Chase’s First Chiropractic Adjustment

Introduction

The body is supposed to function normally, no chronic sickness, disease, pains, insanity, etc.   Normal function is regulated by the “wisdom of the body.”  This wisdom created each and every single person from a half cell from dad and a half cell from mom.  When the sperm and egg unite, life is created.

This wisdom is transmitted only thru the brain and spinal cord, ie. the nervous system.  Cut off the head, the body doesn’t work anymore.  Cut the nerve to the heart, it doesn’t beat.  Cut the nerve to the quadriceps muscle it doesn’t contract.  Therefore, normal function of the body is dependent on normal nerve impulses from the brain, thru the spinal cord, out the nerves to the organs, muscles, glands, etc.

Normal nerve impulses that send life giving messages to the body, depend on the mechanical integrity of the spine.  The spine is designed to protect the nerves.  Sometimes when the bones of the spine move out of place, instead of protecting the nerves, the spine irritates the nerve and interferes with those nerve impulses.  Chiropractors call that subluxation.

Normal Alignment - GOOD

Misalignment - BAD*

The job of the chiropractor is to correct these subluxations (video) with an adjustment (video). Once the adjustment is given, normal nerve impulses may resume so the body may function more normally.  Chiropractic is as simple as that.

When the vertebrae subluxate, the nerve impulse is interfered with, and now the organs, muscles, glands, begin to function abnormally.  The heart organ may beat a bit faster, or slower.  The sex organs may produce too much, or too little estrogen or testosterone.  The muscles may contract a bit more on the left side, instead of the right, causing a scoliosis curve or abnormal weight bearing of the body.  Cells may divide quicker speeding up the aging process.  Cellular division, body chemistry, and body biomechanics are slightly off normal. Since function of the body is at a cellular level, and there are 70 trillion cells in the body, it may take a good bit of time before enough cells are malfunctioning for tissues to be affected.  This means that subluxations have no symptoms.  This is especially true for children.

Kids don’t get neck pains, or headaches, or back pain.  Most often, subluxation beings at birth.  Birth is a traumatic process, for the mother and child.  I had a woman in the office ask me how old you need to be before you can be adjusted.  So I added these pictures and videos of birth.

Check out “normal” child birth.

Click for Video - Hospital Birth

Here’s a forceps delivery.

Click for Video (start at 5:35)

Here’s vacuum extraction and its consequences (lump).

Click for Video (starts at 1:10)

Here’s a c-section birth.

Click for Video

Whether these methods of birth are right are wrong is not a chiropractic discussion.  However, there are consequences to physical stresses that the body can’t adapt to.  Our best medical minds are still baffled by SIDS or crib death and cannot find a cause.  Isn’t it conceivable that twisting the neck during child birth may affect the area in the brain responsible for respiration?

In infants, the tiny bones of the neck are quite frequently traumatized by these birthing procedures, the twisting and pulling of the head.  An infant has atrophied muscles and ligaments.  It’s virtually impossible for their weakened bodies to adapt to this type of force in the upper neck. When the child is subluxated, the entire body begins to function abnormally as explained above.  And most parents, because chiropractors have done such a poor job educating them, don’t have the baby’s neck checked for subluxation after birth.

And this continues after child birth too.  How many meals at McDonald’s will your children have to adapt to chemically to sort thru the toxins in Chicken McNuggets or soft drinks?  How many times do they fight with their siblings, fall trying to walk, or fall off a trampoline?  The stresses children’s bodies go thru are endless.

Kids generally don’t have chronic pains, so rarely do parents get their kids checked by their chiropractor for subluxation.  Yet most parents would agree that birth and childhood is traumatic, plus they wouldn’t want their kids to have the same challenges they do as they get older.  Had my chiropractor told my parents that the purpose of chiropractic was to allow the better expression of life, maybe I wouldn’t have struggled from years 5 thru 28 with asthma.  It all starts with the body not functioning properly.  But why wait for symptoms to show up?  Then it could be too late.

Chiropractic is gentle.  Check out the video a the top.  This is Chase’s first adjustment.  Chase doesn’t have neck pain or headaches.  But he is subluxated, and that is reason enough to adjust him.  I adjusted his atlas (c1 – top bone in the neck, at the brain stem).  Immediately after setting this atlas and releasing the pressure, his body is better able to function normally.  Normal function happens at a cellular level.  Since there are three billion cells dying and being created every 60 seconds, now his body will produce better functioning cells.  All chiropractic suggests is that your body will function better without the nerves pinched off.  Obviously, if someone tied a piece of string around your aorta and I suggested your heart would work better if I cut off the string, you would agree.  Chiropractic is just that simple.

Instead of waiting for your kids to develop abnormal function, it’s best to get them checked by your chiropractor in Encinitas.

* To chiropractors  and chiropractic students.  Here’s a chiropractic philosophy and science note.  Misalignments are not always bad.  Only when the pressure on them is creating irritation to the nervous system.  Many times the body will develop curvatures of the spine to adapt to subluxations elsewhere in the spinal column.  For ease of understanding, I’ve used the bone pinching the nerve, which is not entirely correct but is fine for discussion and understanding.  Occlusion of the IVF is what I’m really talking about, whether via disk, inflammation, or even bone.

For Chiropractic Students

I set this atlas ASL.  I had a soft contact on the left TP.  I took the slack out as much as I could without making it uncomfortable to him.  I tried to allow him to let his head fall into position.  I gave him a gentle pressure with my right hand to facilitate this, until he relaxed in that position.  Then I lightened up on the contact, yet kept the slack out.  Once relaxed, I gave a very shallow, gentle thrust.  There is a slight click at the end.  The clicking noise doesn’t mean much, however this did clear out the upper cervical with the instrument.

Note that the most important thing is to let him relax and be comfortable with me.  If the child is resisting you, don’t adjust him until he relaxes.  It’s definitely not best practice to use force to overcome his fidgeting.  For some younger clients, I will set up with them only for the first few visits until they become comfortable with me before I adjust.