Creation Chiropractic Blog - Eden Prairie MN

1) Chiropractic Doesn't Judge You: 

A diagnosis judges how your body should be by comparing it to an average body that belongs to nobody, and definitely not your body. Medical statistics show that their initial diagnosis matches their final diagnosis (often with a toe tag) less than 20% of the time! Now, this isn’t meant to put down medicine but it is meant to put it into perspective. They are attempting to take on the daunting task of guessing about your incredibly complex body. Any other profession would have the same dilemma trying to do the same thing. The truth is only the intelligence that created you and maintains you knows exactly how you should be at all times. So when it comes to any of your body functions, chiropractic recognizes that everything your body does is important and essential.  It may not be fully understood or appreciated but without every single body function, you would die or would be in a worse place without it, no matter what the diagnosis. The chiropractor simply looks for interference between your vital intelligence and the body it created to make sure it is able to perform exactly how it should. 

Chiropractic accepts you just as you are.

2) Chiropractic Doesn't Manipulate You:

Once your body functions have been judged with a diagnosis, the next logical thing to do is to try to manipulate, control or stop it.  And even if a therapy helps someone feel better, the cause is still just dangling there waiting to be addressed.  If we define the problem as the oil light in the car, the best thing that can happen is a dark dashboard that still needs an oil change.  Therapies treat the dashboard.  What we need to do before we can change the oil is change our thinking.  Every action has a thought process behind it so it is important to understand who we are and redefine problems in a new light. It is said that you can’t make an apple seed into an apple.  You can only provide the resources to allow that seed to become its potential if it is just given the opportunity and the time required.  In other words, you can’t speed healing.  You can only remove interference from the process of healing.  It is also said that you can’t get oranges from an apple seed. To make the body do anything other than it was designed to do is to take away from its inherent abilities.  So to try to make the body do something it wouldn’t naturally do on its own is to make something other than a healthier you and a true expression of your life. 

Chiropractic lets you be yourself.

3) Chiropractic Doesn't Guess About You:

Prognosis is a fancy medical word for predict.  It tries to guess what is going to happen to you in the future and usually takes the form of a treatment plan.  It guesses how often you should be manipulated chemically, physically or otherwise. The problem is, it is often wrong because an educated guess is still just a guess. Treatment plans are based on averages and are never created for your specific needs.  Chiropractic takes a different approach. Any other attempts are guesswork, no matter how well intended or required on a certain level of crisis care, but we don’t guess about your life. We will specifically check your nervous system for interference on a frequency that is determined by your body’s demands without having to guess, all in your time and way. With chiropractic, your body is always in charge of every aspect of your care because your body has its own care plan based off its own needs. Your chiropractor just listens to your body and follows its requests. We simply allow your body to fully express itself again, giving you back your potential to be your best.

Chiropractic follows your lead.

Pregnancy is a normal and natural process that billions of mothers in the world have experienced from the beginning of time. Unfortunately, you wouldn’t know that by how much medicalization and fear is associated with it.  A big reason for potential complications that can lead down scary roads is because all mothers who don’t see a chiropractor have interference to the their nervous system.

What does that mean?  Since the nervous system controls and coordinates everything in the body, including the structures and functions of pregnancy, it means an awful lot.  In pregnant mothers, that means every chemical, hormone and movement required to conceive, carry and deliver a healthy child is dependent on their nervous system.  Everyone gets nerve interference, called spinal subluxations, so that means all mothers too.  The brain has to connect with your unborn baby through your spine.  With spinal subluxations, your brain can’t talk to your baby and your baby can’t talk to your brain.  When pregnancy issues do arise, you can bet that interference to the nervous system is involved in some way or another, and therefore it is impossible for mom and the unborn child to be as healthy with subluxations. 

Here are three specific ways that chiropractic adjustments have been shown to help:

1) Fertility:  Studies have shown a dramatic improvement in the ability to conceive for those who have a history of infertility.  Proper conception chemistry cannot be ideal when there is interference to the system that MADE the chemistry to begin with!

