Decompression

Decompression

Chiropractic Care Promotes Flexibility, Balance, and Coordination

Flexibility, balance, and coordination are innate human functions. These abilities add beauty to the forms of our physical actions. We instinctively admire the grace and skill of professional athletes, men, and women who have achieved very high levels of flexibility, balance, and coordination. Many of us have permanent mental images of stunning sports moments we've witnessed, when human beings have performed extraordinary feats using these inborn, yet highly trained abilities. Not all of can become professional athletes, yet we all can function at the peak of our own capabilities. Chiropractic care helps us do this. By ensuring that our central mechanism of flexibility, balance, and coordination - our spinal column and core musculature - is functioning at maximum efficiency, chiropractic care helps us achieve high performance. Overall health, creativity, and physical abilities are all enhanced by chiropractic care.

Did you know that your spinal column's spongy intervertebral discs (IVDs) comprise 25% of this segmented structure's entire length? Did you know that an adult's spinal column is approximately 24-28 inches in length? A little quick math shows that the total height of your spinal discs is approximately between 6 and 7 inches. But most of us don't get to enjoy the maximum height, springiness, or shock-absorbing capabilities of our spinal IVDs.

Why is that? Another fact known to anatomy students is that IVDs begin losing their total water content at the early age of 2. If you're a young adult, that water-losing process has been going on for 20 years. If you're older, tack on a couple of decades. But this is a natural process. Whether we like it or not, our body parts are not built to last forever. They are designed to keep us healthy and fit for about 150 years (another little-known fact). What's not natural is the sedentary lifestyle associated with living in an economy driven largely by the service sector.

Until very recently (75 years ago or so), most adults worked at jobs which required physical labor. Employment in agriculture and industry required actual work using one's body. Those jobs had a built-in exercise component, all day, every day. In contrast, 21st-century jobs require a lot of sitting. For many jobs, workers are sitting all day, every day. When you're sitting or standing in an unchanging position, the relentless force of gravity bears down on your spine at a steady, never-changing rate of 32 ft/s². The long-term result on one's spinal column is compression. Natural water-losing forces are unopposed and your spinal discs just keep getting thinner.

We need to reverse these trends. We need to find ways to pump our discs back up. We want to regain the health of our spinal discs, regain lost stature, and be able to stand up tall, achieving our full physiological height.  We need to identify and engage in decompressive activities, activities that will restore fluids to our IVDs.

Fortunately, a highly decompressive set of activities is readily available and has been in use for thousands of years. Yoga is a system of exercises that provides a broad range of health benefits including spinal decompression.^1,2,3 In fact, done correctly, all yoga exercises (known as postures, poses, and asanas) result in spinal lengthening. The key is to make the yoga posture active, constantly engaging, working, and lengthening your core muscles while you're doing the pose.

Regular yoga classes (even once a week may be sufficient) will lead to noticeable benefits, including a sense of being taller. The spinal decompression obtained through regular yoga practice will help increase your flexibility, balance, and coordination. Yoga can be done at home. The only equipment needed is a rubber mat. The long-term payoff is big, in more ways than one.

¹Jeng CM, et al: Yoga and disc degenerative disease in cervical and lumbar spine: an MR imaging-based case control study. Eur J Spine 20(3):408-413, 2011

²Williams K, et al: Evaluation of the effectiveness and efficacy of Iyengar yoga therapy on chronic low back pain. Spine 34(19):2066-2076, 2009

³Goncalves LC, et al: Flexibility, functional autonomy and quality of life (QoL) in elderly yoga practitioners. Arch Gerontol Geriatr 53(2):158-162, 2011

Conservation of Energy

Breakfast - Meal of Champions

"Eat a good breakfast!" We've heard this advice all our lives. Most of us completely ignore this ancient recommendation, rushing out the door every morning to try to avoid being late yet again for school or work.  Others, feeling guilty because they know they "should" be eating better, grab a frozen pastry or gulp a glass of orange juice as they desperately try to find where they tossed their keys last night.  In fact, eating a "good breakfast" is a sound nutritional policy. Eating breakfast restores badly needed energy to your depleted systems. Without breakfast, the needle on your internal gas tank is on "empty". you're literally "running on fumes".  Breakfast renews your resources. You have available energy to do the things that need to get done. And, it's easy to put together a good breakfast. Two pieces of whole wheat toast spread with peanut butter. Or a cup of yogurt mixed with a half-cup of cottage cheese. Or a hard-boiled egg, a stick of string cheese, and a banana.  It's so simple to eat a healthy breakfast. It takes five minutes, tops. You derive the benefits all day long.

Renewability, sustainability, and energy conservation are all over the news. Every newspaper's front page and every television nightly news program features sustainability daily. These are important issues, not only for the health of our planet but also for our physical health and well-being. 

Our physical health depends on how we maximize our available energy resources - how we use our body's stores of energy, how we replace and renew that energy, and how we practice conservation of our physical energy. 

The interaction of all the elements of human physiology is exactly analogous to the interaction of ecosystems in the global ecology. It's an interesting and powerful comparison. 

Energy resources in our body consist of nutrients obtained from food, oxygen, and stored energy in the form of sugars (glycogen) and fats. We gain energy by eating good food and balancing our nutritional choices from all the major food groups.^1,2 We gain energy by having efficient and well-toned cardiovascular and respiratory systems. We gain energy by having strong muscles. And we gain energy by getting sufficient rest. 

How we use these resources depends on instructions from the nerve system. Being able to use these resources efficiently depends on the underlying tone of our cells and tissues, which in turn depends on normal flow of information in the nerve system. 

