Fatigue and Forward Head Posture

Importance of Head Posture

Breakthrough research reveals the importance of your head position in relationship to your health. It’s critical that the position of your neck allows your head to sit directly above your shoulders. Unfortunately, the effects of gravity, poor posture, the weight of the head, or past trauma can cause neck and skull misplacement, leading to a condition called “Forward Head Syndrome.” This syndrome, which is often accompanied by the loss of the normal neck curve, is when the chin juts out in front of the shoulders and chest and causes pathological (disease-causing) tension on the spinal cord and brain stem.

In his prize-winning book, “Rejuvenation Strategy,” Dr. Rene Cailliet, director of Medicine and Rehabilitation at the University of California, wrote this description of the deadly forward head syndrome, as well as the humpback syndrome:

1. Incorrect head position leads to improper spinal function. (It is a major and complex form of vertebral subluxation).
2. Forward Head Posture can add up to 30 pounds of abnormal load on the cervical spine.
3. Forward Head Syndrome results in loss of vital capacity. Lung capacity is depleted by as much as 30 percent. Loss of lung capacity leads to heart and blood vascular problems. (Try it yourself – Stick your chin out and then tuck it into your chest; now, try to take a big breath in through your nose. You can barely do it!
4. The entire gastrointestinal system is affected, particularly the large intestine. Loss of good bowel peristaltic function (regular bowel movement) and evacuation is common to people how suffer from Forward Head Syndrome and loss of neck curve.
5. Forward Head Syndrome causes an increase in discomfort and pain. Freedom of motion in the first four cervical vertebrae is a major source of stimuli that causes production of endorphins. As a result of this loss of endorphins (hormones that reduce pain and affect emotions), many otherwise non-painful sensations are experienced as discomfort.
6. Forward Head Syndrome causes loss of healthy spine-body motion. The entire body becomes rigid as the range of motion becomes diminished, and the person’s body becomes hunched.
7. In an October 2004 study published in the Journal of the American Geriatrics Society, forward head syndrome was found to significantly increase the likelihood of death. Further studies found humpback syndrome to both increase Uterine Prolapse and decreased physical function and mobility, respectively.

Nutrients essential to the brain for survival – such as oxygen, glucose, and others – are transported from the body to the brain through the fluid that flows inside your spinal canal. This fluid is called the Cerebrospinal Fluid (brain-spine) fluid, or CSF. Forward Head Posture and other subluxations will lead to abnormal and reduced flow of oxygen, glucose and other important nutrients to the brain.

That is why the spine-brain connection is so important for the entirety of your life.

A bad back or a bad neck will literally give you a bad brain!!! Correcting and maintaining your spine not only gets you functioning better, it gets you thinking better!

Dr. Roger Sperry, the 1980 Nobel Prize recipient for brain research, has demonstrated that ninety percent (90%) of ALL the energy output from the brain is used for posture alone – keeping the body upright under gravity. Only ten percent (10%) has to do with thinking, metabolism, and healing.

The poorer your posture, the harder your brain has to work to keep you upright, leading to a lifetime of chronic fatigue, impaired concentration and a virtual ‘trance-like’ state.

The better your posture, the more usable energy your brain has for other things, such as thinking, metabolizing, healing, digestion, reproducing ……OH, AND LIVING!!!

This is yet another great reason to be 100% committed to reducing your Forward Head Posture through maintaining your originally scheduled adjustment (OSA) and doing your traction as per your doctor’s recommendations.

Forward Head Posture robs your brain and body of life…the more Forward Head Posture you have, the less energy your brain and body have for living. Reduce it, correct it, maintain it for life! Contact us today at (214) 972-0302.