As a parent, you know when something isn’t right with your child. Maybe they can’t calm down after minor upsets, or they’re battling one health issue after another. You’ve heard “they’ll grow out of it” from your pediatrician, but deep down, you sense something more is going on.
If this sounds familiar, you’re not alone.
According to the CDC, 1 in 6 children in the U.S. has a developmental disability, and more than 3 billion people worldwide live with some type of neurological condition. The prevalence of neurodevelopmental conditions such as Autism, ADHD, and sensory processing issues has skyrocketed in recent years.
And these are just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the wide range of health issues that stem from a malfunctioning nervous system, commonly known today as nervous system dysregulation.
As Neurologically-Focused Pediatric and Family Chiropractors, we’ve seen firsthand the profound impact that restoring balance to a dysregulated nervous system can have on a child’s health and quality of life. Therefore, in this article, we’ll dive deep into what nervous system dysregulation is, the critical role of the Autonomic Nervous System, and, most importantly, what you can do to help your child thrive.
What is Nervous System Dysregulation?
Nervous system dysregulation refers to a state where your child’s Autonomic Nervous System becomes imbalanced and loses its ability to self-regulate. Instead of smoothly shifting between active (sympathetic) and calm (parasympathetic) states, the nervous system gets stuck—typically in fight or flight mode.
Understanding the Autonomic Nervous System
To understand nervous system dysregulation, knowing about the Autonomic Nervous System (ANS) is essential. The Autonomic Nervous System controls involuntary functions like heart rate, breathing, digestion, and blood pressure. It consists of two main branches:
- The Sympathetic Nervous System (SNS): This is the body’s “gas pedal,” activating the fight or flight stress response during times of stress or perceived danger. When your child’s sympathetic system kicks in, their heart rate increases, breathing gets shallow, muscles tense up, and digestion shuts down—everything primed for survival mode.
- The Parasympathetic Nervous System (PNS): This is your child’s “brake pedal,” responsible for activating rest and digest functions. When the parasympathetic system is working, your child can calm down, their heart rate slows, breathing deepens, digestion works properly, and the body enters healing mode.
A vital key to the parasympathetic “braking + regulating” system is the vagus nerve. We now know that vagal nerve tone and function not only play an important role in the functions mentioned above, but also in social, emotional, behavioral, and communication functions as well. In short, vagus nerve dysfunction and overall nervous system dysregulation go hand in hand.
In a healthy nervous system, the SNS and PNS work together seamlessly, maintaining a state of balance known as homeostasis. Your child’s body naturally shifts between fight or flight when needed (like playing sports or avoiding danger) and rest and digest when it’s time to recover.
However, when the nervous system becomes dysregulated and “rest and regulate” can’t activate appropriately, this balance is disrupted. It’s like having your foot stuck on the gas pedal while the brake pedal stops responding. Your child stays trapped in fight or flight mode—unable to access the rest and digest state they desperately need for growth, healing, immune function, and emotional regulation. This leads to dysautonomia, where the Autonomic Nervous System can no longer self-regulate effectively.
“The Perfect Storm” of Factors That Contribute to Nervous System Dysregulation
As parents, it’s natural to wonder what causes nervous system dysregulation in children. While there is no single answer, research has identified a confluence of factors that can contribute to this condition.
We call this the “Perfect Storm”—and it’s a framework that explains how multiple stressors combine to overwhelm your child’s developing nervous system.
Stage 1: Prenatal Stress and Early Programming
The “Perfect Storm” often begins before birth. When mothers experience chronic stress, anxiety, fertility struggles, or complications during pregnancy, stress hormones like cortisol cross the placenta and affect fetal nervous system development.
What researchers call adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) can actually begin in utero. The developing neuroendocrine system is particularly vulnerable during these critical windows. Prenatal stress isn’t about blaming mothers—it’s about understanding that chronic stress during pregnancy creates physiological changes that can predispose a baby to dysregulation.
Stage 2: Birth Trauma as the First Traumatic Experience
Birth itself can be one of the first traumatic experiences a child endures—though pediatricians rarely acknowledge this. When birth involves interventions like forceps delivery, vacuum extraction, emergency C-section, prolonged labor, or induction, the forces applied to a baby’s delicate neck and skull can be enormous.
We’re talking about several pounds of pulling force on an infant’s spine during forceps delivery. That kind of yanking, twisting, and pulling can create subluxation in the upper cervical spine, fixation, and neurological interference right where the brainstem meets the spinal cord. This is exactly where the vagus nerve exits, which is why birth trauma so often leads to dysregulation.
The conventional medical view considers these “successful deliveries” as long as mom and baby survive. But what about the neurological impact? What about the subluxation that interferes with vagus nerve function? That’s what gets missed.
Stage 3: The Accumulation Effect—When Chronic Stress Compounds
Here’s what many people don’t understand: it’s not just one thing. The “Perfect Storm” is about accumulation.
