Chiropractic Care and You with Dr. Una Forde

Good morning and welcome to Green Tea Conversations, the radio show that delts into the pages of Natural Awakenings magazine to bring you local experts who share progressive ideas and the latest information and insights needed so you can lead your best life. I'm your host, Candi Broeffle, publisher of the Twin Cities edition of Natural Awakenings magazine, and I've had the honor to meet hundreds of highly qualified professionals in the areas of natural medicine, sustainable living, and healthy relationships, and I wanted to find a way to help them expand their reach, to share their expertise.

 

Green Tea Conversations is our vehicle to do just that. Our guest this morning is Una Forde Doctor of Chiropractic and owner of Golden Sun Chiropractic Wellness Center, which is located in Bloomington. Dr. Forde recently wrote an article entitled Winter Wellness Begins With You, which can be found in the January 2019 issue of Natural Awakenings magazine and online at NaturalTwinCities.Com. Welcome to the show, Dr. Forde.

 

Thanks, Candi.

 

So each month, Natural Awakenings has a feature theme, and for January, the issue, the theme was strengthening organ vitality, and your article focused on the bladder and kidneys. You shared that based on Chinese medicine, meridians and the fact that the bladder and kidney meridians are the most affected in the winter. So before we get deeper into that, can you first explain to us what meridians are in Chinese medicine?

 

So in Chinese medicine. So just like in Western medicine, we understand that the blood circulates through the vessels in the body, the circulatory system. So in Chinese medicine, they look at the body a little bit differently. So your body has an electromagnetic field. And in Chinese medicine that energy flows through vessels or channels, just like how the blood flows through the blood vessels in the body. In Chinese medicine, that electromagnetic energy flows through what we call meridians or channels or vessels that have little points along them that are kind of like gates that you can open or close or stimulate.

 

In Chinese medicine or calm or the terms that they usually use where you can increase the energy flowing through that meridian, just like the Mississippi River has those little dams along there and you can open a dam and it slows things down or you close it or vice versa. So the same thing with the meridians, they have points along them that are like little gates that will increase the if you simulate it a certain way or decrease the energy flowing through that channel that's called the meridian.

 

So just out of curiosity, then for certain types of health issues, you decide whether you want the energy to flow stronger or to slow it down.

 

Correct. So sometimes you have too much energy flowing through that channel and you need to calm it down. And sometimes you don't have enough and you need to increase the energy and that's kind of what Chinese medicine and acupuncture. There's whole systems that are involved in figuring out what you need to do in order to maintain our create balance in that energy channel.

 

Okay. And how many different meridians are there?

 

There are twelve major meridians. And then there are a couple of extra ones that are also kind of important. And then there's a few other miscellaneous points that make up different special points along the body. But there's twelve major ones. And we talked about our article was on the ladder and kidney meridians, but there's also long and large intestine meridian. There's stomach and plain meridians and at small intestine and a couple of other ones that are all throughout the body. And all those work together in a system that each one kind of influences the other.

 

And that's where harmony and balance, like what we go for in holistic medicine and Chinese medicine. That's what they've been going for for thousands of years and trying to create balance within those energy channels and radians throughout the body.

 

Okay. Well, so everything in balance.

 

That's right. Everything in balance.

 

And the article you really focused on the bladder and the kidney. And you said that the bladder and kidney meridians are most affected in the winter. So there's different seasonal, different meridians are affected differently in different seasons.

 

Absolutely. Yes. In the wintertime that's the season that's associated with the bladder and kidney Viridian in the springtime. That's when the liver and the Galani meridians are more active. And I think in the summer it's the heart and small intestine. And in the fall, long and large intestine meridian. So each each meridian has a season that's associated with a different foods, colors, tastes, et cetera. That are associated with that channel in that meridian.

 

Okay. And so why are the bladder ing kidney most affected in the winter?

 

Because that's the season that's associated with that meridian. So if there is, like adverse weather conditions, like cold or just dryness in the wintertime, that can create a stress on those meridians and those organs because that energy channel, those sets the electromagnetic field that strengthens or builds those organs. And those organs are also dissociated with other areas in the body is not just the bladder and the kidneys. It can be also the adrenals. So sometimes you might find that when you're under stress, sometimes the winter season can be stressful that affects the bladder and kidney meridians, because the adrenals are associated with that.

