Cafe of Life

Just another WordPress site

admin

The Hero and The Villain

by Leave a Comment

If your personal journey of health and well-being was a story that lasted 100 healthy years or more, who would be the hero of this story? Who would be the villain if you did not live these quality years and instead lived a deteriorating life to 60 or 70? Understanding the hero and the villain will help you make choices that ensure that you and your loved ones live an active, healthy life and express your full potential throughout your lifetime.

The hero of this story is your Innate Intelligence. Your body has within it an Innate Intelligence that, from the moment of conception, strives to keep you functioning at your best. From the moment you were conceived, one cell grew into over eighty quadrillion cells without any direction from a doctor, drug, or research.

Your brain and spinal cord were placed in protective casings of bone for safety as they are the most important systems in your body. Your heart was placed in the center of your chest, an efficient location to distribute oxygen, nutrients and waste products to their proper locations with great efficiency.

Your Innate Intelligence knew how tall you were going to be before you were born and was equipped with the resources to digest your food and adapt you to your environment. As long as your Innate Intelligence is free to express itself, then you would have a great chance of expressing your full potential for eighty, ninety, a hundred years and beyond.

The villain in this story is anything that interferes with the expression of your Innate Intelligence.

Nerve interference, lifestyle interference and environmental interference can reduce your body’s innate ability to communicate or regulate itself. It is very common during the birth process for a baby’s spine to be injured, especially in the upper neck, which can reduce nerve transmission over the spinal cord and nervous system. This type of nerve interference can result in immediate symptoms like colic, constipation, diarrhea, allergies or other problems or it may lie dormant for decades until your body can no longer adapt.

Nerve interference can occur during childhood through sports injuries, childhood falls and poor nutrition, again, causing numerous symptoms or lying dormant and asymptomatic for decades. Car accidents, falling down the stairs, weight gains or losses and emotional stress are just some of the additional causes of nerve interference.

Lifestyle interference can also alter the expression of your body’s Innate Intelligence effecting your health while also causing nerve interference, sickness and disease. Lifestyle interference includes poor diet, being overweight, eating excessive amounts of sugar and caffeine, taking drugs, poor posture and stress. Interference is the villain of this story, your story, because it robs your body and mind of your true innate capabilities.

Environmental Interference is caused by toxicity from air, food, water, or chemicals, as well as accidents or natural disasters. With chem trails blanketing the sky, GMO foods on our tables dangerous chemicals in our crops and water, environmental interference has never been more of a problem to our nervous system. So much so that Robert Zieve, MD recently wrote in an article called Neurological Disorders: The Growing Epidemic of the 21st-Century, that chronic neurological diseases are fast becoming the debilitating epidemic of our time. As Dr. Zieve points out, “We live in a toxic world. The great majority of chemicals we now take in daily were not on the planet 30 years ago. These toxins become neurotoxins, damaging the nervous system.”

Our chiropractic office will do everything we can to nurture your hero and eliminate this villain from your life, and keep it out of your life for the rest of your life, so that you and your loved ones can enjoy the quality of life you deserve. By nurturing your Innate Intelligence and expressing your full potential and you will enjoy health for a lifetime.

Hope And Healing

by Leave a Comment

We hope for a healthy mind and body. Many of us hope for meaningful relationships and the abundance to live, give and enjoy the good things in life. We hope these things for our loved ones, too.

What happens when something changes in our lives and hope is hard to muster? What can we do when we are faced with many challenges at the same time and we find ourselves feeling hopeless?

The Anatomy of Hope: How People Prevail in the Face of Illness by Jerome Groopman, MD discusses those living in “extreme circumstances” as having a hope that “assesses all of the obstacles, all of the problems, all the potential for failure” and still “sees a path to the future”.1 Research demonstrates the healing power of hope and how it can impact pain levels, respiratory problems, heart attack outcomes and Parkinson’s disease by stimulating neurochemical changes in the brain.2

Hoping is a healthy way to cope with daily stressors and the unexpected. Set your mind to believe that things will get better. Take action steps to do something different to make the rest of today and tomorrow better. Think positive thoughts. Consciously choose to spend your time, energy and resources in ways that agree with your goals. Take care for your body so you have the energy and attitude to be at your best. No matter your current situation, it is not too late to start.