After a stressful pregnancy and traumatic birth, many babies then face:
- Rounds of antibiotics that disrupt gut health and immune function
- Environmental toxins and inflammatory foods
- Reflux medications that mask the signs without addressing the root causes
- Ongoing stress from colic, sleep struggles, and feeding difficulties
- Inadequate recovery time between stressors
Each factor alone might be manageable. But when you stack prenatal stress + birth trauma + antibiotics + environmental toxins + inadequate nervous system recovery, you create a “Perfect Storm” that overwhelms the developing system.
The accumulation of chronic stress—from before birth through early childhood—creates what scientists call experience-dependent plasticity. Essentially, chronic stress rewires the nervous system, training it to stay stuck in survival mode. The Sympathetic Nervous System dominance that starts as a response to these traumatic experiences becomes the default setting.
The “Perfect Storm” Timeline:
- Before Birth: Maternal stress, fertility struggles, anxiety, complications
- During Birth: Forceps, vacuum, C-section, induction, prolonged labor
- After Birth: Antibiotics, reflux medications, environmental toxins, inflammatory foods
- Early Childhood: Chronic illness, inadequate recovery, ongoing stress accumulation
Each factor alone may not cause dysregulation, but together they create a “Perfect Storm” that overwhelms your child’s developing nervous system. This is the root cause that conventional pediatrics doesn’t assess or address.
Signs Your Nervous System is Dysregulated
However, when the nervous system becomes dysregulated, it can lead to many traits and challenges that affect every aspect of a child’s quality of life.
Physical Signs
- Chronic pain and muscle tension, particularly in the neck and shoulders
- Digestive issues like constipation, diarrhea, reflux, and food sensitivities
- Sleep disturbances, including difficulty falling or staying asleep, night terrors, and bedwetting
- Chronic fatigue—always tired despite adequate rest, low energy that doesn’t improve with sleep
- Respiratory challenges like asthma, allergies, and frequent colds or infections
Emotional Dysregulation and Behavioral Signs
Emotional dysregulation shows up as frequent meltdowns, mood swings, and intense reactions that seem out of proportion to the trigger. When your child’s gas pedal is stuck in fight or flight mode, emotional regulation becomes nearly impossible—no matter how hard they try to calm down.
- Emotional dysregulation: frequent meltdowns, mood swings, inability to self-soothe
- Anxiety, depression, and difficulty managing emotions
- Hyperactivity, impulsivity, and difficulty sitting still or focusing
- Hypervigilance—always on edge, difficulty relaxing, constantly scanning for threats
- Frequent emotional outbursts, meltdowns, or tantrums
- Difficulty coping with stress, changes in routine, or new situations
Cognitive Signs
Brain fog is one of the most common cognitive signs parents and older children describe. It’s that feeling of mental cloudiness—difficulty concentrating, forgetting things, feeling like you’re thinking through molasses. Brain fog isn’t laziness or lack of effort; it’s a cognitive sign of dysregulation that occurs when the nervous system prioritizes survival over executive function.
- Attention and focus difficulties, including ADHD-like issues
- Brain fog—difficulty concentrating, mental clarity issues, feeling “in a haze”
- Sensory sensitivity: hypersensitivity to light, sound, touch, textures, or tags in clothing
- Delayed milestones in areas like speech, motor skills, or social interaction
- Regression in previously acquired skills or abilities
The sensory sensitivity that makes grocery stores overwhelming, or tags in shirts unbearable, stems from nervous system hypervigilance. When stuck in fight or flight, the nervous system interprets normal sensory input as threatening. What’s diagnosed as Sensory Processing Disorder often involves sensory sensitivity driven by autonomic dysfunction.
Immune System Dysfunction
- Chronic inflammation, congestion, or coughing
- Frequent infections that take longer than normal to clear
- Autoimmune conditions or persistent allergies
Age-Specific Manifestations
- Infants (0-12 months): Colic, reflux, difficulty latching, arching back, constant crying despite all needs being met, poor sleep
- Toddlers (1-3 years): Frequent meltdowns that seem extreme, sensory seeking or avoiding behaviors, digestive issues, sleep resistance, difficulty with transitions
- School-age (4-11 years): ADHD-like traits, anxiety, difficulty making friends, frequent illness, stomach aches before school, emotional dysregulation during homework or activities
- Teens (12-18 years): Mood conditions, chronic fatigue, brain fog that affects school performance, unexplained pain, emotional overwhelm, social withdrawal
The Limitations of Traditional Approaches
Unfortunately, the traditional medical approach often falls short when it comes to nervous system dysregulation. Conventional medicine tends to focus on managing the signs rather than addressing the underlying cause. This can result in:
- Medications to suppress traits (antacids for reflux, stimulants for ADHD, anti-anxiety meds) without addressing why the nervous system is dysregulated
- Diagnoses that label signs (Autism, ADHD, Sensory Processing Disorder) without investigating the root neurological dysfunction
- Dismissal of parent concerns with “they’ll grow out of it” or “that’s just how some kids are.”
