Dogs, dreams and deregulation

(Nimue)

On the other side of the River Severn from me, near a place called Lydney, are the remains of a temple to Nodens. He’s a godd associated with dreams and healing, and a number of small dog statues are associated with his site. That’s the factual stuff – what follows on the Nodens front is speculative.

I have been thinking about the idea of temple dogs in a healing context. Plenty of modern people find dogs to be good emotional support, so it’s hardly a wild idea to consider. If a healing temple has dogs in it, how might that work? It struck me that dogs are of course warm, so sleeping alongside them might be soothing and beneficial. 

Some years ago I was blessed with a cat who was good at getting people to sleep – she enabled me to nap which I can’t normally do. The warm softness of her little body resting on mine was a healing thing and I know she had that impact on other people as well.

One thing I’ve been seeing a lot about recently is the idea that trauma and illness can disregulate our nervous systems. That can have us experiencing things in weird and unhelpful ways, including how we experience pain, dissociation and how we respond to what’s around us. Hypervigilance is a kind of deregulation. How we regulate temperature, blood pressure, digestion, our immune systems – any of this can potentially be disrupted if our bodies are thrown into chaos.

I’ve also seen recently that there’s evidence for gentle time in nature helping us grow the parts of our brains that enable us to deal with stress. We’re very responsive lifeforms and our bodies are deeply affected by our environments and our experiences – both in terms of taking damage and being able to heal.

In myself I have observed over months now that being held takes the panic down. With enough gentle, physical contact, my whole system calms down. In the last nine months or so my blood pressure has improved, I can can digest things more easily, my periods have calmed down, my perimenopausal symptoms have  calmed down, I’m less prone to panic attacks, my tendency to hypervigilance has dialed down, and I’m in dramatically better shape. I’ve established beyond any shadow of a doubt that when I get into trouble, being held through it will get me through it quickly and effectively.

There’s a lot of trauma in my history. It might be fair to assume that my system has been pretty disregulated.

So I imagine a healing temple where you go to sleep and dream. In the healing temple there are dogs – sweet natured, affectionate dogs who love to snuggle and who want all the belly rubs and cuddles. Dogs who won’t mind at all if you sob into their fur, and who will sleep alongside you. Our soft mammal bodies can, I think, be greatly influenced by proximity to other mammal bodies that are calm and gentle. Closeness and warmth can be emotionally healing. Lying next to a calm and healthy mammal might help your own body remember how to regulate itself properly again. In the peace and safety of the temple, comforted and protected, a person might have a better shot at healing themselves. That’s my feeling, anyway.