Transcript

Emma: Hey, hello everybody. Excuse my bedhead. Welcome everyone. Hi Heidi, hi Jenny, it’s really nice to see you all. We’re going to be talking about the hoo-ha that has been going on in the wellness industry around the polyvagal nervous system research and the apparent debunking of Stephen Porges’ work. We’re going to go through that in a bit more detail and analyze it a little bit.

Give us a second while we sort out the tech stuff… these lives can be a bit finicky at the beginning.

Tanya: Yay, I’m here. Sorry. My Instagram has just been so weird today. I haven’t been getting people’s DMs.

Emma: Don’t worry about it at all. It’s really lovely to see you. I always find with Instagram Live I look like I’ve got a comb-over. I haven’t looked in the mirror yet today, so it’s like… oh dear.

Tanya: Well on the subject of hair, it’s been raining here and my grey roots are showing so it looks like I’m going bald at the top of my head.

Emma: Not to me, Tanya. You look perfectly perfect today.

Tanya: Well I’m glad we’re here. Glad we made it.

Emma: Me too. Could I hand over to you to introduce our subject for today?

Tanya: No problem. Today we’re going to be talking about polyvagal theory. I’ve made some notes so if I look down, I’m just referring to them because I want to get it right.

For those of you who are unfamiliar, polyvagal theory was proposed by Stephen Porges. It offers an understanding of the nervous system’s response to safety and threat. According to his model, it’s kind of like a ladder.

At the top we have the ventral vagal state, which is your safe and social state. If there is threat, our neuroception — which is our sense of what’s safe or dangerous — alerts us. Then we move down the ladder into the sympathetic response, which is activation, generally the fight-or-flight response. And sometimes we move further into a shutdown response, which is the dorsal vagal state.

One of the reasons this theory has been so popular with coaches, therapists, and psychologists is that it gave us language to help us understand what’s going on in the nervous system. It introduced ideas like neuroception and co-regulation. It helps us understand what might be happening for ourselves and for our children at a nervous system level.

Instead of looking at a child having a meltdown or an autistic child trying to elope and assuming it’s bad behaviour, we can understand it as a nervous system response to threat.

Recently there’s been debate because another researcher, Paul Grossman, wrote a critique of polyvagal theory that was peer-reviewed by around 36 colleagues. Since then there have been headlines saying the theory has been “debunked.”

For many people in the neurodivergent space, this theory is important because it gives us a framework to explain and articulate our lived experience. So today we just wanted to have a conversation about what parts might be critiqued, what parts are still relevant, and how our understanding of the nervous system is evolving.

Theories are theories — our knowledge of the brain and nervous system is constantly evolving.

Emma: I remember first learning about polyvagal theory when I was studying to become a counsellor at university. One of the lecturers said, “I’m going to talk to you about polyvagal theory,” and it was quite controversial even then.

But it was explained really well and became a very useful tool for me in understanding safety responses. I listened to a lot of Deb Dana’s work — she wrote a beautiful audiobook about befriending your nervous system.

At the same time I was training to be an alcohol coach and did six months with Jolene Park, who also wrote about the nervous system. Polyvagal theory was very much part of that training as well.

What I find fascinating is not just the theory itself but the internet response to it — people feeling anxious about what it means if it’s wrong.

Most people outside our spaces don’t even know what polyvagal means. But in the neurodivergent world we talk about nervous systems and safety responses a lot. Whether you define it exactly as the ventral–sympathetic–dorsal ladder or not, the theory has contributed to reframing behaviour as safety responses.

For me, working with adults, reframing behaviour this way removes shame and blame. It allows people to bring self-compassion into the narrative.

Tanya: Yes. Understanding this theory helped me understand my own tendency to people-please or fawn. When I felt threatened, I’d agree with people even when I didn’t actually agree. I’d say yes to things I didn’t want to say yes to.

Earlier in my journey I would freeze up and be unable to advocate for my child because I felt so under threat. Afterwards I’d walk away and be really mean to myself — telling myself I had no backbone or needed to be more courageous.

Polyvagal theory helped me see that as a nervous system response learned over many years to keep myself safe.

Emma: Exactly. These responses are often incredibly resourceful. That’s the reframe.

Taking shame away from these behaviours — both for children and adults — is incredibly valuable.

