Understanding Your Brain and Stress: How to Reset a Broken Stress Response

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We’re so excited that you could join us for our coffee chat.

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Today’s focus is on the stress response in the brain and what to do

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when it has hijacked your brain. I’m Lisa Regul,

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I’m one of the founders of Jakapa and I’m excited to bring you some

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of this information today. So the first thing to think about

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when you think about a stress response is that we think our brain as

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just like the brain. But it’s actually like a giant corporation with lots

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of departments. So just like a big company you have a data department,

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you have a security department and IT department,

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you have a CEO’s office. In our brain there’s three main departments

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that are responsible for stress. There’s our thalamus,

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which is our data manager, there’s the amygdala,

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which is our security monitor and there’s the prefrontal cortex,

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which is our CEO. So as we think about these departments,

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you can use your fist to think about how they work together.

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And I would encourage you to share this with your students or your children.

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So if you look at the fist, you have at the very base of

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the brain is where we find the thalamus.

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And the thalamus is job is to take an information.

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In the middle of the brain, there’s a little common-sized component called

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the amygdala, and the amygdala is our security center.

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It is the one that decides whether or not we need to hit a

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panic button and do fight versus flight.

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And then, finally, there’s the prefrontal cortex up here,

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and the prefrontal cortex is the part of your brain worth thinking and logic

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and reason happens. So you can kind of think of this fist because if

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we allow the thalamus to send a message to the amygdala that we’re in

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danger, then we disregulate and all of a sudden there’s no connection

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anymore between the parts of the brain.

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So as we think about the thalamus that’s your data manager and what his

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job is is to analyze all the sensory data in the environment and create

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a report and so they,

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you know, cite, smell, sound,

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situations, all of that goes into our thalamus and then they kind of type

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up if you think of it as like an incident report But the problem

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is that the thalamus is programmed because of evolutionary biology,

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it is programmed to send the report to the amygdala or the security center

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by email, which is super fast,

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and send the report to the CEO by snail mail.

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So by design, our brain wants to know our re-endanger,

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because if we’re in danger, then we need to react before we really think

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about it and use over it. So your security center gets that information first.

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Then you have your amygdala, which is your security monitor.

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His job is to read that data that report and analyze the danger level.

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If the danger is high, then our amygdala hits the alarm and sends all

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these chemicals. We have adrenaline and cortisol and all the stress chemicals into our

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body. It also shuts down our CEO’s office because if

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we are in trouble, we need to fight,

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light or freeze, we don’t need to think about it.

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The final part of the brain then is your CEO,

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which is your prefrontal cortex where your thinking happens.

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What her job is is to calmly read the report and then analyze using

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logic. So we’ve had this happen before,

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and we were safe. It’s okay, we don’t need to be alarmed by this.

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But again, as I was saying before,

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your security monitor gets that information before your CEO.

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So, if you have a security monitor who is super excitable,

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then that panic button is already hit.

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And when the panic button is hit, it sends your CEO out to lunch.

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And the problem with that is just like in any job,

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the more you do your job, the better you get at it.

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And so if you have a CEO who doesn’t ever get to do her

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job, because she’s always sent out to lunch,

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because this body is always in a constant stress response,

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then the CEO doesn’t get good at her job.

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And the CEO’s job is the executive function needs.

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So executive function includes being able to plan and organize.

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So your time management, your task management,

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responsibility management. It’s also your ability to be adaptable and shift between

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situations and thoughts. This part of the brain sets priorities so

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that you can decide what to work on first, what can weight,

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and even priorities on what you’re thinking about.

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And then also that monitoring component,

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whether or not you’re keeping on track, how you’re doing,

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it’s that sort of meta cognitive function where we learn how to learn,

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we learn what makes sense for us. And then it’s also about controlling our

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emotions and our impulsivity and using working memory.

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So we develop soft skills in the brain.

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We can’t do that if our brain is hijacked by a stress response.

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So, you might have the data manager saying this place is dangerous and

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then your security monitor going, oh, I better hit the panic button and now

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you get into this hijacked response. The problem is that every time the panic

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button is hit, the panic button becomes more like a hair trigger and

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so less and less and less will lead to a stress response.

