Does Chiropractic Care Make You Taller?
We talk a lot about posture with our clients and how we need to pull our shoulders back and bring our chin into our chest to allow our body to extend and keep us upright.
Many clients ask us if they will be taller after they’ve had a series of Chiropractic adjustments.
How does this work and are we making people taller?
Let’s first talk about the spinal anatomy and what happens to make people appear smaller over a period. When you wake up in the morning, you will always be taller than you are last thing at night. This Is because we have squishy intervertebral discs in between the vertebra.
We’ve talked about this lots before. Remember it’s like a jam doughnut made up of a soft centre and then a tough outer ring. The centre is what gives the disc its height and as we get up in the morning, we stand up and put weight through our discs. This means the centre then gets compressed.
They will get compressed between one to two millimetres and if you think there are over 20 discs in the spine, it can be quite a lot of height we could potentially lose over a period of 16 hours whilst we are awake.
In the long term, as the structure in the spine changes, this can often make it appear that people are smaller. You’ve often seen older people as they tend to stoop. The head comes forward, the shoulders begin to round. They will lose their height purely from a structural perspective.
If we were stretch them out, they would probably be the same height as they always were. It’s just the way they’re holding themselves, this is how people get taller with Chiropractic care as we change the structure.
As you begin to increase the extension through the base of the spine and bring your shoulders back and the head up, it allows you to stand much taller and to feel taller.
How do Chiropractic adjustments work?
On an individual vertebral level, we’re looking to align the vertebra to take pressure off the nerve to allow people to function better. Overall, the nervous system then functions well, creating better health and optimised body.
As the vertebra gets adjusted, it will come into the right position, which will then increase the curve through the spine. The main one that we change is the neck curve. As the neck curve comes back, the weight is then loaded through the facet joints, which are the springy joints at the back of the neck and the head will be drawn back across the shoulders. This will then make the person feel taller.
Will they stay their long term? If the person continues to sit behind a desk or practice poor posture, then no. The problem will come back over a period. Not immediately but it will come back. You need to practice good spinal hygiene or get maintenance adjustments to keep your body in the best position.
A lot of clients ask us if they need to come for the rest of their life. It’s simply not the case. If you can manage the issue yourself with some light exercise, practicing good habits, not slumping, then your posture will remain good long term and your height will maintain.
If you ever come into an accident, traffic accident or fall or a bump or any whiplash, I would always recommend coming in and getting checked just to make sure that everything is still OK.
If you’re looking for a couple of extra inches on your height, then why not give us a shout? We would do a full assessment, then we take a posture photograph with our app and then we can see where you may be lacking some height and we can make some minor tweaks in order to improve your posture and you’re positioning.
If you do know someone who is struggling with their posture, please send them our details. You can send them this blog and they can request a free copy of our book which has posture related exercises in it as well. Click here for FREE book.
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