Health, Pain, Headaches, and More…

I hope you're doing well as we settle into a New Year with a new President in office.  It should be an interesting ride, regardless of where you sit on the political spectrum. 

President Trump in his first week has already started moving forward with changing the Affordable Care Act and many of his other agenda items. 

One thing I can say about him, the President, is that he understands the power of decisiveness and fast action. 

There is a difference between decisiveness and impatience though they are semi-related. 

Decisiveness means that we quickly, without hesistation, make up our minds once we have information. 

• Impatience implies an irritability with delay. 
• I was thinking about this as I write this email to you today. 

I see so many people that want to improve their health – whether it is that they want to get out of pain so they can sleep better, perform better, and really just enjoy their lives more. 

Others would like to lose weight, improve their blood pressure, diabetes, and other very significant risk factors for so many health problems like heart disease and an early death. 

There is a disconnect in what most people want and what they do to get that benefit, recovering their health. 

Too often, we are impatient… 

We want to take a pill to change a symptom quickly even though we must realize that the pill does not really change why we are having the problem (even in cases where we really do need a medication, it only treats a symptom). 

We still have to change other things in our lives to really improve our health. 

A simple example is looking at a painful condition whether it's a headache, neck pain, back pain, shoulder pain, or some other area of our bodies that hurts. 

The truth is that it hurts for a reason. 

Certainly, we can take a strong enough pain reliever that we won't feel it for a little while. 

The question remains though, why does it hurt? 

Let's say you are unfortunate enough to suffer from frequent headaches. 

You might find some relief in taking over the counter pain relievers (let's say it's motrin or another NSAID), possibly taking so many over several years. 

The medication seems to help, but do they really? 

This is where things start to get a little uncertain. 

What if you are experiencing the common problem of rebound headaches. 

This is a well known condition where taking a pain reliever temporarily helps the headache but makes it much more likely to come back. 

Worse, over time the medication blocks an enzyme that protect your gut and kidneys (the COX enzyme). This leads to damage to these critically important organs.

If you're diabetic or have blood sugar problems like so many Americans, then you are already at greater risk of kidney problems – now you are at greater risk. 

What if you have cardiovascular disease, heart disease? 

Did you know that taking these medications, can put you at greater risk of a heart attack? 

Unfortunately, many of us have heart problems or cardiovascular disease but never realize we have it until we have a heart attack. We very well might be taking something that we later discover was a very serious problem for us.

This is how we lose our health, gradually over time. 

We are sacrificing our health a little bit day after day. It happens so slowly that we don't realize it's occuring. 

Returning to headaches, I've seen thousand's of people suffering from headaches. It the vast majority of cases, I can take care of it with conservative care. 

This is even in people that have been experiencing migraines for decades and have been told there is nothing else that can be done. Often these people can still get better, reducing their migraine headaches. 

I've got a patient right now that was experiencing headaches so bad that not only have he taken many medications for years, but has had nerve blocks and cauterization done to try to reduce his pain. 

Never once has a single doctor that he has seen ever recommend that maybe he should see a chiropractor to see if it would help. 

Don't get me wrong, most doctors of all types are recommending care that they believe will help you. The doctors simply don't know about the alternatives in most cases.

The problem is that there are often other safer alternatives that can help you. 

I really want to say this because I care about helping you and others that are suffering needlessly… 

It's up to you to make a decision to change your health. 

If you or someone you know is hurting and live in Texarkana, there is an excellent chance that I can help you without medication or surgery. It's the only reason I'm here.  

 

For Your Health,

 

Dr. Marc Hagebusch

Hagebusch Chiropractic 903-793-1084