Illness or Normal Body Function

From Pathways Issue 10 - Summer 2006

Letter from the Editor
Jeanne Ohm, DC

I just spent the last several days in bed with a flu and raging fever. The first day I sulked. Who needs this? The second day I fasted on fruit and water. Temperatures were elevating and there were moments of delirium. I anxiously awaited the pinnacle of letting a fever run its course – the break into a full body sweat. I am a firm believer in allowing symptoms to run their course and avoiding suppression with drugs, because that suppression only drives the illness deeper. The flu is a viral overload. The body raises the temperature to the specific degree it needs to be at to address that overload. A healthy system is able to handle these temperature elevations and they are a sign of normal body function. The more toxicity in the body, however, the more difficult the whole process becomes.

By the third day, I was still in the dry heat/chills stage. I was becoming a bit concerned. Where was the sweat? Where was the breaking point? I couldn’t last too much longer with these elevating temperatures. What is the boiling point of human body fluids?

I began to consume ginger root tea by the jarful. Somehow the burning sensation of the ginger was mild compared to the heat of my body. It was soothing to the chills. The flavor, the warmth, the liquid- it was the first drink that my body kept going back for more. And so I did. Several, spicy jars later, I intimately experienced visceral effects of ginger. It aided in heat production! My skin temperature reached a level comparable to a hot griddle. And then finally, the glorious sweat came– oceans of it poured out of me. Now I craved water. I was envious of fish. Truly they lived the glorious life. Then I knew to restore my electrolyte balance and I selected miso soup.

Here is my purpose in sharing this. All in all I had four days of what could be considered “an awful illness”. In reality, I was given an opportunity to do a complete cleansing fast, experience what was very comparable to a sweat lodge, to be alone, reflect on old patterns that needed to change – wow—very similar to some of the healing retreats out there all in the comforts of my own home!

The reason why I was hit so hard by this was because my body was in need of a housecleaning. Do you remember Dr. Phil Incao’s article, “Not a Battle but a Housecleaning” (Pathway’s Issue 6)? In his article he discusses the importance of these “house cleanings” and when we neglect to initiate them on our own, our bodies will do us the service. I had innately known this, and was planning a time of pulling myself “away from it all” and do a major meditative, restorative detox. As life would have it, I kept saying “next week”, “soon”, “after this project”. The wonderful wisdom of my body had a clearer insight into my needs and seized this time as perfect. How fulfilling to allow my body to complete this process without suppressing and hindering it.

This is most important point I want to leave you with: the huge value of allowing an “illness” to run its course without suppressing its symptoms. Reread Dr. Incao’s article. His perspective may be life saving in your ability to turn “illness” into “a healing retreat”. Also, in this issue of Pathways, pay close attention to Dr. Moskowitz’s article. He explains vaccines do not enhance immunity, but through suppression actually hinder normal immune system function. When “choosing to vaccinate or not” our concerns about the thimerosal, the age of the child, the amount of dosages per shot, or selectively choosing shots are minor compared to the effects of irreversibly altering this wonderful mechanism we call the immune system.

Our Strength is in Our Knowing

There has been quite a stir lately about fluoride in drinking water. I am glad to see this get this public attention-- it is an issue that needs consumer action. However, I do want to point out, that chiropractors have known about this and have advised the public about this issue for years.

Back in chiropractic school, my husband and I did a presentation on fluoride in class. It was set up in debate format, similar to Saturday Night Lives's: Point Counterpoint, a parody of CBS's 60 minutes broadcast of the late 70's. If you remember, the SNL reporters were: Dan Akroyd (the conservative) and Jane Curtin (the liberal). Dan usually began his arguments with the line, "Jane, you ignorant slut."

Even back then, there was significant information for us to fulfill a 15 minute debate on the issue. (It was quite a bit more difficult to access info then as it is today... remember searching microfilms for articles in the library as opposed to googling?) In our skit, Tom was Dan, I was Jane. Of course we held to their sarcastic/ NY/ in your face style. Of course Tom used the line, "Jeanne, you ignorant slut" to cause an uproar in our class.

