapped Turkey. That’s something that my family likes to do. They wrap it in bacon and brown sugar. Delicious. Wow. Doesn’t make me feel that great after I eat it. ’cause it’s different, it’s outside the norm. A lot of sweets, a lot of sugar, a lot of processed stuff, a lot of carbs, a lot of dinner rolls and bread and butter and it’s all good stuff.

[00:13:57] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: And it’s great to be taking that in and, spending [00:14:00] time with family and enjoying good food. But it also can make you feel lugg. So being aware of what you’re eating and then how much you’re eating. I’ve got a, a really concrete, really actionable tip for you. They have done studies on people’s eating patterns and they find that when people have a bigger plate, they eat more.

[00:14:20] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: Very simple. People take more on their plate, there’s more room, and then they eat it. So here’s the other tip. Even if you’ve got. A big plate. If you have a smaller plate, take a smaller plate. If you’re still hungry, go back up for more.

[00:14:33] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: If you’ve got a big plate, put less on it. Give it a try. There will trust me the amount of food that I have seen my own family and, and friends make, there will be plenty. Don’t feel like you have to take two pieces of pumpkin pie right away. Take one, and then listen to your body. Sit in it for a moment.

[00:14:53] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: It takes around 20 minutes. For your stomach to actually get the message that there’s food in it and to start [00:15:00] digesting, which I think kind of sucks because if I stub my toe, I know right away. Right on. But if I’m full, it takes me a second. So give it a second. Listen to your body. If you’re still hungry, take your plate up.

[00:15:13] Pete Waggoner, Podcast Host: Get some more. Well, to that point, I think sometimes, you know, pace matters. Mm-hmm. If you eat fast and it’s taking 20 minutes, it’s going to, you know, you’ll, you’ll just put a whole lot in there. Nothing’s telling you really. Exactly until you, you stop. And it’s the same thing with the plate. I’m gonna try that.

[00:15:29] Pete Waggoner, Podcast Host: I like it. Yeah. That’s smaller plate, mindful eating. Yeah. That’s a great piece of advice there. Mm-hmm. If someone notices, their appetite starts to change whether it’s more or less when you’re stressed out, what’s it telling you? 

[00:15:42] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: So kinda like I said before, especially if someone else notices and this has been a change that maybe has been happening over time, that’s a flag just to take a look is something different to my feeling.

[00:15:53] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: Okay. But changing appetite, either eating too much or not eating enough. Those are [00:16:00] flags for both anxiety and depression explicitly. That’s something that when I sit down and I talk to someone for the first time in, in an assessment, that’s one of the first questions I ask them, really, how’s your appetite?

[00:16:10] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: How are you eating? Because if you’re eating too much or if you’re not eating enough, that is the sign that you are equilibrium is off. I, use the word homeostasis earlier. Mm-hmm. Equilibrium, same thing. Our body wants to remain at a constant kind of even place, and so. A change in your equilibrium that resting state, that’s a sign.

[00:16:31] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: Again, listen to your body, potentially get some extra help if that’s impeding your daily life. For sure. 

[00:16:37] Pete Waggoner, Podcast Host: Can I go off the rails with question follow up on that? Yeah. So if, if someone has more of an appetite or less of an appetite mm-hmm. Through the process, why is that? Why, why is your gut telling your brain or vice versa?

[00:16:52] Pete Waggoner, Podcast Host: That. Eat or don’t eat? What does that, what, what’s 

[00:16:56] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: happening there? Good question. So a lot of [00:17:00] times I associate anxiety with more of a lack of appetite which is kinda like I talked about earlier, anxiety is that fight or flight mode always on. Yeah. So your, your body is telling your brain, I’m not hungry, I need to escape, whatever this might be.