Tanya: I initially trained as a teacher through behaviourist approaches — reinforcing or discouraging behaviours in a Pavlovian way. Polyvagal theory helped me see my child in a totally different light.

Parents I work with often worry that their neurodivergent child is lazy or defiant. But when you understand what’s happening in the nervous system, you can respond with compassion instead.

Understanding the brain and nervous system is such an important tool.

Emma: It’s interesting when you apply that to environments like school. My youngest child went through severe burnout, and there was a lot of pressure from professionals to use exposure therapy — essentially forcing him back into situations that felt unsafe.

If a child’s nervous system genuinely perceives an environment as unsafe and they’re forced into it, that can become traumatic.

Many of us grew up in compliance-based parenting systems where we were told to push through emotions. But that often leads to shame around feelings and behaviours.

When we instead look at nervous system regulation and safety, it changes everything.

Tanya: Absolutely. When we don’t bring a nervous system lens into systems like schools or healthcare, people often feel invalidated and vulnerable.

I think part of the panic around polyvagal theory being “debunked” comes from how helpful it has been in explaining our lived experiences.

Emma: Yes. And another piece of this is our tendency — especially as neurodivergent people — to want certainty. Anxiety is often about trying to control the future so we feel safe.

So when something we relied on suddenly feels uncertain, it can feel very destabilizing.

Tanya: Exactly. And I think it’s important to say that polyvagal theory hasn’t been fully debunked. Some aspects just aren’t strongly supported by evidence yet, and our understanding may need to evolve.

Before we get into that though, I’d like to talk about regulation, because there’s a misconception that regulation means always being calm and in control.

That’s not how the nervous system works.

Emma: Yes. One thing I noticed in the online discussions was people treating regulation as a kind of destination — like being calm all the time.

But the nervous system naturally moves between states. The original ladder model suggested moving between ventral (social), sympathetic (fight or flight), and dorsal (shutdown).

The goal was never to stay in a constant calm state. The goal was flexibility.

But research now suggests the nervous system doesn’t operate strictly like a ladder. Different states can overlap or occur simultaneously.

For example, when my youngest was in burnout, he could be completely shut down physically but still extremely anxious and reactive at the same time.

So the nervous system is more complex than a simple linear model.

Tanya: Yes, exactly. Humans are complex. Parts of us might appear calm on the outside while inside we’re in complete fight-or-flight.

And things like hormones, cycles, and life context can influence regulation too.

Emma: And there’s also intergenerational trauma and social conditioning, particularly for women and marginalized groups. Many people have had to mask or suppress their needs for survival.

All of that shapes how our nervous systems respond.

Tanya: Yes. Neuroscience itself is a relatively young field. Our understanding will continue evolving.

Even within neurodivergence research, our understanding has expanded dramatically in the last five years simply because people started sharing their lived experiences.

So it’s important to approach this with curiosity rather than rigid certainty.

Emma: Absolutely.

Tanya: One final point I’d add is that regulation isn’t about forcing self-care routines. It’s about creating small moments of safety throughout the day — reminding our bodies that we are safe in this moment.

I once had a coach who said something that stuck with me: self-care is like doing the laundry. You can’t do it once and expect clean clothes for life.

It’s small, ongoing actions that look different for everyone.

Emma: I love that.

And I think the most important takeaway is this: frameworks and theories can be helpful, but they should never override a person’s lived experience.

Tanya: Exactly.

If you’re listening to this and your experience feels different from ours, that’s completely valid. We’d love to hear about it.

Emma: Yes — the goal is never to make people feel wrong for their nervous system responses. The goal is compassion and understanding.

Tanya: Before we finish, we like to share a “magic moment” from the week.

Emma: I had one last night. I’d had a really tough day and ended up having a little meltdown. Later I joined a call where we did havening — a somatic practice where you gently touch your arms or face while doing inner-child work.

By the end I was lying on the floor feeling warm and calm. My nervous system felt like warm jelly.

Tanya: That sounds beautiful.

My magic moment was seeing a double rainbow this morning. Rainbows have always symbolized hope for me, and after lots of rain it was just such a beautiful moment.

Emma: I love that.

Tanya: If anyone listening had a magic moment this week, we’d love to hear it.

Emma: Thank you so much for spending this time with us today.

Tanya: Yes, thank you everyone. We look forward to chatting again next week.