 

And things like that's always very busy during December at the end of the year, with all the holidays and everything else that people get bogged down with, and then you're dealing with the stress of the cold, the outside weather, so that also can be affecting your energy and draining that energy and making you feel more susceptible or your energy starts to wane. And so it's important to kind of do things to nurture and build the kidney meridians. I think in the article we talked about the importance of some foods et cetera.

 

Like Burdock or Burdock root is good for healing the kidneys and things and getting rest. Sleep. All those things help to water, not eating too much salt, but having the right kinds of salt, all those things help to nourish the kidneys. And again, in Chinese medicine, the kidneys are very important in another way that there's another system I associated with the kidneys that deals with, like, what they call our ancestral energy. So that's where our like, the energy that we're born with. So we kind of like we come into our body with a certain amount of energy that we're supposed to keep to throughout our lifetime.

 

Kind of like our ancestral energy is what they call it is kind of like you're born with a certain amount so you can change your energy levels by your nutrition and by other things that you can do. But this is something that is kind of like your genetic disposition that you come into into this body with. So again, if you deplete that through over using your body through kind of burning the candle at both ends, then that kind of causes stress on those kidneys and the adrenals.

 

Ultimately so kind of like what you've heard of in Western medicine. If you do too much and stress your body out, then you go into that cycle of fatigue and adrenal fatigue. So that's another area that we need to kind of make sure we're nurturing adrenals by getting rest and not pushing the envelope when we're too tired and trying to the dump a bunch of caffeine into our bodies to give us that fake energy, because that ultimately depletes that genetic or ancestral energy that is stored in the kidneys and the adrenals.

 

So also in the article you talked about, winter is a great time to take time to reflect. And if somebody who grew up on a farm, I loved winter because winter was the time where we got to kind of rest. And it wasn't as busy as the rest of the year when animals are being born and gardens have to go into the wood fire. And so winter was always our time to kind of you hunker in and have time to really rest and reflect. And you said that's an important part with the kidneys.

 

Absolutely. Yes, absolutely. Because as you said, it's like the rest of the year. We're very busy, but kind of like a lot of us have gotten away from being with the farms. And so we're in this artificial environment where we're constantly under stressed. There's never a time really to have downtime. So if you can create that downtime once the holidays are over, take January, where we are right now is an opportunity to relax, get some extra sleep. It's darker out at night. It's shorter days. So a nice time to go to bed earlier and get up a little bit later.

 

Go back into your natural rhytm.

 

Exactly and take some time to just kind of heal those adrenals by not pushing it as much as you do with the rest of the year.

 

Okay. And now another thing that you said and I didn't stop you as you were talking. But I wanted to make sure I get back to it. As you said, it's important to get the right kind of salt.

 

Yes.

 

So what are the right kinds of salt?

 

So some of the best kinds of salt are like net salts from natural vegetables such as celery. And you can find one of our favorite salt is, I think a product called Herber. Or there's lots of different systems of cleansing out there. One of them that's very popular these days is celery juice, drinking 16oz of celery juice in the morning. But celery is such a great source of different minerals such as selenium and potassium and various other minerals that your body needs. And sometimes you can find those natural vegetable salt.

 

So that's ideal. The harsh, straight sodium chloride is very stressful for the kidneys and for the body. So the more natural salts, such as the Himalayan salts or sea salt, those are all more absorbable. They usually come with more minerals that are part of that that are combined with its is more easily absorbed. And finding a natural salts that also have iodine. That's one of the things that I guess sometimes the salts that we find in the health food stores, we don't have as much iodine in them.

 

But if you get your salts from sea vegetables and that's another way of combining the great salt, plus adding in the sea, the seaweed, the kelps different, you can find a lot of them in the macrobiotic section, usually in your health food stores, Walcam, Nor, or all great sources for natural minerals.

 

Okay, great. So where can our listeners go to learn more about Golden Sun Chiropractic Wellness Center?

 

Well, you can go to our website at www.GoldenSunChiro.com.