Our Chiropractic patients present with a wide variety of conditions and goals for care. Some people come in seeking care for a crisis, seeking chiropractic care as a last resort. Children come in because their parents want them to have the advantage of growing up with an optimally functioning spine and nervous system. Athletes want to keep their body mechanics working at peak levels so that they can heal faster, avoid injuries and enjoy their sport for as long as possible. Some people are concerned about chronic conditions that are draining their bank accounts and causing them physical, mental and social suffering. They want a drug-free, non-surgical solution that will address the root cause of their health problems.

What should you do if you or a loved one has been hopeless about your health or potential to heal? As long as you are alive and breathing and there is life flowing over your nervous system be hopeful and consider giving chiropractic care a chance to work for you. A chiropractic examination will be able to identify whether or not there is interference to the function of your nervous system that may be affecting your health on many levels. Chiropractic care can help your body and mind to function better and you will learn to think differently about your health decisions. Your hope combined with the chiropractic techniques and lifestyle suggestions we offer can make the difference.

If you are suffering from acute or chronic pain, have been diagnosed with a severe condition, are feeling discouraged or stressed, there is hope. Make the health of your nervous system a priority. Your hope and personal commitment can make all the difference.

1. Daniel Cappello. (November 10, 2003). The New Yorker. In The Reeve Factor. Retrieved March 8, 2015, from http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2003/11/10/the-reeve-factor.

2. Park, Kevin K, Liu, K, Hu, Y, Smith, P, Wang, C, Cai, B, Xu, B, Connolly, L, Kramvis, I, Sahin, M, and He, Z. Promoting Axon Regeneration in the Adult CNS by Modulation of the PTEN/mTOR Pathway. Science. 2008 Nov 7; 322(5903): 963-966.

Copyright 2016. The Family Practice, Inc., Dr. Eric Plasker and The 100 Year Lifestyle. All Rights Reserved.

What Happens When You Stop?

by Leave a Comment

“Your body is a reflection of your lifestyle.”
Outwardly, this is obvious to us. Bodybuilders are easily recognized, as are yogis and other athletes. Even when we observe those who meticulously groom themselves or those who decline to subscribe to grooming standards, there is a “lifestyle” and values associated with the behavior. We are creatures of habit, as they say, and what we choose on a daily basis affects our long-term outcomes, even if the effects aren’t as outwardly apparent.

Continual chiropractic adjustments have already been shown many times to increase health due to the ability to increase positive neuroplasticity.1 “In the past ten years, researchers have objectively demonstrated that spinal adjustments can change aspects of nervous system function including muscle reflexes, reaction time and the speed at which the brain processes information.” Chiropractic Lifestyle Care ensures your body’s potential to experience your longevity with a nerve system that is continually optimized.

Across all health platforms, research has continually supported the importance of lifestyles and habits that foster health, instead of those that foster inactivity, disease and negative neuroplasticity, loss of brain function.2,3 When it comes to exercise, research published in the journal Frontier in Aging Neuroscience revealed that endurance runners who skipped workouts for 10 days had reductions in blood flow to their brain.4 Just like we cannot expect to eat healthy for one week and expect those effects to last a lifetime, we cannot expect to receive chiropractic care for a few visits or a couple of weeks and expect our nervous system to be optimized for the rest of our lives, especially in the high-stress world we live in today.

The 100 Year Lifestyle is about developing and nurturing habits that will ensure your health through your 100th birthday and more. Abandoning the consistent care of your spine and nervous system as a part of your lifestyle can result in a return to what has become known as the “standard” aging process. The brain and nerve system is like the rest of your body: when you don’t use it consistently, it assumes you have no more need for these abilities. Therefore, the body uses energy elsewhere, allowing the ill-used brain to atrophy and shrink. Due to this physiological adaptation, the normal aging adult experiences a decline in information processing speed in the brain, affecting all nervous system processes, including, but not limited to, motor function, joint function, memory, cognitive quickness and slowed autonomic responses to homeostatic changes.3

Instead of allowing the nervous system to stagnate, lose speed and function, utilize chiropractic Lifestyle Care to keep your spine and nervous system well adjusted. You will enjoy the benefits of the care today and you will appreciate them even more as you age.