Hyperactive nerve systems and sluggish nerve systems - due to a variety of causes - create imbalances up and down the line.³ Systems perform abnormally. Your metabolism slows down or speeds up. You don't digest your food properly. You use too many or too little resources for a given task, and the job doesn't get done properly. Muscles get tight. Joints get stiff. You have pain. You get sick. 

In these cases, you're using more energy - due to inefficient systems - than you're taking in. You're not sustaining your resources; you're depleting them. Sooner or later, your entire system will begin to break down. You have chronic pain, you're tired all the time, you toss and turn when you should be sleeping, and you're irritable during the day. 

Energy is not being renewed. Your body's out of balance, physically and metaphorically. 

Chiropractic treatment directly addresses these energy concerns. Chiropractic care is all about energy management and conservation of resources. Gentle chiropractic treatment focuses on restoring balance to nerve systems, muscular systems, and physical structure. Energy begins to flow to where it's needed most, chronic pain begins to resolve, and you begin to sleep more restfully. You have a greater focus and get done the things you want to get done during the day. Your relationships with family and friends are more enjoyable, and life itself becomes much more fun. 

Your chiropractor - your energy conservation specialist - is an important natural resource for your well-being and your family's well-being. 

¹Katona P, Katona-Apte J: The interaction between nutrition and infection. Clin Infect Dis 46(10):1582-1588, 2008 
²UNESCO, Regional Office for Education in Asia and the Pacific: Population, nutrition, and health. Bull Unesco Reg Off Educ Asia Pac 23:260-268, 1982 
³D'Melllo R, Dickenson AH: Spinal cord mechanisms of pain. Br J Anaesth April 15, 2008

Road Trip

Super-Charged Carrot Muffins

These delicious muffins are highly nutritious and packed with energy. They combine plenty of protein and carbohydrate and - with a glass of milk - make a complete small meal. This recipe makes 12 muffins. Preheat the oven to 375 degrees. Prepare a no-stick 12-muffin tin. 1 cup oat flour 1 cup whole wheat flour 3/4 cup wheat germ 1/2 cup brown sugar 9 TBSP plain or vanilla protein powder 3/4 TSP salt 1 1/2 TSP cinnamon 2 TSP baking soda Sift together the oat flour, whole wheat flour, baking soda, and cinnamon. Combine in a bowl with the wheat germ, salt, brown sugar, and protein powder. Mix well, combining all ingredients. 3/4 cup unsweetened applesauce 4 large egg whites (or 1/2 cup egg substitute) 3/4 cup 1% or 2% milk 2 cups carrots, shredded In a separate bowl, combine the egg whites, milk, and applesauce. Pour this mixture into the dry ingredients mixture. Stir well, moistening all ingredients. Gently fold in the shredded carrots. Mix well. Fill all 12 muffin cups. Bake 18-20 minutes until golden. Insert a toothpick and make sure it comes out clean. Enjoy these marvelous muffins!

The days are long, the weather's warm, the sky is blue . . . it's summer and we're ready to enjoy the great American pastime - road trips!

We want to get to wherever we're going safely - and healthily, too. A safe trip is ensured by following the rules of the road and practicing good driving habits. A healthy trip is ensured by bringing along snacks that fill us with fuel and are packed with healthful nutrients.

And a fun trip is ensured by keeping the kids entertained with plenty of music, games, and electronic gadgets.

Being a safe driver consists of continuously practicing many small habits.^1,2 Keeping your eyes on the road is a given. When you need to check how the kids are doing in the back seat, just flick your eyes to the rear-view mirror. Don't turn your head around - instead, make eye contact with them in the mirror. Your kids can read your eyes pretty well - they don't need to see your face to know what you want them to do.

Keep checking the traffic around you. Use all three mirrors to see what's going on - who's behind you and who's on your right and left. Always make sure you have enough space to stop short or make a quick lane change if needed. If you're boxed in, all you can do when confronted with an obstacle is crash.

Maintain a minimum safe distance (MSD) from the car in front of you. The MSD between two cars traveling at 65 MPH on the freeway is three seconds. Find a landmark and start counting as the car in front of you passes it. If you reach it in less than three seconds there's not enough space between you and the first car.

And of course, only use a hands-free cell phone.

What about food? On longer trips, good snacks are key - for both the adults and the kids.

Kids want to eat chips, cookies, and candy.³ The best we can do is bring along more nutritious alternatives as well and encourage our kids to mix and match. Energy bars combining 20 grams of protein and 25 grams of carbohydrate are terrific. These chocolate-coated complete small meals have only 5 grams of fat and 300 calories. Juices without sugar additives provide energy and vitamins. Bananas, apples, carrots, and celery can be sliced and carried in plastic bags for no-mess access.

Bring plenty of water. Drinking enough water keeps everyone alert and focused. This is particularly important for the driver, as well as the passengers. Drinking enough water is a subtle way to keep everyone's spirits up, ensuring a happy, fun trip.

Road trips help families bond and create life-long memories. A little preparation goes a long way toward making these family outings safe and fun!

¹Verschuur WL, Hurts K: Modeling safe and unsafe driving behaviour. Accid Anal Rev 40(2):644-656, 2008
²Donmez B, et al: Mitigating driver distractions with retrospective and concurrent feedback. Accid Anal Prev 40(2):776-786, 2008
³Contento IR, et al: Enhancing personal agency and competence in eating and moving. Formative evaluation of a middle school curriculum. J Nutr Educ Behav 39(5 Suppl):S179-S186, 2007