 

And Chiro is Chiro definitely. It's all one word. So GoldenSunChiro.com we're talking to Dr. Una Forde, and when we come back, we're going to talk about better health in aging. For more information or to read Natural Awakenings online, visit NaturalTwinCities.Com. You can find a podcast of this show on Am 950Radio.Com on iTunes or anywhere you get your podcast. You're listening to Green Tea Conversations on Am 950, the Progressive Voice of Minnesota. We'll be right back.

 

Welcome back to Green Tea Conversations, where we delve into the pages of Natural Awakenings magazine and talk to the professionals who share their expertise on natural health with you.

 

I'm your host, Candi Broeffle. And today we're talking with Dr. Una Forde, the owner of Golden Sun Chiropractic Wellness Center in Bloomington. Thank you for being with us today.

 

Thank you for having me, Candi.

So, according to the center for Disease Control, the life expectancy for men today is about 76 years old, and for women, it's about 81 years old. So average is about 78.6 years old by 2050. They say that this will increase to over 100 years old and may even be as much as 125 or 150 years old. So how can we add quality to our life as we age?

That's a great question, Candi. One of my favorite talks that we do in our office with our patients and that we do to educate the public is about how to improve your quality of life as you get older. And a lot of times, what people don't realize is that, yes, we might be living a lot longer. And it's important that we maintain our mobility because what they found is that mobility is like the number one complaint that people have as they get over 50 is just being able to get around.

 

So a lot of times we're trying trying to look young, but we're not necessarily thinking about the importance of how movement is to making us look young, because if we can't move around, then we're not going to look as young as we want to. So I'll tell you.

 

I turned 50 this year, and the difference between 49 and 50 is ten fold. The movement is not quite as easy anymore.

 

Yeah, we get a lot of complaints of back pain and neck pain, et cetera in our office. So it's and that's because people don't always realize that the best thing to do is to kind of throughout their life kind of do preventive measures to keep that from building up until that point where you have arthritis. Now, you have difficulty with all kinds of things that have been gradually building up over time. So we forget that our lives are very busy and active. And a lot of times, especially in Minnesota, in the wintertime, we kind of slip and fall.

 

We catch ourselves and we think, oh, I didn't fall. So I'm okay, I'm but in the process of that, something may have been out of alignment or gotten out of alignment in your spine or in your joints. And if that's not corrected, then that just stays that way. And that creates a wear and tear on those joints. So we do a great job of taking care of our cars usually or try to we take our cars in for an alignment in the Minnesota. We're always hitting those pot holes, and we know that if the car is out of alignment, that means the tires are going to wear unevenly.

 

So it's the same thing with your body. Like if you don't maintain that alignment in the spine and then the joints, then over time, those joints wear on each other. And that's what causes what's called osteoarthritis. And that's one of the main issues that people have as they get older. And so that in itself can affect your mobility because the joints form bone spurs, which then kind of start to limit that mobility. So by using chiropractic care as a preventive tool throughout your lifetime, just like you take your car and for an oil change or front alignment, you bring your body into your favorite chiropractor and get things in so that everything is moving smoothly.

 

You don't have to wait till it's to that point where things are in pain.

 

So it's really interesting that you talk about that, because I hear a lot of friends whose parents or even themselves have gone in and maybe had a hip surgery and they've had hip problems for a long time, which has caused them to kind of shift the way that they walk. And once they have the surgery, try now it brings up a whole bunch of other issues.

 

Absolutely. Because especially if you've gone. I'm assuming the surgeons done a really good job of making sure everything's balanced. Well, if you've been walking out of balance for ten years or longer than the rest of your spine and your joints have kind of compensated for that. And now things are lined up so that's great in terms of your hips are now working better because you have the replacement. But the effects of that ten years of discomfort before you got to the point of having the hip replacement is still there.

 

And so again, that's something that using chiropractic is a tool to facilitate that. A lot of times, physical therapy is very helpful for rehabbing the muscles, but it's still important to do the proper alignment in the joints in conjunction with the physical therapy so that the nerves are functioning better to those muscles to support the rehabilitative process that's going on as you recover from the surgery and try to get back into being active in your life.

 

So you recommend chiropractic care starting very early in life, especially for ice on your website. You actually do chiropractic care for children as well?

