Chiropractic Helps Mental Health

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Chiropractic Helps Mental Health

May 6, 2021

Today is a great day to be alive. And the day after this is great too!

Maybe you're not feeling that statement and maybe you won't like it tomorrow either...

Let's talk about mental health in today's world as we are all engaging in a shift back into whatever "normal" life means to you. Talking about mental health can be stigmatizing, exhausting, and painful. So let's keep this discussion direct and to the point.

Our family wellness office is located in the beautiful city of Huntington Beach, CA. 45 minutes South of LA and 2 hours North of San Diego, tucked along the pacific coast. Sounds like heaven doesn't it? Well this week alone, our city witnessed 2 very public suicides. This is hitting our office hard because we are celebrating our community opening back up and finally engaging with each other again. It seems that many of us are unsure of how to approach feelings that arise when there is so much uncertainly surrounding us.

What can chiropractic do for those suffering with depression, social anxiety, and adapting to this new world?

Reconnect Your Brain and Your Body

When the nervous system is working on overdrive trying to manage it's responses to these new stressors, the immune system takes a back seat. Meaning the body is so overtaxed that it cannot focus on the automatic things. These things are: sleeping, digesting, eliminating wastes, breathing, heart rate, breath rate, etc. Over time your blood pressure stays high, your breathing becomes short and stiff, and your food doesn't get absorbed. Leaving you with feelings of physical stress, anxiety, gut dysfunction, and deficient nutrition. When you receive a chiropractic adjustment your brain can sense everything the body needs by increasing crucial nerve signals. When the brain is fully connected to the body, the brain can relax and focus on what it needs to heal.

Vagus Nerve Stimulation

The Vagus nerve is the coolest nerve of the body. It's the only nerve that connects the brain to the gut. This is why we have "gut instincts" or moments where the brain may be saying one thing, but the gut tells you something different (side note, always go with the gut instinct). This nerve helps our response to stress by deciding how hard to breath, how strong the heart should beat, and how fast things should be metabolized. When this nerve is out of balance, then all these responses are affected and your mental health suffers. Luckily for those under chiropractic care this is a foundational element of the chiropractic adjustment. With each adjustment the body regains Vagus nerve balance and your brain becomes less stressed.

Parasympathetic Balancing

Our nervous systems have 2 different and opposing functions. One part of our system has the ability to rev us up. This is the "flight or fight" response and it is used for times of stress. The other part is "rest and digest" which slows down our systems to allow us to relax and heal. In today's world, we find many people stuck in a sympathetic response - this includes things like high blood pressure, elevated heart rate, anxiety, trouble sleeping, digestive issues, and more. Chiropractic is one of the only tools to bring your body back to it's parasympathetic state. When we are in this state of ease and rest the brain resets to a state of balance.

There are many other facets to our mental well-being. But we cannot only address the mental part, without also addressing the physical body and it's control center - the NERVOUS SYSTEM. When the nervous system is in a long term state of stress, the brain fatigues and loses the ability to uptake the happy hormones. This is why antidepressant drugs work to increase uptake of these happy hormones. At Thrive Family Chiropractic, we specialize in keeping our patients off harmful medications by working within the beautiful innate system already built inside you! Take a chance at happiness by getting checked by one of

5 of the most impactful things to stay happy and healthy:

Get adjusted regularly
Move everyday
Eat real, clean foods
Stay connected to community
Address gut issues

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