The thinking brain vs. the reactive brain

[Cat Familiar]

This is terminology from natural horsemanship. The idea is that we try to engage the horse's thinking brain, rather than their reactive brain. This keeps us safe, as handlers and riders. It's inevitable that horses will see something that frightens them. The goal is to get them to think about it, rather than blindly react and possibly injure themselves or us in the process.

This is such a good lesson for those of us dealing with loved ones with BPD. So often in the past when my husband was dysregulating, I tried to use logic to calm him down. It didn't work because he was stuck in his reactive brain, not his thinking brain where he could have understood what I was saying.

Just like with my horses, when I see him start to dysregulate, I now immediately try to distract him or get him to focus on something else. It's been working well as he's not had a full-blown dysregulation in months.

The irony for me is that I know better than to get my horses more worked up when they're reacting. It just didn't occur to me that trying to relate to my husband the way I'd relate to a "non" would end up making him more upset.

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[Notwendy]

Great post,

I think the flight or fight response isn't much evolved and so would be similar with both humans and animals. When activated, the "thinking brain" is suppressed biologically.

[waverider]

This is all part of the Wisemind principle

https://bpdfamily.com/parenting/05.htm

In the case of a dysregulating person the emotional (reactive) mind is overwhelming the Executive (thinking) part of the mind so that the Wisemind is compromised.

So yes, distract the emotional mind whilst trying to engage the executive mind is the go, even if not same issue related, its a matter of not stimulating one whilst trying to kick start the other

[Cat Familiar]

Great link, Waverider. Thanks.

My husband is extremely emotional (though not good at talking about either his emotions or mine) and I'm extremely logical. He has called me "robot woman." Growing up with a BPD mom who was frequently out of control emotionally, I was so contemptuous of being a victim of runaway emotion, that I went the other direction. Interesting that I married emotional guys.

I think we all have different abilities as far as accessing our executive function. Much like horses--some of us are hot-blooded and some of us cold-blooded. Today we're having quite a downpour with heavy winds. The previous client my horseshoer saw this afternoon has a very large Thoroughbred, a breed that can be known for having a flighty temperament. Stormy weather can increase incipient fear in horses and this horse went completely ballistic when a sudden breeze blew a feedbag through the breezeway of the barn. It was all my horseshoer could do to protect the owner and not get seriously injured himself when the horse freaked out. As it was, he was struck very hard on his leg, but that was minor compared to what could have happened when the horse reared and struck out.

This is an example of dysregulated behavior and how some individuals can cool down quickly while others remain in heightened alert. Even though he waited 15 minutes for the horse to calm down, every time there was a loud gust of wind, the horse started freaking out again. Finally he realized that he was not going to shoe the horse today--it would have been too dangerous for everyone involved.

My horses are cold-blooded breeds--Quarter Horse and Morgan. That's not to say that all individuals in those breeds are not over-reactive--there's truly a lot of individual variation. But they tend to less reactive and calm down faster than Thoroughbreds and Warmbloods. I think many of us "nons" fall into that more cold-blooded category, while our pwBPD are often more hot-blooded.

So many of us are completely perplexed by the volatility we see in our loved ones. They probably are equally baffled by our relative calm.

I've had my husband accuse me of "not caring" about something because I wasn't agitated about it like he was. I've tried to tell him that I care, it just wouldn't help anything for me to get upset about it.

[Cat Familiar]

A big issue for me is to not be judgmental about my husband's difficulty in controlling his emotions. I tend to see it though my own abilities to be strategic and controlled. I have to remind myself that he is not similarly equipped. He has other abilities that I don't have--like a gift for public speaking.

[waverider]

Sometimes the emotional mind has to completely burn though its reactions before the executive mind even gets to have a vote in their minds boardroom.

I often think of the mind as being full of little people sitting around a table trying to argue their way through decisons . In a pwBPD mind the "emotion party" has the biggest majority. The nerdy executive party are too timid...

[Cat Familiar]

In a pwBPD mind the "emotion party" has the biggest majority. The nerdy executive party are too timid...

Yeah, and with a "logical thinker" the situation is reversed. The "emotion party" is seen as hysterical and frivolous.