 

Absolutely. You can start off life with problems in your neck and spine. A lot of times. Getting here is can be challenging at.

 

 Birth itself is pretty big at

 

Birth itself can be very traumatic. Sometimes parents are wondering, well, why is is my baby crying or my baby's not sleeping at night? And sometimes that can be because just like us, your baby just went through a challenging process going through the birth canal. Sometimes it may have needed to get the baby may have been stuck and had to get pulled out.

 

Or there are other interventions that needed to happen. So your baby might be crying because he or she might have neck pain or have a headache because of soreness from what happened. And so it's again, chiropractic has been very beneficial in helping many parents with their children that have colic or have been having issues with sleeping, because just gentle, very gentle mobilization can help relieve some of that discomfort, allowing the baby to relax and be able to sleep better. Just like we feel after getting an adjustment.

 

And a lot of times people are thinking, Well, that sounds so chiropractic for kids. That sounds so stressing. That sounds very stressful that it must be. You don't want to do that kind of manipulation to an infant. But the manipulation that's done or the adjustments that are done for a child and especially for an infant are very different from what you would do for an

 

Adult.

 

Yeah. They're very gentle.

 

Right. So I look back and you think back to I start a chiropractic care when my mother started it with us when we were probably 8 10 years old. That's for doing that. So it's been 40 some years. Chiropractic care has changed a great deal in 40 years.

 

Yeah, absolutely. There are so many gentle ways of doing adjustments to the spine and that you can add in cranial work. There's all these wonderful methods the chiropractors over the years have developed that are very non intrusive, but still get the same results of allowing the nerves to function better, which is the whole goal of chiropractic is improving the function of the nervous system so that the body can heal itself. And when your body heals itself and you're feeling better than you have more vitality, which is what we're looking for.

 

Going back to our original thought process of how to stay young. It's like when you have your body functioning the way it's supposed to, the nervous system is working. That means the brain is able to then send the proper messages to the organs and systems and the body things are working. It's kind of like I use the description of, like a light bulb. It's kind of like when we're not feeling good. We're kind of walking around with a dimmer switch down and everything's on dim, then getting your nervous system adjusted and working it cranks it up.

 

And now you have all that vitality and energy to do all the things you want to do and stay young for as long as you want.

 

Great. So now we're going to be taking a break here in a few minutes. But if somebody wanted to make an appointment with you, what is the phone number that they should call?

 

Our office phone number is 959-221-478, and we would love to hear from you to schedule an appointment.

 

Okay. Great. So one more time. What is the phone number?

 

952-9221-478 and our initial visit. We usually donate the funds from that to charity, and it's usually $20.

 

Excellent.

 

It's a great opportunity.

 

So $20 for the initial visit, we are visiting with Dr. Una Forde of Golden Sun Chiropractic. And you are listening to Green Tea Conversations on Am 950 The Progressive Voice of Minnesota will be back in just a bit.

 

Welcome back to Green Tea Conversations, where we delve into the pages of Natural Awakenings magazine and talk to the experts who share their expertise on natural help with you. I'm your host, Candi Broeffle. And today we're talking with Una Forde, Doctor of Chiropractic and owner of Golden Sun Chiropractic Wellness Center.

 

Thank you for being with us today, Doctor Forde.

 

Thank you, Candi. It's an awesome pleasure to be here today.

 

So just prior before the break, we were talking about some of the things that people can do in order to add longevity and quality of life for themselves as we age. And so you were talking about consistent chiropractic care is very important, and it helps to alleviate the aches and pains that we can have in our joints and try to reduce the arthritis problems that we have. What are some other things that people can do, especially in relation to arthritis, either by helping to prevent it, or I suppose we can talk a little bit later about how to treat it once they have it.

But in order to help prevent arthritis, what are some things that people can do?

 

Thanks, Candi. Thanks, Candi. Yeah. We talked earlier about the importance of maintaining the alignment and the joints, and that's one of the main things for helping prevent osteoarthritis. And of course, once things are in alignment and maintaining that with healthy exercises and making sure that you're eating the proper diet. Those are things that are very important to help produce other types of arthritis that are causing inflammation. So having regular chiropractic has the benefit of not only aligning the joints, but as we were talking about improving the function of the nervous system, which helps the overall organs and systems of the body.

