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#181 THE LONGEST HOUSE CALL

2/20/2018

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I’m sitting in the co-pilot’s seat of a Cirrus G3 propeller driven 4-seater plane.  My right hand is on the control stick.  We took off from Santa Barbara airport heading south back to Fullerton, just passing over Oxnard air space.  My wife, Diana, is in the left rear seat.  The pilot, Aria, is to my left.  “See that mountain over there.  Head toward that and maintain our altitude at 5,500’… now bank to the right heading toward Point Loma and then take it down to 3,500’ at a descent rate of 500’/minute.  That’s a comfortable descent rate for passengers.”  My first and probably last flying lesson, lasting about 10-15 minutes.  I didn’t break the plane.  That’s a good thing.  How did I get here?
 
            It all started about 18 years ago when a young attorney walked into my office with terrible lower back pain.  He was bent over a bit.  Had a rough time getting out of a chair.  He was desperate.  It was not his first time like this either.  He had tried other chiropractors with no success.  But what else was there for him to do?  Drugs…not a viable option for this young man.  Surgery…not a candidate, nor a viable option either.  So in he walks into my office.  I listened to him.  I examined him.  I took his x-rays.  Then I did something no chiropractor had done before, or has been able to duplicate on him since.  To be just a bit technical, I did a base-posterior adjustment of the sacrum with a superior to inferior torque.  Right after the adjustment he got off the table nearly 100% pain-free, a rare but wonderful outcome.  A true success story.
 
I would take care of him, his then wife, his kids, and his brother for several years as he began his young law career.  He was one of those types that was self-assured, even cocky, some would think him arrogant.  Within about 5 years he had sold his house in Southridge and moved on.  I saw him a couple of times when he would limp into my office needing a fix and happened to be in the area.  He kept trying chiropractors wherever he was, since his back would “go out” far too often.  He even tried several chiropractors who were “experts” in the Gonstead technique, the same technique I use, the same technique that taught me the base-posterior adjustment that provides instantaneous relief to this young attorney.  And then I heard nothing from him for several years until last Friday.
 
I played the voice mail left by him on my cell.  “My back has gone out,” he says.  “I would really appreciate your help.  Are you willing to make a house call?  No other chiropractors can do what you do.  I’ve tried them all.  By the way, I live in Ojai now!!”  For those of you who don’t know, Ojai is inland, sort of in between Ventura and Santa Barbara, at least a 2-1/2 hour drive from here.  I’m not driving to Ojai to make a house call.  I don’t drive to Fontana from my home in Yorba Linda for house calls.  But he needed my help.  I couldn’t leave him high and dry.  So I called him back and we settled on a plan.
 
In the intervening years he had become quite successful, so he sent one of his three planes to pick up me and my wife in Fullerton and flew us to Santa Barbara where I had arranged for a very good Gonstead chiropractor to accept him as a new patient.  I adjusted his lower back to demonstrate the technique to the new doctor, got a Starbucks, got on the plane, took my flying lesson, and went home.  The longest house call of my career.  What a day.  You just never know what tomorrow may bring.  
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    Dr. Rick

    After writing an article per week for a year, I just kept going.  These are most of my collection.  They are written with my existing patients in mind, so some stuff may seem odd or unusual, but would make perfect sense to those who know chiropractic and who know me.  Enjoy and share!  For my personal blog visit: 

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Yolanda wrote:
     
     I used to suffer severe headaches and migraines on a daily basis, usually all day.  I managed to work in an office because I had to.  When I went home at the end of the day I would often close the shades and go to bed.  I could not plan weekend events because I simply never knew how I was going to feel tomorrow.  If there were a special event such as a birthday or wedding, I would begin to medicate myself two weeks in advance to give myself the best chance of making the event.
     Friends and fellow church-goers had been trying to get me to see Dr. Rick for some time before I finally gave in.  Looking back, I don’t know why I waited.  Within a month, I was headache free.  I couldn’t remember what it was like to not feel pain.  I could do whatever I wanted and not live in fear of the headache.  This was a miracle for me, but the story does not end here.
     An opportunity came up for us to adopt a newborn baby girl not long after I began chiropractic care.  This baby was particularly important to me and my husband because her mother is a relative.  Tragically, her mother was also a drug user and did drugs during her pregnancy.  If we could not adopt the baby she would have been put into the foster system since the biological mother was incapable of raising her.
     To keep a long story short, we did adopt her and she is doing fantastically.  There is no sign of any effect of the drugs on her as of yet, and with God’s help, there never will be.  We think that is because of the vast amounts of love and attention she gets from us, her real mommy and daddy.
     What does this have to do with chiropractic?  The reality is that without chiropractic, I would still be nearly an invalid with headaches.  I COULD NOT HAVE TAKEN CARE OF AN INFANT OR RAISED A YOUNG CHILD.  THEREFORE, SHE WOULD NOT HAVE ANY OF THE OPPORTUNITIES IN LIFE THAT MY HUSBAND AND I WILL BE ABLE TO PROVIDE FOR HER.  MY DAUGHTER’S LIFE IS POSSIBLE BECAUSE SOMEBODY MADE ME GO TO A CHIROPRACTOR. 
     You need to tell everyone you know what you know about chiropractic.  Who knows who’s life you will change too.
Andrew's mother, Barbara, wrote:

     Hello, My name is Andrew and I am a happy, healthy one year old.  But I wasn’t so happy or healthy when I first met Dr. Rick a few months ago.  I had been having problems with my ears for four months, I couldn’t sleep at night and I was miserable.  We’d been to the doctor lots of times but nothing was helping.  In fact, all the medicines the doctor had tried seemed to make me worse instead of better!  Both the regular doctor and the Ear-Nose and Throat doctor said that if the antibiotics didn’t work, then they’d just have to put tubes in.  Now my Mom and dad weren’t about to let them do surgery on me, especially since they had been reading and learned that tubes can cause more problems than they solve.  My mom and dad did a lot of praying.  Then my mom heard that sometimes babies who have a traumatic birth like mine have ear trouble.  You see when I was born they used a vacuum extractor and forceps to pull me out.  I guess all that yanking on my head, hurt my neck.  She also heard that chiropractic care can be the answer.  Now she was skeptical because she couldn’t imagine a chiropractor helping ear infections!?!  But at that point she was willing to try anything!!  Happily, a few weeks of adjustments and my ears were all cleared up.  In addition, I no longer had a stiff neck or shoulders and my whole personality was happier.  I have to tell all babies who have ear troubles, don’t let them give you tubes until you at least try chiropractic care first.  After all, it can’t hurt and if you’re like me, you could be perfectly well with no drugs and no surgery.  In my family, we thank God for Dr. Rick, because I feel better, my mom and dad are happier and sometimes, I even sleep through the night.