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So oftentimes, the problem may be your data manager.

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So if you have a data manager that has a negative confirmation bias,

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and basically what that means is your data manager thinks that the world is

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dangerous or scary or people are out to get you,

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maybe there’s social anxiety, and they think people aren’t going to like them.

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So then what happens is our brains are programmed to confirm biases,

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and it’s actually for protection,

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you if in, you know, way back when in evolution,

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if you ended up where, you know,

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you saw a certain type of animal and you learned that that animal was

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dangerous, then every time you would see that animal,

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you would be concerned about your safety and you might have your security monitor

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hit the button. The problem is that when you have a confirmation bias

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that’s negative and, and it’s,

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you know, the world is not all dangerous and scary.

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There’s lots of positive things, then you end up where your security

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monitor gets hypersensitive. And there’s a picture here of tuning forks because

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it’s very interesting. Scientists have started actually studying,

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we’re all, you know, energy. And so we can actually record how

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we vibrate, how the energy and our body vibrates.

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And positive energy when you feel joy vibrates at 520 hertz.

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And if you think about a tuning fork,

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the way a tuning fork works is if you hit the tuning fork,

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then another tuning fork that is programmed to the same

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level of hurts will vibrate.

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So like vibrates like. So if you have a positive confirmation bias,

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your body actually at the cellular level is vibrating at a higher hurts.

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And what will happen is you will notice the things in your environment that

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are vibrating at that same level. So again,

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the energy kind of explains how that phalamus works and the idea that if

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we believe that the world is is safe and supportive,

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then we’re going to notice things every day that are safe and supportive.

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You could have two people who have the exact same experience in a day.

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And at the end of the day, you say, how was your day? And

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if they have a positive confirmation bias,

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they’ll say it was pretty good day because they’ll remember the things that were

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good that confirmed that bias, where if they have a negative bias,

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they’ll say, oh, is the worst day. And then they’ll cite all the negative

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things that happened. And the person with the positive confirmation bias might be like,

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oh, yeah, I guess that did happen, but it’s not the part that they

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remember. The other piece that’s really important about stress is

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that it not only lives in our brain, but it actually lives in our

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body. And so there’s a couple different systems involved.

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One is our nervous system. So we have a sympathetic nervous system.

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That’s like the gas pedal. and it energizes our body,

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and it actually activates when we breathe in.

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So if you ever need a little pick me up of energy,

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you can go and breathe in real quick and then exhale slowly,

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breathe in real quick and exhale and energize your body.

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The parasympathetic nervous system is the brake pedal in our body.

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It relaxes our body, and it’s activated when we breathe out.

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So when someone is stressed, having them breathe deeply and take more

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time on the breath out is really important if you’re tired and you want

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energy spend more time on the breath in and then let it out really

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quick. The other part of our body that’s involved in the stress responses,

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the polyvagal nerve. This is kind of the highway that connects a stimulus in

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our body systems to our brain.

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So for example, they call it our social relationships nerve.

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And so, as you think about, you know, sometimes it’s even things that we

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don’t notice in our body, like our heart rate and our heartbeat and how

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we feel when we’re in certain situations.

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There was a very interesting study done about non-burble face,

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it’s a face study. So people would have different expressions and then they would

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ask kids, you know, what is this face telling you?

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And what was interesting was that students who have a hyperact stress response

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or students who are getting ready to go through puberty lost the ability

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to read facial expressions and especially for teenagers.

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You think about, you know, we’re all worried about them all the time.

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I’m a parent with a 19 in a 22 year old.

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I can only imagine that for probably five or six years,

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my face was always concerned because you’re worried about them.

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You want to make sure they’re okay. They’re safe. they’re doing what they’re supposed

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to do. The problem is that they only interpret happiness

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or obvious surprise or obvious sadness.

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Basically, any other face, so concerned or contemplative,

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all those different kinds of faces, they interpret as anger.