 

So when you start it's January and again, we're all on our Eat Healthy Lose Weight exercise for starting our New Year's resolutions. So when you're considering eating healthy and adding exercise, that's one of the other pieces that having a healthy nervous system and proper alignment helps with because it makes it easier to exercise, because when you're no longer having aches and pains and your joints, when you go to the gym and start working out, that allows you to continue your exercise program, because now when you start moving, you're not having pain.

 

But definitely, movement is important. Stretches and strengthening and the aerobic activity. All those things help maintain things once they're in alignment and then the proper nutrition. So avoiding foods that create inflammation a lot of times that's the number one, of course, is the sugar.

 

Okay.

 

Yeah. So avoiding sugar is a big key because that adds to inflammation and the joints and in the body in general. And then, of course, avoiding things.

 

Like. What we were talking about dairy and of course, gluten. Some people have found that by eliminating or reducing their intake of some of these foods helps them with the overall inflammation in their body. But that would be the number one with me. I was going to say pick anything to avoid that would be sugar. The next thing that many people have benefits from doing is avoiding gluten and replacing that with more vegetables and fruits in your diet, eating a greater quantity of that than of the other foods.

 

So reducing some of the fats and reducing the amount of if you're eating a lot of heavy pros proteins that also can burden the kidneys, like what we were talking about earlier and just kind of eating lean meats if you do eat meat. If you're vegetarian, kind of cut back on some of the unhealthy fats, like the canola oil or some of the unhealthy oils, replacing that with healthy oils like olive oil, coconut oil, avocado oil. All those things are beneficial in reducing the body's overall inflammation.

 

Inflammation is the biggest thing. That the biggest culprit for causing the arthritic pain.

 

Right. So there's different types of arthritis. We talked about the osteoarthritis caused by the misalignment and the joints, creating bone spurs, but sometimes coupled with that and other types of arthritis are basically causing inflammation, and that's where they're swelling around the joints. And so you can reduce that by changing things in your diet can help with that process as well.

 

So have some Chinese practices that you use and some other practices that you use in your chiropractic care. One of the things that's on your website is a sacred occipital.

 

Sacred occipital technique.

 

Very hard word for me to say. So what is that?

 

That's a method or a system in chiropractic where you're focusing on the function of the open or the a the cranium, the skull and its connection with the sacrum or the tailbone. And so there's a system called the cranial-sacral system in the body. And that's where the what is called the cerebral spinal fluid, which is a fluid that nurses the brain, the spinal cord and the nerves. It flows up and down the spine around the spinal cord itself, and it's pumped by the synchronous movement of the head and the tailbone.

 

Sacral occipital technique and cranial sacral technique. Those are all methods that help to create the proper movement in that system. So that fluid that nourishes the brain and the spinal cord flows properly. If there's a blockage, like if there's tension or misalignment at the base of the skull or on the tailbone, that can prevent that proper pumping action that moves that fluid around in the spinal cord D. So those methods Sacral occipital technique or cranial sacral or other methods that address the movement of the head and the plates or the bones within the skull, that helps facilitate that movement, which helps the nervous system, which ultimately helps create relaxation or reducing stress or increasing again, function in all the systems and organs in the body, which helps overall balance and holism and your body's ability to heal itself.

 

Okay. Now another thing that you practice is acupuncture, correct. And so does that go back to the Chinese meridians. The twelve is and that's when you open and close.

 

Right. So there's different methods of treating those meridians. One of them is acupuncture, and that's where you're using very fine needles that you insert in those little points that I've mentioned that are kind of like gates, like along the Mississippi River. You're stimulating and opening and closing those little gates and increasing the flow of energy and those meridians by stimulating the points. So you can do that with the needles. You can do that with acupressure, where you're just they're massaging those points or using gentle touch on the points.

 

You can do that with cupping. You may have heard of cupping. So there's lots of different methods Chigong that moves the energy through the channels in the meridians.

 

So do you do cupping at your clinic?

