Krumme Chiropractic

The Power of Thought


Much has been written on the power of the mind. There are documented cases of the power of positive thinking curing people from cancer and other diseases. Laughter is the best medicine. Just make up your mind and do it. I am sure you can think of your own saying to go along with this.

In the video "The Secret," they talk about how if we have vision of what we want we will get it. One example is a business man who had a vision board with picture of all the things he would like to have. It was packed away for a while and after several moves and years he unpacks it again to discover the very house he had on his vision board was the house they had just bought. Speaking out what you desire and focusing on that will focus your thoughts towards positive actions instead of negative actions. If you only think about your problems you are sure to have more of them.

Another book, "Magnificent Mind at Any Age" reviews the idea that thought produces chemicals in your body that either make you feel good or make you feel bad. Negative thoughts produce chemicals that dampen your spirit and make you physically hurt. Everyone had seen the commercials for the depression drugs. What does the drug promise to do? Get rid of your pain. If your thoughts were in a positive frame of mind, you wouldn't need the drug. That of course is a simplified statement, but positive thoughts do release chemicals that boost your mood and your immunity.

After all, our creator did not design our bodies to need artificial chemicals. He designed our bodies to work perfectly, but our thoughts, food we eat and things we do change how our bodies work. Another way to state that is stress makes us sick. Stress can be chemical, emotional, or physical. It will impact your mind, body and spirit. Chiropractic can reduce the physical stress by allowing the nervous system to flow freely. To put it in perspective, ever have a bad day and your shoulders end up around your ears? Do you get a headache? By realigning the spine, that physical stress that is manifesting from emotional stress is relieved and you do feel lighter.

So how do we produce positive thought? Talk good to yourself. Write out positive statements about you and how good you are. These are affirmations. At first it is hard to believe them, but repetition will reinforce the message. Listen to encouraging music and tapes. Christian radio is a great place to find positive messages all day. Surround yourself with positive people who have the things that you want and copy what they do. It doesn't have to monetary things, but it could be a happy home, or maybe they are a great friend to others. Stop watching the news and reading the newspaper. Have you ever gotten a positive message from the news? Volunteer to help people less fortunate than yourself. It will remind you just how good your life really is, and don't forget to be grateful.

Positive thoughts require positive actions. So start thinking and acting positive and you will see a positive affect on your life.

Recently a patient told me about a quiz they took on life expectancy so I thought I would check it out. It brought a few questions to mind.

If you knew when you would die, would you change they way you live? Would you spend less time at work and more time with family and friends? In reality none of us can predict when we will die. But one thing is certain, the habits we have will impact the quality and quantity of our life, like it or not.

Just for fun I took the quiz. I did two of them; one was on MSN and one by a MD. (http://calculator.livingto100.com/calculator) I got very similar answers, 97 and 94 years respectfully. Not too bad, considering I think my diet should be better and I need to exercise more. But what about the quality of my life; hopefully that will be good for my 90 some years.

What if people knew their habits were killing them early? We all know that smoking is bad for us, drinking damages the liver, stress increases blood pressure, etc. When you put that all together and calculate you life expectancy, what if you got 54? Would it motivate you to change your habits?

Being healthy is a process. No one can change everything all at once. What if you made just one change a month? Cut the sugary drinks in half. Add a serving or two of fresh vegetables or fruits. Increase physical activity by taking the steps or walking more. One small change a month can increase your longevity in quantity but most important in quality.

That is what Chiropractic is all about; improving the quality of life for our patients. Maybe regular chiropractic adjustments can be part of your change toward a longer healthier life. This spring come in for a spinal check up. See if Chiropractic can help you enjoy more of your life.

Chiropractic or Surgery?

I am very sad today because a patient I once had, but never really did have, is having spinal surgery. This person never even came in to find out what I could do for them. Appointments were made but never kept and I never forced the issue. Now I will never know if Chiropractic care could save them from surgery. I never had the chance to even try and help this patient. WOW�what a reality check.

Chiropractic care is the number one alternative health practitioner, yet we only see less than 10% of the population. Do the other 90% not have a spine? Chiropractic care�s effects are limitless. But if you never even try, you will never know if Chiropractic care is what you need.

The basis of Chiropractic is the vertebral subluxation. To put it simply, there is a bone out of place and it causes a pinched nerve. Where ever that nerve goes will be affected, eventually. It can take years to develop symptoms and some people will never have any symptoms. But if there is a kink in your hose, you may still get water, but not as much water as if you removed the kink. The nervous system is like that. We have so many nerves, that they can be pinched, and not functioning fully, but enough that things work �OK�. That means no symptoms. Wouldn�t you rather have your nerves working 100% all the time? Or you may notice that over time things don�t seem to work as well as they used to.

Back pain, neck pain, arm and leg pain are all signs that there is a possible subluxation in your spine. Chiropractors are the only doctors trained to find and correct them. Surgery is an option, but why not try to fix it naturally first. Surgery can cost anywhere from $40,000 to $100,000 and cost more in time lost from work and even possible long term disability. Why not try and see if Chiropractic can fix it first before you do surgery?