2) Presentation of baby:  The uterus is a baby house made of muscle and is dependent on nerve function for proper tone, shape and function.  In turn, all these are essential for proper baby position.  Many babies presenting in less than ideal positions have literally turned into better positions while the adjusted mother is still on the chiropractic table!  The baby follows the uterus.  When people try to turn the baby itself, it is shown that this is successful roughly 50% of the time.  When the chiropractor simply concentrates on making sure the mother is adjusted, the uterus follows the adjustment and so does the baby.  This usually results in a successful turning of the baby as high as 90% of the time, all without directly moving the baby itself.  Go baby!

3) Labor time:  Its been shown that pregnant women who get regular adjustments have about a third less labor time.  The reality is that spinal subluxations actually increase labor time by about a third longer.  Removing interference just allows labor time to be exactly as it should be.

In general, most women report feeling better overall with chiropractic adjustments, even those that were told that chiropractic couldn’t help them, and some even comment that they feel better than before they were pregnant!  That means that much of the discomfort commonly associated with pregnancy is really just a complication of spinal subluxations.  As you can see, our culture needs to stop blaming pregnancy for issues just associated with a normal function like pregnancy.  And chiropractic adjustments are easy for pregnant women, just as they are for everyone else and the experience is usually easier than you think. 

When pregnant moms get adjusted, so do their unborn babies.  That’s why we like to say that your unborn baby’s care is free until it is born.  Your baby gets the benefits of your spinal adjustments without even trying.  So you see, when you get adjusted while you are pregnant, it is really is a BOGO:  “Adjust One Get One Free”! 

Written by Dr. Matthew Alvord DC, DPhCS

As you may already know, autism rates are climbing astronomically.  Until just decades ago, the rate within society was never more than 1 in 10,000.  The latest rate now ranges from 1 in 68 to 1 in 45!  Something huge is happening to our children and our society.  An MIT professor has even declared recently that if something doesn’t change by the year 2025, half of all children born in the United States will have autism.  Wow. Do you know what kind of health problem that would mean to our society?  I can’t imagine and I don’t want to.  What I do want to do is talk about what can help these statistics and all the children behind them, because there are also a number of things associated with what causes autism and what helps children with autism once they are diagnosed with it.

With the different factors and areas of the body that affect autism, the greatest concern is the effect in the brain. Whether someone has autism or not, everything bounces off the brain and all roads to and from the brain pass through the spine.  When bones in the spine misalign, they commonly interfere with signals directly affecting the brain.  Over half of every single message that goes to the brain from the body is coming from the spine and almost 90% of this important feedback is coming from the upper neck, which surrounds the brain stem.

Enter Chiropractic.  It is very important for everyone to get their spines checked for nerve interference because spinal interference has been shown to dramatically affect brain function.  There have also been a number of studies showing that adjusting spinal misalignments back to normal not only helps brain function in general, but it specifically helps any of the autism spectral disorders.  That means when children who have autismsee a chiropractor, they have an increased chance of having their symptoms improve, some so dramatically that they no longer have the diagnosis that made their parents bring them in!

Children with autism are trapped.  Everyone else can get from A to Z but they just stay stuck on A, and do it over and over and over again.  A could be anything, but it just represents the inside world they keep repeating because they can’t get out.  Getting to B is just a pipe dream for these kids. They never get a chance to move on and outside themselves, to a world where life is meant to be lived from A to Z. 

There is also a lot of stress that affects everyone around this condition as well.  Families dealing with autism have divorce rates as high as 80%.  The rippling affects of autism can cause a crippling affect around them for the rest of their lives.  But it doesn’t have to be this way.   Regardless of the rates of autism, things can get better with a better understanding and a better approach. It may be that some children stuck at A will never get to Z but with Chiropractic, it is possible for these children to get a new jump start from A to B to C.

Written by Dr. Matthew Alvord DC, DPhCS

Ever heard the song about how the foot bone is connected to the hipbone and the hipbone is connected to the backbone? Well, the same thing is true for all the nerves in your body, and everything in your nervous system is connected through the spine in your back. That also means that every organ that hangs from the nerves off your spine like puppeteer strings are completely dependent on a properly functioning spine.  Every organ must communicate with the rest of your body, especially your brain.  When bones in your spine misalign, important messages from your brain cannot properly get back and forth, to and from the rest of your body.

