36 - From Bump to Baby: How Chiropractic Supports Pregnancy, Postpartum, Infants & Children (Guest: Dr. Emma Swartling from Lumos Chiropractic)

In this can’t-miss episode of Doula Talk: Postpartum, Babies, and the Battle for Sleep, Deb sits down with Dr. Emma Swartling of Lumos Chiropractic for a deep (and surprisingly fun!) dive into what chiropractic care actually is—and why it might be the secret weapon every new parent didn’t know they needed.

Whether you’re pregnant, postpartum, or caring for a baby who seems uncomfortable no matter what you do, this episode is packed with aha moments. Dr. Emma breaks down the magic of nervous system regulation, explains why pregnancy pain is more than just “normal,” and demystifies infant chiropractic care (nope, it’s not bone cracking—it’s more like melting butter). From pelvic alignment and round ligament pain to fussy car rides, reflux, and tongue ties, Deb and Dr. Emma walk listeners through how bodywork can gently support comfort, development, and yes, even better sleep.

Listeners will also get the inside scoop on:

• How chiropractic care supports feeding challenges (spoiler: it’s not always a latch issue)
• What to know before and after a tongue tie release (including why bodywork should be part of your plan)
• The brain-body connection in infancy and childhood—and how supporting it early can transform long-term development
• Dr. Emma’s Brain Blossom Program for school-aged kids with emotional, learning, or social challenges
• How parents can tune into their baby’s cues and trust their instincts when something feels off

💛 Whether you’re prepping for birth, navigating the postpartum fog, or wondering why your baby cries every time they’re in the car seat, this episode will leave you feeling empowered, informed, and ready to explore new tools in your parenting toolbox.

Tune in now—because your baby’s nervous system (and yours) will thank you.

Chapters

• 2:50 How Chiropractic Changed Her Life (and Career)
• 5:40 What Is Pediatric Chiropractic?
• 8:30 Pregnancy Alignment & The Webster Technique
• 11:20 Pelvic Pain, Round Ligament Tension & Third Trimester Woes
• 14:10 What an Infant Adjustment *Actually* Looks Like
• 17:00 Why Baby Bodywork Matters: Tension, Feeding & Sleep
• 19:50 Car Seat Drama, Gassy Babies & Nervous System Clues
• 22:40 Let’s Talk Tongue Ties & Body Tension
• 25:30 The Importance of Pre- and Post-Release Bodywork
• 28:20 Fascial Connections: Tongue to Toes
• 31:10 Primitive Reflexes, Regulation & Baby Development
• 34:00 How Chiropractic Helps Sleep & Digestion
• 36:50 The Brain Blossom Program for Older Kiddos
• 39:40 Signs Your Baby (or Child) Might Benefit from Chiropractic
• 42:30 How Dr. Emma Personalizes Care for Every Family
• 45:20 From Fussy to Flow: Real Stories from the Office
• 48:10 Dynamic Body Balancing & What’s Next for Dr. Emma
• 51:00 How to Work with Dr. Emma & Final Thoughts

Transcript

Deb (00:40)
Hey there and welcome back to Doula Talk Postpartum, Babies And the Battle for Sleep. I'm Doula Deb and today's episode is going to calm your nervous system and blow your mind. I'm sitting down with the incredible Dr. Emma Swartling,

Lumos chiropractic here in Tacoma. If you've ever thought, ⁓ chiropractic sounds so scary, especially for babies, then you need to buckle up because Dr. Emma is about to show you how gentle, effective, and downright magical this kind of bodywork can be. Whether you have pregnancy aches, to baby reflux,

to helping your toddler stop launching their sippy cup across the room. We are gonna dive into how chiropractic care supports pregnancy, birth, and postpartum recovery. Yep, even with sneezing pains.

What infant adjustments actually look like? Spoiler more like melting butter than cracking bones. why your baby might be gassy, grumpy, or just generally mad at the car seat, and how body work can help with feeding, tongue ties, sleep, and overall regulation of our tiniest humans. It is science, it's nervous system

and it's everything your crunchy curious parent heart didn't know and needed. Let's get into it.

Deb (02:00)
welcome to Doula Talk. This is Dr. Emma. I want you to start by sharing a little bit about your journey into being a chiropractor and what inspired you to focus on women, parents and children. welcome.

Dr. Emma (02:14)
Thank you. Thank you for having me. I grew up with chiropractors in my family, but never considered it as a career until I had already graduated undergrad, thinking I would go into pre-med and not really sure where to take me. I did a lot with anthropology in undergrad as well, studying different people and cultures and how we interact with each other. And when my cousin, who's a chiropractor, suggested that I consider chiropractic, it seemed like...

a good meeting point between my love of anthropology classes and my desire to do something within medicine. And I took the jump from there. Of course, when I had told people I was going to be a chiropractor, so many people were like, oh, you'll be great with moms and babies. And I was feeling a little defiant at the time and was like, I don't want to work with moms or babies. And, and.

