Tag Archives: healthy

The Goal of the Chiropractor

If you spent the day in our waiting room you’d meet people coming to see us who have all kinds of health problems:

  • allergiesthe goal of the chiropractor
  • asthma
  • headaches
  • migraines
  • vision and hearing problems
  • digestive problems
  • immune system issues
  • pain in all kinds of places: back, hip, neck, shoulder, legs, arms;
  • people who’ve had sport injuries
  • so many others

But the ultimate goal of the chiropractor is to keep people so healthy that they don’t get sick in the first place! 

Good Health Is Easy: Sickness Takes Work

We are born with such wonderful bodies designed to last us over a hundred years in perfect physical and mental health. But a lifetime of physical, mental, and chemical stress and abuse wears us down, weakens us, and causes our body to malfunction. 

Chiropractors are the only professionals that are trained to locate and correct a serious deep stress most people have inside their body that can damage their ability to fight disease and stay healthy: a subluxation. It is usually painless and usually found in your spine.

When your body is free of subluxation stress you are better able to function at your best, to heal at your best and to think at your best because stress that has been sapping you of your life energy is now gone or reduced. Chiropractic promotes balance, resistance to disease and improved function. (1)

No matter what the disease or condition, you need a subluxation-free body to keep your healing ability at its optimum. That’s why you’ll find people with all kinds of health conditions in a chiropractor’s office. (2)

Call and schedule an appointment today! 517.627.4547


  1. Blanks RHI, Schuster TL. A retrospective assessment of network care using a survey of self-rated health, wellness and quality of life. JVSR. 1997;1(4):1.
  2. Marino MJ, Phillippa ML. A longitudinal assessment of chiropractic care using a survey of self-rated health wellness & quality of life: a preliminary study. Journal of Vertebral Subluxation Research. 1999;3(2):1-9.

Hearty Spaghetti with Lentils & Marinara

This recipe originally appeared on the Cookie and Kate website. One of my favorites for vegetarian recipes. 

  • Prep Time: 10 minutes
  • Cook Time: 25 minutes
  • Total Time: 35 minutes
  • Yield: 4 servings 

Lentils

  • ½ cup dry lentils (French green lentils or regular brown lentils), or 1 ½ cups cooked lentils (leftover or from a can, rinsed and drained)
  • 1 bay leaf
  • 1 large garlic clove, peeled but left wholelentils
  • ¼ teaspoon salt
  • 2 cups vegetable broth or water

Everything else

  • 2 cups marinara sauce
  • 8 ounces whole-grain pasta (or 12 ounces, if you like your pasta less saucy than mine)
  • Optional garnishes: grated Parmesan or vegan Parmesan and/or chopped fresh basil

INSTRUCTIONS

  1. To cook the lentils, first pick through the lentils for debris (I once bit into a tiny rock) and then rinse them in a fine-mesh colander. In a small saucepan, combine the lentils, bay leaf, garlic, salt and broth.
  2. Bring the mixture to a simmer over medium-high heat, then reduce heat to maintain a gentle simmer. Simmer until the lentils are cooked through and tender, which will take somewhere between 20 to 35 minutes, depending on the age and variety of the lentils. Drain the lentils, discard the bay leaf and garlic, and set the pot aside, uncovered.
  3. Meanwhile, bring a large pot of salted water to boil. Cook the pasta until al dente, according to the package directions. Drain, then return the pasta to the pot and set it aside.
  4. Stir the marinara into the lentils and warm them together over medium heat. Divide pasta into bowls, top with warm marinara and lentils, and garnish with Parmesan and/or chopped fresh basil, if you’d like. Serve warm. Leftovers will keep well, covered and refrigerated, for up to 4 days.

Why do chiropractors encourage breastfeeding?

Questions and Answers About Chiropractic: Why do chiropractors encourage breastfeeding?encourage breasfeeding

Chiropractic is a natural healing art that recognizes the wisdom of nature. Nature makes a perfect food for baby for optimal brain and body development. It’s called breast milk and the advantages over anything else are many.