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So when they interpret it as angry, then that sends a message from their

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thalamus to their amygdala that says, hey,

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somebody’s angry at me. I better like,

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show myself up and be ready to fight and so it activates that

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panic button. So one thing that I’ve always encouraged teachers and parents to do

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is name your face. So when you’re talking to a student or your child

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to be able to say, hey, this right now, this is not anger.

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I’m just worried and helping them to make that connection between what your face

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looks like and what your emotion is.

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The other thing you want to do is connect stress to the stress lives

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in our body and it can impact the the vagal nerve also impacts your

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stomach and your bowels and see you think about students who have you know

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nervous stomach or maybe they get nervous about something in the end of with

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diarrhea. So you want to connect stress to the body because the other piece

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is we may not always understand exactly how we feel.

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We may not have the words to describe the emotions we’re feeling but anybody

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can tell what their body feels like.

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So asking, what does your body feel like when it’s stressed?

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And having them make that connection, you know,

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are you somebody who starts to get shaky?

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Are you somebody who gets hot? Are you somebody who starts to fidget or

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get like, you know, jittery or bounce a leg up and down?

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Like, what are the things that I could start to notice?

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Oh, gee, I’m getting hot. What am I stressed about?

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Maybe I’m stressed. And sometimes we don’t even know where stressed.

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Have you ever had a day at the end of the day where you

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sit down and all of a sudden you’re like man my shoulders are tight

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and I didn’t even realize that I was stressed all day so connecting the

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stress to the body feelings when you do that you’re able to start to

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change that hijack stress response because now when I start to feel hot before

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I hit the panic button I’m able to say okay wait a minute my

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stress is ramping up I need to intervene and calm my body down so

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that I don’t end up in a situation where I am out of control

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from stress. The second question that you can ask is what does your body

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look like? And this can be really helpful because that way there’s a cue

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that you can look for in others to understand,

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hey, you’re getting stressed. I did this activity once with teachers and one of

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the teachers said, well, when I get stressed,

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my eyebrows go way up and her teammates were like,

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oh, yeah, they do. And so the teammates were able to look at her

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and if they’re in a team meeting and her eyebrows disappear behind her bangs.

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They know, hey, wait a minute, she’s getting stressed. Maybe we need to take

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a temperature, take a break, take a breath,

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and let everybody get calm down before we move on.

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And then the third question that’s super important is what does your brain tell

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you? And it is specifically phrased that way,

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not what are you thinking, because what are you thinking?

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Assumes that your CEO is at her desk and making decisions about what you’re

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thinking. But when the stress response has hijacked your brain,

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your CEO is out to lunch. So the person who’s doing the thinking for

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you is your amygdala and your thalamus,

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they’re the ones that are sending the messages. And so asking what does your

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brain tell you separates a person from shame or control like

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that this is some kind of a character flaw that I have and it

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helps them to say, you know what my brain is telling me that I’m

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in danger, but I’m not. And so it helps to reconnect that CEO with

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the messages that a brain might sending that aren’t accurate,

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and it reduces that sense of shame that there’s something wrong with me that

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I’m thinking that everybody hates me or that,

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you know, I’m gonna be, you know, embarrassed or whatever it is.

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You can, you can separate yourself and say, that’s just my brain telling me

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that and it’s not true. So the second part of this connecting to the

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body is once you understand how your body experiences stress,

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then you say, what can I do? So how do I regulate that system.

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How do I get that parasympathetic nervous system to calm me down?

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And where can I go to be safe so that I can find a

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spot where I can relax that stress response?

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The other pieces that are super helpful is understanding what can others do and

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what should people not do? Some people don’t want to be touched when they’re

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when they’re stressed out. Other people really want to hug.

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And if you have somebody who does not want to be touched and you

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go to give them a hug, you can actually escalate their stress.

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So, doing this kind of a chart becomes like a social contract that

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says, hey, here’s who I am.

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Here’s what I’m going to do to try to control my stress.

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And here’s how the environment can help me do that better.

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So, here’s an example of what that looks like when it’s finished.

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So, in this particular case, this was a fourth-grade boy who was

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super, super anxious about math. And he had low-working memory in his

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executive functions. and so he would struggle to remember the math.

