Breech Babies: The Nitty Gritty Details

When I first started this practice, I always wondered why moms always waited until the last minute to reach out to me with a breech baby. Then I asked my friends who are midwives and OB/Gyns and they told me they don’t diagnose breech babies until 33 weeks. Cool. 

You see, when a baby is small and still pretty mobile, there is no reason to be concerned about them being in the right or wrong position. There are many factors as to why they may not be positioned correctly. It could be prior trauma, previous surgeries, multiple pregnancies, poor pelvic and lumbar bony and muscular function, and some freak accidents in between. 

As a chiropractor, I have been trained to evaluate the function of joints and soft tissues in the bony. As a Webster Certified chiropractor, I have been trained to zero in on the muscles, ligaments and joints that are found in the lumbar spine and pelvis. 

The Webster Technique looks is synonymous with the round ligament of the uterus, but it addresses (or at least should address) so much more than that. The round ligament is basically like an anchor for the uterus to the pelvis. It is one of the few ligaments that has muscular fibers within it in the human body, that’s why you can have a direct effect on it. Often pregnant women will feel round ligament pain when they sneeze, cough or laugh. You will feel it on the outside of the bottom of your belly. It is only ever felt in pregnant women, though it’s present in women all of the time. Another ligament that lives in the same area is the broad ligament of the uterus. Chiropractors who use the Webster Technique will also affect this ligament, but it isn’t thought of as frequently as the round ligament. 

But remember how I said the Webster Technique should address more than just the round ligament? 

Your chiropractor should be looking at how your low back and pelvis and how they are moving and functioning and if they are hyper- or hypo-mobile and then addressing the dysfunction via an adjustment, however that may be. Another important structure for a chiropractor to look at is the musculature. The psoas, the lumbar spine erectors and the muscles of the core are important for encouraging proper fetal positioning. 

If your chiropractor is trying to help your baby get into the right position and they are only addressing one of these elements, get yourself a new chiropractor who does. I can’t tell you how many moms I see who called because they were seeing a pregnancy and pediatric chiropractor during this pregnancy or a previous pregnancy with a breech baby and they saw me and had no idea what i was doing because their other chiropractor didn’t do what I was doing (which is more, from what I am told by the patient, than their other provider). 

Look at the ICPA’s website to find a Webster Certified Chiropractor in your area, but if you are local to San Antonio and would like to schedule with me to address whatever is going on in your pregnancy, low back pain, neck pain, breech presentation, just let me know...I’ve seen it all :) 

If you feel like I am a good fit for you, my number is (210) 323-2163, we can chat and get you on the schedule.

Exercises for Common Problems

No body is perfect, hopefully if you follow these exercises we can help your body function more perfectly.

TMJ

If you’ve ever noticed your jaw popping or clicking (or getting stuck open or closed), you may have TMJ. You will also notice some ear or jaw pain associated with it. Most of the time, if you’re like me, it’s from clenching your teeth, especially while sleeping. Our favorite exercise for TMJ to instruct patients on is super easy to do, no one will be able to even tell you’re doing it at all. So, first, check and see where your tongue is sitting in your mouth. It should be lightly pressed against the back of the two top front teeth. That’s the exercise (yeah, really). I told you it’d be easy. In fact it’s so easy, that’s actually where the tongue should automatically go when at rest, like we’re talking anatomical position, correct biomechanics stuff (...<3). When you do this, it is virtually impossible to clench your teeth because it inhibits the muscles responsible for closing the jaw. 

The hard part comes into play when we need to train your brain into putting it there. 

So, what we suggest doing is pick a trigger (whatever it is, a text, a phone call, your kids shouting for your attention, etc.), make it something that happens throughout the day pretty regularly and then check and see where your tongue is. From a fellow TMJD patient, this really works. I’ve alleviated my symptoms and my tongue automatically goes behind my top front teeth. 

Neck Pain

Neck pain is the worst. Most of the time it is followed up with a headache, which can range from not that bad to turn-off-all-of-the-lights-and-no-one-talk-to-me-until-I-am-ready bad. Lucky for you, we have some easy ways to help the neck pain you’re already experiencing and may prevent it from happening again. 

