Its Here Again!

Can you believe that this past year went so fast?  It truly is remarkable.  It seems like I was just writing last year's holiday newsletter. ( It was a pretty good one too....its still posted...go read it!) 

I would consider stopping to smell the roses, but they won't be back around until it thaws.   Even though we don't have snow yet, remember to stow a 'snow pack' in your vehicle with candy, a flashlight and disposable heat packs that hunters use in their gloves and shoes.  You never know when you may get stranded!

This issue will be a fun, light-hearted newsletter.  I will still have pertinent information that will be of value in your life, but during this Holiday Season, we should have some fun as well.

I haven't told any stories lately, so I thought that I would tell you about Santa's trip to the Chiropractor.  I had fun writing it and even I wasn't sure what the ending would be.  I wonder if Steven King has the same problem?  Now wouldn't that be a Christmas story?

I have included an interesting article on thyroid disorders and how prevalent thyroid problems may actually be in our society.  A common problem with detecting a thyroid disorder is that it may mimic something else!

Also, there is a very interesting article on how the brain works.  The 80% of brain mass that we supposedly never use actually does have a use.

How we determine what something means is based on life experiences, both good and bad.  Therefore, the majority of our physical brain is used for the integration and association of what people, places, and things actually mean!

This month Eileen brings you a family tradition of holiday waffles.  I guarantee that you will fall in love with this recipe! 

I hope that you have enjoyed another year of Dr. Frisch's ENews.  If you have any topics  that you may enjoy hearing more about, just send me an email at dr.frisch@att.net and I will do my best to accommodate your wishes.

Have a great Holiday Season!

Dr. Frisch

HAPPY HOLIDAYS!

Santa Visits the Chiropractor

Santa has a problem.  It's not that he got stuck in the chimney, or that he dropped his bag of toys trying to get out, or even that he fell off of the roof squeezing out of the chimney.  Santa's problem is that he hurt his back during the fall and he can't stand up!  He even crawled over to his bag on the ground, opened a tube of 'icy-hot' (for grandma) and used it liberally. He saw last year's hot item, the 'Clapper', in the bag as well. He wasn't sure if banging on that thing a couple of times would help or not, but on television it seemed to work for every ailment known to man.  

So, after he clapped on and off for what seemed like an eternity, the icy-hot seemed to kick in a little bit and his back started to get warm.  This, however, was not a good thing because the area began to swell (that's what heat does) .  Soon, the low back swelling 'puffed out' over the top of his already overly, tight red pants and began to throb.  Mrs. Clause had been all over him to exercise and lose a few pounds during the off-season.  She had even bought him the new Atkins Diet book, thinking that he would give it a go, but he hadn't bothered to even open the cover.  Now though, he wished that he had paid more attention.  Not having any other choice, he went back to his large red bag of toys looking for options.  

The first thing that that caught his attention was a box of frozen Kansas City Steaks.  "Wait a minute", he thought.  "If I put a cold steak on my back it should help with the swelling, just like in the old 'Rocky' movies."  The problem was that first, he couldn't get the frozen steak tucked down the back of his pants and second, he still couldn't get off the ground.  Luckily, the yard was dark and there was no traffic at this time of night.

His search of the bag had revealed a pair of Sans-A-Belt slacks.  "I love these things", he said.  The stretch band would allow the steak to slip down nicely and and it seemed better than any diet plan he could think of.  He knew already that next year's suit would be Sans-A-Belt.  So, off with the suit pants and on with the no-belt slacks.  It seemed to work well, but the steak was too cold.  He had remembered seeing some red oven mitts in the bag, so he dropped the steak into one and slid it back down his pants.  He thought to himself, " I've got the hang of this now!"  He would just lay there for a few minutes until the pain went away.... it had to go away....didn't it?

What Santa hadn't planned on was the owner of the house having a dog.  Not a mean dog, just a large, fat, happy, yellow dog..... who happened to like meat!  This was a difficult situation for Santa because he had a bad back and he could only roll from his belly to his back, which seemed like play-time for the overweight dog, who still wanted the meat that he had stuffed in a mitt and then down his pants.

Santa, decided to improvise.  He crawled into the large red toy bag thinking that the dog would leave him alone, but no, the dog dived into the bag just as Santa was closing the drawstring.  The tussle that ensued made for quite a sight.  The noise coming from that bag full of toys awoke the owner of the house, who then called the police.

