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Chiropractic adjustments are a powerful way to help you manage stress by way of the brain body connection. In this post, we’re breaking it down to the basics giving you a break down of the nervous system, the adjustment, and how it all works together.
The Nervous System
Our bodies have a lot of systems to keep everything working properly. One of those is the nervous system. The nervous system is made up of the brain, the spinal cord, and all of the nerves that travel throughout the body. While all of the systems in the body are vital, the nervous system is especially important because it controls all of the other systems in the body.
The brain is located within the skull and attaches directly to the spinal cord which is surrounded by all of the bones of the spine, the vertebrae. At each level of the spine, nerves exit the spinal cord and branch off hundreds of thousands of times to travel to all of the organs, tissues, and cells of the body. This creates a pathway in which the brain and body are connected to each other and are able to communicate with one another. Think of this pathway like going to the drive-through at the bank. When you are sitting in your car you put information into the capsule that you send through the pipe to the banker inside. When the banker receives the information, they act accordingly and send the message back through the pipe to reach you in the car. The path of the nervous system is very similar.
The nerves in the body collect information that is then sent to the brain through pathways in the spinal cord. Once that information gets to the brain, the brain makes decisions about different functions and actions throughout the body and sends the response back to the body through the spinal cord and nerves. This pathway of communication is constantly occurring and is how the brain makes sure that the body is staying balanced and functioning optimally.
Stress.. what's that?
There are several factors that can impact the communication pathway between the brain and the body: physical stresses (e.g. sprained ankle), mental stresses (e.g. major work deadline coming up), and chemical stresses (e.g. fried food).
These specific factors will be explored in more detail in future posts, but for a brief overview, it is important that we define what stress is in general. Stress to the human body is anything that requires a change or an adaptation by the body in order to maintain balance. Stress can sometimes be a good thing and other times it can be a bad thing. The key is knowing that too much or too little of any one thing, including stress, can be problematic. When the body is in a state of stress where change and adaptation are constantly occurring it is said to be in a sympathetic state. When the body is in a sympathetic state, the nervous system is constantly active. Think of this as having your foot on the gas pedal. When the nervous system is sympathetic dominant the body is in a state of “go, go, go”, without the ability to slow down. A few examples of what this looks like in everyday scenarios is anxiety, poor sleep, difficulty focusing, and a weakened immune system. On the other side, the nervous system can also be in a state of calmness in which the nervous system acts in a parasympathetic state. Parasympathetic responses in the nervous system are like stepping on the break, which allows the body to slow down, rest, and recover. Actions that occur during this time include food digestion and absorption, proper immune function, and rest and recovery with sleep. Having a balance between the parasympathetic and the sympathetic response in the nervous system is vitally important for the body to function optimally. Anytime the body is exposed to stress, it alters the parasympathetic and sympathetic balance, and the body has to be able to adapt to this change. If the body is constantly in a state of “go, go, go” it gets run down and is unable to adapt. On the flip side, if the body is so calm and relaxed that it doesn’t have the energy to pick up, it also cannot adapt. This altered balance between the sympathetic and parasympathetic nervous systems leads to interference in the communication between the brain and the body causing dysfunction in the body’s physiology.
Think of this interference like the signal on your cell phone. It is optimal to have 5 bars of reception, but the phone will still work if there is less of a signal. However, having fewer bars of service may cause static on the call or may cause the call to cut in and out, making it more difficult to hear or understand the messages being said on the phone. This interference can come from a variety of places, most commonly, from lack of motion somewhere in the body. At every point in the body where two bones come together a joint is formed. And at each joint, there is an expected range of motion that it should move through when it is functioning properly. If there is a loss of motion at a particular joint this is what chiropractors call a subluxation. Subluxations interfere with the way the brain and body communicate with each other by altering the signals being sent back and forth between the brain and body; this creates nerve interference. This often comes with increasing signals of pain and inflammation, and a decrease in the brain’s ability to receive signals on how that particular area of the body is moving and functioning. As these altered signals get transmitted over time, the body starts compensating by changing how someone walks and moves, which leads to an increased chance of injury.
What Does Chiropractic Have To Do With It?
What brings most people into the chiropractic office is their symptoms. This could be pain, weakness, numbness or anything else that they realize isn’t normal or that may be interfering with the things they want to do. Chiropractic care is fantastic at reducing symptoms, but that’s not all it does. Ultimately, chiropractic care helps to restore function in the body. Chiropractic treatment involves an assessment to determine where the subluxations are in the body, and specific chiropractic adjustments are given to correct those subluxations.
The chiropractic adjustment is a specific force delivered to the subluxations in order to put motion back into that area. Over time, as motion becomes restored at the level of the subluxation, nerve interference becomes minimized so that the brain and body can communicate optimally. The removal of the interference within the nervous system allows for balance to be brought back between the parasympathetic and sympathetic nervous systems so that the body can heal and function optimally again.
To bring all of this together, let’s say you have a headache. Your brain is telling you there’s pain because of interference somewhere in the nervous system. A chiropractor will assess you and may realize that even though the pain is felt in your head, the cause is coming from the subluxation in your mid-back. By adjusting your mid-back and putting motion back into that area you notice that your head starts to feel better and eventually is eliminated. With the body and brain being able to communicate properly again you are able to go about your day pain-free allowing your body to continue functioning optimally.
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