Works Cited:

1. Murphy, Dr. Bernadette. Chiropractic and Neural Plasticity. University of Auckland 2003. https://spinalresearch.com.au/wp-content/uploads/Factsheet-LG2003-6.pdf
2. Schuster, Tonya et al. Wellness Lifestyles I: A Theoretical Framework Linking Wellness, Health Lifestyles, and Complementary and Alternative Medicine. The Journal of Alternative and Complementary Medicine 2004. Vol. 10, No. 2; pg 349-356.
3. Vance, David E. et al. Neuropsychology and Cognitive Health in Healthy Older Adults. Journal of Psychosocial Nursing and Mental Health Services 2012. Vol. 50, No. 6; pg 30-37.

Movement and a Healthy Brain

by Leave a Comment

Your brain is remarkable. It’s comprised of hundreds of billions of individual cells that are constantly receiving and transmitting information about your body and its place within your environment. The sum of all this activity is what you perceive as your personal human experience. Put more simply, the health and activity level of your brain determines who you are as a person.

In order for your brain to be healthy and perform its job at a level that allows you to enjoy life, each one of your individual brain cells needs to be healthy and maintain proper communication with it’s neighbors. Therefore, if you are to keep your brain healthy as you age, it is important to understand the three requisite factors of a healthy brain cell: oxygen, nutrition, and activation. Without the right amount or quality of any of these factors it becomes impossible for your brain to efficiently perform the countless functions that make you you.

Unfortunately, everyday life is not conducive to a healthy brain. Our jobs and schools require us to sit for hours limiting the amount of activation our brains receive. Technology forces us into positions that work against our natural breathing mechanics, and it has become exceedingly difficult to find high quality foods. To top it all off, there has been a marked increase in the amount of mild traumatic brain injuries (mTBI) due to falls and accidents to the point that public agencies have declared mTBI “A Silent Epidemic.”

We all experience these forces to varying degrees, but the only time we can truly appreciate it is when our brain’s functioning declines to levels that make every day life more difficult. Headaches, pain, confusion, fogginess, vertigo, sensitivity to light and sound, anxiousness, dizziness, and light headedness are just some of the many symptoms that people can begin to experience as their brain cells decline in health.

Fortunately, modern science has discovered that there are strategies and activities that you can perform on your own to mitigate the deleterious influence of modern life on your brain. The one constant in most of these brain-healthy activities is movement. When you move your body, receptors in your spine, joints, and muscles send powerful signals to your brain that help to drive growth, forge new connections, and enhance the ones already in place. That’s why most people feel more alert and energized after exercise.

Study after study has shown that regular purposeful movement whether it be weight-lifting, running, yoga, dancing, or Tai Chi can help keep your brain functioning at high levels and even lower your risk of developing neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s, dementia, and more.

There are many times that the insult to our brains and nervous systems require professional intervention. Chiropractic examinations and protocols can assess the function of your nervous system and the movement in your spine to correct the cause of imbalances and restore proper function.

Don’t wait for a crisis to force you to take action. Be proactive, schedule an examination, and keep your nervous system healthy throughout your lifetime.

Article Contributed by Dr. Jacob Plasker, 100 Year Lifestyle Affiliate Chiropractor in Bend, Oregon.

We Are Not Just Lucky

by Leave a Comment

Luck, as defined by the Cambridge Dictionary, is the force that causes things, especially good things, to happen to you by chance and not as a result of your own efforts or abilities. Winning the lottery would classify one as being lucky and for the amateur golfer, so is a hole-in-one.

The athlete who trains for their sport day after exhausting day, the straight-A student who reads and studies extensively, the person who changes their eating habits and becomes more active and returns to their ideal weigh…their success has nothing to do with luck and everything to do with action and choices!

What about health? Is it luck that allows children to be born drug free and without intervention? Is it luck that those same children enjoy a childhood free from ear infections, antibiotics and trips to an urgent care facility for every illness that happens to be going around? What about when they grow into adults who do not require major surgeries, countless prescription and over-the-counter drugs and ultimate confinement to a bed in a nursing home? The answer, is no. It involves effort and choices.

Paying close attention to eating a healthy menu of food and exercising on a regular basis is helpful. These actions are of vital importance to overall good health; however, there is another piece to the puzzle. You were born with the Innate Intelligence that gives your body the ability to heal from the inside out. From the moment of conception, the power that made the body heals the body. You must choose to trust your body to do its job.

