The Healing Process with Chiropractic Care
When children dealing with autism, ADHD, anxiety, sensory processing disorder, behavioral issues, autoimmune challenges, frequent illness, etc. begin chiropractic care, they often experience “regression before progression.” While that may accurately depict and explain what is going on the “outside”, it is not true for what is happening on the “inside.”
Chiropractic care focuses on removing subluxations, or interferences, from the nervous system to improve brain to body communication. By removing the subluxations, your child’s body has the ability to receive accurate information from their brain, so their body can function at its best, and heal!
How Can My Child Seem “Worse” in the Beginning, Yet The Objective/Functional Findings Are Improving at the Same Time?!
Subjective findings are those signs and symptoms, such as pain, discomfort, tension, behaviors etc, which vary from person to person (for example, pain tolerance). Therefore, they are not the best for measuring improvement or change. Objective findings are measurable and more definitive, such as posture, diagnostic imaging, neurological insight scans, bloodwork, etc. It’s a hallmark of functional wellness care that objective findings are more reliable and indicative of health changes than subjective findings.
Even though your child is expressing more subjective findings, they are shifting, changing and healing through the objective findings! Neuro-behavioral detox is a good sign! You may be asking yourself…
How Can A Neuro-Behavioral Detox Be A Good Sign?!
Children with overstressed nervous systems, immune systems, and digestive systems have likely been that way for a long time, meaning they have become “hard wired” with that stress, tension, and toxicity. Usually by the time they come to Revival, all they know is stress, stress, stress! In the end, for your child to get better, that stress has to come out!
An analogy I can use is a person doing a nutritional detox program. The purpose of the nutritional detox is to rid the body of built up toxins and junk. The ingredients in the detox are ones that kick on the body’s “cleaning and eliminating” organs, such as the liver, kidneys, and gut. Therefore, it’s common for people to experience headaches, diarrhea, skin outbreaks, and more when going through a detox. While one may perceive those as negative symptoms (subjective), when you understand what is happening physiologically, you can see that those are really positive symptoms (objective) that the body is going through.
Many of the subjective challenges your child is going through that must eventually “come out” in order for them to ever be healed or free from: anxiety, hyperactivity, outbursts, coughing, gut issues, etc. These things are all bound to increase on the “outside” as the body gets them out of the “inside” as care begins.
This inside-out approach to healing is due to the innate intelligence within your child. Innate intelligence may not be a familiar term, but it something we all know to exist and be true. Innate intelligence is the continuous life force that controls and coordinates the healing process. It is what causes a cut on a living being to heal, and why the one on a cadaver will not. The control and coordination of that life force is governed and done within the nervous system – the system most affected by chiropractic care!
The beauty of chiropractic care is that it is working from the inside-out, meaning that the goal is simply to allow your child’s body to better function and express that innate intelligence, or life force. The adjustment removes the interferences (subluxations) to that healing, allowing your child’s body to do its job better, with more efficiency, and heal on its own!
How Long Will My Child Be In Neuro-Behavioral Detox?
It is true that once your child starts getting adjusted, symptoms (anxiety, big behaviors and emotions, etc.) often “flare up”, increasing in frequency and intensity. For very young children, this usually lasts no longer than a few days. For kids 5-10 years of age, this usually lasts a week or two. For older children whose challenges have been present for longer, this period can last up to 4-6 weeks. In more difficult cases, it can take even longer unfortunately.
How Is An Increase In Symptoms A Sign of Healing?
In the same way that a body purges toxins in a nutritional detox, the nervous system purges stress in the same manner. If the nervous system had years of stress and symptoms “hard wired” into it, it has to purge it to get rid of it, which means an increase in those stuck symptoms and stress.
When you put it all together, “regression before progression” is not regression at all, it is a true sign of healing. Many times the body must go through this to get to the end desired result. That is why as a chiropractor, I often get excited when I hear these reports back. I am not excited that your kid is having more symptoms, but I understand and respect the healing process the body must go through to ever be well again. Without going down that road, the body may never truly be well.
What Is The Common Alternative Approach to Chiropractic Care?
Most seek out western medicine options or pharmaceuticals. Pharmaceuticals are designed to work on an outside-in approach, not inside-out. This means that those drugs attempt to control the change, control the healing, and control the physiology. Pharmaceuticals do not take your child’s environment, or innate intelligence into account at all. Drugs are created and designed to “bottle up” and control symptoms. For example, taking Tylenol to bring down a fever (the body’s natural response) is masking and trying to get rid something your body is innately and intelligently expressing. Just because it is not a pleasant or positive symptom, does not mean the body is inherently wrong in producing it.
We Are In This Journey Together!
If you are in the thick of a neuro-behavioral detox with your child, please know that I am here for you and understand what you are going through. I will be your guide on this journey and walk through each and every step alongside you and your child. Chiropractic care allows your child to better heal and express that innate intelligence within them, which is exactly what they need to have revived health and wellbeing!