Benefits to baby:

  • Breastfeeding protects against infections including meningitis, bacteremia, diarrhea, respiratory tract infection, necrotizing enterocolitis, otitis media, urinary tract infection and sepsis in pre-term infants.
  • Breastfed babies have less Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (CRIB death).
  • Breastfeeding is associated with better grades in high school.
  • Breastfed babies have less diabetes, lymphoma, leukemia, Hodgkin disease, obesity and asthma.
  • Breastfed babies show enhanced cognitive development.

Benefits to mother:

  • Decreased postpartum bleeding
  • Faster return to pre-pregnancy weight
  • Natural child spacing/family planning
  • Decreased risk of breast and ovarian cancer
  • Decreased risk of hip fractures and osteoporosis after menopause
  • Women in their 60s who breastfed were 10% less likely to develop heart disease, high blood pressure and stroke. 

    https://www.webmd.com/parenting/baby/nursing-basics#1

Did You Know? Which of your organs is the largest? 

Is it your liver? Brain? Intestines? None of those – it’s your skin! It’s gigantic. Your skin includes everything that covers your body and that organsincludes your hair and fingernails. Your skin is rather heavy – it accounts for about 16% of your entire body weight. 

Even though it’s heavy, it is very thin. At its thickest, the bottom of your feet, it is 1.5mm thick (as thick as a grain of rice). At the thinnest, your eyelids, its only 0.5mm. 

How much do you know about your organs?

We know you can recognize people from looking at their face; you can also recognize them from their liver, stomach lungs, heart, eyeballs, spine – our parts are unique. Every part of your body is like your fingerprints, unlike any other fingerprint in the world. Even identical twins have different fingerprints! 

Speaking about fingerprints, they are not just useful to the police for identification. Fingerprints give your skin friction so you can pick things up and hold them.

Your skin is also a barrier to protect you from infection and also serves as a major waste disposal site – using sweating, rashes, boils, pustules and other yucky mechanisms to keep you healthy and free from toxins.

Perhaps most amazing is that your skin completely renews itself every 27 days! Even during this complete change, your fingerprints remain the same. So, you can improve your looks by eating better, getting a massage, sitting in a sauna, fasting and cleansing – but it’ll take about a month to see the difference.

 

Fermented Foods are Good for You

Do you eat fermented foods regularly? eat fermented food

Fermented foods are absolutely essential for your health and should be a part of every meal. They are found in every culture.

Fermented foods help keep your intestinal flora healthy and that is necessary for so many aspects of your health:

  • digestion
  • elimination
  • nutrition
  • mental health

Popular Fermented Foods

Among the most popular fermented foods are:yogurt is a great fermented food

  • sauerkraut
  • pickles
  • yogurt
  • kefir
  • kombucha*
  • kvass
  • sourdough
  • (traditionally made) beer
  • root beer and other soft drinks (not the commercial stuff).

Even ketchup was originally a fermented sauce.

Nearly any food can be fermented or pickled.You can make your own!

Two good books are The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Fermenting Foods and The Art of Fermentation both by Warden Harmon.

*On Kombucha …there is a class available in Old Town….. if you are interested ….talk to me

~DR.C

Baseball and Chiropractic

It’s baseball time! Chiropractic care can improve your baseball game

And what better way to improve a team’s performance than chiropractic care!

Minnesota Twins Baseball and Chiropractic

Minnesota Twins pitcher Kyle Gibson has seen the chiropractic light. Gibson described the problem by saying, “There were a couple starts where I didn’t sit down in between innings because if I sat down, my hips just got tight.”

The Twins relief pitcher, Trevor May, also suffered back problems. At first, he saw the chiropractor occasionally, with limited results, but after getting more regular adjustments, his condition greatly improved. “My hips were really, really out of line. Seeing a chiropractor consistently has helped me make sure I’m getting readjusted and staying in line as much as possible.”

Florida Marlins Baseball and Chiropractic

The Florida Marlins pitchers Adam Conley, Jarred Cosart and Wei-Yin Chen also receive chiropractic care to improve their game. Chen, who signed an $80-million-dollar contract with the Marlins commented how chiropractic helps him by saying that he “…noticed a huge difference in recovery time between pitching days.”