Deb (02:44)
Yeah.

Mmm.

And then look

where you are now.

Dr. Emma (03:11)
I like, I want to be a sports chiropractor. I don't like sports. don't like to watch sports or play sports. But then the more that I learned in chiropractic school about how the brain and the body function together and the nervous system, the more I understood that it really does make sense to work with young kids and to work with the parent that's carrying them so that we can set their life up for success and

Deb (03:14)
⁓ okay.

Bye, ⁓

Mm-hmm.

Dr. Emma (03:39)
Then when I got to be in the clinic and work with my own patients I loved working with the kids and the babies and the moms and I was like, okay everybody was right

Deb (03:39)
Yeah.

Okay. Yeah. Well, and that's

my experience with you as well. It's like you are just so, so wonderful with kids. But you're also like the whole time you're being so personable and loving. And then it's like, you're actually working through it at the same time. and my kids love you. They just love you so much.

Dr. Emma (04:05)
I have always liked, even when I was a kid, I liked being like a teen leader of kids groups and I like helping people learn and understand so it made sense. just wasn't ready to see it when I was younger myself.

Deb (04:10)
Yeah.

Yeah,

yeah, it's almost like they knew you. Well, cool. So I want to get into like your background a little bit. It says that on your website that you're a certified Webster technique and then you're a member of the International Chiropractic Pediatric Association. That's a mouthful. Can you explain what that is for us?

Dr. Emma (04:20)
Yeah.

Sure. So I'll start with the International Chiropractic Pediatric Association. That is a really cool organization that is both national and worldwide. And they help to educate and do research and provide courses and classes so that we can be better chiropractors and better trained to work with kids, families, and pregnant people. And so within that group.

is where everybody that wants to work with pregnant patients would get the Webster technique certification. And that technique is technically an analysis of the sacrum, which is a bone on the backside of your pelvis. It's the very last bone at the base of your spine. And using that analysis, which you can use on anybody that's weight bearing, so from young to old, we can determine if the sacrum and the pelvis itself is in balance or out of balance.

And that becomes very important during pregnancy because this is where baby is growing and that part of the body has to make a lot of changes and accommodations and adaptations during the pregnancy process. So we'll use that analysis as a means of helping to decide what part of the sacrum or what part of the pelvis we should work on.

Deb (05:32)
Mmm.

Mm-hmm.

Yeah. Yeah.

Dr. Emma (05:53)
So we have to be weight bearing, which means younger kids, once they're able to stand sufficiently on their own, you could do the Webster analysis for. The analysis, again, helps to decide and determine which area of the pelvis we should be working on, what side of the sacrum. And knowing what side of the sacrum is in balance helps you to understand through knowing the bodies.

Deb (05:53)
not babies, like burying.

Mm-hmm.

Dr. Emma (06:16)
biomechanics where the other things might be taking place. So let's say for example, we find that somebody has sacral imbalance on the left or left Webster, then we could expect that the right piriformis muscle would be more tight as the body's trying to correct that sacral imbalance. We would expect that the left hip flexor on the front of the body was more tight and tense also to try to correct that sacral imbalance. So it gives us a way of

Deb (06:31)
Mm.

Dr. Emma (06:42)
working with the body, but also if we're not seeing things show up in normal biomechanics, then we know that maybe there's more work to do, or we might have something else going on that's contributing to why their body might not be coming in, demonstrating normal biomechanical responses to change.

Deb (07:00)
Can you tell me how that relates to pregnancy? there's so much, like you said, going on in the pelvis of weight distribution and your body is just shifting so much stuff to accommodate this giant thing in your belly and how maybe chiropractic care can be helpful in that situation.

Dr. Emma (07:03)
Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah, so the body does have to go through a lot of changes. In fact, early on, as soon as you get pregnant, your body starts to release a hormone called relaxin. And relaxin's job is to make ligaments stretchier, a little bit looser, so that when baby makes their way through the vaginal canal, if that's the trajectory that birth takes place, then the pelvis has the ability to open and allow that baby to move through.

In the meantime though, it takes about that full nine months for those ligaments to get nice, soft and stretchy. And sometimes people notice that happening as their body changes. So you might be more susceptible to having things out of balance in pregnancy. And the thing with hormones are they don't just stay right where you want them in the pelvis. They'll go through the whole body. So all ligaments are being stretchier and looser.

