ICU – “I See You” Podcast
The Mind-Body Connection
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In this episode of the ICU Podcast, we explore the powerful relationship between the mind and body—and how that connection can be both disrupted and harnessed in life with a vestibular disorder. From the ways stress and anxiety can amplify dizziness to the grounding effects of mindfulness, movement, and self-compassion, we discuss the science and lived experience behind mind-body healing. Through personal stories and expert insights, listeners will discover how cultivating awareness, patience, and inner balance can help restore a sense of control and resilience on the path toward recovery.
Guests
Sandy Brunner describes herself as an awesome stay-at-home mom and an okay housewife. Pre-kid, she was a speech-language pathologist and blogger for Life Without Land Legs. Sandy started her vestibular journey with Mal de Debarquement Syndrome, or MdDS, on a trip to Europe in 2018, adding vestibular migraine, PPPD, and cervicogenic dizziness to her vestibular bingo card along the way. She was in VeDA’s first season of the Life Rebalanced Chronicles docuseries. When she’s not doing mom stuff or at the gym, she is planning parties, going on random adventures, organizing something, reading, or doing crafts.
Donna McArthur, DC has been a chiropractor for thirty years, sharing a wellness-based practice with her husband in the mountains of British Columbia. She provides patient- centered care aimed at restoring function to the neuro-musculoskeletal system, utilizing evidence-based therapies and drawing on her deep knowledge of biomechanical, neurological, and fascial approaches. Her work is grounded in a heart-centered, integrated philosophy of healing.
Summary
Sandy: Living Inside a Constantly Moving Body
Sandy lives with several overlapping vestibular diagnoses: Mal de Débarquement Syndrome (MdDS), vestibular migraine, PPPD (Persistent Postural-Perceptual Dizziness), migraine with aura, and cervicogenic dizziness. Her “big explosion onset” came in 2018 on a trip to Europe. After stepping off a tour boat in London, everything continued to move as if she were still on the water. A Google search led her to MdDS, and a doctor later confirmed the diagnosis.
Over time, her picture became more complex:
- Migraines increased and evolved into vestibular migraine and migraine with aura.
- She developed a constant background dizziness that wasn’t pure rocking or vertigo, fitting criteria for PPPD.
- Neck-related issues and years of bracing against constant motion contributed to cervicogenic dizziness—though it’s hard for her to know what came first: the neck problems or the dizziness labels.
Through all of this, Sandy has seen firsthand how emotions and body states are intertwined. Strong feelings—whether negative like fear or positive like excitement—almost always intensify her dizziness. Thinking more positively doesn’t magically erase symptoms, but it helps her move through triggers with more ease.
Her experience has shifted her view of the mind–body connection. Early on, she hoped that if she could only relax enough, meditate enough, or ground herself enough, her symptoms would disappear. Now, she sees a line: mindset and emotional regulation clearly influence her dizziness, but there are also deeply physical factors at play. For example, after LASIK eye surgery, she experienced a period of symptom remission—something she sees as a strongly body-based event rather than a mental shift.
Sandy also had to confront hypervigilance. In the early days she tracked and blogged about every trigger and fluctuation. She describes it as a “gratitude journal for my symptoms”—constant attention that kept the illness front and center. Over time, she’s learned that while awareness is important, obsessive monitoring can become its own problem.
Donna: The Mind and Body as One Living System
Donna’s work centers on helping people reconnect with their bodies and cultivate inner awareness as a foundation for healing. For her, “mind–body connection” isn’t about two separate systems talking to one another—it’s one integrated organism. Thoughts, emotions, physical sensations, and nervous system responses all arise together.
She often sees two extremes in her chiropractic practice:
- People who seem to “live outside their body,” struggling with even simple movements because they’re so disconnected from their physical selves.
- People with strong physical intelligence but an unregulated mind that “runs wild,” amplifying distress and symptoms.
In both cases, Donna believes awareness is a learnable skill. She encourages people to start “listening from the inside out”: noticing how emotions affect symptoms, how posture affects pain, how small changes in movement or breathing shift their internal state.
She also emphasizes that chronic illness can shrink people’s sense of self. They stop taking up space—physically, emotionally, and socially—because they feel terrible and powerless. A key part of healing, in her view, is helping people remember they are still entitled to occupy their space in the world, no matter how they feel.
