Chiropractic works with your brain to relieve pain
I had a great conversation with a patient this week about the brain.
I’ll just share with you a bit of her history so you have a some background for our conversation.
Chronic pain for several years
She has suffered with panic attacks and chronic pain for several years.
And before we met she had tried to get help. . .she tried all kinds of medications, even opioids. . . she’s been to several massage therapists, a couple of physiotherapists, tried acupuncture BUT we were the first correction based chiropractic office.
Pain relief after just 2 months
After being under care for a couple of months, she was down from daily pain and muscle spasm to weekly episodes.
Which is far from where I want her to be, BUT she’s ecstatic because of the fact she has hope again because her life is coming back.
Can you imagine having daily pain and spasm’s so bad that you are walking around on eggshells filled with anxiety about when your body is going to experience another wave of pain?
Doctors and therapists didn’t understand how the brain works
All these doctors and therapists didn’t understand that brute force will never win the battle against a brain that is only trying to defend itself. And Sara was caught in this lack of understanding, like so many people that are in North America today.
So back to our conversation this week.
It was about the way the brain works when we’re trying to change our bodies, especially the performance of the nerve system.
Pain control or body performance
This certainly matters in pain control, but it also matters in a professional athlete that needs their body to perform at it’s best.
It’s the same concept. It’s how the brain and nerve system behave towards change.
If we are going to change your body function and performance we need to convince your brain that it’s going to be safe. That everything is going to be ok.
There are base protective actions that your brain is programmed with that resist change.
The brain has been hardwired to protect you from change, good or bad.
Your brain has been trained for hundreds of generations over several thousand years that change is dangerous, even when change is good.
The limbic system is the part of the brain that Seth Godin call’s the “reptile” brain and when we are working to change performance patterns, especially pain patterns we need to convince the reptile brain that everything is going to be ok. OR it will resist it with all it’s might.
And no matter what you do, once your brain is convinced of something, you will not win that battle by brute force.
Why medication and therapies need to be intensified
That’s why medications need to be increased because your body builds up a tolerance to them — no matter how strong the drug is. You can not “beat” your nerve system with brute force. The same thing for things like IMS, you start low and the therapist has to keep on upping the voltage they are pumping into your muscle to get a response. Brute force.
It may “seem” like things are working temporary, but it’s completely going against your brain’s wiring and your bodies physiology. You’re fighting your bodies survival mechanisms.
Today’s chiropractic takes time but it’s authentic healing from the inside out.
That’s why really healing spinal and neurological problems take time. I’ve had migraine suffers take 8 to 12 months to get over their pain. But it’s authentic and real, not temporary.
It’s important for people to understand what their brain is doing seems normal and appropriate to it — it’s only acting out what it believes is in the best interest of the body EVEN if it causes chronic pain.
That’s another reason your posture based exercises are based on repetition and based on retraining your nerve system. I’m not trying to get you to look like Arnold Schwarzenegger, your exercises are not about bulking up or giving you buns of steel. They are about retraining your nerve system.
Brain performance AND beating pain
That way we’ll eventually beat your pain and more importantly increase your nerve system performance at the same time.
In fact the proper understanding and “order” is to increase your nerve system performance THEN you will see your pain disappear. . . not the other way around.
Yes, it takes time BUT in the process we’ll also help you with more important things like your golf swing, your running or cycling and playing with your grand kids.
Brain performance is critical for every aspect of your life and it’s so much more than just beating pain.
We have it completely backwards in North America. . . focusing on brute force to change your body and brain doesn’t work, we need to come along side your brain and body and help it find a new set point.
Chiropractic works because it works with your brain.
Your chiropractic adjustments are a major factor in re-calibrating your nerve system so a new normal can be established. A new normal where pain is a thing of the past.
Today’s chiropractic is all about your brain and nerve system working in harmony with your body so you can live The 100+Living Plan from the inside out.
