How Chiropractic Care Keeps Kids Resilient

Did you know that regular chiropractic care can ensure proper development in your kids and provide a natural approach to many health challenges? Typical childhood illnesses and disorders—from colds to ADHD—can be successfully addressed by your chiropractor. Regular chiropractic care can strengthen and balance the nervous system, improving emotional and physical resilience. Read on to find out how chiropractic works and the benefits to overall well-being that you can expect.

Chiropractic Care Solves Nervous System Interference

Many states of ill health are brought on by subluxations. A subluxation is a dysfunction within the nervous system. Subluxations cause stress and tension on the nerves. When the stress is significant within the nervous system, it causes the body to go into a protective state, which is when the sympathetic nervous system kicks in. This is what we call the “fight-or-flight” response. A chiropractor checks to see if a person’s body is stuck in a fight-or-flight response.

So how do we get this way? The three culprits responsible for sending us into sympathetic nervous system overdrive are: physical stress (a literal trauma), emotional stress or chemical stress (toxins).

A physical stress doesn’t have to be huge. Kids fall on their bottoms when they’re learning to walk. They fall off the bed or the couch. They play soccer and a ball bonks them in the head. These traumas add up. From a chiropractor’s view, all traumas are big traumas. That’s why having your kids under care is important because traumas happen so frequently, and you don’t want them to “snowball” and hinder their development.

Emotional stress is just what it sounds like. For infants, it can be something simple like missing Mom and Dad when the babysitter comes. As kids get older, they experience increasing emotional stress within school and social settings—and especially social media.

Chemical stressors are everywhere—in our air, water, personal care products and even in our food! We’re surrounded by a “toxic soup,” so we all must do the best we can to avoid toxins in the first place and mitigate their effects. This is where chiropractic care comes to the rescue!

Unfortunately, our kids today are more stressed than ever because these three factors are so prevalent. That’s why it is so important to introduce chiropractic care early in their lives and have them checked often. The more we can help a child’s body adapt to these stressors, the better their bodies can fight off illnesses, like colds and flu. From birth trauma to everyday bumps and falls, chiropractic offers natural, drug-free solutions to keep children resilient and developing at full potential.

Nervous System and Immune System: The Chicken or the Egg?

Everyone is different, but for the most part, the body is going to fight until it can’t fight anymore. When the central nervous system is stressed, then the immune system or digestive system might shut down. How does this happen? The nervous system controls and coordinates all organs and structures of the human body. So, when excessive stress and tension build up in the spine, this creates the interference that overloads the nerves. A stressed nervous system manifests in symptoms like colic, ear infections, acid reflux, social emotional dysregulation, ADHD, etc. A chiropractor tests for the cause of the symptoms in the body and then corrects that interference. A strong nervous system can adapt more easily and become less prone to the effects of stressors.

How Chiropractic Care Helps Kids by Age Group

Of course, chiropractic helps people of all ages, but it’s always useful to know that some of the symptoms that are often labeled merely normal “rights of passage” for each stage of development may not indeed be normal at all!

Chiropractic for Babies

It’s recommended to get infants checked as soon as possible after birth so that physical traumas acquired from delivery can be gently resolved. For infants, a chiropractor can help with colic, reflux, constipation, digestion problems and issues with nursing.

Chiropractic Helps Elementary School-Age Kids

Kids in elementary school often suffer from ear, sinus and respiratory infections and colds/flu. Nervous system subluxations may be the culprit in a child that gets sick all the time. Extremely prevalent (and less obvious) illnesses due to subluxations include sensory processing disorders, bedwetting, autism, allergies and ADHD.

Chiropractic Help for Teenagers

Teens these days experience an unprecedented amount of anxiety. We covered the various sources of teen stress in our article, “The Teenage Brain and Why Teenage Anxiety is on the Rise.” Teenagers can have the same immune system and behavioral challenges as younger kids, but the interplay of brain chemistry and hormone fluctuations also become complicating factors. Older kids also have harder workloads and more activities in school. If they haven’t been evaluated early, all the factors tend to “snowball” into larger issues.

In short, the nervous system gets overextended and stuck in sympathetic overdrive. Just like for the younger age groups, chiropractors can uncover exactly where the stress is affecting the nervous system and work on unraveling that stress, wherever it is manifesting (for example, the upper cervical spine or lumbar).

Teenagers also start making their own food choices, which can greatly affect their health. It’s best to teach teens good dietary habits that they’ll take with them for a lifetime. Check out our Teenage Nutrition Guide article! (Remember, your teens are probably old enough to read it for themselves.)

Side Effects of Chiropractic Care on Kids

The ideal time to have your child checked by your chiropractor is as soon after birth as possible, to ensure proper development from a very early stage. After that, regular checks will ensure subluxations are caught early, which plays a huge role in prevention. If your child suffers from any health challenges, chiropractic may offer natural and drug-free solutions. Lastly and most importantly, chiropractic can have some pretty impactful side effects, which may include:

more favorable report cards
improved sports performance
better attitude and moods
improved behavior
increased ability to concentrate
happier parents 😉

The bottom line is: chiropractic care helps kids establish a strong foundation during their development. Removing obstacles (subluxations) in the nervous system allows the body to do what it is designed to do—adapt—and be most resilient in the face of the multiple stressors we face today.

Special thanks to Dr. Kelly Fredricks, DC, CACCP, for her help with this article. Dr. Kelly is the owner of Family First Wellness Center in Altamonte Springs. She loves treating patients of all ages, but her true passion lies with pediatric, pregnancy and full family wellness care. Being a parent herself, she understands the challenges of raising a healthy child in today’s environment.