Donna draws on the research of Dr. Ellen Langer on “attention to variability.” Many people with chronic conditions assume their symptoms will either stay the same or get worse. But our bodies are constantly changing. By intentionally noticing fluctuations—setting an alarm, rating symptoms from 0–10, or tracking how a massage or exercise session shifts sensations—patients can begin to see that their symptoms are not static. That recognition can reduce helplessness and restore a sense of agency.
She suggests simple, grounded practices:
- Feeling feet on the floor and consciously “taking up space.”
- Sit-to-stand exercises to gently build strength, balance, and trust in the body.
- Mirror work: looking deeply into one’s own eyes while focusing on a body part that feels okay. It sounds corny, she admits, but can be powerful for rebuilding self-trust and self-regard.
- Doing one hard thing—whether that’s throwing a medicine ball or stepping into a cold shower—to prove to yourself that you can tolerate difficulty and survive it. These small acts can be surprisingly empowering.
Donna often sees that when people change something physical—starting movement, building strength, or grounding—it sends a ripple outward into their emotional, mental, and even spiritual life. When the body feels a bit more capable or stable, it creates more capacity for hope and growth in other areas.
Sandy: Movement, Motherhood, and Reclaiming Her Body
A major turning point for Sandy has been shifting from “diet culture” exercise to embodied, mindful movement.
After pregnancy, a pelvic injury led her into physical therapy. There she learned to truly feel her muscles: which ones were working, which needed strengthening or stretching, how to coordinate breath with movement. She carried that awareness into group fitness classes.
Now, she goes to the gym as often as she can, not to chase a certain body shape, but because:
- It’s one of the few times she is truly in the moment.
- She focuses on breathing and the specific muscle she’s using.
- Classes feel like a moving meditation—with fun music, social connection, and a sense of play.
She jokes about being a “gym rat,” but under that label is something deeper: confidence. Each time she throws a heavy medicine ball, lifts weights, or completes a class that once felt impossible, she’s proving to herself, “I can do hard things in this body.” That confidence softens the mental load of chronic dizziness.
Sandy also leans on hands-on therapies: dry needling, massage, and targeted physical therapy. When her muscles are tight, her dizziness speeds up—faster rocking, quicker spinning. After treatment, when muscles relax, her dizziness “loosens” and she becomes, in her words, a “kinder, easier to get along with person.” Her husband can spot the difference as soon as she walks in the door smiling.
Strength work for posture has been especially important. Her upper traps used to do all the work; PT has helped her recruit other muscles so her neck isn’t constantly overfiring. The result is a subtle but real feeling of greater stability.
Outside the clinic and gym, Sandy uses grounding as a simple, accessible tool—often with her young daughter. Inspired years ago by walking a sensory stone path at a Japanese garden, she now spends as much time as possible barefoot outdoors. Feeling grass, earth, and varied textures underfoot helps calm her nervous system and regulate her emotions. It’s an easy way to drop into the present moment amid the chaos of parenting.
Motherhood itself has been both a challenge and a lifeline. On hard days, her daughter still needs breakfast, playtime, and outdoor adventures. That necessity pulls Sandy out of bed and into movement, even when she’d rather hide. It’s not a tidy story—she’s clear that parenting with persistent symptoms can be extremely hard—but being needed has forced her to keep engaging with life, which in turn has helped her move away from some of her darkest mental spaces.
Building Confidence and Safety, One Small Choice at a Time
Both Donna and Sandy return again and again to the theme of confidence and safety. The vestibular journey often feels like being at war with your own body. Symptoms are loud, frightening, and unpredictable. Hypervigilance and fear can make everything worse.
Yet within that reality, they highlight small, practical ways to shift the inner climate:
- Noticing even brief windows when symptoms ease.
- Claiming space in your body—through grounding, strength, or simple movement.
- Seeking supportive hands-on care when possible.
- Letting joy, play, and connection (with others or with nature) coexist alongside dizziness.
- Questioning automatic thoughts like “it will always be this bad” or “nothing can change.”
None of these erase a vestibular disorder. But over time, they can help people rebuild trust—in their body, in their resilience, and in their capacity to live a meaningful life even when the room is still moving.
