07/12/2024
Stress Hormones, they are comfortably misleading us.
Cortisol. If you asked most horse people what cortisol is, they would say, it is a stress hormone. But upon closer analysis, cortisol is not a stress hormone. First, let us define exactly what stress is.
Medi-line Plus is the US National Library of Medicine and their website which is an official extension of the US Government, describes stress as:
"Stress is a feeling of emotional or physical tension. It can come from any event or thought that makes you feel frustrated, angry, or nervous. Stress is your body's reaction to a challenge or demand. In short bursts, stress can be positive, such as when it helps you avoid danger or meet a deadline."
Our layman's understanding of stress simply, is
Stress = Bad.
Stress = Unhealthy.
Stress = Poor Moral/Ethics/Welfare.
We need to know that this meaning of stress is not scientific. It is an implied emotional meaning to the word. It is a societal conditioning.
Yet if we detach ourselves from the implied emotional meaning that our society has conditioned into us as to what stress means, and look at the components of stress, we find ingredients of "stress" everywhere in the body in a whole host of functions.
If you fall in love, the neural-chemistry is very akin to negative-emotional-stress. In fact, more similar than it is different. Like how chimpanzee's share the majority of the DNA with us. So much so that studies of chimpanzee's have been used to influence human healthcare. Love and Negative-Emotional-Distress are chemically very similar in the nervous system.
Eustress.
Described by Miriam-Webster as
"A positive form of stress having a beneficial effect on health, motivation, performance, and emotional well-being."
Yet chemically, stress and eustress are almost (not completely) identical.
They both involve cortisol.
Did you know that without cortisol, you would faint every time you stood up after laying down? Without cortisol, you couldn't interpret a new recipe for dinner. You couldn't drive a car. You couldn't exercise. You couldn't engage with other humans socially. You couldn't care for horses. You couldn't learn to ride. You couldn't in fact, learn to do anything, and then do anything you have learned to do, without allowing your body to produce cortisol.
Because Cortisol is NOT a stress hormone. Cortisol is a metabolic regulator. Cortisol ensures that your body has the right systems online, for the right tasks. Without it, you actually dysregulate.
But the horse training world has not understood this. As a necessary departure from the Negative-Emotional-Distress we have witnessed for much too long in our industry, we have run head first into a total over-correction. We have demonised cortisol, often because we do not have enough healthy role models of trainers creating Eustress is horses, and horses enjoying Eustress. Or if we do, our leaders are not promoting it publicly, they promote it privately and silently, because they can feel that the community at large does not have the ability to recognise the difference between a positive and negative stress state.
So we err on the side of caution. And promote down-regulated parasympathetic nervous systems only. I have played a very strong part in this trend. And to this day, down-regulation IS my starting point with almost any horse.
But down regulation is not my Achievement Goal. It is not the ultimate version of horsemanship.
The ultimate achievement is a horse that can experience ALL that life has to offer, together with their human. All of it. I will take all of it. Up and down the nervous system. Side to side through valance and arousal. In and out of emotional meaning.
I wish for you to imagine the following allegory, to help you understand the potential negative effects, over-focusing on down regulation can have on your relationship with your horse.
Imagine you invite a friend out to coffee. You and your friend are not traumatised people, or recovering from trauma. You are both mentally and physically healthy and happy generally. Good moods, most of the time.
You go to the cafe. You start to tell your friend a story. As you tell the story you become animated. Excited. (Cortisol). You recount this funny and engaging story with facial expressions. With emotions. With hand gestures. You passionately describe the story to your friend you hope is listening and enjoying the story.
As you up-regulate your nervous system while you communicate with your friend, they do something strange now.
They stop looking you in the eye. They even look away from you into the middle distance. They deeply sigh. They fold their hands into their lap and go quiet. They disengage with you. You ask them what's wrong and they don't answer. They just deeply exhale again. They begin to meditate deeply while you are in the middle of your exciting story.
Eventually, the message you get from them passively, is that your excitement, your passion, your expression... IS NOT WELCOME with them.
So you copy them. You gaze into middle distance. Fold your hands. Get quiet. Behave yourself. Stop looking at them. And stop telling your story.
Then, and only then, your friend says
"Good!" And rewards you. Pats and strokes you. Then they smile at you and reward you with the return of their social engagement.
