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How To Start Your Day with Spinal Health

What better way to start your day...

...than by activating and energizing the structure that houses your central nervous system. No matter what your job or lifestyle, your spine is going to be under threat all day. So the best way to prevent this threat from causing damage is by being proactive about strengthening and stretching your spine. Now, we understand that very few people have the time or determination to complete an exercise routine before they go to work. We are not asking you to make such a drastic lifestyle adjustment- instead, we are suggesting that you take 5-10 minutes out of your morning to stretch. In particular we want you to elongate your spine. This helps:

Jumpstart your circulation, getting oxygen and nutrients flowing to your spine
Decrease tension in the supporting muscles which will aid in posture all day.
Improve mobility of the spinal joints

How to Fully Enjoy Your Spine After Chiropractic Adjustment

Spinal wellness on the rise

For many of our patients, the hours and days that follow a chiropractic adjustment can be a revelatory time- rediscovering lost range of motion, feeling less pain and feeling more able are the most common results of spinal adjustment. By providing gentle adjustments to the spinal joints, we are able to restore spinal alignment, alleviate nerve impingement and improve the mobility of previously dysfunctional spinal joints. But how can you turn those hours and days into months and years? Because the spinal adjustment is just the start. Once you've reestablished spinal alignment and spinal range of motion, how can you be sure to keep your spine in such a state of balance and wellbeing? It starts the moment you leave our office, the second you step in your car. Read on to find out our post-adjustment tips for keeping spinal wellness on the rise.

Micro-Exercise: Suited to Your Busy Lifestyle

The power of micro-exercise is plain to see

Be honest with yourself- are you really too busy to workout? Look at it this way: you can't really afford not to exercise; a compromise has to be struck. Micro-exercise, or micro-workouts, seem to offer the perfect compromise. On the days you are simply too busy to devote an hour to exercise, try to seek out smaller blocks of time. And yes we are talking seriously small: as few as 60 seconds is better than zero. What's more, micro-exercise actually benefits your productivity and boosts well-being, meaning that it makes you more adept at dealing with a full schedule. So how does it work?

Yoga for Chronic Sitters

What does a day's worth of sitting do to your back?

Sit up straight and brace yourself as you read: prolonged sitting is killing you slowly and this is no exaggeration. The human body was not made to sit for prolonged periods of time and as a result, it takes a serious toll on our physical and mental well-being. Here are some of the ways that sitting negatively affects your spine:

Damages your spine by increasing downward compression
Damages organs and
Compresses your abdomen and interferes with digestion
Encourages poor posture which carries over into other positions
Tightens certain muscles and underworks others, leading to muscular imbalance

In the end, sitting is literally taking unquantifiable years off of your life. The solution is to get up and move; in fact, this is the greatest way to stay feeling young. If you are tasked with sitting on a daily basis, make sure you are proactive in fighting the risk factors that come along with it.

Lumbar Problems: When the Pain Won't Go Away

Muscle problems are the most common cause of lower back pain

This rather large category can refer to tangible, definable problems like muscle and tendon strains and ligament sprains to the more nebulous muscle problems that result from years of neglect and mistreatment. Regardless, it goes without saying that your muscles are the main support for your spine- any problems in the musculature are going to directly affect the integrity of your spinal cord; the knock-on effect will come to define the way you feel and function in all activities. Therefore, controlling for muscle problems in the lower back is a signal way of increasing your overall wellbeing.

Defining Balance for Athletes

Balance keeps athletes on the winning side of those fine margins

Whether it be a personal record or the winning point in a team competition, balance is one of the elements that determines athletic success. That is why it surprises us that many athletes forego this opportunity: by choosing not to focus on maintaining and improving balance, you are letting go of a great method for boosting athletic performance. At our office in Ramsey, we focus on helping athletes improve their musculoskeletal balance through education, awareness, and natural modalities.