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He would do two or three or four problems and then he couldn’t remember

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how to do the problem again. He would get super stressed out and he

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would literally have like an internal panic attack.

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And so you can see here we looked at stage one,

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stage two, and stage three. So when he first starts to get stressed,

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he starts to have his hands wet, his face might get red,

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his body might freeze, and he might not respond to if he’s talked to.

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And, you know, this is where we end up disciplining students because we don’t

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understand there having a mental health moment. So if I’m trying to talk to

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a student and he’s not responding, I’m like, oh, you’re being in subordinate.

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So now you’re in trouble. Well, that’s not really what’s going on.

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What’s going on is he is in a stress response and that’s how he

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reacts to stress. When he starts to get more stressed,

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he doesn’t know what to do. Now he’s tapping his foot.

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His shoulders are tense. He might actually start talking back to you at that

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point, which at that point we say, oh,

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you’re being defiant and we discipline them.

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When the reality is again, he’s moving into an internal panic attack.

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The third stage is he just gives up his hand shake and at this

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point he can’t even hear. So you can see just from these stages of

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stress, if we respond to this person when they’re in that state,

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how successful are we gonna be? We’re not gonna be very successful trying to

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reason or trying to just tell him to get to work,

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what we need to do instead is make sure that they understand how to

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calm their body down and that we’re doing what is necessary so that that

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student can do that. So, for example,

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in this child,

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you know, the stage is short for the first one,

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move me to a quiet space. The second,

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you know, let me take a brief break and remind me to calm my

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body down. Gover maybe the steps that I’m supposed to be doing help me

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get started. And then, you know,

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the third face is, again, he’s in a void or so it’s like let

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me leave the room for a minute. Let me let me just go call

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myself outside of this room because being in that room continues to escalate the

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stress. Using nonverbal signals to help me remember to breathe.

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You know at this point if you remember stage three he can’t hear well

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and he’s really shutting down so a nonverbal signal can really help him

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remember okay I’m really I’m really in trouble right now I just need to

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breathe and And then there’s some things there that you can see that are

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what not to do. We often times escalate situations because we don’t

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connect stress to the body and we don’t recognize the physical symptoms

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of what’s going on and the fact that we need to have de-escalation techniques

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prior to ever trying to problem solve a reason.

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So here’s what a couple of them look like with students from a high

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school. So this is a student who you can see here,

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you know, fidgety, watery eyes, this student it’s sarcastic.

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When they get to stage two, now they get spiteful.

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And so, if you are observing, first it’s sarcasm,

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so maybe your little red flag goes up that hate is,

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could start into having a stress response.

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If they start getting spiteful, you know that it’s escalated,

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and if they get to a complete shutdown or don’t talk to me,

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they’re trembling, they’re crying, then you know that there’s no point reasoning with them.

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Instead, we have to help them calm themselves down.

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And you can see here, this person’s response is leave me alone.

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What should you not do? Don’t ask me questions.

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Don’t talk to me. Don’t touch me. Don’t breathe in my general direction.

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So, this student needs to be able to escape.

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And you can see that the calming techniques are escape techniques.

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Let me read. Let me go for a walk.

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Let me listen to some music. On the opposite end of the spectrum is

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this child. You know, when they are feeling anxious,

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they get nervous, they start to think,

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maybe they get confused at stage two and then at stage three,

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they’re shutting down. And you can see here,

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they have some techniques to do, but what they want the teacher to do

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is to help me guide me, listen to me.

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You know, what they shouldn’t do is pressure me or keep bugging me about

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it or just awkwardly stare at me. So this is a completely different set

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of needs for this student than for the previous one.

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Then you have some students who are like, leave me alone,

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but then ask things escalate if they’re not able to take care of their

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own stress and calm their body down,

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then they need some help. So a couple things you can think

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about when you’re working with students or your child around trying to calm the

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body is that, you know, when you remember the panic button was hit,

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cortisol, adrenaline, all these chemicals flood the body.

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And at that point, the animal side of us takes over.

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We’re going to fight, we’re going to run away or we’re going to freeze,

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whatever we decide is our, you know, best mechanism for being safe.