Point being, is that chiropractors were privy to the harms of fluoride and we avoided public drinking water getting our water from nearby springs. As soon as we graduated and had the money (there weren't student loans back then...) we bought a reverse osmosis water system and have had one ever since.

Here is an article I wrote years ago along these lines....

Our Strength is in Our Knowing

More often than not, it has been our experience as chiropractors to watch an issue of truth come to the masses--a very issue we as chiropractors knew all along to be so! Think about a few of these issues which DCs have known to be true and have recently gained public popularity and acceptance--even medical approval!

More often than not, it has been our experience as chiropractors to watch an issue of truth come to the masses--a very issue we as chiropractors knew all along to be so! Think about a few of these issues which DCs have known to be true and have recently gained public popularity and acceptance--even medical approval!

Body movement is one which comes to mind. DCs have long taught the importance of keeping the body in motion for both healing and regeneration. Exercise became the buzz word of the 90's. Right along with this has come the consciousness to eat better. I can think back to my student days in the early 80's and recall my first intro to good foods coming from DCs. The rest of the world thought we were crazy to be somewhat conscientious about what we put into our bodies. Today, nutrition is becoming vogue and accepted as an ingredient to health.!

Another issue was our innate apprehension about antibiotics and their complicated effects preceded the inkling that a greater scientific law was being tampered with. The 90's brought out study after study warning of the dangers of antibiotic usage. One need only to look back to BJ's writings in the 50's to realize that from a chiropractic standpoint, antibiotics were destined to be shown up as causes of further complications.

As chiropractors, our history and perspective on health and wholeness has always shown us reason to doubt, fear and most importantly refuse vaccines. Today, there are more and more groups out there becoming leery of vaccines and obtaining the scientific data to support their concerns. Now lets be realistic here--it hasn't been the sole effort of DCs which has gotten these messages out to the public, but it has been our diligence to communicate and our unfaltering knowing which has greatly contributed to the public finding out about these issues. The little bit each and every one of us does, adds up to a momentous tide for change.


What I want to point out is another one of those bits of knowledge we as DC's know to be true. It needs our attention, because as with all of our concerns for humanity, the lives of many depend on it. Thanks to the works of some greats in our profession, the significance of the birth process as the first cause of subluxation was brought to the attention of the world. Teachers like Dr. Joe Flesia gave us the research and educational tools to support the hypothesis and the devastating effects of VSC at birth Others, like Dr. Arno Burnier provided us with the passion and commitment to educate our patients about birth. Still others like Dr. Larry Webster equipped us with adjusting technique, skills and equipment. He taught us how to prevent traumatic birth with specific maternal adjustments and how to analyze and correct subluxations in infants and children.

What I hope to do here is to bring you closer to the devastating effects a traumatized birth can have on the life of a child. First, I would like to look at some of the atrocities which lead to trauma at birth. In our country, women are led to believe they are having a "natural birth" if their eyes are open. Local anesthesia, spinal taps, episiotomies, induced labors and birth positions which go against gravity and anatomy are all considered part of a normal, natural birth. With fear tactics and intimidation, women have been led to compromise one of the most powerful experience they will ever have. When women's natural capacities are violated like this, the birth process becomes a painful, traumatic, unnatural procedure for both the mother and baby. The effects of this type of birth on the newborn can be life-threatening, indeed.

One only needs to look at some birth pictures or videos to realize the undo force applied to the baby's neck and spine. It's amazing how gentle everyone is with the child's spine and head when passing a newborn from one to another, and in contrast, how brutal the actual birth procedures may have been just minutes before! The force applied with forceps and vacuum extraction is far beyond any force you could imagine exerting on a delicate newborn spine. As chiropractors, we can look at these procedures in horror and shudder at their probable effects.