 

Yes, we do. I do cupping. And I also work with my husband, who's a massage therapist, is also trained in using cupping. His business is healing touch and we're in the same location. So we kind of refer back and forth. And so he does a lot of the muscular, skeletal bodywork, including cupping, massage, and active, isolated stretching.

 

Cupping has gotten kind of more notoriety. I guess if you get it with the Olympics, then people have the big area on their back, been on their bodies. And so it became more notable to people or people absolutely tend to notice it better. But it is actually an ancient technique that does

 

Yes, it is definitely.

And so how is cupping is used in the same way? It's a same type of procedure.

 

So you can use cupping in different ways. You can cup along the meridian, or you can also up just with the intent of bringing more blood and circulation into whatever area it is there's. The Olympians were using it or the athletes we're using it to kind of help them recover after their gain, their sport or whatever the event was that they were in. And a lot of times that's because the muscles start to tighten up. Or the Pasha, which is another tissue that's over the muscles can cause, can be a scar tissue that builds up in that that can start to make a stiffen up.

 

So the cupping helps to increase the nutrients flow through that area and helps to prevent or reduce the amount of scar tissue buildup or the tension that is created in that Fascia, the muscles after you've used them, or if you're just an average person that's been sitting around for a while and you're feeling stiff and sore, it helps to kind of loosen that up.

And so there's different ways that you can cut. There is procedure where you actually light.

 

Yes. So there's that called fire cupping, and it's all designed to create a vacuum inside the cup. And that vacuum is what you put on the tissue. And so it creates that section, which is what holds the cup in place. So you can create that vacuum with the fire cupping where you're using a fire inside the cup and that heats up the air, which creates the vacuum. Or they have other ones that I kind of like a little section gun that creates the vacuum. Using that you it's a plastic one.

 

You just attach it to the body and pump it up and it attaches itself through the vacuum created by the pump.

 

It is a very effective technique. I've had it done several times, actually, and it is very effective the first time you have it done, it kind of I'm sorry, but it kind of freaked me out a little bit freaked out. My husband, what happened to you? Do you like what they do to you? Exactly? How does some of the procedures that you do help with people who have sleep issues?

 

So definitely sleep is another thing that's important for longevity. And in addition to we were talking about diet and soon I just want to put a plugin for juicing and antioxidants and the importance of fruits and vegetables that are high in antioxidants before we get into the sleep part. But definitely sleeping is a key part of reducing your stress. And stress is one of the big things that creates aging in our body and in our organs. So getting a good night's sleep is important. So again, that goes back to things like exercise.

 

And one of the benefits also that people report with chiropractic again is being able to sleep, because a lot of times people are tossing and turning because they're in pain or their nervous system is out of balance. They're in fight or flight. And chiropractic can help rebalance that. So that helps to relax the overall nervous system, which helps you to sleep better. And again, exercise, getting the circulation flowing, some of the cranial sacral, the acupuncture, all those things that just get energy flowing in the body and reduce stress.

 

Dealing with your stress, I use a system called Health Kinesiology, which uses active pressure to reduce stress. And that basically in that system, you're using kinesiology to identify what the stress is. And then once you've identify it, you have the person think about it or feel it. And then you hold acupressure points to again rebalance the body's meridians that are being stressed by whatever that thought or feeling is that's keeping you up at night, so to speak. And so the more you can reduce your overall stress, the better you sleep, the better because high Cortisol levels, which is the stress hormone, affects your sleep also.

 

So that's why being able to find ways to relax. Deep breathing, yoga, meditation, all those things help or coping things that we can do to allow our bodies to relax. Just doing deep breathing is amazing. I would like we forget that something as simple as that. But breathing from your abdomen, just keeping slow, deep breath can flip you from being in that the little bit right. Mind racing to going back into that more calm, more balanced state of being.

 

And that's a great reminder for listeners. So thank you so much. Well, we are coming up on the end of this section, and I just want to remind people that to make an appointment with Dr. Forde, they can call 952-922-1478 or you can visit her website at GoldenSunChiro.com

 

Com.

 

Thank you so much for being with us today and for sharing your knowledge with us. We really appreciate it.

 

Thank you so much for having the Candi you are listening to.

 

Green Tea Conversations on Am 950 The Progressive Voice of Minnesota. We will be right back.