Try This at Home

Your thyroid gland is responsible for maintaining your metabolism, your blood calcium as well as releasing other hormones to regulate other glands.  But when this gland is not working right it can cause an array of problems and symptoms including: weight gain, low energy or fatigue, cold or tingling hands/feet, dry skin, hair loss, brain fog, sleeping problems, muscle pain, ankle swelling, headaches/migraines, and cholesterol problems.

Even though many doctors don’t recognize it, a necessary raw ingredient for thyroid function is iodine.  The two main thyroid hormones, T3 and T4 are made of three and four iodine molecules respectfully and a person low on iodine will not produce these vital chemicals appropriately.  Here’s the catch!  Research published by Dr. David Brownstein discovered that in testing 4000 people, 96% of those tested were deficient in iodine!  A similar study by the World Health Organization found that 72% of the world’s population is deficient.  This is especially true in the Midwest where culturally we don’t eat as much seafood.

How do you know your iodine levels?  While it may not be as precise as regular blood-testing, there is a cheap and simple way to check iodine at home.  Simply go to the drugstore and purchase a small bottle of tincture of iodine and with a swab, paint a small square of the brown liquid on your arm or hip.  The iodine should stain your skin and remain very visible for about 24 hours before shedding off.  A person who is deficient in iodine will actually absorb the nutrient through the skin very quickly (often the stain will be gone in less than an hour).  This person could benefit from iodine supplementation.  Try this test!  Or, for more information on this topic, check out the work of Dr. Brownstein or take the online survey on the website for the Women’s Health Institute of Texas at 1-thyroid.com.

Fixing a Broken Brain

How do you fix a broken brain?  For most of history, science has believed that the brain is stagnant and unchanging with fixed memory and potential.  We know the brain can lose function with trauma, drugs, alcohol, etc.  But nobody believed that the brain could repair or rebuild.

I’ve reported on this in the past, but another study released in Scientific American has shown that the previous beliefs about the brain’s limited potential are simply not true.  In reality, the brain has the potential to build and repair its cells and it is routinely laying down new ‘wiring’ to interconnect cells based on new experience for more efficiency.  In previous articles I’ve reported on ways to boost brain power.  But this recent study performed on animals shows that physical exercise is one of the strongest brain boosters and can double the number of cells found in the hippocampus.  This part of the brain has always been associated with converting short-term memory to long-term memory; explaining why exercise can improve memory.  Other literature suggests that the hippocampus is also involved with the stress response in the body.  This gives insight to how physical exercise is consistently the most effective stress reliever to decrease anxiety and depression.

I encounter many people that try to stay healthy with diet, rest, and positive thinking while neglecting any form of exercise.  While these are all critical factors, there is too much research like this study proving that you can never be as healthy as possible without including exercise as part of your lifestyle.

Why Do I Do It?

Even 122 years after its inception, there’s still a great deal of misconception involving chiropractic and like most people, I thought chiropractic care was simply an alternative for back and neck pain.  But, after receiving almost immediate relief of my own routine headaches, sinus problems, and allergies I knew I needed to learn more. 

What really attracted me to chiropractic was the simplicity of its principles.  You see, chiropractic is built on the premise that there is an inborn or innate intelligence in the body – this is the same intelligence that allowed us to develop from just two individual cells from our parents and into who we are today.  This same intelligence is what allows us to organize, regulate and heal our body naturally.  You don’t think about digesting lunch, or regulating hormones.  When you cut your finger or break your arm, it’s not the band-aid or cast that heals.  The body does this automatically.  How does it?  It is the communication between the brain and the body through the nervous system that allows everything to coordinate and function properly.  The spinal cord and nerve branches that communicate with most every cell, tissue, and organ in the body travel through the 24 moveable vertebrae that make up the spinal column.  If, from various stresses, one or more of these moveable vertebrae should misalign, that can create pressure on the spinal cord or nerve branches and interfere with the communication between the brain and the body much like trying to talk on a phone with static on the line.  This interference and miscommunication can disrupt the body’s ability to coordinate which can result in our inability to heal right, feel right, or function right.  A chiropractor’s job is to locate this interference and remove the pressure or stress from the nervous system so that the body can function and regulate as it was designed through its own intelligence.  It’s that simple!