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Water can actually metabolize cortisol. So one thing that can be really helpful is

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to give the, the kid a glass of water and just give him a

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minute. Let him drink some water, breathe,

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try some of the, the calming techniques that they have,

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and that water will speed up the amount of time that it takes for

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a body to calm down. And I’ll give you an example.

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I was working with a school for very at-risk kids and they had a

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runner who’s not like on the track team but like took off and ran

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out of the building. So the principal and I this child

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was like way down the street. So we got in the car and drove

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down the street. Normally what would you do?

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You’d put the window down and you’d be like what are you doing? Where

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are you going? Well that would just escalate him. So instead what she did

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was she rolled the window down and she said man, you never told me

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we’re such a great runner and the kind of looked at her like yeah

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and she said you know you’ve run a really long way you’re far away

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from the school. So you realize you’re gonna turn around and run all the

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way back and the kid kind of looked behind him and realized how far

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he’d gone and she said you want to ride back I’ll just give you

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a ride back. So we got in the car she handed him a bottle

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of water we said nothing on the ride back.

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Then she got to her office she put him in her office and said

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hey I just have something I need to do real quick.

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Gave him a couple more minutes let him finish the and then when she

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walked back in, she was able to say, so tell me what happened,

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what made you want to run? And now the kid unloaded everything that he

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needed to say. So you can see that understanding stress,

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and how we deal with it to prevent escalation,

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can make all the difference in the world in helping a student process that

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stress and process the behaviors that they did because of it.

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The other thing that’s kind of interesting is that our eye position actually activates

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different areas of our brain. So,

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when we are looking up, we are activating our CEO in the prefrontal cortex,

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which is why when you ask somebody a question sometimes they go,

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um, and they look up. It’s just an automatic thing that says,

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hey, wake up CEO. In the middle,

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if we’re looking around outside our eyes,

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ears, nose, who’s in charge, phalamus,

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he’s getting all of the information. Our data manager is on overdrive saying,

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hey, what’s going on in our environment? What are we hearing?

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What are we seeing? And he’s busy writing that report.

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When we look down, our limbic system is activated,

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and so you’re amygdala and that’s security response,

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and so you think about when you get in trouble,

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what do you do, or if you’re ashamed, you oftentimes without even thinking about

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it, you look down. So another piece that’s really important to help in calm

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that stress brain is to look up,

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because that will take away that limbic system constant reinforcement,

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and it’ll who the CEO to say, hey, time to come back from lunch

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and start having a conversation with this body of yours.

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And so another thing that I’ve seen work really well is to create a

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calming corner with a bean bag or something that you’re kind of lying backward,

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reclined a little bit. You can put some fun relaxing pictures on the ceiling,

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so it gives you something to look at. So you know,

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you drink in a glass of water, and lean in back, looking up,

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and all of a sudden that body temperature goes down,

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that body stress response goes down,

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and it allows us to reason our way out of stress.

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So in understanding how we can help students,

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that name it on it, control it, that name it on it,

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control it plan is a reactive solution.

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It’s planning for stress. It’s saying, here’s how I experience it,

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here’s how I’m gonna call my body, and here’s what I need from my

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environment to call my body. But the way that our brain learns,

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If we want to be proactive to avoid stress,

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is to understand we learn through repetition,

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experience and emotion. So,

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you know, you think about learning math.

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We regularly daily practice math facts.

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It’s that repetition, it’s that experience of every day,

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and maybe it’s the emotion of getting a good score.

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If the emotion is high enough,

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then we don’t need as much repetition. So,

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you know, I have two kids. I don’t need 12 kids to remember the

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00:23:49,471 –> 00:23:54,090
birth experience and completely understand the first few weeks of trying

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to take care of a baby, it was highly emotional.

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So our brain learns through this repetition experience and emotion,

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00:24:00,930 –> 00:24:03,710
we’re kind of like a highway. So when we’re born,

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our brains just a giant field of grass.

