This article about the vagus nerve is reprinted with permission. It was copied in its entirety from a newsletter sent by Proactive Health Solutions. This article is not gluten-free related per say. Rather, it is health related which – I personally believe – is important to all of us whether we live a gluten free lifestyle or not. I hope you enjoy it as much as I did.
The Importance of the Vagus Nerve
In this newsletter, we go in depth to share more information about reducing inflammation specifically with the vagus nerve. Much of the information shared here is from Shawna Darou, NMD in her article “6 Ways to Stimulate Your Vagus Nerve to Relieve Inflammation, Depression, Migraines, and More.
What is the Vagus Nerve?
The vagus nerve is our longest nerve. It originates in the brain as cranial nerve ten. It then travels down from the neck, passes around our digestive system, liver, spleen, pancreas, heart, and lungs. This nerve plays a chief role in the parasympathetic nervous system, which is our “rest and digest” portion of the Central Nervous System (CNS) as opposed to the sympathetic nervous system which is the “fight or flight” response.
Vagal tone is measured by tracking your heart rate alongside your breathing rate. Your heart-rate speeds up a little when you breathe in and slows down a little when you breathe out. The bigger the difference between your inhalation heart-rate and your exhalation heart-rate, the higher your vagal tone. Higher vagal tone means that your body can relax faster after stress.
Benefits of Having a High Vagal Tone?
High vagal tone improves the function of many body systems including:
- improved blood sugar regulation
- reduced risk of stroke and cardiovascular disease
- lower blood pressure
- improved digestion via better production of stomach enzymes
- reduced migraines.
- improved mood
- less anxiety
- more stress resiliency
One of the most interesting roles of the vagus nerve is that it essentially reads the gut microbiome and initiates a response to modulate inflammation based on whether or not it detects pathogenic** versus non-pathogenic organisms. In this way, the gut microbiome can have an affect on your mood, stress levels, and overall inflammation.
Conditions Associated with Low Vagal Tone
Low vagal tone is associated with:
- cardiovascular conditions and strokes
- chronic fatigue syndrome
- cognitive impairment
- higher rates of inflammatory conditions including all autoimmune diseases (rheumatoid arthritis, inflammatory bowel disease, endometriosis, autoimmune thyroid conditions, lupus, and more).
How to Improve Vagal Tone
As you can see, having high vagal tone is preferred over having low tone. The next question is “how can I improve my vagal tone?” According to Darou, there are 6 no-cost ways to address your vagus nerve to improve its tone.
- Slow, rhythmic, diaphragmatic breathing. Breathing from your diaphragm, rather than shallowly from the top of the lungs stimulates and tones your vagus nerve.
- Humming: Since the vagus nerve is connected to the vocal cords, humming mechanically stimulates it. You can hum a song, or even better repeat the sound ‘OM’.
- Speaking: Similarly, speaking is helpful for vagal tone, due to the connection to the vocal cords (I practice this one a lot!)
- Washing your face with cold water: The mechanism here is not understood, but cold water on your face stimulates the vagus nerve.
- Meditation: especially loving kindness meditation which promotes feelings of goodwill towards yourself and others.
- Balancing the gut microbiome: The presence of healthy bacteria in the gut creates a positive feedback loop through the vagus nerve, increasing its tone.
Utilizing these 6 steps are affordable for everyone and come with such beneficial side effects. Take the time to incorporate some of these (or all of them) into your daily life and you may notice the far-reaching benefits, too!
More Information about the Vagus Nerve
For more information on the vagus nerve and your health, you can pre-order “Accessing the Healing Power of the Vagus Nerve: Self-Help Exercises for Anxiety, Depression, Trauma, and Autism.”