A high-flying lawyer who struggled with severe burnout after losing her father in a car accident has revealed how she finally transformed her health after an extensive search for answers.
Loren Hogue, 34, from Melbourne, was working as a junior lawyer in 2011 when her dad unexpectedly died in the accident.
The combination of working long legal hours with helping her mum wind down her business and grieving for her father led Loren to feel like she was barely coping.
She recalled her hair was falling out, she couldn’t sleep, she lost 10kg in weight and was anxious and exhausted all the time.
A high-flying lawyer who struggled with severe burnout after losing her father in a car accident has revealed the warning signs of a dysregulated nervous system, and the steps she took to transform her health inside and out (Loren Hogue pictured before)
Loren Hogue, 34, from Melbourne, was working as a junior lawyer when her dad unexpectedly died in the accident; at the time she felt she wasn’t coping (pictured before and now)
‘I began experiencing what I now know to be the symptoms of a dysregulated nervous system,’ Loren told FEMAIL.
‘I had gut issues, chronic anxiety and trouble switching off. I had severe brain fog and near-constant pain. I was irritable and emotionally irregular. I didn’t know what to do.’
The 34-year-old eventually quit her job in 2014 and started searching for answers, spending thousands in the process.
‘I hired psychologists, life coaches, healers, kinesiologists, business coaches, acupuncturists, naturopaths and even shamans in Peru to help me,’ Loren said.
‘I tried everything from meditation apps, mindset coaching, EFT, hypnosis, EMDR – you name it. I experienced some results but things still didn’t feel right inside of me.’
She said she spent thousands on psychologists, life coaches, healers, kinesiologists, business coaches, acupuncturists, naturopaths and even shamans in Peru to try and help her, but all to no avail (pictured before and now)
Loren said no matter how hard she looked, she just couldn’t seem to find the answer.
That was until 2020, when she was first introduced to nervous system regulation as a concept.
Nervous system regulation allows you to maintain homeostasis, access restorative sleep, decrease inflammation, and is involved in memory, auditory processing, learning, controlling sensory processing and more.
‘I was introduced to it and things finally started to click for me,’ she said.
‘I realised I didn’t have a mindset issue and there wasn’t anything wrong with me. I just had a dysregulated nervous system that was stuck in overdrive after years of stress.’
Loren added: ‘It turns out that 80 per cent of the nerves in the body are afferent nerves, which means that they run up from the body to the brain.
‘Only 20 per cent of the nerves go down to the body. This means we need to utilise the body and embodiment practices in order to treat burnout and stress and not mindset work.’
Loren and her scientist and tech entrepreneur husband began to delve deeper into the idea of nervous system regulation, which led them to develop their Neurofit app – which is designed to help people regulate their nervous systems daily.
‘I want people to realise that the nervous system is key to overcoming stress and burnout,’ Loren said.
‘There are body-based exercises people can do daily to assist them and habits people can implement to make them feel better almost instantly.’
Eventually, Loren (pictured now) said she discovered she has a dysregulated nervous system, and there are simple daily habits you can adopt to improve this today
Within months of launching Neurofit, the app has already been a huge success.
Loren said 54 per cent of users reported less stress in just seven days, while within five minutes of doing the neurological fitness exercises, 96 per cent felt less stressed and dysregulated.
Thousands of people have downloaded the app, and they’re already seeing big results.
‘A healthy nervous system is resilient to internal and external stressors and it significantly influences our behaviour and how we experience the world around us,’ Loren said.
‘A healthy nervous system can quickly shift out of the negative nervous system states of sympathetic (fight or flight) state, Dorsal Vagal (shutdown and freeze) state and overwhelm state into the more positive states of ventral vagal (read and digest) state, play state and stillness state.’
Without a strong neurological fitness baseline, Loren said people are much more susceptible to chronic stress and burnout, anxiety, health issues and emotional dysregulation.
She developed an app called Neurofit with her husband Andrew (both pictured); it is designed to help people regulate their nervous systems daily
Finally, the 34-year-old shared her nine tips for regulating your nervous system and starting fresh in 2023.
The first and one of the most important tips is you put your phone away as much and as often as possible.
Secondly, Loren said you need to make sure you avoid social fatigue by paying attention to the people around you.
If you find a person draining, it is healthy and acceptable to take some distance from them and set a clear boundary
‘Our nervous system mirrors the people around us. If you find a person draining, it is healthy and acceptable to take some distance from them and set a clear boundary,’ she said.
Loren recommends a break from alcohol if you’re struggling as alcohol is a nervous system depressant, so it’s best avoided.
‘Make time for social play,’ she said.
‘Playing games or sports with friends and loved ones teaches the nervous system to be in a heightened state without going into fight or flight mode.’
In a similar way, you should also both make time to exercise and do other embodiment exercises to get you ‘into your body’.
Good examples of this are things like tai chi, dancing, body shaking and meditation.
Finally, Loren said you should try and get good sleep by allowing yourself naps and time to sleep in, and make sure you eat a minimum of three hours before bed to give your body ‘time to digest’.
‘Take a probiotic and avoid inflammatory foods,’ she added.
‘The gut produces 96 per cent of the serotonin in the body, and keeping your gut microbiome in balance with proper diet and probiotics lends itself to better digestive function and improved emotional balance.’
Loren Hogue is the co-founder and CEO of Neurofit with her husband, Andrew. For more information, please click here.
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