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00:24:07,050 –> 00:24:11,590
And then through repetition, we start to build roads on our highway

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00:24:11,591 –> 00:24:13,730
with off ramps. So for example,

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00:24:13,810 –> 00:24:17,770
when I’m first born, I cry when I’m wet or when I’m hungry.

404
00:24:17,771 –> 00:24:20,370
And that’s my when I’m wet or hungry,

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00:24:20,630 –> 00:24:25,110
then I cry. But then that then from crying is replaced with when I

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00:24:25,111 –> 00:24:29,350
cry, my mom comes to me and either feeds me or takes care of

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00:24:29,351 –> 00:24:32,970
my needs or changes my diaper or my dad comes and picks me up.

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00:24:33,530 –> 00:24:37,990
So you start to develop these pathways in your brain when then plans.

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00:24:39,150 –> 00:24:41,350
You know, sometimes we develop really bad offerings.

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So you know, as adults, we might say, man, I’ve had a hard day.

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I need a drink, right? We don’t really need to drink.

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00:24:46,990 –> 00:24:49,310
It’s probably the worst thing for you because it’s a depression.

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00:24:49,650 –> 00:24:51,950
However, we get on this like automatic,

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00:24:52,150 –> 00:24:54,790
man, I’ve had a bad day get off at that exit and I’m going

415
00:24:54,791 –> 00:24:59,130
to do something that’s unhealthy. As we want to be healthier,

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00:24:59,490 –> 00:25:03,190
we need to think about what are the offerings that lead us to opportunities,

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00:25:03,510 –> 00:25:05,550
to better choices, to happier life,

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00:25:05,890 –> 00:25:10,750
but it takes time and repetition and emotion and celebration and experience

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00:25:10,751 –> 00:25:15,530
to get there. So you can use something called a when-than-plan to help

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00:25:15,531 –> 00:25:18,530
students start to build those highways in their brain.

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00:25:19,590 –> 00:25:24,390
So repeated experiences build those off-ramps and it can be really hard to resist.

422
00:25:25,010 –> 00:25:27,910
So you know, sometimes we have students who, for whatever reason,

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00:25:28,090 –> 00:25:32,350
their life has continually taken them to the wrong exit on the highway.

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But just like if you’ve ever been on the highway and you have to

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00:25:34,831 –> 00:25:38,350
use the restroom, you want to get off at the fastest exit you can

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00:25:38,351 –> 00:25:40,910
find to go to the restroom. So let’s say you get off in an

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00:25:40,911 –> 00:25:43,470
exit and you go to a horrible part of town and you end up

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00:25:43,471 –> 00:25:46,010
getting mugged or your car gets stolen.

429
00:25:46,410 –> 00:25:48,670
Well then the next time you get off at that exit and you end

430
00:25:48,671 –> 00:25:51,470
up with the same outcome. The next time you get off at that exit.

431
00:25:51,910 –> 00:25:56,110
So some people’s lives have been driven to the wrong exit.

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However, what’s important to remember is what we are asking the brain to do

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00:26:00,271 –> 00:26:04,610
when we’re building a new exit is we’re asking that brain to stay in

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00:26:04,611 –> 00:26:07,570
pain longer. So if you have to go to the bathroom,

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00:26:07,571 –> 00:26:09,870
maybe the next exit is not for five miles.

436
00:26:10,350 –> 00:26:14,290
You have to stay uncomfortable but until you get to the exit that takes

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00:26:14,291 –> 00:26:16,910
you to the better part of town where you’re not going to have your

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00:26:16,911 –> 00:26:21,030
car stolen or get beat up. So as we think of those highways in

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00:26:21,031 –> 00:26:25,230
our brain, we need to think about how do we do it enough that

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00:26:25,231 –> 00:26:29,990
repetition and that experience and that emotion so that that exit becomes

441
00:26:29,991 –> 00:26:33,990
our automatic off ramp and the exit to the bad part of town gets

442
00:26:33,991 –> 00:26:37,790
overgrown and it’s more work than it’s worth to go off that exit.

