The Checklist of Care

Posted by: The Balancing Center

Gravity never forgets to pull down. (At least it hasn’t yet in recorded history.) Our body’s natural resistance to gravity is what gives our muscles definition and tone, what strengthens our bones so we can walk, work, and play.

But if you’re out of balance, the uneven connection you have with the ground makes it harder for your body to function easily. Your left leg might have to work harder than your right leg, causing your muscles, bones, and joints to work unevenly. Gravity might never forget to pull down, but your body can forget what it’s like to properly pull up.

However, if we can restore that connection and your innate balance, your body can start to work with gravity instead of against it. You can turn off your emergency response systems, decrease your stress level, and feel more relaxed. How do we restore that connection? By building upon a checklist of care to discover what combination of tactics can create the best strategy for health for each patient.

1. We promote a different perspective on health: you are designed to be well and health issues arise because of interferences in that design. Health issues are multidimensional and require multidimensional solutions.

2.  We discover if your upper neck is misaligned. If it is, we realign it with our precise upper cervical technique.

3.   We check for any secondary structural issues in the rest of your spine and body. If we find any, we clear and correct those.

4. We check for underlying emotional or mental patterns of trauma that might be interfering with your body on a level separate from structural issues. If we find any, we release or recondition those patterns using kinesiology techniques.

5.  We teach you our unique exercise program, a series of simple movements that help you hold your spinal adjustments longer and more effectively. Practicing these movements also retrains you to sit, stand, and move better.

6.  We determine what kinds of supplements and products will best support your healing process through all its stages.

7.  We have you take ownership of your healing experience. When you are an active part of your healing, you can achieve better results and more clarity.

Though we work off of this basic skeleton, the details of your care might change every time you visit because you are a dynamic and flexible being. The right combination of techniques at the right time can restore your connection to the ground so you can work with, and not against gravity.

Come to Orenda's Open Event!

Posted by: The Balancing Center

Here at The Balancing Center, we like to think of Orenda supplements as the chiropractic care for your endocrine system. A few daily supplements can support the alignment of so many important functions, including your thyroid, cell growth, sex hormones, and adrenal glands.

You can find out more from the experts themselves: Orenda is hosting an open informational session tonight!

Thursday, July 11 at 7:00 pm

Hilton Garden Inn

10 E. Grand Ave

Chicago, IL 60611

The event will feature Dr. Shanhong Lu, speaking on The Science of Toxicity and Stress as it Affects the Endocrine System. As an added bonus, Bob and George Hall, the co-founders of Orenda will also be speaking!

For more information, visit Orenda’s website to find out more! You can also contact us at The Balancing Center to get more information!

Stressed? Here's a Tip!

Posted by: The Balancing Center

Are you feeling anxious? Nervous? Stressed? Have you ever? Will you soon?

Here’s a new, old way to destress and relax: exercise. (Surprise, surprise?) New research suggests that exercise causes certain neurons in your brain to suppress your stress and anxiety response.

When you strengthen your heart, lungs, and muscles, you also strengthen your brain’s ability to stop your neurons from firing the stress signal. Imagine experiencing overall reduced anxiety because of your daily walk, yoga class, or dance class!

If you want to experience the benefits of regular exercise without joining a gym, try incorporating our Foundational Movement Practices into your daily routine. The FMP are easy, quick, and ultimately life-changing because they retrain your whole body to sit, stand, and move better. As an added benefit, the FMP make everything you do over the course of your whole day exercise! According to the research, that will in turn decrease your stress and anxiety. It’s a win all around!

Read all about this fascinating research here.

Orenda is Hosting an Open Event!

Posted by: The Balancing Center

Did you know that just like your atlas is the master control of your spine, your pituitary gland is the master control of your endocrine system? Chiropractic adjustments are effective at unwinding locked sections of your spine but if your endocrine system is on the fritz, your body might still be operating at reduced efficiency. The endocrine system controls cell growth, sex hormones, thyroid function, and the adrenal gland--it’s clearly important to have that system operating at full throttle!

That’s where Orenda can help! Orenda offers a line of supplements designed to support your endocrine system. In fact, we like to think of Orenda as the “chiropractic” for the endocrine system! For optimal health, the doctors and bodyworkers at The BC often recommend one or more of Orenda's supplements in conjunction with regular chiropractic and therapeutic care.

Want to know more? You're in luck! Orenda is hosting an open informational session on:

Thursday, July 11 at 7:00 pm

Hilton Garden Inn

10 E. Grand Ave

Chicago, IL 60611

The event will feature Dr. Shanhong Lu, speaking on "The Science of Toxicity and Stress as it Affects the Endocrine System." Bob and George Hall, the co-founders of Orenda themselves, will also be speaking!

For more information, visit Orenda’s website to find out more! You can also contact us at The Balancing Center to get more information!

Adapt to the Normal You Want

Posted by: The Balancing Center

The first week I lived near the El, I thought I would go crazy from the constant, disruptive rumbling. The second week I lived near the El, a guest asked me, “How do you sleep with that noise?” and I answered, “What noise?”

Humans are fantastic at adapting to their environments and mental, physical, and emotional circumstances. We tune out background noise, adjust to the fluctuating temperatures of the seasons, and can live fully without the full use of our bodies. The human capacity to adapt is remarkable--so remarkable that we often take it for granted and do not even remark on it!

Humans also adapt exceptionally well to pain and discomfort. When we are in a suffering state for long enough, our bodies come to accept that suffering as normal as part of its remarkable survival mechanism. If my body thinks it is under a constant threat, then my constant state of emergency response will become my new normal. I won’t look for an alternative solution because why would I? According to my body, everything is just fine. If I haven’t been able to stand up straight for over half my life, then that crooked view would grow to seem normal.