The nice policemen couldn't stop laughing as their spotlights shone on the bag, which by now had only Santa's legs sticking out of the bag and what looked like a dog with an oven mitt for a head.  Santa was quite embarrassed as he tried to explain to the nice officers how he had come to end up in the bag with a dog, looking like a seven layer salad, and smelling like grandma in a pair of Sans-A-Belt slacks.  

Policemen like a good joke, but they also knew Santa was in trouble.  They helped him up to the house of whose roof he had recently fallen off, and the owner welcomed him in.  The owner was a nice young chap who also happened to be a Chiropractor.  "Oh no", thought Santa, "Not the bone crusher."  The doctor was nice, however and promised that it wouldn't hurt because he used an Activator Instrument.

The Chiropractor fixed Santa right up.  He also gave Santa a shiny, new ice pack and threw the steak back to the dog, who happily went on his merry way.  Before leaving, Santa was given exercises for his weakened low back and a copy of the Atkins Diet Book that the doctor had recently purchased for himself.  Santa politely took it, without saying he already had one.  He offered an IOU to the Chiropractor for the Sans-A-Belt slacks (they were for him) and a promise of something extra in his stocking.  

It wasn't until everything was cleaned up and the toys were back in the bag and loaded on the sleigh that Santa realized that Rudolph and the others had been doing Chinese fire drills in his absence, and none of the reindeer were where they were supposed to be.  The deer were laughing, the policemen were still laughing, and Santa just realized that the dog had bitten a large hole in the seat of his newly acquired slacks......the temperature was dropping......it was going to be a very long night.  

Santa's Elves Found!

An October, 2004 report published in the journal "Nature" describes a culture of people who were no more than three feet tall!

This is not a joke or a hoax.  Anthropologists have actually found physical evidence of this minute culture of people.  They were performing studies in an Indonesian island cave, near Australia, when the discovery was made.

Initially the findings were thought to be a mutation or some other anomaly, but now, at least 7 human remains have been found and they are all little people!

The researchers were associated with several major Universities in Australia.  They described the small humanoids (hominins) as having a brain no larger than a grapefruit, but they did craft tools and shelters (caves), as well as hunt and control fire, as evident by charred remains of pygmy elephants and Komodo dragons within the caves.  Imagine being 3 feet tall and attacking a Komodo dragon!  Wow!

The little ones existed between 95,000 and 13,000 years ago.  This is quite an extended time period for such a unique culture.

Modern humans (homo erectus) reached Australia by about 45,000 years ago.  This would mean that the two groups may likely have encountered one another over the 27,000 years of a somewhat co-existence.

What happened to them?

Evidence of their demise lies in geological records.  There was a massive volcano eruption on the island about 12,000 years ago, which may have extinguished this race of humans completely.  The first signs of modern human activity on the island is dated at about 11,000 years ago.

Island folklore has described the little people and Dutch records from the 1500's describe little people who lived in caves.  Who knows? Maybe a few did survive the volcano and proliferated for a time.

This is a fascinating story and I can't wait to see a re-creation of what they really looked like!

See, I told you that this issue is about having fun!

Santa....I Want a New Thyroid!

The thyroid is a gland that is located in the front of your neck behind your 'Adam's Apple'.  It is an important gland that helps to control every cell in your body.  It aids in cell replication and healing, as well as organ and muscle function and regeneration.

What this all means is that the thyroid gland is responsible for your body's metabolism!

When your thyroid gland underproduces or overproduces the thyroid hormone, you will likely feel 'out of sorts', but you may not know what is wrong.  There may be days when you are very hungry or not hungry at all.  Your skin may become dry and flakey or you may notice that for some unknown reason you are putting on weight.

Because the thyroid gland produces so many different actions within the body, it may be quite some time before your doctor can get a handle on what is wrong with you.  It's not that your doctor is incompetent, but rather, it can be that difficult to diagnose. 

Simply putting someone on thyroid medication for an underactive thyroid or burning out part of the thyroid due to an overactive thyroid is not always the answer.  The gland may be over or under producing as a result of a disease process or a physical malady somewhere else in the body! 

Because the thyroid is a gland, it releases hormonal chemicals that do many things in the body.  When you alter the way that the thyroid releases chemicals and the volume of chemicals released, you will also alter other functions in the body!  This means that you and your doctor may have to weigh the benefits against the detriments of doing anything with the thyroid at all!

