Have you ever experienced a traumatic event? If you have you are not alone. A recent survey of Americans found that 9 out of every 10 people have experienced at least one traumatic event in their life. If you have experienced a traumatic event, the experience could have affected your health and well-being as stress impacts your brain in a very specific way.

90% of Americans have experienced a least one traumatic event in their life

Sympathetic Nervous System

Your brain would have activated your sympathetic nervous system that releases hormones that flood your brain and body with adrenalin and cortisol. The brain’s alarm system – the emotional limbic part of your brain – is responsible for this and it also turns off your logical rational thinking part of your brain – the prefrontal cortex.

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Stress Relief

If you suspect your current health concerns could be due traumatic events from your past, seek help from trained health care providers, exercise regularly, do yoga and mindfulness meditation and regularly go see your family chiropractor so you can relax easier, feel better, be more resilient and function at your best!

Video References
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  2. Arnsten AF. Stress signalling pathways that impair prefrontal cortex structure and function. Nature Reviews Neuroscience. 2009;10(6):410.
  3. Arnsten AF, Raskind MA, Taylor FB, Connor DF. The effects of stress exposure on prefrontal cortex: Translating basic research into successful treatments for post-traumatic stress disorder. Neurobiology of stress. 2015;1:89-99.
  4. Thayer JF, Åhs F, Fredrikson M, Sollers III JJ, Wager TD. A meta-analysis of heart rate variability and neuroimaging studies: implications for heart rate variability as a marker of stress and health. Neurosci Biobehav Rev. 2012;36(2):747-756.
  5. Moench KM, Wellman CL. Review article: Stress-induced alterations in prefrontal dendritic spines: Implications for post-traumatic stress disorder. Neurosci Lett. 8/5/5 August 2015 2015;601:41-45.
  6. Van der Kolk BA. The body keeps the score: Brain, mind, and body in the healing of trauma: Penguin Books; 2015.
  7. Eden AS, Schreiber J, Anwander A, et al. Emotion regulation and trait anxiety are predicted by the microstructure of fibers between amygdala and prefrontal cortex. Journal of Neuroscience. 2015;35(15):6020-6027.
  8. Ghosal S, Hare BD, Duman RS. Prefrontal cortex GABAergic deficits and circuit dysfunction in the pathophysiology and treatment of chronic stress and depression. Current opinion in behavioral sciences. 2017;14:1-8.
  9. Treadway MT, Waskom ML, Dillon DG, et al. Illness progression, recent stress, and morphometry of hippocampal subfields and medial prefrontal cortex in major depression. Biological psychiatry. 2015;77(3):285-294.
  10. Webster M, Knable M, Johnston-Wilson N, Nagata K, Inagaki M, Yolken R. Immunohistochemical localization of phosphorylated glial fibrillary acidic protein in the prefrontal cortex and hippocampus from patients with schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, and depression. Brain Behav Immun. 2001;15(4):388-400.
  11. Butler D, Moseley GL. Explain Pain. Adelaide, Australia: Noigroup Publications; 2003.
  12. Haavik H, Murphy B. The role of spinal manipulation in addressing disordered sensorimotor integration and altered motor control. J Electromyogr Kines. October 2012 2012;22(5):768-776.

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