[00:17:14] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: Mm-hmm. Even if it’s nothing, right? Yeah. For depression, a lot of times it can be overeating. And. There are, again, there’s some complicated brain stuff that happens. , There’s a part of your brain that, that we like to call the pleasure center. Mm-hmm. Which is the part of your brain that processes when things feel good, when you 

[00:17:31] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: eat 

[00:17:31] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: something good, when you put on uncomfortable clothes, when you when a scratch off, whatever it might be.

[00:17:35] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: Yeah. Um, something good happens then. That part of your brain, part of your brain blinks. Um, if you’re in an MRI literally it blinks. Oh, really? It lights up. Really, really? Yeah. There’s actually a physical part. And so do something blink. Now, I can’t say you sound blink brighter. Uh, it depends, depends on the, the amount of uh, dopamine.

[00:17:54] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: Okay. Is, is an example. Those like pleasure chemicals. Okay. More dopamine might be a, a brighter blink [00:18:00] in the M mri. I don’t know. I’m, I’m not an MRI tech to be fair. 

[00:18:02] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: Okay. 

[00:18:02] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: But eating. Anything releases that, those pleasure chemicals. So if you are in a place like a clinical depression where your brain is not making enough of those pleasure chemicals to keep you at a happy resting state, your brain says, oh, well I know that if I eat a candy bar, then that gives me at least a little bit, but that’s not permanent.

[00:18:26] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: Your brain still it’s equilibrium, has fallen. To, to more of like a lower mood, not as much pleasure chemical. And so eating, overeating gives you a burst for a moment, but then it could lead to, all kinds of stuff. Weight gain, feeling sluggish, feeling bad. And so you asked why one of the other might happen.

[00:18:46] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: Anxiety and depression have a lot of overlap, in their symptoms. It’s, it comes down to almost to 50 50 sometimes, depending on which symptoms are present, which diagnosis actually happens because there’s so much overlap with those. [00:19:00] So, so there’s some potential crossover 

[00:19:02] Pete Waggoner, Podcast Host: there. Yeah, absolutely.

[00:19:02] Pete Waggoner, Podcast Host: Where there a little bit of barrier? Yeah, sometimes both. Okay. So we’re getting into that level. Uh, when should someone consider talking to a counselor about digestive issues that maybe you thought was just something I feel 

[00:19:13] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: What I always say is that when a symptom starts to impede your daily life and affect you in a way that is dysfunctional what regular responses to negative life events might be.

[00:19:27] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: If someone close to you dies, there’s a grieving process. You are sad if that persists for a long, long time. For years even that is a flag to. To seek some extra help, or if that grieving process impedes your ability to go back to work for months after the fact then that’s where to look for extra help.

[00:19:48] Pete Waggoner, Podcast Host: What’s one simple technique someone can try? In the moment when they feel stress starting to affect their body.

[00:19:55] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: I’ve got a really good one for this. So we talked about the parasympathetic [00:20:00] nervous system. That’s your rest and digest. So there’s a way that we can trick our brains into activating that parasympathetic nervous system, and that is using a breathing technique. This is kind of. It can feel kind of trite oh, I go to therapy.

[00:20:15] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: I learned how to breathe right? But there’s science behind it. So if we pay attention to our breath, that tells our body that we are in a safe place, that we are in somewhere where we can rest and digest. If we are not feeling that way, that’s when our stomach might feel bad. So if you start to notice that, then this is the trick.

[00:20:36] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: You are gonna take a deep breath in five second increments. But the caveat is that you’re gonna hold it in between the breaths. So you take a deep breath in for five seconds, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, through your nose like you’re smelling roses. And then you’re gonna hold that breath in for five seconds.

[00:20:56] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5. Then you’ll breathe out [00:21:00] for a full five seconds. Whew. Like you’re blowing out birthday candles . So in like you’re smelling flowers out, like you’re blowing birthday candles. One, two, three, four, five out. And then this is the hardest part. Hold on the out breath for five seconds as well with no air in your lungs.

[00:21:16] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: Whoa. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5. And then you can do another five seconds in. And that literally tells your brain. I’m in a safe place because I wouldn’t be able to take this long of a breath if I wasn’t. 

