Fundamental Nervous System Anatomy & Function
You’ve been working with clients, regardless whether a short or extended time, and you’re ready to take things farther. Studying fundamental nervous system function is exactly the place to begin. There is so much information circulating on ways you can integrate the nervous system. But it’s imperative to start with learning some key information on how the nervous system works. If you skip this step and go straight to studying the tools and tricks, you’ll lack depth of understanding, critical reasoning, and ability to apply appropriately.
The nervous system is divided into two primary divisions, the central nervous system and the peripheral nervous system. The central nervous system includes and any nerve cell entirely housed within the brain and spinal cord. The peripheral nervous system is any nerve cell that branches off from the brain or spinal cord, including the nerves that are running through our limbs.
Did you know that the nervous system begins developing around day 19 in utero? This sophisticated system grows at a rate of approximately 250,000 new neurons per minute in utero, astounding! When we’re born, we have approximately 100 billion neurons but these neurons will continue to develop by forming new pathways and connections. Around the age of 3, we enter into a state of cell pruning where our brain begins eliminating unnecessary neurons and connections. It’s a state of refining when you might notice impact behavior, regulation, and thinking in small children.
Are you curious about neuroplasticity? Neuroplasticity is the term used to describe the nervous system changing, for better or worse, along with the development of new neural pathways and is integral to what we do as movement professionals. If you’re intending to create long lasting impact but helping clients adopt more efficient and functional movement patterns, you’ll be relying on neuroplasticity. There are many things that you can comfortable integrate into your movement sessions to help facilitate this process. I’ll get into this more in future, neuroplasticity focused articles and we go into great depth with this in my continuing education courses. People have the ability to change their nervous systems at any age in life! Sure, it slows down as we get older and it needs to be a more active and deliberate process but it does occur at any age.
Nervous system regulation is a prevalent topic these days but what does this mean? There are many components that go into nervous system function but you can start learning about this by understanding the parasympathetic and sympathetic nervous systems. The parasympathetic nervous system is the state of rest and digest, it is regulated by the vagus nerve which runs from the brain to the basin of the pelvis. When we are in a parasympathetic state, we are able to digest food, learn, heal, and more. The sympathetic state exists for good reason, it is imperative for human survival. When our brain, specifically the amygdala, perceives threat or danger, it triggers a cascade of events that switches us into the sympathetic state. At first, our adrenals are signaled to release adrenaline to help us respond physiologically and then if we continue to stay in the sympathetic state, our adrenal glands release cortisol, known as the stress hormone. Concerns with the sympathetic state arise when we are hypersensitive to activating the sympathetic state and when we exist in the sympathetic state excessively or unnecessarily. At the core of nervous system regulation should be working with these states in harmony and I will get into this in further articles.
Lastly, most of what I refer to above is referring to the brain’s interaction with the body and our environments. But what about the nerves running through our limbs? Peripheral nerves are housed within a connective tissue sheath and need to be able to glide, slide, strain, compress, and absorb load and forces. When these abilities are negatively impacted, it can result in neural tension. To help maintain peripheral nerve function or address neural tension, neural glides are a great tool that is appropriate for movement professionals to use!
I go into all of these topics and more in my continuing education courses and movement classes but I hope these broad strokes provided you some framework to start appreciating nervous system function!