Hey parents! You may have heard some buzz about Pediatric Chiropractic and the Perfect Storm, and you might be wondering what it's all about. First and foremost, it can absolutely help you take control of your child's health journey.
You may find yourself asking questions like, "What the heck is a pediatric chiropractor, and what do they do?" and "What IS the Perfect Storm?"
We want you to know that we are on a mission to spread awareness about pediatric chiropractic and our specialized approach to healthcare, and what is known as the Perfect Storm. Put simply the Perfect Storm is meant to give you 3 wildly important and impactful things:
- Hope – when your child struggles with chronic health challenges and you feel like you’ve tried it all, it’s easy to start to lose hope. We work first to give that back to you like never before!
- Answers – you’ll learn about the true root cause of health challenges in kids, and once you have the answers as to what’s causing them to get sick and struggle, the answers and action steps (next one) become super clear
- Action Steps – this is our favorite and most exciting part, where we move things forward and can now form an effective action plan to restore your child’s health and help them reach their full potential!
What Is the Perfect Storm?
The Perfect Storm refers to the incredible impact and transformative changes that pediatric chiropractic care can have on your family's life, especially if your child is facing chronic challenges like autism, ADHD, epilepsy, or autoimmune conditions affecting their gut, immune system, and related conditions like PANDAS and Pots.
Through the Perfect Storm, we dive deep into the underlying causes of the challenges your kiddo faces. We explore when these issues really began to brew in your child's body, brain, and developing nervous system, making sure we go far enough back in time to address the real root cause of their challenges and not just try and treat the symptoms.
We know because of the incredible parents you are, you’ve already done absolutely everything you can to help your child. But it's important to note that you won't hear about the Perfect Storm in your pediatrician's office or any standard medical specialist. Honestly, it’s not something you’ll even be able to learn about entirely from those in our preferred natural + holistic health space, as it’s something very specific to our approach as Neurologically-Focused Pediatric Chiropractors.
Our focus is on identifying and addressing the root cause of these challenges, not just treating the symptoms or providing temporary relief. You see, the traditional medical approach excels in crisis and emergency intervention care. But when it comes to restoring and rebuilding health and well-being for your child, that's where the field of medicine falls short. When your child is grappling with chronic health issues, you need an expert to work side by side with you that can help rebuild their health from the ground up.
Think about it like a house rehab or remodeling project. A skilled remodeler or rehabber starts by stripping everything down to the studs, reaching the foundation, and then rebuilding from there. That's exactly what the Perfect Storm does.
It teaches parents about the foundational challenges and initial stressors that contribute to sensory processing disorders, seizures, autism, and a wide range of conditions that occur long before the diagnosis is made.
Understanding the Perfect Storm empowers you, parents, to grasp the underlying issues affecting your child's well-being. It offers a path to address these challenges at their core, allowing for comprehensive healing and restoration. And that's what we're going to dive deeper into - the components of the Perfect Storm and valuable insights and strategies to support your child's health journey.
Digging Way Back Into Your Child’s History
So let's talk about the Perfect Storm in a nutshell. One critical aspect we, as pediatric chiropractors, address is the impact of early stress on children's development. Surprisingly, around 60% to 70% of children with neurological challenges have experienced significant stress on their nervous system. This stress can start to build up during pregnancy and affect the baby's well-being. The umbilical cord acts as the neurological power cord, transmitting stress from the mom to the baby’s developing system.
Unfortunately, our modern society often fails to provide adequate support and empowerment to expectant mothers. That's where prenatal chiropractic care comes in and plays a vital role as well.
The stress experienced by mothers during pregnancy can have a profound impact on the baby's brain development. It triggers an early adaptation towards a sympathetic fight or flight response, even during the prenatal stages. This early shift sets the stage for future struggles faced by these children.
From there, birth interventions become major contributing factors in what we call the "Perfect Storm" of challenges. Common medical interventions like C-sections, forceps, vacuum, and induction are prevalent during labor and delivery. Unfortunately, these interventions can be traumatic for the brainstem, the vagus nerve, and the delicate areas of the skull and upper neck.
When these regions experience injuries during birth trauma, the corresponding part of the nervous system shifts into a fight or flight response dominated by sympathetic activity. This creates additional stress during the child's crucially formative developmental stages, impacting both their brain and nervous system. Essentially, these early experiences shape the brain's hard wiring and its responses in the future.
This can explain why your baby may have exhibited challenges such as colic, fussiness, nursing difficulties, reflux, and constipation. And as they grow older, around four to six months, maybe they began getting recurring ear infections, croup, or RSV. We know it is excruciating to watch your sweet baby suffer with these challenges, and that’s why the ultimate goal of our office is to be a part of the child’s care team right from the beginning so we can help handle these issues drug-free and hold off neurosensory challenges later on in life as well.
As you know and have most likely experienced firsthand, conventional medicine often resorts to antibiotics, corticosteroids, and other medications to address these issues. And as a parent, when you want to help your baby who is struggling, you’ll try anything!
But here's the thing - the use of such medications, especially in the first few years of a child's life, significantly increases the risk of autoimmune disorders and gut issues later on. We must understand that the nervous system, brain, spinal cord, gut, and immune system are all interconnected and work together for our child's development.
Breaking Free of The Perfect Storm
To break free from the Perfect Storm and address these challenges head-on, we need to identify two key factors. First, we must determine if your child experienced early stressors. And if they did, we need to assess whether their nervous system has become stuck in sympathetic fight or flight overdrive, hindering their rest, digestion, and overall development.
During a consultation, we thoroughly examine your child's case history, taking into account factors such as pregnancy stress and birth trauma. By delving into these details, we gain valuable insights into our child's condition.
We also utilize remarkable technology called the INSiGHT Scans that allows us to measure, quantify, and locate the stress on your child's brain, body, and nervous system.
Once we have gathered all the necessary information, we move on to the next crucial step. Our dedicated team of PX Docs specializes in creating drug-free, customized care plans tailored to your child's unique situation. We take the time to sit down with you, understand your concerns, and envision the future you desire for your child.
This personalized care plan incorporates neurologically focused chiropractic adjustments, which effectively release stress and restore balance to the nervous system. Seeing the positive impact these adjustments have on children is the highlight of our work!
So if you feel like you've exhausted all other avenues and are still seeking answers for your child, we hope you give us a call to help support you on this journey with your child. If you aren’t local to us, we encourage you to explore our PX Docs network.
May your journey with your child be blessed. Remember, you know your child better than anyone and have the power to make the biggest difference in your child's life. You are amazing parents, and together, we can navigate the Perfect Storm and make it to the other side stronger than ever!