[00:21:28] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: Yeah. 

[00:21:28] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: And then you should reactivate that parasympathetic nervous system. Wow. That’s fascinating. Mm-hmm. 

[00:21:33] Pete Waggoner, Podcast Host: What about your final thoughts on this topic?

[00:21:35] Pete Waggoner, Podcast Host: I thought it was a really fascinating one, and, I’ve learned a lot on this one. Through what you do on a daily basis, how much does this play into? I mean, I know it was one of the first questions you asked. Mm-hmm. How’s your appetite? Mm-hmm. But how much does this really play into a lot of what you’re dealing with?

[00:21:51] Pete Waggoner, Podcast Host: On a day-to-day basis. 

[00:21:53] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: Well, we all eat every day or we should, right? Your brain needs fuel. [00:22:00] Here’s another fun fact for you. Your brain only uses glucose. That’s the only food that your brain can process. Which I had a biology professor who said, that’s why I always eat sugar before I do things.

[00:22:13] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: She said it vaguely on purpose. She eats a candy bar before she does everything because really your brain can only process glucose, which was a little bit of a joke at the time, but also little truth. Yes. Yeah. So your brain needs food. If any other part of your body is malnourished, it’s not gonna work.

[00:22:30] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: Right? Simple as that, right? If you cut off blood supply to your hand, it’s not gonna function. If you are not getting enough nutrients in your body for your brain to be able to function, that affects. Top down, top down cascading effects in the rest of your nervous system. And it, it tends to pile up, right?

[00:22:49] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: Your brain subconsciously controls your digestion. And so if you’re not eating much, then you’re not digesting as well, and so on and so forth. So there’s a feedback loop that occurs [00:23:00] there. So in session daily almost constantly. My, my patients probably are, are sick of it. How are you eating?

[00:23:07] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: You’re eating well. Are you eating more, eating less, eating the same as last we talked and just making sure that people are getting the nutrients that they need to think and function well. And I pitch a breathing exercise to people probably once a week because it’s, because it is so helpful. And even if it, even if gut health isn’t your concern, if that sympathetic nervous system, that stress system is active, that causes a whole host of other concerns so that breathing can help slow us down.

[00:23:37] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: Bring us back to that parasympathetic center, 

[00:23:39] Pete Waggoner, Podcast Host: you know, from a, a broadcast perspective. Mm-hmm. We’re trained on a couple of breathing ex diaphragmatically, obviously. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Exercises. Yep. And they, a lot of it played around that exact concept of what you said. Mm-hmm. I could say firsthand, it really, like if you’re, if you’re a little like uptight about going into something and you’re not sure it really reset [00:24:00] everything.

[00:24:00] Pete Waggoner, Podcast Host: And the way you explain it makes complete sense that your brain’s like. Well, I guess I don’t have time to worry. Exactly. If you got time to be like this, I guess I’m good. Yeah, and it magically works. Mm-hmm. And I, I would urge anybody to give that a shot ’cause it’s a good thing.

[00:24:12] Pete Waggoner, Podcast Host: For sure. Wow, great stuff. Once again, we’re Stellis Health mental health practitioner Tom Hawkins. And that’ll be a wrap for this episode of Beyond the Checkup. Thanks for joining us. Thank you, Pete. It was awesome. 

[00:24:23] Tom Hawkins, Mental Health: Pleasure. 

[00:24:24] Pete Waggoner, Podcast Host: I was brought to you by Stellis Health, our neighbors, care for Neighbors.

[00:24:26] Pete Waggoner, Podcast Host: I’m Pete Wagner and I’m grateful you spent time with us today. If something in this episode made you pause, nod your head or feel seen, don’t keep it to yourself. it to someone you care about. Start the conversation. That’s how we change the way we care for ourselves and each other. Subscribe to Beyond the Checkup for more real talk about your health.

[00:24:46] Pete Waggoner, Podcast Host: Until next time, stay well and keep showing up for yourself.