As professionals interested in research results, we can read medical studies which support the theory that the birth process is a life threatening experience. One such report "Latent Spinal Cord and brain Stem Injury in Newborn Infants" by Abraham Towbin MD published in Dev. Med Child Neurology tells us that "the birth process even under optimal controlled conditions is potentially a traumatic, crippling event for the fetus." He goes on to tell us that "Survival of the newborn is governed mainly by the integrity and function of the vital centers in the brain stem. Yet, paradoxically, the importance of injury at birth to the brain stem and spinal cord are matters which have generally escaped lasting attention."

These are serious statements and are certainly supportive of our suspicion that modern birthing procedures in this country are indeed life-threatening to infants. Just how life threatening is my thought proposal for you now. Several years ago, while attending a vaccination seminar, a homeopathic MD was reviewing the relationship between SIDS and the DPT shot. The latest medical studies on SIDS was drawing a substantial connection between a baby's sleeping position as a possible cause of SIDS. It was being considered, that placing a child on its back reduced the incidence of SIDS. Being firmly fixed on the DPT vaccine/SIDs relationship (which I am in no way discrediting) he looked at it as nonsense. My chiropractic antenna went up and so did my hand. I explained to him the idea that placing a child on its stomach to sleep causes undo stress to the cervical spine as the child's head needs to be turned one way or another. Combining this biomechnanically unsound position with an even slightly traumatic birth could be the insult added to injury that affects the spinal cord's respiratory centers in such a way as to cause SIDS. Sound plausible? Towbin's other report, "Spinal Injury Related to the Syndrome of Sudden Death In Infants" published in the American Journal of Clinical Pathology supports the relationship between birth trauma and SIDS. This study, too was published in the 60's. Yet today, if you ask the "SIDS experts", they will tell you no known cause exists, just make sure you place your child on its back--for whatever reason.

If you are detecting cynicism, yes, I do confess. Perhaps it is because more children die of SIDS in a year than all who die of cancer, heart disease, pneumonia, child abuse, AIDS, cystic fibrosis and muscular dystrophy combined! It is also because when searching a website called "Child Secure" under their SIDS section, they not only held to the medically protected theory that there is no known cause for SIDs, they further slandered Chiropractors and their theory connecting birth trauma and SIDS as "old wives tales and ignorance". (Look it up yourself if you want a blood pressure surge). The defensiveness points that we may be onto something big here.

Well folks, here we are again- faced with an issue which needs our immediate attention and efforts to bring it into play. As always, we must continue to educate. Patients are not aware how damaging the birth process can be. Women need to be reoriented about birth and what they can do to regain their say in this crucial event in their child's life. We need to do what we can to help prevent these harmful births from happening. Our adjusting skills need to be fine-tuned to work more specifically and effectively with children. Makin' Miracles is working to provide chiropractors with the opportunities to make an impact on birth trauma. As I travel each weekend to different cities around the world, I am privileged to share accumulated knowledge with the attendees about adjusting infants and pregnant mothers. It is a wonderful thing that we as DC's can make a correction to an infant's spine, remove interference to the nervous system and watch the infant's body heal and repair from the damaging effects of birth. It is even a greater thing however when we have the skills to adjust the mother throughout pregnancy, remove interference to her nervous system, help balance her pelvic muscles and ligaments and allow her to have an easier, safer delivery because of it.

Every day we get up and draw on our inner strength to face the masses--to be the one voice among the noisy crowd. Amongst the confusion and the chaos and the resistance, we get up and we do what we know we have to do. Sometimes we soar ahead, and sometimes we are knocked back a few steps. Then there are the times we wonder if we are really making a difference at all. Those are the times most critical-- those are the times we must not just simply hold on, but realize the tremendous impact we have made and must continue to make in this world.

Applaud yourself--you deserve it! We are the one clear voice in the turbulent, noisy crowd. What we have to offer is life giving. We need only to perfect the skills of our hands and draw from the strength of our hearts. In this way, we will continue to make a world of difference.

Many, many blessing,
Jeanne