Letters – Parent applauds doctor for infant care

To the Editor:

I am writing this letter in order to share my wonderful experience with chiropractic care for my nine month old.

When my son was six months old, I was told he had hypotonia (low tone muscle). He was unable to hold his own head up or sit on his own, and this led to many other delays with feeding, socializing and gross motor skills. As a parent, I wanted to d

o whatever it took to help him, so I got him enrolled in services and he began receiving physical therapy three times per month and I was working with him at home.

The therapy seemed to be helping, but he still couldn’t hold his head up fully. I had started visiting a chiropractic clinic for myself and was having good results, and during one of my visits I mentioned the problems my son was having to Dr. Todd Richards.

He told me that children can begin receiving chiropractic care at birth and that the event of birth can be traumatic to the spine. At first, I was a little skeptical, and after doing some research I was even more confused. Who knew taking an eight month old to the chiropractor would be so controversial! I used my best judgment and decided that it was worth a try to help my little guy out.

At the first visit, Dr. Richards started very slowly with him. I was surprised to see how my son giggled as the Dr. realigned the bones in his neck. Within the first 20 minutes of our visit my son was supporting his own head!

The doctor informed me that I really needed to watch and protect him when he threw his head backwards as he was possibly giving himself whiplash every time. For 10 minutes we tried to get him to throw his head back so he could show me how to protect it, but we could not get him to do it as he had been before we came into the office. I was amazed at the transformation that had happened in only 30 minutes. My son has since been back to visit one more time, and loves to go see the doctor.

I now have a nine and a half month old that holds up his own head and is getting closer every day to sitting on his own. He also plays with toys, reaches for things, and is working hard on feeding himself! I attribute  the head control he gained to the chiropractic care he received, and I will recommend this and physical therapy to any mother who is struggling with the same issues.

It can be very hard to determine the “right” thing to do when you are trying to help a child who needs special attention, but I am so glad I took the leap of faith with Dr. Richards and got my son the care that he needed.

Sincerely,

CJ Jakel