I sure wish I had followed up with this patient to see if Chiropractic could have saved them from surgery. Who do you know might be helped by Chiropractic care? Isn�t it worth sending them in to even just see if they can be helped first naturally?

Call 513-759-6500 for information.

There are many essential parts of health as we looked at last time. Today’s topic has to do with the feeding the body. This is not going to be a nutrition lecture. I do not claim to be a nutritionist. But what I will talk about is how the things in society we perceive as good for us really aren’t.

WATER: Did you know that most of us are dehydrated most of the time? The blood is 99% water, the cells are a water reservoir, with the rest of the body and cells containing 70% water. When you become dehydrated the body takes water from the cells leaving them “shriveled” and this can cause muscle cramping and fatigue. Water is made up of Hydrogen and Oxygen and we can use the oxygen for energy. By the time you feel thirsty, you are already dehydrated. The body needs one half you body weight in ounces of water a day. So if you weight 150 lbs. then you need to drink 75oz. of water. For every cup of caffeine, you need to increase your water by one cup.

VITAMINS: You think you eat well? Do you know that is takes approximately 50 times as much salad to equal the same nutritional value the same salad had in 1950? Our food supply’s nutritional content is diminishing. Even on the strictest diet of raw food, you are not getting the same nutritional content you once did. Adding in a whole food supplement is a must. The question now becomes which one? Well how about which one not. Most MD’s do not get a good background in nutrition. They spend most of their time talking about disease and pharmaceuticals while they are in school. So when they tell you to but Centrum or One a Day’s, it’s not their fault. They just don’t know.

Vitamins come from our food. When they are created as synthetics, you are only getting a fraction of the nutrient. Vitamins are made to work with the other chemicals they are found with in the food. That is why whole food supplements are a better source of nutrients than the over the counter from the local store. There are many good quality supplements you can pick from. We use a variety of supplements; Juice Plus is one we carry along with Liquid Health and Arbonne. There are many others you can buy both in stores and from an individual. Read the labels. If you see food on the label then it is a whole food supplement.

FOOD: My favorite subject! Who doesn’t love to eat? One simple rule here; the Grandma rule; if grandma couldn’t eat it then neither should you. For some of you that would be great grandma. Our food today is loaded with high fructose corn syrup, bad fatty acids, nitrates, preservatives and sodium. Packaged food has little nutritional value, but lots of calories. That equals fat!

Whenever possible you want to pick food that is unprocessed and or raw. Fresh fruit and veggies, meat from the butcher (not hotdogs, or bologna), and skip the boxes. Packaged food has more preservatives and fat than fresh whole food. Diet soda is full of Aspartame which can be a neurotoxin (a toxin against nerves). Regular soda while not good, is better than diet.

More on this topic later.

Bottom line, because that’s what you really want to know right?

1. Add more water! Plain unflavored water is all you need.
2. Use a whole food supplement.
3. Eat raw unprocessed food as often as you can.

What is health and how do we achieve it?

My daughter is taking a health class at school. So of course they are talking about …health. But what I find disturbing is how the teacher is defining health for them. They were discussing different developmental stages of life and what during that stage a person could do to achieve good health. As they were discussing infancy, the teacher says that the most important thing you can do for your baby is get them immunized. Now if you are reading this you probably already know me, or know that I am a chiropractor, so you can imagine I found this quite disturbing! Why on earth would someone think shots are more important than, oh I don’t know; breastfeeding? So after I calmed down I came to the conclusion that it isn’t the teachers fault. She is only repeating what she has heard over and over and over again.

This first entry is not going to be about immunizations. But instead I want to talk about different conceptions of health. I believe there are many aspects of health, and not just one aspect can make a person healthy. The AMA (American Medical Association) has its definition of health just as the ACA (American Chiropractic Association) has its own definition of health. Whose right? Well they both are. There are just different ways of looking at health. The teacher was only discussing one aspect of health; perhaps she has never heard another view point.

Health can come from many different directions. There is physical health, mental health and spiritual health. If one of those three is missing, then you are likely to diminish in your overall health. There is no doubt that mental stress can decrease your physical well being. And you can be psychologically fit and physically fit but be missing spirituality and feel run down and depressed. Chiropractic physicians focus on all aspects of health and believe the body can heal itself if you feed it right, avoid or diminish stress and keep the nervous system free from interference. Chiropractic was based on the belief that Innate could heal the body, but you had to let Innate flow. That is what the adjustment is all about; letting your energy flow.

In the next few blog entries I am going to discuss the physical side of health. After all, being a chiropractor that is what I know best. We think that if you are healthy, then you are absent of disease. This is partially true. Healthy people do not exhibit symptoms. But what about the 45 year old man that suddenly dies of a heart attack but had no symptoms? Was he healthy? I would say not. He just didn’t have warning signs or he ignored them. What we are taught by the medical community is that no symptoms = health. This is not so and I hope by exploring different aspects of this I can help shift your thinking just a little so that you can live your life in the best shape possible.

Next Topic we will discuss the essential ingredients for good health


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