Which is your "normal?"

Having a misaligned spine is an example of a threat to your body. And you might not even know you are under a threat if you have been misaligned long enough. But even if your body thinks everything is fine, the stress of that misalignment is taking its toll.

Increased stress leads to increased cortisol levels. Cortisol is a hormone that regulates countless bodily functions, including blood pressure, blood sugar, and the immune system. Too much stress and too much cortisol can lead to high blood pressure, hyperglycemia, suppressed immune function, thyroid troubles, weight gain--you might have heard this list before. At some point we might even grow accustomed to hearing that list of “bad things” thrown at us from every healthy corner of the Internet.

We have certainly grown accustomed to using medication to ease us into normalcy. But that’s not the point. Neither is the point the laundry list of scary things that can happen because of increased stress. The point is, you might ask yourself what pains or discomforts in your life and your body have you come to accept as normal? And is that really the “normal” you want or need? If so, then awesome. But if not, then what kind of normal do you want? What can and will you do to create that new and (hopefully) better normal for yourself?

One option would be to see if your neck is out of alignment and if you have been living under the low but constant level of stress that can cause. Getting back into alignment and balance can help unravel several other issues and problems that appear in your life--clearing the way for your body to relax and heal itself from the inside out. Now, what if that were your new normal?

Fighting Tiger, Fleeing Rabbit

Posted by: The Balancing Center

A rabbit might flee if something startles it. A tiger might fight. Adrenaline is what provides both with the energy to either run or attack; both enter a defense mode where their senses heighten and not-essential-to-survival systems, like digestion and procreation, power down. The rabbit doesn’t have time to eat if it is on the run. The tiger isn’t concerned with sex in the middle of a battle.

While the kinds of threats to humans have changed since we hunted and foraged, our physiological responses to those threats have not. When a driver cuts you off in traffic or when someone verbally assaults you, your body enters the same defensive system as the rabbit or tiger. Your adrenaline increases, your senses heighten, and your body’s not-essential-to-survival systems shut down. You too cannot focus on eating or procreating if you think you are under threat. But once the threat is gone your body can return to its normal state: at rest but ready to spring into action.

What if you suddenly found out that your body has been operating under a low but constant threat for days, weeks, months, or years? That your adrenaline has been pumping at a low but steady rate for all that time? That the systems not necessary for immediate survival--digestion, circulation, elimination, recreation, and procreation--have been operating at reduced efficiency?  

Did you know that when you are out of balance, this is exactly what happens? If your spine is out of alignment, your body cannot get a good grip on the ground and your finely tuned physical sensors think that you are about to fall over at each and every minute. Your body goes into a mild defense mode to protect you from the perceived threat that you are about to trip or topple over.

 

As anyone who has ever been frightened knows, being in defense mode with your adrenaline pumping and your heart racing and your senses on overdrive is incredibly stressful. Mild but prolonged stress can take as large a toll on your body as short but intense bursts of stress. And because your body thinks it is in a mild emergency, your body thinks that this stress and defensive strategy are normal. It’s not looking to correct itself. And while it might seem like nothing is wrong, it also seems undesirable to walk around in a constant state of distress.

No need to fear, however! (No need to stress about it!) The doctors and practitioners at The Balancing Center offer a simple solution: get balanced.

If your body gets balanced, your body can actually, finally, and fully relax. You can breathe, rest easy, and take your time to go about your day. You’ll be able to stop defending and start digesting, stop protecting and start procreating! (If that’s what you want, of course.) Run into the office today to see how you can get out of defense and into health!

Connect to Health, Connect to Life

Posted by: The Balancing Center

How many connections did you make yesterday? Not only in the networking sense, but how many times did you seek out a way to connect to something or someone? Yesterday, my attempts to connect to the Internet easily ran into the double digits. I also texted several different people, caught trains, chatted with family, and basically spent my entire day, in some fashion, making connections.

This is how a day goes for many (if not most) of us because humans have an almost innate need for connection. We are born crying out, waving our hands in the air in the attempt to make a connection. As we grow, we seek to sustain and enhance the connection we initially craved.

When we lose our connections, whether to people or places or the Internet, it is frustrating or sad or painful. Considering how easy it is to lose the most obvious connections, it is no wonder we often overlook one of the most understated, yet important, connections we have ever wanted and needed: our connection to the ground beneath our feet.

Often we’re not even aware that we have lost connection to the ground. An accident or trauma, (whether physical or emotional), can cause damage to our spine so that our nervous system becomes locked, tight, or confused. Such trauma might be painful or uncomfortable, but underneath the pain and discomfort lies something even more harmful. When our spine is locked, damaged, or confused, the rest of our body compensates to make up for the trauma. This compensation often, if not always, causes our body to fall out of balance. For instance, if your neck becomes locked, your hip might tighten and your leg might shorten to keep you standing upright.

An imbalanced body means we have an uneven connection to the ground. Losing this connection causes our body to become even more confused as it seeks out an even and balanced relationship with the earth. But our bodies have amazing abilities to adapt to uncomfortable situations and we come to accept this imbalance and disconnection as normal. Our body has to now fight against gravity to maintain its locked position; we have to fight to keep our hip tight and our leg short.

And this is how many (if not most) of us go about our day! We’re generally not frustrated with this loss of connection because we’re not even aware of it. But even if we don’t notice it directly, that disconnection interferes with our energy and health in many significant ways.

Are you connected to the ground? At The Balancing Center, we help you answer that question. Whether you are or you aren’t, we work to improve your balance to get you even more connected to the ground. What was once a weak signal, one flickering bar, can become a full broadcast, five strong bars of connection.

So come on in, get balanced, and satisfy your lifelong search for connection!