Do you suffer from neck pain or back pain?

As much as I talk about pain being a poor indicator of health and how your body's ability to function dictates how healthy you are, it is still a very big problem for thousands of people in this country. Every day, millions are reaching for a bottle of aspirin or Tylenol to relieve some type of pain. Most don't even know that they are poisoning their bodies at the same time and setting it up for failure further down the road.

Take aspirin for example, we are taught to take it for aches and pains. You should even take one a day as you get older to show your heart that you care about it. Right?!

Did you know that your aspirin is causing your stomach and intestines to bleed everytime you take it? They fail to leave that part out of the commercials. Or how about your liver and kidneys? They have to filter everything out of your body.

Being that ALL medication is processed as a poison (because that's what it is) in your body, it will cause damage to either one or both. As a matter of fact, Tylenol is now reported as the number 1 cause of liver disease. You cannot assume that something is not dangerous to your body because you buy it at the grocery store without a script.

Here's something else I bet you didn't know: you don't suffer from a deficiency of aspirin or Tylenol! I usually get a few chuckles when I make that statement so feel free to insert yours here. Your pain does not come from not having a high enough level of pain killers or antiinflammatories in your system. Pain is a perception of the brain or signal.

This means if an area of the body loses its ability to function then at a certain level your brain decides, "Hey, I guess I better tell him/her about it." It then throws out a signal to you, preferably where the problem is, so that you can correct the problem. Sometimes the brain gets the location right and sometimes it does not. This is because less than 10% of your nerves actually deal with pain, everything else is function.

Let me translate. By the time you are feeling pain, then something else has already lost its ability to function properly somewhere else. So how do I know that? (Glad you asked)

All nerves exit from the spine and every single cell, tissue, and organ in your body is hooked up to a nerve. Every nerve controls more than one thing. Part of the nerve goes to control a group of muscles and the other part goes to organs and tissues. If you have pain, then something is not functioning properly. The nerves exiting that part of the spine are now affected, which disrupts the messages being sent to whatever parts of the body it controls.

For example, lets say you have a job where you work at the computer a lot. Now you notice that your neck is starting to get tight on a daily basis and some pain actually starts to creep in from time to time. The nerves exiting that part of the spine also go to control areas of the brain, your eyes, your nose, your sinuses, your throat, etc. All those areas are not allowed to function as well as they normally would.

Now I am not saying that you will also have problems in all those areas. What I am saying is that now you are set up to have problems in those areas. Let's say with no stress on the neck your sinuses can function at 100%. Now let's throw a little stress in there and a couple of misalignments and now they can only function at 75%. Who do you think is more likely to get a sinus infection - sinuses functioning at 100% or 75%?

I get asked all the time what the deal is with chiropractic. Why shouldn't we just take Advil or whatever else? My response is that we look at the body differently than most MDs. We try to find an area of the body that is not functioning properly, which is causing problems (symptoms) there or somewhere else, and restore normal function. If you go to your RD (that's regular doctor), they will ask for your symptoms and prescribe medication to correct those.

So let me ask you this? What makes more sense, addressing the cause of the problems or the effects of the problems? In which scenario do you think a reoccurrence is least likely? This is why pretty much all the research you can find on the effectiveness of chiropractic says we are just as good or better than medication.

The more things you can improve or problems you can solve without drugs or surgery, the longer your body will last you, and the more you will be able to enjoy it later in life.

Studies show millions of US kids are lacking in vitamin D

When I came into work this morning and pulled up my homepage on the internet, one of the top stories was entitled "Studies: Millions of U.S. Kids Lacking Vitamin D." I immediately clicked on the link to read the article. The first two paragraphs are as follows:

"Millions of U.S. children have disturbingly low Vitamin D levels, possibly increasing their risk for bone problems, heart disease, diabetes and other ailments, according to two new studies that provide the first national assessment of the crucial nutrient in young Americans.

About 9 percent of those ages 1 through 21 — about 7.6 million children, adolescents and young adults — have Vitamin D levels so low they could be considered deficient, while an additional 61 percent — 50.8 million — have higher levels, but still low enough to be insufficient, according to the analysis of federal data being released Monday."

This is a HUGE problem and kids are being set up for failure. Parents in general are taking a back seat to their children's health. It is assumed that they are getting all the vitamins and nutrients they need in their Poptarts, school lunches, and happy meals.

According to the article, about 70% of children have insufficient amounts of the super important vitamin in their bodies. You think we have health problems now?! Just wait and see what happens if nothing is done to correct this problem. Heart disease, cancer, viral infections, and so on will go through the roof.

I am not trying to point a finger at anyone and say you stink as a parent. I'm only trying to raise your awareness of a very serious problem that could easily go overlooked and have damaging effects to your child's health. I have 3 kids of my own and never really thought about this vitamin until Dr. Mercola started touting it's importance recently, so I'm preaching to myself at the same time.

I'm sure by now you're thinking to yourself, "So how do I make sure my child is getting enough of the good stuff?" I'm so glad you asked.

First, we need to turn off all the video games and cartoons and get kids outside playing. It's not the playing part for the vitamin D but the sun exposure. Your body will naturally make the vitamin when your skin sees the light of day. In fact, one theory behind why the flu is more prevalent in the winter is because of dips in the general populations vitamin D levels from keeping skin covered up.

Getting kids more active will have a lot of positive health benefits besides boosting their vitamin D levels. It will also help their bodies develop neurologically, promote a healthier immune system, and help prevent type 2 diabetes. Of course, regular exercise for kids does a lot more for their body then just those few things. I just wanted to hit some highlights.

Second, you need to find a high quality Vitamin D supplements for your kiddos. I say high quality because that is important in the world of supplements. In general, vitamins and herbs are still very loosely regulated. Brand X in the grocery store doesn't always make sure that what they have in their pills match what the label says on the outside and the vitamin in said pills aren't always of a good absorbable form of whatever you are taking. If you don't take the time to know who you are buying your supplements from then you are literally urinating or pooping your money away.

I would also like to point out that there is no 1 company that is the "best" with a secret formula to get you more vitamin D. There are several companies that produce quality vitamins. The company I recommend is web-based because I can't find any brands in the grocery stores that are reliable.

I hope that I have raised the awareness of at least 1 person. Have an excellent day!