Therapies like cognitive-behavioral therapy (CBT), EMDR, and somatic therapy can certainly help children develop coping skills and process traumatic experiences. These trauma-informed care approaches have value, and we often see children benefit from working with skilled therapists alongside receiving Neurologically-Focused Chiropractic Care.
However, these approaches don’t address the physical subluxation and vagus nerve interference that often underlies the signs. They work on the psychological level without addressing the structural and neurological root cause.
The Nervous System Assessment Gap
What’s missing is assessment of:
- How well your child’s nervous system shifts between sympathetic and parasympathetic states
- Whether birth trauma created subluxation in the upper cervical spine
- How chronic stress has affected their ability to self-regulate
- Where the nervous system is holding tension and dysfunction
- Vagal tone and Parasympathetic Nervous System function
This is exactly what Neurologically-Focused Chiropractic Care addresses. We look at what traditional medicine doesn’t assess—the actual function of your child’s nervous system. We use objective technology like INSiGHT scans to measure what pediatricians can’t see with standard exams.
As an Iowa farm boy teaching neuroscience, I know how simple this sounds. But the neck is the on-off switch. When birth trauma affects the upper cervical spine, it messes with the vagus nerve, and when you mess with the vagus nerve, you mess with everything—digestion, sleep, immune function, behavior, all of it.
Neurologically-Focused Chiropractic Care
Neurologically-Focused Chiropractic Care offers a different approach. Instead of simply caring for the signs, we focus on addressing the root cause: subluxation and nervous system dysregulation.
How We Assess Nervous System Function
We use advanced neurological scanning technology called INSiGHT scans to objectively assess your child’s nervous system function. Research studies use heart rate variability (HRV) to measure Autonomic Nervous System health and vagal tone. We also use INSiGHT scanning technology in clinical practice to provide an objective assessment of autonomic dysfunction.
Both approaches reveal what you can’t see with the naked eye—the actual state of nervous system regulation. The INSiGHT scans measure:
- Thermal patterns showing autonomic imbalance
- Heart rate variability indicating stress vs. regulation
- Surface EMG revealing muscle tension and subluxation patterns
- Where the nervous system is stuck in fight or flight mode
It’s important to note that this technology does not diagnose medical conditions, and Neurologically-Focused Chiropractic Care is certainly not a cure for nervous system dysregulation or any other condition, not even back pain. Instead, these INSiGHT Scans help us track down the root cause of nervous system dysfunction and dysregulation, and build customized care plans and adjusting protocols to help shift the nervous system back into a state of balance, regulation, and resilience.
Gentle, Specific Adjustments
Our adjustments are incredibly gentle—often using no more pressure than you’d use to check the ripeness of a tomato. We focus on removing subluxation, particularly in the upper cervical spine, to restore proper communication between the brain and body.
As the vagus nerve function improves and subluxation is reduced, the nervous system can begin to shift out of constant fight or flight and back into rest and digest mode, where healing happens.
Supporting Nervous System Health at Home
While Neurologically-Focused Chiropractic Care addresses the structural root cause of nervous system dysregulation, there are also practical steps you can take at home to support your child’s healing:
- Create a calm environment: Reduce sensory overload with dimmer lights, quieter spaces, and predictable routines that help your child feel safe.
- Prioritize quality sleep: Establish consistent bedtimes, create a dark and cool sleep environment, and limit screen exposure before bed.
- Nourish the gut: Focus on whole, nutrient-dense foods that support gut health and reduce inflammation. The gut-brain connection is powerful.
- Encourage gentle movement: Activities like swimming, walking in nature, or yoga can help discharge stress and support nervous system regulation.
- Practice breathing techniques: Try box breathing with your child: breathe in for 4 counts, hold for 4, breathe out for 4, hold for 4. This simple technique helps activate the Parasympathetic Nervous System. These mindfulness practices support your child’s ability to self-regulate, working alongside Neurologically-Focused Chiropractic Care.
- Provide co-regulation: Your calm nervous system helps regulate your child’s. When you’re regulated, it creates safety for them.
Take the Next Step
If you suspect your child is dealing with nervous system dysregulation, we encourage you to find a PX Doc in your area. Our network of trained Neurologically-Focused Chiropractors specializes in assessing and addressing nervous system dysfunction at its root cause.
Using advanced INSiGHT scanning technology and gentle, specific adjustments, we can help your child’s nervous system shift out of chronic fight or flight and back into the rest and digest mode, where true healing happens.
Your child deserves more than trait management. They deserve a nervous system that works.
Visit the PX Docs Directory to find a trained practitioner near you and take the first step toward helping your child thrive.