Improve Your Game Today!chiropractic care improves baseball

Chiropractic care brings balance, strength and coordination by correcting subluxations and removing or reducing interference. With greater balance and nerve communication athletes under chiropractic care can perform at their highest level. (3)

Disease and Vaccines

The disease is over when we think we have itdisease-vaccines-boy

We know the names of what are referred to as childhood diseases: measles, mumps, chicken pox and whooping cough/pertussis. But did you know that by the time a child is said to “catch” these diseases of childhood with their characteristic rashes, skin eruptions, fever and general malaise (overall yechy feeling), the disease is over?

The natural way people get these diseases is that germs come in contact with the mouth and throat (nasopharynx) where your tonsils, adenoids and other immune tissues reside. They alert your body to the invaders and you mount an offense.

The symptoms are not the disease

The symptoms that we associate with a disease are not the disease, they are the body ridding itself of the disease waste. In the words of Hippocrates, considered the father of medicine:

“We call them diseases but they are the cure of disease.”

The disease is actually over; the body has confronted the germ invaders, has won the war and is doing cleanup.

The symptoms we associate with the disease are really the discharge of waste after the disease is over. The wastes leave through the skin (perspiration, rashes, pustules), are burnt up by fever, discharged by diarrhea, and take our energy so we feel fatigue and other unpleasant body expressions. We may dislike those symptoms, but they are good for us. The result is a healthier, stronger, cleaner person.

That’s why growth spurts, in body and mind, are often seen after a child experiences a childhood disease or even a fever. The body has detoxified and can now move on to a stronger level of health and wellness.

How does vaccination affect childhood diseases? disease-infection

Do vaccines prevent disease?

Vaccines inject viri and bacterium, toxins associated with the virus and other chemicals deep into the body, into the bloodstream where they are not supposed to be. Because it is so deep, the body is not able to mount a proper offense; the disease may never leave. Vaccines do not prevent disease; they drive disease deeper where more damage may occur.

That is why studies show vaccinated children are the ones who have autism, allergies, asthma, ear infections, arthritis, diabetes, ADD/ADHD, dyslexia, stuttering and other conditions. The vaccine toxins damage the nerve and immune system and the result is a less healthy child.

They still get the disease, but are unable to perform a detox so they don’t get the symptoms we associate with the disease. Therefore, they are sicker deeper in their body, longer (chronically) and often permanently.

Of course symptoms of body discharge must be respected – a child who is going through a post-illness detox must be properly nourished, given rest and have procedures promoting a complete detoxification and cleansing.

Stay healthy: don’t get a flu shot!

We are approaching flu shot season again. Drug companies spend millions advertising the not only useless but dangerous flu shot that causes brain and nervous system damage. flu shot

Did You Know?

Not many people know this, the media doesn’t report it, but the U.S. government records vaccine injuries and deaths and the flu vaccine has been linked to both.

Government records show the flu vaccine kills and damages more people than all the other vaccines combined. The mercury in the shot has been linked to Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s, MS and autism.

There is no proof that pregnant women, children, babies or adults (especially asthmatics) get any benefit from it. Send this information to those you care about.

The Flu Shot: useless and dangerous

Anthony Morris, Ph.D. former Chief Vaccine Control Officer, US Food and Drug Administration and flu vaccine expert:

There is no evidence that any influenza vaccine thus far developed is effective in preventing or mitigating any attack of influenza. The producers of these vaccines know that they are worthless, but they go on selling them anyway

Colds and flu prevent cancer

For thousands of years healers have viewed colds, flu, fevers and skin eruptions as some of the most powerful weapons your body has for cleansing, detoxification and self-healing. These symptoms are uncomfortable but provide natural benefits no drug or vaccine can give you. For example:

Those with carcinomas of the stomach, colon, rectum, breast, and ovary … and controls (with no history of cancer) were interviewed. A history of common colds or influenza prior to the interview was found to be associated with a decreased cancer risk. (1) 