Deb (08:04)
You

Dr. Emma (08:06)
and you'll be more likely to hear popping or cracking. You might be more likely to feel some muscle tightness, especially later in pregnancy, because when ligaments aren't holding bone together, joints together, then muscles will be a little bit tighter potentially to keep that joint space the same. And that sometimes leads to pain points that bring people into chiropractic care. Commonly, you get a little bit too much movement in a joint. The brain and the body doesn't like that. It doesn't feel...

Deb (08:31)
Mm-mm.

Dr. Emma (08:32)
like we would expect, makes the body a little bit nervous and so it starts to be painful so you're more aware that hey this is different than usual maybe we should take it easy there.

Deb (08:41)
Hmm.

Hmm. Okay. That makes sense. So what would be some things that a pregnant person would like be feeling and that would be helpful with getting an adjustment?

Dr. Emma (08:45)
Yeah.

Okay, so some things that might bring somebody in or prompt them to start chiropractic care. A lot of times it's pain on the back of the pelvis and that's gonna be that joint by the sacrum and the other side of their pelvis called the ilium or the sacroiliac joint. Often that feels like kind of a sharp pain or it could be a dull achy pain.

Deb (08:57)
Mm-hmm.

Dr. Emma (09:15)
It's a little bit closer to the butt than it is to what we call our back. And so a lot of people think they're having sciatic pain or sciatic-like pain. And it's usually not during pregnancy. It can be for sure, but it's always a little easier. It doesn't take as long for the pain to change or go away if it's not true sciatic pain typically. But often it's pain on the backside of the pelvis. Sometimes people come in with round ligament pain or pubic bone pain, and those can all

Deb (09:19)
Mm-hmm.

Thank goodness.

Mm-hmm.

Dr. Emma (09:43)
be some symptoms that show up from pelvic imbalance because the pubic bone is formed by the two sides of the pelvis in the front of the body and the round ligaments connect from the uterus over the pelvis and the uterus itself connects to the pelvis. So if things shift or move, that uterus can tilt or twist slightly and it can contribute to the ligaments trying to bring more balance to that uterus to keep the baby in a more upright position.

Deb (09:51)
Mm-hmm.

Hmm.

Mm-hmm.

Okay, or sneezing. Gosh, I remember, I remember that. Yeah, no, I'm just saying. I remember my rattle and grunt pain was like, I was like, God forbid if I cough or sneeze, it was just like the worst pain ever in my pelvis in the front. It was so bad. Yeah.

Dr. Emma (10:12)
Well, was easy.

Yes.

Yeah.

Well, the round ligaments are special. I know we just talked

about how the ligaments get softer and stretchier in pregnancy. The round ligaments are part ligament tissue and part muscle tissue. So they have a contractile factor, which is why you can feel them when the uterus has shifted or like with sneezing and your ab muscles may not be as supportive as they were pre-pregnancy during pregnancy. And so sometimes you'll get that contraction of the round ligament with those big.

Deb (10:36)
Yeah.

Interesting.

Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

Dr. Emma (10:57)
movements like sneezing or coughing or bearing down. And yeah, yeah.

Deb (10:58)
Yeah.

Okay, I didn't know that. That's really interesting.

Perfect. Okay, so we talked about pregnant people. So the other thing that I worked a lot with people is a postpartum. And, you know, there may be things going on with the baby and I'm like, maybe some body work and chiropractic could be helpful. The first thing most of the time I get met with is like,

Dr. Emma (11:10)
Mm-hmm.

Deb (11:20)
my gosh, I don't want them cracking the bones of my baby. I'm so nervous about that. What does that look like? ⁓ And so can you walk us through? what this this care looks like with an infant?

Dr. Emma (11:25)
Yeah.

Sure. So infant chiropractic care is very different than adult chiropractic care. Kids' bodies, infants' bodies, they are going to grow into adult bodies, but when we're younger, we're not exactly the same as adults, and we require a different type of approach, a different type of care. I like to think about infant adjusting a lot using an analogy of butter. So if we get cold butter out of the fridge and you just set your finger on top,

Over time, butter starts to melt, right? You don't have to push hard. The butter's already hard from being in the fridge, so you can't really press into it. But you're just resting your finger there and waiting for that butter to melt. And that's a lot like infant adjusting. We're just putting our fingers in places that the body is telling us are a little more tight or restricted or imbalanced and waiting for the body to make those changes and responses.

Deb (12:09)
Mm.

Dr. Emma (12:19)
And so it's very gentle. I've had infant sleep through visits. Sometimes they've come to sleep, asleep during their visit and they leave asleep. Sometimes they fall asleep during their visit. Sometimes of course we have to keep in mind that if we do have tightness or tension from birth or from the position they were in the womb that it can be similar to when you have a tight muscle in your body. And sometimes we'll hear a little bit of fussiness, but I try to never work.