If you have not been feeling your normal self for quite a while, and its not just the 'Holiday Blues', I do recommend a physical with your doctor.  You may even have to suggest a thyroid evaluation to him or her.  The blood test is often not part of a normal routine screening, even though it probably should be!  If you think that only younger people can be affected, you would be wrong.  People over 60 years of age are often undiagnosed with a thyroid problem because it can masquerade itself as another disease like heart disease, depression or even dementia!  

It is estimated that up to 12.2 million Americans may have an undiagnosed thyroid problem.  Most of those will have hypothyroidism (underactive), but up to 2.6 million may have hyperthyroidism (overactive).

For those of you old enough to remember Marty Feldman (Igor) in the Mel Brook's movie, 'Young Frankenstein', you likely would remember his bulging eyes.  He had thyroid disease.  That is why he looked the way that he did!  I was told that his death was also related to his thyroid disorder.

Thyroid disease is a serious condition, but like I have stated, it is often undiagnosed or slow-to-be-diagnosed.  You may have to be your own Santa Clause and request that the test be performed from time-to-time as you get older.

Statistics reprinted from the Harvard School of Medicine Special Supplement. Copyright 2004

Eileen's Corner

This is an old family recipe.  My mother first got this recipe off of an Occident Flour bag in the early 1940's.  I grew up eating these waffles and they are still the best that I have eaten.  They will be slightly crispy on the outside, but still light and fluffy inside when they are cooked properly.  These are 'everyday' waffles that I hope become a tradition with your family!  

Have a wonderful Holiday Season and remember to enjoy the people that you are with and the food that you share together!

Eileen

What is the "Meaning" of Christmas?

What is real and what is made up in our heads?  In trying to determine this, scientist researchers at the University of Rochester in New York had ferrets watch a movie called 'The Matrix", starring Keanu Reeves.  The research team literally tried to get inside the ferret's thinking process!  The results were published in the medical journal Nature.

The researchers wired the brains of the young, middle age and mature ferrets and then exposed them to three separate conditions.  First, the ferrets watched the movie with Keanu Reeves, followed by watching TV static, and then they sat in complete darkness.

This was a unique study because it was really measuring what happened internally in the ferret's brain when influence by outside stimulation, or lack of it, using three levels of ferret maturity.

It was found that the youngest ferrets elicited NO visual brain activity when sitting in the dark, but the middle and mature ferrets had visual cortex activity, even when left alone in the dark.  This means that there is order in the brain that is dependent on past experiences as it applies to current situations.  

Additionally, when the middle and mature ferrets watched the movie or TV static, their brain activity actually increased by 20 %.  This was not seen in the young ferrets.

What Does This All Mean?

The findings of this study correlate to human studies which report that only about 20% of our brain is used to take in information from the outside world.  The seemingly, 'unused' 80% of our brain is actually used for correlating and interpreting incoming data with what is already known or experienced!  It brings meaning to situations, events, and even people!  

The researchers explained like this:

"Our brain is like the ocean...where you have 2-mile deep waters and tiny ripples on the surface.  The ripples are the sensory input, underneath is the 2-mile unknown internal activity."

This study is going to be reproduced with some variations in the near future.  The scientists want to alter the ferrets 'normal' environment to see if their reality and interpretation will change as well.

My Conclusion

It is for this exact reason that I began using Clinical Hypnosis 8 years ago in my practice.  It addresses the underlying brain neurology of which you are not consciously in control.  A patient's  interpretation of daily, sensory information may be in direct conflict with their physical or emotional health, and they may not know why.  Past experiences, both physical and emotional, do have an affect on every person's current-day, physical thought processes and behavior. Behavior may be affected, but often not with the typical 'Just Say No' mentality.  

The fix is considerably more complicated because the brain state of 'conscious' thinking is not what rules the higher-order brain processes.  Those of you who have experienced some of the clinic's programs know what I am talking about!  It is exciting, however, to see that University and Medical research is beginning to understand the connection between the brain and body.  Even basic Chiropractic is validated each and every time a study like this appears!  There is more to Chiropractic than just 'shoving bones around'!  Chiropractic is based in neurology!

My clinic will continue to bring you cutting-edge technology and research supported treatments.  This next year will be exciting one!  I will be implementing several new procedural therapies that will be unavailable anywhere else.  I will share the technology when it is time!  I shant break the piñata before the party starts!!!!!

"I would like to thank each and every one of you for you trust and support over the past year and I look forward to providing continued care for you and your families in the upcoming year."

Have a Fabulous Christmas Holiday Season!

Dr. Frisch