The uterus is one of those organs. If we get back to the body song, we can even say that female organs are connected to the neck! Since most of the misalignments that happen in the spine occur in the brain stem area of the upper neck, we also know that many issues that happen with the uterus are really neck problems!

What kind of female problems? How about those monthly issues that last way too long before the next one, or never seem to go away at all? How about more intense symptoms when they do happen? How about having to rearrange your entire schedule be a slave to these issues? How about thinking any of these issues are normal, just because you’ve always had them!

How about difficulties with pregnancy or even getting pregnant at all? How about abnormal positions of the baby? Or how about complications with cysts, fibroids or other uterine issues that threaten a hysterectomy?

Just because hysterectomies are common doesn’t make them normal. And contrary to popular belief, you need your uterus for more than having babies. If it didn’t belong there, it wouldn’t be there because there are no extra parts in the body. So even after someone has their babies or if they don’t have them at all, that important organ is involved with lots of other functions for proper health, especially hormone balance. Does that one sound familiar?

It is common to have spinal misalignments, especially in the neck, that cause or complicate the direct function of the uterus and your hormone system. Chiropractic adjustments have actually been shown to change and improve blood chemistry, including hormone balance. The body is an amazing creation that if given the chance to function without the interference that chiropractors are specifically trained to find and correct, it is possible to recover from many uterine conditions that may not have seemed possible before this connection is truly understood.

Written by Dr. Matthew Alvord DC, DPhCS

Hesitation:  “Chiropractic seems so different.  I’m used to medicine so maybe I will just keep doing what I already know.”

Fear:  “Does chiropractic hurt?  I know medicine often does.”

Cautious: “Is chiropractic care expensive? I really can’t afford much more.  All my medical bills have maxed out my insurance.”

Confusion: “I read that you don’t treat anything.  How are you going to help me without treating my problem?”

Distracted: “Maybe I will come in after I try another therapy someone just told me about and see if that helps my problem.”

Procrastination: “I’ve got so much to do right now.  Maybe next week.”

Concern: “I’m not sure you can help me.  I’ve been to so many doctors and no one seems to know what my problem is.”

Anger: “I’m sick and tired of being sick and tired!  I don’t want to get my hopes up or get talked into anything!”

Sadness: “I have so many problems and anything I have done has only made it worse.  Maybe I’m just not supposed to get better.”

Depressed: “I can’t get better because my doctors told me so. I’m just supposed to live with my health problem.”

Anxious: “I just can’t sit through another long exam and treatment… the waiting and the gowns and poking and prodding!”

Skeptical: “How can you help me when I’ve been to doctors who specialize in my problem and they couldn’t even help me?”

Desperation: “Can this really help me?  I’ve been to so many different places looking for help and not finding it.  I have no where else to go.”

Denial: “My problem isn’t that bad.  I can live with it.  I have always known that I have a high pain tolerance.”

Worried: “I’m so young.  If I’m this bad now, how bad will I be when I get older?  Maybe I won’t even make it that long.”

Bitter: “I’ve had so many medical procedures go wrong for me.  I just can’t afford to have something happen bad to me again.”

Embarrassed: “I’ve got a health problem that I have a hard time talking about.  How can you help me when I can’t even tell you about it?”

Annoyed: “My doctor tells me there is nothing wrong with me and it’s all in my head, but I just know they aren’t right.  It’s not in my head!”

Jealous: “Everyone in my family is healthy except me.  I must be unlucky.  I always to have to watch everyone else have fun in life.”

Overwhelmed: “I’m on so many medications and now they want to put me on even more!  There has to be another answer.”

Sensitive: “I’m hurting so bad I don’t know how I will be able to get the care I need, even if it helps me.”

Lost: “My doctor told me that chiropractic can’t help me so there is no sense in even getting started.”

Suspicious: “Will I get locked into a contract? Everyone seems to have to do that nowadays.”

Ashamed: “I know I should have come to a chiropractor a long time ago but maybe it’s just too late to even get started now.”

Doubt: “My friend tried chiropractic and it didn’t work for them so why would it work for me?”

Hopeless: “The doctors are having me do more and more but I keep getting worse and worse.”

Confident: “I feel pretty good but if I ever have a problem, I will come in as soon as it starts.”

Have you heard enough? Its time to call us: 952.944.2133

Written by Dr. Matthew Alvord DC, DPhCS

If your nose went away, would your allergies go away too? If it’s not the nose that causes allergies, is it what the nose smells or is it something else? And why do different noses react differently to the same thing? Why dont the allergens that people love to demonize, such as pollen, animals, mold and anything else, cause the same reaction in everyone?

As it turns out, the thing that determines how each nose reacts to the outside environment is the ability of the intelligence behind each nose, on the inside environment. The nose knows what it knows because this inborn intelligence that created and controls everything in your entire body also controls your nose. And the intelligence in the body is unique to each person and each nose based on the unique demands of each person. 

Even when your nose is red and swollen from allergies, it’s not about your nose or what your nose smells. Your allergic reaction is always an intelligent response by the living intelligence inside you to protect you and heal you. So much so that if you didn’t have an allergic response whenever it is required, you would die. And since it is impossible for dead people to even get an allergy, there is something pretty special going on inside you and inside every living person. And that should be respected.

Once this perspective is understood, there is respect for this special intelligence in the body and its ability to be communicated from your brain to all the parts of your entire body. This important messaging channel happens mainly through your spine, protected within the bones in your back. When these bones misalign, they interfere with these special messages expressed by the intelligence relayed by your nervous system. This system is especially important when it comes to allergies because it also controls your immune system and any allergic reaction, including what comes through your nose.

When someone develops an allergic reaction to something that another person doesn’t, it is often because there is interference to the nervous system in the person working harder requiring the reaction. When someone’s immune system is working well enough, they are able to process potential allergens without expressing symptoms. The result? No allergy. But if someone has a bone misaligned in their spine interfering with their nervous system, this decreases the function of their immune system, ultimately decreasing their ability to fight off allergens appropriately. The result? Allergy symptoms. Without ever treating a single allergy, most allergies improve or go away completely when spinal misalignments are analyzed and adjusted back to normal again, regaining proper communication in the nervous system, improving immune system function, making sure the allergic response by your body is normal.

Only chiropractors are trained to specifically find and address the interference that can cause or complicate your allergies. And since this interference is common, and often people with allergies don’t have back or neck pain to prompt them to get their spine checked for misalignments, it is important for everyone to see a chiropractor so they can make sure they’re body is working right and that their nose knows best. 

Get to a cause of allergies. Get to a chiropractor.

Written by Dr. Matthew Alvord DC, DPhCS

Are fevers good or bad? What should I do about them? And where do they even come from? These are some of the questions people have about fevers. Many people fear them, but almost everyone misunderstands them. Let’s get one thing straight: 

Fevers are a good thing. 

Without them, we would die. So where does the fear come from? There can be rare complications related to fevers but the fever itself is always there to get your body temperature to a level that will allow your body to best fight off an infection, and that is always good. Fevers are like the Good Samaritan at the scene of the crime. Sometimes they get blamed just for being present during health issues, but they are always the Good Samaritan. They are always there to help us.

Fevers are produced by a combination of processes in the body. First, your immune system detects something that requires a reaction. Secondly, it sends signals to your brain to increase muscle contraction throughout your body. Third, the increased muscle activity increases body heat to the right temperature to optimize healing. This is because many germs will not function well when your body temp is raised. And regardless of whether or not your body needs a low grade or high grade fever to accomplish the task, your body always brings your temp to the exact amount it needs to burn off those germs.

All this is controlled and coordinated through your nervous system, which is made up of your brain, the spine in your back and all the nerves connecting everything else. The intelligence running your nervous system is always intelligent and therefore everything it does is intelligent, including fevers. Our main concern is to make sure that there is no interference to the process controlling your fevers. We do this by analyzing your spine for misaligned bones that interfere with your nerves, interfering with the intelligent messages communicated between your brain and your body, and ultimately any fevers.

In a way, we could call the intelligence in your nervous system your “fever achiever.” The same system that causes your fever is the same system that reduces your fever when it is no longer needed. It always creates a fever for a very good reason and takes it away when that reason is gone, and not a moment before. The bottom line is that you don’t want to demonize your fevers or any process of the body trying to protect or heal you. Just make sure to get your spine checked for interference to make sure your fever achiever can achieve for you.

This is a guest blog from a man who gifted our services to his wife.

My wife and I met about eight years ago. She was that cute girl across the bar that I couldn’t stop looking at. A friend of mine said I should go talk to her and I worked up the courage to say hi and well… we never looked back. We learned all sorts of things about each other. What was our favorite foods, hobbies, activities, and also things we didn’t agree on like what TV shows to watch. One thing I learned about my wife was that she had terrible allergies. She calls them seasonal allergies and she was taking all sorts of over-the-counter meds almost every day. I didn’t think much of it over the years. She seemed to have them under control and I didn’t have the problem so for me it wasn’t a topic of conversation all that often.

That changed in the spring of 2015. She seemed to be getting worse. The Kleenex box went from the bathroom to the bedroom because her nose was running so bad. Her nose was getting sore like you see in the winter during the cold season but this was spring and not a cold so what the heck was going on?!?!? It was starting to change our daily routine and not in a good way. I was noticing her sneezing and her nose running a lot more than ever before. When you see the person you love dealing with something like this every day it makes you want to do anything to fix it.

So, I started reading. I read about why allergies exist and what function they could possible serve. I also consulted with people who are more educated in the health fields and that’s where Matt and Vicki from Creation Chiropractic came in. I met them at a networking function and we got to talking about the subject. Dr. Matt explained to me how our bodies are just like any other machine. We are full of sensors that connects everything in our body to our brains. He told me how there were 3 trillion messages each second running through this system that tell the body to move, feel, taste, and so on. Well, the part nobody thinks about it the feedback we get from this same system. When I burn my finger I feel the pain and my brain instructs me to move finger. Our organs and other systems work the same way and sometimes in ways we cannot feel directly. It was fascinating and very informative. Dr. Matt has a way of explaining things with analogies so it was easy to pick up.

How can a chiropractor fix my wife’s allergy problems? Well, they can’t. At least not directly. This is what I found most interesting. Dr. Matt wasn’t going to cure her allergies. He was simply going to get her nervous system in proper working order and in turn that would likely fix the other issues we were having. Just like a coax cable ran to your TV for cable your nerves carry data to your extremities, organs and your brain.  If you kink a coax cable the signal is weakened or completely cut off. Your body has millions of these cables (nerves) running all over and they too can become kinked. When that happens your body is so amazing it creates work-arounds and eventually grows around the problem. This may sound like a good solution but it’s actually a form of atrophy. It’s taking a step back in your life.

I realized I needed to get my wife in to see Dr. Matt. Only one problem…  She doesn’t like chiropractors. She comes from the veterinary world and is very much a believer in modern medical technology and had a negative impression of chiropractors. She was reluctant to see Dr.  Matt but after some begging I was able to get her to do the orientation visit at Creation Chiropractic in Eden Prairie. Matt and Vicki were awesome and explained everything I just explained above to my wife. They made her much more comfortable with chiropractic care and after some talking she decided to get the adjustment and sign up for a month of unlimited adjustments.

The first one was a little scary for her. She wasn’t used to a neck adjustment and was a little shocked from the feeling. At first she didn’t like it. In fact that day she felt off and a little woozy. We were told this was possible and that the wooziness would go away in a day or so. It did and the great thing is that was an indicator that we were doing the right thing. She was feeling nerves that had been kinked for years. Matt was quick to let us know we needed to get right back in to maintain what we had done. It’s easy for those nerves to go right back where they were and lose progress. So she proceeded to go in about three times per week and guess what: Her allergies were starting to go away. Not only that but she had some back pain from her job (lifting large dogs all day at the clinic) and that started to go away as well. It was like a new person had emerged. She will continue to get care with Matt and Vicki at Creation Chiropractic. We live in Minneapolis and are happy to make the trek to Eden Prairie to See Matt and Vicki at Creation Chiropractic. The outcome has been great and nothing we ever expected.

