The Mission: Rumination Elimination to Break the Cycle of Negative Thinking
Are you engaging in cow-like behavior that amounts to mental torture? That’s the question for today.
My name is Dr. K. Martin, and I’m a psychiatrist based in the Southeast. My goal with these brief posts is to provide you with quick and easy access to information about mental health.
Okay, so I’m definitely not an expert on farm animals, but I’ve heard of this process called rumination that occurs with cows. Another term you might have heard for this is “chewing the cud.” Cows have the ability to regurgitate partially digested food and chew it again to digest it further. For cows, rumination is beneficial. For humans, not so much. Actually, for humans—not at all.
Let me explain. We--as humans on the whole—don’t engage in the practice of voluntarily regurgitating our food to chew it further to aid in digestion. However, we do have the capacity to mentally regurgitate the negative and traumatic experiences of our lives and chew on them—or think about them over and over and over again. We can also anticipate the possibility of negative experiences in the future and replay these negative thoughts over and over and over again—even though they haven’t even happened. We just fear that they will. Do you think this process is helpful? No, it is not. Rumination in humans—by definition—is the cycle of thinking negatively. It’s the cycle of vomiting up negative past experiences and or anticipating future negative experiences and then dwelling on, wallowing in, or mentally re-experiencing these negative events or interactions. I’m telling you—it’s mental torture. It’s absolute torture. And for those of you who engage in rumination regularly and habitually, you know. Rumination is both terribly distressing and terribly distracting. It’s terribly distracting because it causes you to always be in your head. It’s like you can’t shut your mind off, and you overthink everything. Rumination mentally and psychologically whisks you out of your present circumstances and immerses you into the quicksand that is your mind. And the problem is, the more you ruminate, the more likely you are to ruminate. You can psychologically become stuck in a rut that deepens further and further. The whole process is exhausting and causes distressing changes within your body. Your heart may race. You may feel tense or experience aches and pains. You may even start sweating or shaking. Y’all, if you ruminate on the regular, imagine what kind of havoc this wreaks on your body.
Now, let me spell out some specific ways that people ruminate:
Repeatedly thinking about heated conflicts, arguments, or negative interactions with others,
Constantly thinking of a past mistake or failure and replaying moments of that fail over and over,
Repeatedly thinking about a conversation and overanalyzing the details of the conversation, often wishing that they’d said something differently,
Constantly thinking about a negative aspect of themselves—perhaps something about themselves that they see as flawed.
Now, research shows that people are more likely to ruminate when their brains are on “autopilot.” During this mental “autopilot,” the default mode network has taken over. Sounds fancy, right? The default mode network is an interconnected series of regions of our brains that become activated when we’re daydreaming or rehashing events of the past. The default mode network are the brain regions that are activated when you are swimming around in your heads, or off in la-la land. Now—don’t this miss this—when you are actively engaged in and paying attention to what you are doing and your surroundings, then the default mode network is not as active.
THAT IS WHY KEEPING YOUR BRAIN ACTIVELY ENGAGED IS THE KEY TO STOPPING RUMINATION.
What I’ve told my patients in the past is this: one of the worst things that you can do if you are feeling anxious or depressed is to isolate yourself…to hole up in some dark room somewhere and sit alone with your thoughts. This is the perfect situation for activating that default mode network, and before you know it, you’ve ruminated yourself into a bottomless pit. And the really sad thing is people take extremely regretful actions in the midst of ruminating. Just watch the news. Just. Watch. The. News. Rumination can lead a person to think themselves to death—literally…or ongoing dark and negative rumination can ultimately result in the widespread deaths of others in the absence of intervention.
So, here’s the most important question: “How does a person stop ruminating?”
Step one is to recognize that you’re ruminating. The biggest clue is a negative change in your mood or an uncomfortable feeling in your body. For example, if you suddenly start feeling sad or anxious, or if you have the onset of muscle tension in your neck, ask yourself, “What was I just thinking?” If you do this, you’ll likely figure out you were heading down the path to rumination.
Once you recognize that you have the tendency to ruminate, then here are some things you can do:
Number one--deliberately keep your brain engaged in activity so the default mode network does not have as much opportunity to be activated and allow rumination to occur. If you find that you’re moving through your day lost-in-thought then your current activities are not stimulating enough to fully engage your attention. In that case, you might want to step up your game and level-up. Seek out something more challenging that demands more out of you.
Number two--seek out and maintain healthy relationships. Look for your people. Find your tribe. Then actively engage in conversation and activities with them regularly.
Number three—schedule an initial therapy appointment and determine how regularly you might need to follow up. If rumination is hijacking your life, then you might need a time and space to process negative experiences with the help of a trained professional. The therapist may also teach you techniques—like thought blocking--to help you stay out of your head and grounded in the present. And this brings me to:
Number four—practice mindfulness. A therapist can help teach you mindfulness, but you may also be able to learn it through reading online or watching YouTube videos. Mindfulness is a practice of paying attention—on purpose—to the present moment with an attitude of non-judgment. Mindfulness pulls you out of your head and roots you in the present moment.
Number five—you know I had to toss this one in there—exercise. Exercise may be one of the closest things that we have to a panacea. Engaging in exercise—even just a single bout—may immediately improve your mood and stop rumination. Believe it or not, exercise does not have to feel like punishment to be considered real exercise. Actually, the more enjoyable the exercise, the better. So, seek out physical activities that you could see yourself doing regularly and that you believe would enhance and enrich your life.
Number six—consider reaching out to a mental health professional or primary care provider who can prescribe medications that help minimize rumination. Rumination is commonly associated with depression, anxiety, OCD, PTSD, and other mental health disorders.
The bottom line is this—finding a healthy activity in which you can fully immerse your mind can help break the nasty cycle of rumination. All that could be needed is a change of scenery—take a step outside, take some deep breaths, and carefully study the leaves on a tree. If you pray or meditate, do that. Turn on the TV or a podcast that fully captures your attention. Seeking help from a mental health provider may be the best option, especially if you are having other symptoms that may indicate that the rumination is a part of a mental health disorder.
