Articles and Education

Apr 26, 2024
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On occasion, I refer to a formative patient I had in my chiropractic practice many years ago. I call him Carl. Carl was a big strong guy that had lifted heavy and played hard for most of his life. While his prior activity was apparent in his physical frame as he sat in front of me, it was juxtaposed by his emotional state. Carl was crying…and not just a trace tear on the cheek, either. This grown man was sobbing and fortunately for me, it was tears of joy. He had suffered a disc injury while lifting, and subsequently re—injured it several times. He’d seen a handful of chiropractors who painfully bounced on him to try to get some magic crack, but made him feel worse about as often as it made him feel better. He’d had more needles stuck into him than his mother’s pin cushion. He’d seen many physicians and surgeons who had all given some sort of advice that resembled “Stop lifting” or “These opioids should take the edge off” or “We can cut you open and snip that out”. He’d heard about poor surgical outcomes and was leery of going that route. His fear of surgery was rivaled by his fear of lifting which had now bled from his sport life into other, more personal facets, including lifting his child, lifting the garbage and lifting his socks from the floor. Carl felt like he was waiting on the edge of something worse, and he was incredibly frustrated that his source of solace-‐lifting-‐could have seemingly turned on him like a traitorous friend. But he wept at that moment because of what we had just done in the clinic.