When you love someone it’s amazing to help improve their life in an impactful way. Especially with things that are painful or impeded on your day to life. I’m amazed at what people live with and don’t even try to fix. Sometimes all you need is a great chiropractor like Dr. Matt.

We would highly recommend Matt and Vicki at Creation Chiropractic. Thanks for all of your help!

---Matt and Jamie

Written by Dr. Matthew Alvord DC, DPhCS

How long will it take?

-Relief usually begins in the first few weeks.

-Everyone is different, with different goals.

-One visit or a lifetime. You are always in control.

-The longer you go, the more you benefit.

How much will it cost? 

-Care at our office is very affordable.

-Single adjustment, monthly, and annual plans.

-Consultations and exams are always FREE.

What about my insurance? 

-You don’t need insurance at Creation Chiropractic.

-Insurance doesn’t pay for true chiropractic.

-Insurance only pays to patch the problem.

-Insurance won’t pay to keep you healthy.

What happens during my appointments? 

-Visits are only a few minutes.

-Come in as much as you want or need.

-Open six days a week.

-No gowns or expensive exams, just pure chiropractic.

How will chiropractic help me?

-It gets to the cause of your problem.

-It allows your body to function properly.

-It helps you get right and stay right.

-It will help you understand your problem.

-It will help you avoid unnecessary medical care.

Written by Dr. Matthew Alvord DC, DPhCS

Over half of all children in the US have an ear infection by the time they are one, more than 80 percent by age three, and almost all will have at least one ear infection by age five. This accounts for 25 million office visits annually with direct costs for treatment estimated at $3 billion. Ear infections are no laughing matter.

Part of the problem is how we view the problem. Ear infections aren’t an ear problem. The ears are like tornado sirens hanging off the side of our heads. If the tornado siren went off in the middle of the night, what would you think if a disgruntled neighbor came storming out of their house, a pair of scissors in hand, looking to cut the power to the blaring horn? We might have silence for a while but we also know there was a very good reason why that siren went off in the first place. Inevitably, we would have to deal with the aftermath that followed. If we disconnect the siren, the tornado is still coming, but if we don’t disconnect the siren, the tornado is still coming just the same. And we can’t heed the warning if we don’t understand the warning. 

If a child has an ear infection, we also have several ways to look at the problem. If we demonize the infected ear by just treating it, we will miss the bigger issue of why the ear is infected in the first place.  Ears don’t all of a sudden get bored and go off like a faulty siren. There is a very good reason for why the body does every single thing it does. 

If we take a step even further back, we can appreciate that the immune system is what controls every infection in the body, so a properly functioning immune system is essential with every infection, including ear infections. But what controls the immune system? The nervous system controls and coordinates every single function of the entire body, including the immune system, so the nervous system ultimately controls the ears and their infections.

The nervous system is comprised of your brain, your spine and all the nerves that control every cell in your body. Interference frequently happens in the spinal when bones misalign and put pressure on the nerves connecting your brain and your body. This compromises immune function and makes your body more susceptible to all infections, including ear infections.

Millions of desperate parents drag their compromised children into the next pediatrician hoping that the 20^th, 30^th or 40^th round of antibiotics will do the “trick.” Unfortunately, even if the antibiotic treats the present condition, it has been shown that taking antibiotics for ear infections can increase the rate of re-occurrence of the infection six times higher than doing nothing at all! And similar studies also show that these same children are more prone to many other immune system related problems later on in life as well.

The best an antibiotic can do is to win the battle but lose the war. And this war is being fought on a much bigger field than just the eardrum of the child. It is taking place in the immune systems and the nervous system of the entire body. So when we hear that misaligned spinal bones can lead to ear infections, our culture needs to start looking at this problem differently if it wants to truly get to the cause of this problem. Can you hear me now?