Deb (12:23)
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah.

Dr. Emma (12:45)
into that zone and just do things that they're comfortable with. ⁓ But the other thing that is helpful to think about is with chiropractic care, we are primarily working with the nervous system to help the brain and the body communicate through the nervous system as efficiently as possible. And so we don't have to have a fully formed skeletal system like an adult does, and there doesn't need to be popping or cracking.

Deb (12:50)
Yeah.

Mmm. ⁓

Dr. Emma (13:12)
or any sort of forceful adjusting to activate the nervous system, to bring more awareness to certain parts of the body, to help the brain understand what's going on in that area. We've got receptors that live in all different parts of our body that allow us to feel sensation and to know where we are in space and to move our muscles. And it's those receptors that we can touch and trigger and help the nervous system bring more awareness to that area. So the brain can then

Deb (13:13)
Yeah.

Yeah.

Mm.

Dr. Emma (13:40)
make those subtle corrections on its own, like loosening muscles that were tight, helping the joint move back into position. So chiropractors are a lot more of facilitators than we are forcefully changing anything.

Deb (13:44)
Hmm.

Yeah.

Yeah. Well, so what would be some of the things that infants come in for adjustments for?

Dr. Emma (13:58)
Yeah, commonly they come in to see me. I would say the most common one lately has been feeding challenges. Most of the time when infants are making appointments, they're having some sort of trouble breastfeeding or bottle feeding. And so that one's pretty big. Often I'll see digestive challenges as another one that's pretty common. It might be constipation.

Deb (14:02)
Ahem.

Dr. Emma (14:21)
in the younger kids and maybe we're having looser stool in some of the older kids that is sticking around longer than we would think is normal. Sometimes parents bring kids in because they just seem to be tight and tense and they think shouldn't this baby be a little bit more soft and snuggly? ⁓ I had some where they just seem to be rather irritable for infants no matter what the parents try to do and

Deb (14:38)
Yeah, and relaxed.

Mm-hmm.

Dr. Emma (14:45)
All of those

things can be signs that the nervous system may be having a little bit of trouble communicating between the brain and the body and might need some help from an outside source to help their nervous system calm and get reconnected.

Deb (14:58)
Mm-hmm. Yeah. Some of the things that I see that I usually refer out are like being uncomfortable eating on one side rather than the other or like getting in the car seat, they're just screaming. And to me, I'm like that if they're in a position because those car seats, they're they're rounded, you know, for safety in the car. But it's not the best position is what I've heard.

Dr. Emma (15:06)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

Deb (15:20)
for infants for the spine. And if they're in that position, all they do is scream like to me, I'm like, that feels like they're hurting, you know? And that they could get some help with that. So I'm more curious, I want to ask more about like the digestive stuff and how that's connected and how you can help with that. Like, do you know how that works? How does it work?

Dr. Emma (15:29)
Yeah, yeah.

Mm-hmm.

So coming back to the nervous system, infants will make this as simple as possible ⁓ because it can get more complicated, but it can be very straightforward too. in the most simple terms, when we're born, the nervous system is born in a state of...

Deb (15:46)
Yeah.

Yeah, I'm sure it's so complicated.

Mm-hmm.

Dr. Emma (16:04)
fight or flight, that sympathetic nervous system is more active. And that sympathetic nervous system is more dominant until we're about two years old. But we have more trouble regulating our nervous system, meaning moving from that sympathetic state to the parasympathetic state, which is nicknamed rest and digest, when we're about zero to six or nine months. And we need our parents to help co-regulate that.

Deb (16:07)
Mm.

Okay.

Hmm.

Dr. Emma (16:28)
So if we're born in sympathetic state, that fight or flight state, the nervous system's primary goal in that moment is survival, and it's not as focused on digestion. And when we look at how the nervous system activates different organs, you'll see that the digestive organs are less active in sympathetic mode versus parasympathetic mode. And so a lot of times, getting adjusted where that helps the brain move from sympathetic to parasympathetic.

can be relaxing. And so it's pretty common to see that infants will have a bowel movement shortly after getting adjusted or they sleep a little bit better that day. But over time with helping their nervous system work on regulation, we see that that becomes a little bit more regular.

Deb (17:03)
Yeah.

Okay, that totally makes sense. All right, yeah, I've seen that. They'll be like, we went to Dr. Emma today. And oh my gosh, they slept the best they did ever last night. I'm like, yes.

Dr. Emma (17:24)
And if that's not happening, then that's kind of a clue to say, okay, what else could be going on? Because if we've got the nervous system able to move back and forth better, like we should all be able to do, ