{"id":241,"date":"2010-04-05T13:42:27","date_gmt":"2010-04-05T20:42:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/eastendchiro.com\/?p=241"},"modified":"2010-04-05T13:42:27","modified_gmt":"2010-04-05T20:42:27","slug":"seven-years-why-i-became-a-chiropractor","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/eastendchiro.com\/seven-years-why-i-became-a-chiropractor\/","title":{"rendered":"Seven Years (Why I Became a Chiropractor)"},"content":{"rendered":"

Seven Years<\/strong><\/p>\n

Seven years.\u00a0 That\u2019s how long I lived with lower back pain.<\/p>\n

It started my senior year of high school in weightlifting class. \u00a0I was a pretty small dude and I wanted to bulk up some.\u00a0 I worked very hard in that class and did bulk up a little bit, at the expense of my back.<\/p>\n

The pain was in the left side of my rear-end and radiated to the back part of my thigh, all the way to the knee.\u00a0 Sitting was excruciating.\u00a0 Bending was very limited.\u00a0 Standing up after being seated was a 5-minute ordeal.\u00a0 I was moving like an old man and I was only in my early 20\u2019s!<\/p>\n

I went to a walk-in medical clinic.\u00a0 The doc prescribed a muscle relaxer.\u00a0 It didn\u2019t help.\u00a0 I went back.\u00a0 He prescribed a narcotic pain-killer and gave me a page of back stretches to do (which I found nearly impossible to perform).\u00a0 The pain- killer made me feel great at least while I was on the painkiller.\u00a0 Maybe a little too great.\u00a0 I found myself well on my way to becoming a narcotic addict.\u00a0 I went back to the doc and asked him if I should go to a chiropractor to which he responded \u201cabsolutely not!\u00a0 Chiropractors paralyze people!\u201d\u00a0 I took the advice of this misinformed doctor and just lived in pain.<\/p>\n

My first run-in with a chiropractor took place at church.\u00a0 I had gone on a two-week tour of Israel and one of the other tourists was the wife of a chiropractor.\u00a0 She became like a second-mom.\u00a0 I started hanging out with this family after church and even went to their house for Easter dinner (in 2000).\u00a0 It was on that day that Dr. Don noticed that I was walking with a limp.\u00a0 He said \u201cI bet you have pain in the left butt and it goes down the back of your thigh about to your knee. . .\u201d\u00a0 I was flat-out impressed that someone could figure that out just by seeing me walk.\u00a0 He invited me to come \u201chang out\u201d in his office and see what chiropractic was all about.<\/p>\n

To my amazement, I didn\u2019t see anybody get paralyzed!\u00a0 I heard no screams.\u00a0 In fact, people actually felt better immediately after treatment without being high on drugs!<\/p>\n

I decided it was worth a try.\u00a0 On my first visit as a chiropractic patient, I was so impressed with this doctor!\u00a0 He did a series of orthopedic and neurological tests and a set of x-rays.\u00a0 He showed me exactly what was wrong and told me what it would take to get me feeling better.<\/p>\n

After two weeks of chiropractic treatment I was a new man!\u00a0 I had nearly full, pain-free range of motion in my lower back.\u00a0 He found some things in my neck that weren\u2019t working quite right either and got that taken care of. (I just thought it was normal to have a very stiff neck and not be able to turn my head after sitting in the car for about 30 minutes)\u00a0 I was sleeping better because I could turn in bed without pain.<\/p>\n

This was also a point in my life where I really needed to make a career choice.\u00a0 I was a psychology major in college and was pretty sure I didn\u2019t want to be a psychologist.\u00a0 I was interested in medicine, but not that impressed with how conventional medicine treated me and my condition.\u00a0 The logical choice, then, was to become a chiropractor.\u00a0 I finished up some pre-med requirements, and off to Logan University in St. Louis, where I graduated as a Doctor of Chiropractic just four years later!<\/p>\n

I love doing what I do.\u00a0 Now I<\/em> can tell people where they hurt just by watching them walk.\u00a0 Now I<\/em> can alleviate most headache syndromes, help fathers and mothers regain their ability to lift their children into their arms again, get runners back in races, help students with tight necks and shoulders focus on their professors rather than on how to get comfortable . . .\u00a0 I could go on and on about how I\u2019ve been able to change so many lives.<\/p>\n

So when it comes down to it, I\u2019m glad I had those seven years of pain.\u00a0 It was a great lesson.\u00a0 It taught me to truly sympathize with my patients.\u00a0 When I realized how quickly my problem could be alleviated, I was introduced to an excellent career!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Seven Years Seven years.\u00a0 That\u2019s how long I lived with lower back pain. It started my senior year of high school in weightlifting class. \u00a0I was a pretty small dude and I wanted to bulk up some.\u00a0 I worked very hard in that class and did bulk up a little bit, at the expense of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"yoast_head":"\nSeven Years (Why I Became a Chiropractor) - East End Chiropractic<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/eastendchiro.com\/seven-years-why-i-became-a-chiropractor\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Seven Years (Why I Became a Chiropractor) - East End Chiropractic\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Seven Years Seven years.\u00a0 That\u2019s how long I lived with lower back pain. 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