Blown
Ankle No More
Over 25 years ago I experienced a
particularly horrendous (& hideous) injury: while playing soccer, I was
slide-tackled with all the force directed toward my cleated and firmly planted
foot. The result of this was an eversion
sprain (rolled inwards, rather than the more common inversion ankle rolling
outwards injury), tearing all the ligaments on the inside of my ankle so badly
I had to be casted for 8 weeks. Nasty,
nasty, nasty…
This “bad” ankle has plagued me for
years. I have had an incredible amount
of therapy on it consisting of chiropractic, physio, and massage which have
helped it immensely but never fully restored its full balanced function. Conventional dogma and traditional teaching
led me to believe that because the ligamentous injury had been so severe it
would never be fully healed and would always need to be just managed so as to
avoid degenerative changes and related secondary injury to joints related to it
(ie the knee, hip, SI-joint and upper neck).
Because I am a Chiropractor and believe absolutely in the incredible
ability of the body to self-heal, I never was fully content with just managing my
“bad” ankle…
I have been running with Vibram Five Fingers
for 4 seasons and now wear them daily in my office while working (this raises
both eyebrows and awareness!). Recently
we have hired a new Team member in our office and are training on all our
procedures; as part of this we repeated my gaitscan last week. The results AMAZED me (see Figure 2 below):
my gait patterns were fully restored, perfectly balanced and completely
healed!!! This has shown me the power of
the body to fully heal given the right conditions. It also gives me the confidence, in spite of
what much of the medical, physio, orthotic and corporate shoe communities are
saying, to encourage everyone to take this approach. Yes, injuries can occur, but it is a process
that needs to be approached gradually over a long period of time similar to
chiropractic corrective care – it will take at least a year, likely more, of
slowly increasing micro-changes.
This is critical to address and vital to health because of the nervous system. Any joint in the body has position sensors in it called proprioceptors. Just as the motion of your car turns the alternator which charges the cars battery, the motion of any joint in the body stimulates these proprioceptors which literally charge your brain. This increases brain energy and function: Movement is Life! The highest concentration of proprioceptors occurs in four joints: the ankle, the SI-joints, the upper neck vertebrae, and the jaw. Therefore, movement of these joints is critical to proper brain function and is also why stretching, exercise and a specific Chiropractic adjustment of these joints will improve your brain activity: Chiropractic is not about pain, it is about your brain!
So, get moving people! Get into your Chiropractor to get checked for
subluxations of these critical joints and have their motion restored through a
specific adjustment. Get out to our
“Barefoot Running Workshop” to learn more (check www.elkvalleychiropractic.com
for schedule)…kick it into action and get your brain ENERGISED!!!
No comments:
Post a Comment