Your Clients Are Receptors

I read a really interesting piece by Dr Nichola Guess earlier, on hyperinsulinaemia

It essentially looked at a study from the ’80s of people with diabetes and manipulated insulin to either have peaks and troughs, or to be flat (continuous)

What they found was that the continuous elevation was a problem for metabolic markers within hours, whereas the pulsatile condition it was fine.

This is common with hormones - continuous elevation of any hormone downregulates it’s target receptor. The cell becomes less sensitive to a constant signal

She says it’s like a parent with a kid that screams all day - after a while they become desensitised to the screaming

All of this reminded me of a completely separate conversation about client communications (yes, my brain is weird thank you)

Always on communication is often sold as a benefit, 24/7 Whatsapp support and number of touch points are the thing that people sell on.

We could think about your contact, attention and accountability as the input.

Your client’s agency, self-trust and problem-solving capacity as the receptor.

Constant input downregulates the receptor over time

I know coaches whose highest-touch clients are the ones who don’t get the outcome they’re there for - and they feel guilty about it, but it’s often the consequence of the always-on comms.

(We see it a lot in mentoring too)

The thing is - these clients DO want that support - and they do ask for it. In the same way that overwhelmed people just want to lie down, when active rest might restore better.

Communication is crucial for coaches - but it’s important to ask if it’s making clients more capable, or more dependent