Subjects who reported a history of infectious diseases (e.g., colds, flu) showed a 30% reduction in risk [of brain tumor]. (2) 

Do not suppress your fever or other symptoms with drugs that interfere with your healing; you may stay sick longer:

Taking aspirin or TylenolT for the flu could prolong your illness by up to 3½   days. (3)


  1. Abel U, Becker N, Angerer R et al. Common infections in the history of cancer patients and controls. J Cancer Res Clin Oncol. 1991;117(4); 339-344.
  2. Schlehoper B, Blettner M, Preston-Martin S et al. Role of medical history in brain tumor development results from the international adult brain tumor study. International Journal of Cancer. 1999;82:155-160.
  3. Plaisance KI et al. Effect of antipyretic therapy on the duration of illness in experimental influenza A, Shigella connei, and Rickettsia rickettsii infections. Pharmacotherapy. 2000;20(12):1417-1433.

How Important is your Health Really?

Do You Really Want To Be Healthy?

There is an old saying, “Everybody wants to go to heaven but nobody wants to die to get there.” health-happy-family

A similar statement could be made concerning health. In almost any survey taken asking people what they wanted most out of life, good health is one of the top three things on the list.

The only two things that ever top it are usually happiness and good family relationships. Yet how many of us allow other less important things to keep us from attaining maximum health?

Like happiness, health does not come by luck. It is true that hereditary factors are important to good health but most people can be healthy in spite of hereditary weakness. Conversely, hereditary strengths will not overcome a failure to take care of yourself.

A Desire to be Healthy

Most people who come into a chiropractic office indicate a desire to be healthy. Unfortunately, thealth-sitting-backhey often do not realize that it will take some effort on their part.

The average person’s experience with medicine has led them to believe that they will be made healthy by what the doctor does to them or what he gives them. They can just sit back, do nothing or at most, remember to take their medication every four hours.

While this approach may be “relatively effective” in the treatment of disease, it has virtually nothing to do with health. For the most part, disease treatment is a passive activity. Health maintenance, or health restoration, is largely an active endeavor. Therein lies the problem.

Sitting back and doing nothing will not promote or maintain health.

Hoping or wishing for it will not make it happen. It must be actively pursued. A choice must be made. Good, nutritious, health-promoting food is available, but then so is junk food. You must make the decision as to what kind you are going to eat and then make the extra effort to get it. Exercise is not a passive activity. You cannot get it by just watching PX90 videos.

Chiropractic is not a passive activity either.

While it is true the patient lies on the table and relaxes, it is the body that makes the adjustment. The chiropractor introduces a force to the spine and the body’s muscles actively move the bone to exactly where it belongs. Further, the benefits of chiropractic care occur after the adjustment, like exercise and eating, they are far reaching and unlike treatments, they are not designed for short-term, immediate effects. It is true you may feel good after eating a good meal or after a good work out. You may also feel good right after a chiropractic adjustment, but the real benefits are the long-term ones. When the body is working better it can actively promote health and well-being and add years to life.

The patient must make the commitment to care.

There is another aspect that makes chiropractic care an active approach. The patient must make the commitment to care. The chiropractor cannot give you a bottle of adjustments and say, “take one every Monday, Wednesday and Friday for the next six weeks.”

The patient must make the willful decision to come in, be regular and follow the program. The chiropractor cannot follow you around or take you by the hand.

Do you really want to be healthy?health-do-you-want-to-be-healthy

Sadly, too many people do not want to pay the price, which is time, money and effort. Happiness does not come by accident. Fame and fortune are not a matter of luck. Similarly, you cannot expect to have good health unless you do those things necessary to attain it. Every individual has to establish his or her priorities. Is watching television more important than exercising for your health? Is saving money by eating poor quality food more important to you than spending the few dollars for good food? Is doing whatever you do that interferes with regular adjustments more important than your health? Only you can answer these questions and how you decide on these and other relative questions could very well determine your health, your happiness and your life.

So do you REALLY want to be healthy?