They repeat this pattern so consistently, that now every time you see them, you have been conditioned by them into being chronically subdued. Then eventually, coffee dates become dates at the gym. And the process is repeated there. When you try to recruit exciting nervous system and emotional states to help you feel motivated by the gym, your friends bizarre fixation on relaxing stops you in your tracks. And now you are lifting heavy weights, trying to cosplay a delicate, particular, pretty veneer of polite quiet confidence.
Trying to make it look relaxed. Which is anathema to offering effort.
All of this is not applicable, if you and or your friend are ill. Sick. Unwell mentally and physically. In the initial stages of healing the body and mind, down regulation is the easiest starting point, and the safest.
And I acknowledge the work of my colleagues who focus on down regulation as their clients generally present varying degrees of sick and unwell horses.
But as soon as horses have a base line of wellness, we are supposed to pivot, and teach ourselves how to power up, and enjoy high effort activities too.
Because that is the spice of life.
Everything else is just a bland mono-culture.
And here with EH, our goal is to ensure you and the horse are mentally and physically healthy, in down regulation, so that you can return to life. To joy. To excitement. To fun.
www.emotionalhorsemanship.com
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Some of the scientific literature I used in the building of this understanding and training approach:
Mommsen, T.P., Vijayan, M.M. & Moon, T.W. Cortisol in teleosts: dynamics, mechanisms of action, and metabolic regulation. Reviews in Fish Biology and Fisheries 9, 211–268 (1999). https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1008924418720
Elizabeth A. Young, James Abelson, Stafford L. Lightman,
Cortisol pulsatility and its role in stress regulation and health,
Frontiers in Neuroendocrinology,
Volume 25, Issue 2,
2004,
Pages 69-76,
ISSN 0091-3022,
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.yfrne.2004.07.001.
(https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0091302204000184)
RT Journal Article
A1 Stalder, Tobias
A1 Oster, Henrik
A1 Abelson, James L
A1 Huthsteiner, Katharina
A1 Klucken, Tim
A1 Clow, Angela
T1 The Cortisol Awakening Response: Regulation and Functional Significance
JF Endocrine Reviews
JO Endocr Rev
YR 2024
DO 10.1210/endrev/bnae024
OP bnae024
SN 0163-769X
RD 12/7/2024
UL https://doi.org/10.1210/endrev/bnae024
Lauren A.M. Lebois, Esther K. Papies, Kaundinya Gopinath, Romeo Cabanban, Karen S. Quigley, Venkatagiri Krishnamurthy, Lisa Feldman Barrett, Lawrence W. Barsalou,
A shift in perspective: Decentering through mindful attention to imagined stressful events,
Neuropsychologia,
Volume 75,
2015,
Pages 505-524,
ISSN 0028-3932,
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.neuropsychologia.2015.05.030.
(https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0028393215300452)
Keywords: Decentering; Mental simulation; Mindfulness; Neuroimaging; Self; Stress
Michele M. Tugade, Department of Psychology, Vassar College; Barbara L. Fredrickson, Department of Psychology and Research Center for Group Dynamics at the Institute for Social Research, University of Michigan; and Lisa Feldman Barrett, Department of Psychology, Boston College.
Preparation of this paper was supported by a National Service Research Award from the NIMH (F32-MH64267) to Michele Tugade; grants from the NIMH (MH53971 and MH59615) and funds from the John Templeton Foundation to Barbara Fredrickson; and NSF grants SBR-9727896, BCS 0074688 and NIMH grant K02 MH001981 to Lisa Feldman Barrett.
https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-6494.2004.00294.x
Interoceptive Sensitivity and Self-Reports of Emotional Experience.
By Barrett, Lisa Feldman,Quigley, Karen S.,Bliss-Moreau, Eliza,Aronson, Keith R.
Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, Vol 87(5), Nov 2004, 684-697
Equine Stress: Neuroendocrine Physiology and Pathophysiology
Written By Milomir Kovac, Tatiana Vladimirovna Ippolitova, Sergey Pozyabin, Ruslan Aliev, Viktoria Lobanova, Nevena Drakul and Catrin S. Rutland. Submitted: 26 July 2021 Reviewed: 25 April 2022 Published: 09 June 2022
DOI: 10.5772/intechopen.105045
https://books.google.es/books?hl=en&lr=&id=bwi9DwAAQBAJ&oi=fnd&pg=PP1&dq=horses+positive+eustress&ots=R9CV5HX1lf&sig=2su0QXyicfeDrzc_jda2x_b-70g&redir_esc=y =onepage&q&f=false
