More Powerful Than Chiropractic

I had a patient once, a widow, who was suffering daily with neck pain and back pain.

The chiropractic adjustments would help relieve her discomfort, but I could tell that she wasn't healing. The adjustments were no better (in some respects) than a prescription painkiller: temporary, removing symptoms but not removing the cause...

This was very frustrating for me as a young chiropractor.  I believed my technique and recommendations were correct.  I was adjusting her two or three times a week.  I knew the subluxations were being corrected after each adjustment.  Why wasn't she getting better?

God love her, she hung in there with me.  She never deviated from my chiropractic care plan.  As weeks turned to months, however, I could begin to see in her eyes a growing discouragement behind her smile as she got off my adjusting table.  Eyes that seemed to ask, "Doc, when is this going to work?"

After about eighteen months of care, she stopped her adjustments.

I had failed.

But about a year after her last visit with me, unannounced she came bouncing back into my office.

Bouncing!

She was joyful, energetic, and excited.  There was a spark in her eyes that I did not see before.  When I asked her how she was feeling, she answered, "No pain, Doc.  No pain.  I feel wonderful!"

We talked for a while.  In my mind, I wondered if she had found a better, more skilled chiropractor than me, someone who was able to deliver a better adjustment.  An adjustment that actually helped her to start to heal!

Nope.

She was in love.  This wonderful lady had met a man and after years and years of loneliness, she was in love.  The two of them were about to take off on a trip to Asia.

Love.

As she hugged me and said goodbye (it was the last time I've seen her) I was so happy for her.  I was also greatly humbled with the realization that chiropractic is not the answer to every problem. Yes, chiropractic has the ability to restore the body's innate intelligence through an optimally functioning nervous system and this is a powerful, powerful thing.

But it cannot mend a broken heart.

Only love can.  And love, I now know, is ultimately the greatest healing power of all.

Comments

[Jackson]

WOW.