You might have heard us talk about this word or mention it in the office. You might have even heard it from another health care provider, or even came across it on social media. Maybe this is the first time you’ve ever seen this word. Whatever your exposure to this term, one of our core focuses is addressing subluxations. But what exactly is a subluxation, and why is it so important to your health, or lack of health?
By the end of this, you will have a better understanding of what we’re looking for during your visits and why chiropractic adjustments can have such a profound impact on your overall well-being.
Defining a Subluxation
A subluxation occurs when a vertebra in your spine is misaligned or not moving as it should. While it may go unnoticed for a while, this misalignment can have significant consequences for your health. Think of your spine as a water hose and the water running through it as the nerves carrying messages between your brain and the rest of your body. A subluxation creates a “kink” and affects not only where the kink is, but anything up and downstream from that.
What Causes Subluxations?
Subluxations don’t happen by chance, and rarely can they be traced back to just one thing. They’re typically caused by stressors—the physical, mental, and environmental challenges we experience in daily life.
1. Physical Stressors
These include injuries, repetitive movements, poor posture, accidents, or even the physical strain of sitting for long hours. Something as simple as looking down at a phone for extended periods or lifting improperly can cause spinal misalignments. One of the biggest physical stressors everyone faces…birth. Birth is where most people experience their first subluxation.
2. Mental/Emotional Stressors
Stress doesn’t just impact your mood—it also affects your body. When you’re under mental or emotional pressure, your muscles tighten, your breathing changes, and your body shifts into a “fight-or-flight” state. In periods of chronic stress, your body is unable to shift to a “relax-and-digest”/parasympathetic state. This calmer state is essential for you to be able to heal.
3. Environmental Stressors
Exposure to toxins, poor nutrition, or even poor air quality can weaken your body and nervous system. These stressors add up over time, making your body more prone to misalignments and less able to adapt to life’s demands.
These stressors are a part of life, but when they overwhelm the body and aren’t managed, they cause subluxations.
Nerve Interference and Its Impact
When a vertebra is subluxated, it can compress, irritate, or stretch the nerves an otherwise healthy spine would protect. This results in nerve interference—an interruption of the nervous system’s ability to send and receive clear messages (Remember the kink in the hose analogy?). Nerve interference can affect everything from muscle function to organ performance and even your immune system’s ability to respond effectively.
Because your nervous system controls every function in your body, this interference can manifest in various ways, including:
- Chronic pain or tension
- Reduced mobility or stiffness
- Headaches or migraines
- Digestive issues
- Difficulty sleeping
- Hormonal imbalances
- Fatigue or low energy
The list is long because the nervous system is integral to every function in your body—it influences tissue and organ in your body.
The Chiropractic Solution
The good news is that chiropractic care is specifically designed to address your subluxations and their effects. Through skillful and precise adjustments, we work to restore proper alignment and movement in your spine, reducing nerve interference. This allows your body to function more effectively, often leading to improvements in the symptoms caused by subluxations.
Chiropractic care isn’t just about treating symptoms. In fact, we don’t treat symptoms at all, we treat the cause. It’s about supporting your body’s ability to heal and thrive. By removing nerve interference, we give your body the ability to do the one thing it already knows how to do — heal and thrive. We just remove the obstacles in the way, helping you get better and stay better.
Take Charge of Your Health
We know that a healthy nervous system is the foundation of a healthy life. That’s why identifying and correcting subluxations is at the heart of what we do. Life’s stressors are unavoidable, but their impact doesn’t have to be. Chiropractic care is a proactive way to address the effects of physical, mental, and environmental stress and keep your nervous system functioning at its best.
If you have questions or want to learn more about how chiropractic adjustments can support your health journey, at Pawlovich Chiropractic we’re always here to help. Let’s keep your nervous system functioning at its best so you can live life to your fullest potential!
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Here’s to a healthier nervous system,
Dr. Logan Eckhoff