The Triple Vagal Method
What is the Triple Vagal Method?
The Triple Vagal Method® (TVM™) is what’s called a bottom-up somatic approach to trauma healing. What that means is, we begin by releasing the trauma and the energy of the trauma that’s stuck in the body. As opposed to top-down approaches like talk therapy, where the mental part gets addressed first.
In TVM™, trauma release happens by helping the nervous system complete any unresolved trauma cycles. These are things like unfinished movements, expressions, or reactions that are still stuck in the body’s system. We gently trigger the nervous system to complete those cycles—and when that happens, the energy behind that unfinished action gets released from the body. That in turn encourages the release of oxytocin (the love and connection hormone), while also lowering cortisol (the stress hormone).
Polyvagal theory
TVM™ is rooted in the polyvagal theory, which recognizes that different types of trauma are stored in different parts of the nervous system—in the fascia, soft tissue, even the organs.All of that can be accessed through physical touch, which stimulates the vagus nerve and helps the system switch from sympathetic (fight, flight, freeze) to parasympathetic (rest, digest, heal).
It’s that back-and-forth switching between sympathetic and parasympathetic that becomes the release valve for trauma.That’s the mechanism that lets it move.
As seen in the graphic above, we can move from safety (green), into a state of danger (yellow)—this is the active part of the nervous system. Then, if the nervous system decides it’s no longer safe to take action (fight or flight), we drop into the shutdown response (red), where we may freeze, go numb, or fawn.
It’s important to note that people can often still move and function even when the nervous system is in a state of frozenness.
In TVM, we work with both: releasing unresolved states of shutdown—red, frozen, numb—as well as the unprocessed, unexpressed energies of danger—fight and flight.
As these different types of energies are released, or the cycles are completed, the nervous system can return to safety (green), where we feel calm, connected, joyful, playful, and free.
TVM sessions can be conducted in person or online.