In order for your body to do this, the pathways by which it receives its messages from the nervous system must be clear. The function of every cell, tissue and organ depends on it.

Interference in this communication can be caused by events such as birth, or a fall, or a sports injury, or a car accident. Interference can also be caused by choices such as eating poorly, drinking too much, strenuous work, heavy exercise or not enough movement. Outside influences such as stress at school or work, chemicals in our food and toxic exposure affect the nervous system. The effects of interference can express itself in ways such as physical illness or pain. It may occur today or it may occur in the years to come, but when it occurs and how should not be left to luck.

A chiropractic examination will determine if you or your loved ones have spinal or nervous system interference. A chiropractic adjustment is the way to remove that interference. The beneficial side effect is a body that has the ability to heal itself from the inside out, just as it was meant to do. The need for sick days, medications and surgery decrease and the potential to live a long, healthy, active life increases. Who would not want that for themselves and their loved ones?

Choose chiropractic for your health, get your spine checked and get those you love checked. When we make a choice, when we take action, when we put our abilities to work then good things happen. Enjoy living life at your best instead of hoping you are just lucky.

Contributed by Jaime Coxon, RD, LD

The Sandwich Generation

by Leave a Comment

A new generation of people has emerged that is vital to the way families function and thrive. They aren’t Generation X, Y, Z or Millennials. This is the Sandwich Generation. It is the moms and dads sandwiched between raising their own children and taking care of their parents at the same time. With extended life spans becoming the norm, and many elderly people are not adequately prepared for their extended lives, the burden of taking care of both older and younger generations is left to the person that is caught in the middle.

The fastest growing segment of our population, according to the US Census Bureau, is the Centenarian (100 year olds). It is estimated that between now and the year 2040, the Centenarian population will grow by 746percentsign while the remaining population will grow by 35percentsign. That is a lot of elderly people! Someone has to take care of them. They are our treasured elders, veterans, academia and workforce who were blindsided by their extended life and deteriorated into old age. The Sandwich Generation has been called to the task.

On the other side of the responsibility coin are the Sandwich Generation’s children. Fifty percent of the children born after 2000 are predicted to live 100 years while the other 50percentsign are predicted to live shorter lives than their parents. Which side of this 50/50 split that the children end up on, and the quality of life that they live, will be determined in large part by the way the Sandwich Mom or Dad cares for the kids and through the health values they themselves adopt and teach their family.

So, who is going to take care of Sandwich Mom or Dad as they care for multiple generations? We all know the answer: they must take care of themselves. Knowing that they are vital to the raising of their children and caretaking of their aging parents, Mom and Dad need to make sure that they are well inside and out. How is it possible for them to do this?

Certainly healthy lifestyle choices such as a positive attitude, healthy eating and regular exercise must become a top priority. It also means Sandwich Moms and Dads must do everything they can to assure that their body’s main communication system, the nervous system, is functioning at its highest potential.

A chiropractic checkup will evaluate the nervous system for interference and will locate vertebral subluxations. It’s non-invasive and the exam does not take long to perform. These regular checkups are vital to health care because subluxations can affect someone immediately. Digestion, sleep, hormone balance, emotions, memory and energy levels are going to be an issue if the nervous system is compromised. Subluxations can also seriously affect organ and brain function in life altering ways that could take decades to present then wreak havoc suddenly. Nerve pressure can exist without pain. Why wait for a crisis?

Getting checked regularly by a chiropractor and following their recommendation can assure that the nerve system is healthier. When all systems of the body are communicating clearly, optimal health can be achieved and the Sandwich Mom or Dad is better prepared to adapt to the challenges of being stuck in the middle. Taking care of others is a tremendous responsibility for the Sandwich Mom and Dad. While they are caught in the middle, they are the leader of the family’s health care. To make the Sandwich Generation’s job easier, the entire family (children, spouse and parents) should be checked regularly for vertebral subluxations.

Are you a Sandwich Mom or Dad or about to become one? Do you know one? Take care of yourself and schedule your appointment to get checked. You know more than anyone that you cannot afford to get sick.

Copyright 2017. The Family Practice, Inc., Dr. Eric Plasker and The 100 Year Lifestyle. All Rights Reserved.