443
00:26:38,530 –> 00:26:41,310
So what a win then plan looks like is you think about what are

444
00:26:41,311 –> 00:26:45,650
the things that trigger your stress? So in this particular example,

445
00:26:45,930 –> 00:26:49,790
this was a student who got super stressed when they got stuck and forgot

446
00:26:49,791 –> 00:26:53,530
what they just learned, or if they were being told to use a certain

447
00:26:53,531 –> 00:26:57,790
method and they didn’t understand that method or they liked the methods that they

448
00:26:57,791 –> 00:27:01,330
used. And we see this a lot in math because math is taught,

449
00:27:01,331 –> 00:27:05,030
you know, students are taught to solve math problems in multiple ways,

450
00:27:05,110 –> 00:27:07,410
using multiple different processes. Well,

451
00:27:07,450 –> 00:27:12,070
sometimes a kid might like one process over another and really resist using a

452
00:27:12,071 –> 00:27:15,310
different process and it stresses them out because now they don’t feel capable.

453
00:27:15,390 –> 00:27:19,730
They don’t feel knowledgeable. Maybe they don’t understand the lesson or they need to

454
00:27:19,731 –> 00:27:22,010
get their math completed or they just don’t get it.

455
00:27:22,050 –> 00:27:25,830
So these were the stressors that would lead this child to shut down.

456
00:27:26,370 –> 00:27:29,790
So if you remember, your CEO is out to lunch when you have a

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00:27:29,791 –> 00:27:33,890
stress reaction. So, if the when statements are the things that cause a stress

458
00:27:33,891 –> 00:27:38,470
reaction, then if you get into the moment where you start to

459
00:27:38,471 –> 00:27:41,810
feel that stress and you start to send your CEO out to lunch,

460
00:27:42,430 –> 00:27:45,050
you need an intervention. You need something right then.

461
00:27:45,270 –> 00:27:48,630
So, in this particular case, that’s the then part of the when then plan.

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00:27:49,170 –> 00:27:51,530
So, if I get stuck and forget what I just learned,

463
00:27:51,890 –> 00:27:54,710
I’m gonna write the steps to the problem and I’m gonna have the teacher

464
00:27:54,711 –> 00:27:57,650
check that I have them down and help me think of ways to remember

465
00:27:57,651 –> 00:27:59,850
them. So it seems simple, you know,

466
00:27:59,851 –> 00:28:02,390
if I don’t understand the lesson, I’ll raise my hand and ask.

467
00:28:02,770 –> 00:28:07,310
But remember when you get into that stress and the stages of stress escalate

468
00:28:07,311 –> 00:28:09,370
and for some people they escalate super fast,

469
00:28:09,490 –> 00:28:12,950
they go from 0 to 3. Other people can live in mild stress for

470
00:28:12,951 –> 00:28:16,170
a long time. But when you get to that point where you’re truly at

471
00:28:16,171 –> 00:28:20,630
a crisis point, you don’t have the mental acuity all the time to reason

472
00:28:20,631 –> 00:28:23,450
through. And so having this written down,

473
00:28:23,451 –> 00:28:26,870
so what we did is we did when then plans and then we had

474
00:28:26,871 –> 00:28:31,170
them taped to the desk. So that way the student has their name at

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00:28:31,171 –> 00:28:34,930
own it control it plan that says, okay, this is how I experienced stress

476
00:28:34,931 –> 00:28:39,050
in my body. So now they’re starting to get more self-aware of how they

477
00:28:39,051 –> 00:28:42,370
experienced stress. So when they start to feel those physical symptoms,

478
00:28:42,371 –> 00:28:44,590
they can look down at their desk and say, okay,

479
00:28:44,950 –> 00:28:49,350
which one of these when statements is happening right now and what should I

480
00:28:49,351 –> 00:28:53,250
do? And so these when then plans can prevent stress and they can also

481
00:28:53,251 –> 00:28:57,250
become an intervention and to calm that body down before we’re out of control.

482
00:28:59,410 –> 00:29:03,350
So hopefully this was interesting to you and gave you some practical suggestions of

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00:29:03,351 –> 00:29:07,130
things you can do, and a little bit more understanding about how the brain

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00:29:07,131 –> 00:29:11,010
processes stress and what happens when we have a hijack stress response.