First start off sitting, then you will tap yourself on your shoulders with your fingers (right to right/left to left). Relax your shoulders (but keep them where they are) and lower your arms down to your sides. Now you will want to take your neck through all of the ranges of motion. Look up, down, side to side and tilt your head from right to left. 

You want to try to do this throughout your day, so there will be natural triggers to remind you to do your neck stretches (hopefully). We also like to do these when we are taking a shower or just trying to relax. 

Low Back Pain

FACT. Low back pain is one of the most common excuses for people to either not go into work or participate in activities they would like to, but feel that they can’t. 

This one may have to be done at home. First, get on your hands and knees on the ground. You’re then going to drop your bellybutton down toward the ground and look up (think of a cow standing in a field), then bring your bellybutton toward your spine/spine toward the ceiling (like a hissing cat).

If you are experiencing any of the above, we have so many more things left in our back pocket to help you. Give us a call, set up an appointment and then we can go over so much more detail. Our number is (210) 323-2163, give us a call anytime.

The Gate Control Theory of Pain

When I was in chiropractic school I learned so much about how and why chiropractic works but this is the one that made the most sense to me and has stuck with me many years later. Now, it’s just a theory, and it’s pretty hard to prove if it is true, maybe in my lifetime it will become a law of science.

Let’s set the scene, you’re walking along and then you stub your toe on the coffee table. What’s the first thing you do without even thinking about it? As soon as your brain realizes what’s going on, you put pressure on the stubbed toe and it helps alleviate the pain. 

Now let’s get into the nitty-gritty details of the theory, pain and movement move up the same neural pathway to the brain. Movement is a faster and pain is a stronger signal up the pathway. The faster one, movement, will get to the brain faster and prevent the stronger one, pain, from making it in. So, by putting motion into the joint, it gets to the brain before the pain, essentially tricking the brain into thinking there isn’t a problem anymore (if there ever was). 

So, how does this relate to chiropractic care? When a chiropractor puts movement into a joint, then that signal makes it to the brain before the pain signal can make it there. So, that’s why when patients get off the table they will feel better almost immediately, even if it’s only slight.

If you’re looking for a chiropractor and live in San Antonio, please reach out and I’m sure we can help. You can reach us at (210) 323-2163.

Let’s Talk About Low Back Pain!

One of the most common complaints doctors hear about from their patients is low back pain, so if yours is bothering you, you aren’t alone. Almost daily I get asked about why someone’s back is bothering them and how they can help it. Luckily, I have a few ideas. First, let’s go over how you got to where you are. 

Low back pain can come on for many different reasons. Degenerative disc disease and osteoarthritis are two that most cannot avoid.  Like to say it happens to the best of us. With that being said, the best way to hold it off is by moving your body and your joints. The human body was made for movement and craves it. One way that everyone can begin moving around is by taking a walk. We live in San Antonio, if it’s in the triple digits that day, another way to get movement into your life and staying cool is by swimming or doing aqua-aerobics.

Most of the time, we can relate low back pain to a weakened core (the core is a whole other blog post in and of itself, and we will get into the nitty gritty at another time). In this scenario, patients will come in and say “I bent over to pick up a pen off the ground and couldn’t come back up”. It’s not like that pen weighed 150 pounds, it’s the fact that they don’t have strong core and they bent over the wrong way one too many times (the proverbial straw that broke the camel’s back). So, if you don’t want to be one of those patients, then you should ALWAYS be using your legs to pick things up (yeah, even that pen that you dropped on the ground).

When I was in chiropractic school a colleague always bent at his knees and squatted to grab his backpack at the end of the day and said he didn’t want to waste his “flexion-dollars”. I really like that concept, the fact that you only have so many flexion-dollars you can spend in one life, so use them wisely and save them in your bank.

Now, you’re on a chiropractic blog, so of course I’m going to talk about why chiropractic is great at helping low back pain. Like I said earlier, your body craves movement and as a chiropractor that’s exactly what we do when we are adjusting patients. We look for joints that are hypomobile, or aren’t moving as much as they should and then put motion into the joint so we can restore normal biomechanical function. It doesn’t matter how you’re adjusted, whether it be manual or instrument assisted, an adjustment is an adjustment is an adjustment. 

If you’re experiencing low back pain and live in the San Antonio, TX area, we would be happy to help you get out of pain. You can get on the schedule by calling (210) 323-2163.