Hi, I’m at Dr. Steph with Stay Mobile KC. I’m the chiropractor who comes to you, whether at home or at work. I make house calls.
So today I want to talk to you about this idea that a problem in your back can cause pain or problems in your hips, knees, and ankles. Now, I remember wondering, “How does that work?” and asking about it and the answer was, “It’s all connected.” Well, that answer just doesn’t cut it with me. Today I’m bringing you an explanation of ONE of the ways that problems in your back can cause pain and problems and altered wear in your hips, knees and ankles.
Let’s start by looking at this picture. Now, notice there is a green line drawn straight up from her ankle. All the joints of her body should be lined up on that green line because that green line represents the weight, the force, straight up from her foundation, which is her ankle, where her leg attaches to her foot. If everything’s lined up above that, then she’s being well supported by her foundation. But look here, if you actually look at the picture, her hips, knees and ankles, represented by the yellow line, or identified by that yellow line, are actually forward of that green line. That means she’s falling forward. And in order to explain how this illustrates problems in your back affecting your hips, knees and ankles, let’s switch gears a little bit and go to talking about some buildings.
So let’s look at this first building and think about the architect who planned this. They planned for the weight of the material of the top of the building to be supported by the structures at the bottom. So those structures at the bottom are supporting the weight of everything above it. It’s the same with our bodies: the structures at the base support the weight of everything above it.
But we haven’t finished this explanation yet. Let’s look now at the leaning tower of Pisa. So this tower, imagine it’s being designed. It’s being designed in the same way, so that the structures at the bottom support the weight and the force of gravity pulling on all the materials at the top. But, it shifts, and that gravity is still going down in this direction but the joints are now angled. That force is still going straight down here, but it’s wearing an altered angle now. So, you can imagine that when it’s designed to be supported in this direction, but it actually tilts and it starts wearing down in this direction, that alters the wear on those joints.
Now, lets look back at the pictures again. Here’s her before picture where everything is pushed forward and just like the other pictures I’ve shown you, the directions before each of these pictures is, “Breathe in, breathe out and let your body relax or slump. So after that first picture was taken, she had several treatments where the vertebra that were stuck forward were identified and those precise segments were moved backwards, towards the back of her body, to bring her more upright and here is the after picture of the results of several treatments. As you can see, that yellow line is much closer to the green line and much, most of it is right on it, so her body has been brought back into much better posture, much more upright.
So, I hope that explanation makes it clear to you and helps you to understand how a problem in your spine, how something stuck forward in your spine can cause altered wear and pain in your, in the joints below in your hips, knees and ankles.
I’m Dr. Steph with Stay Mobile Chiropractic in Kansas City and I look forward to seeing you again next time.
September 24, 2019
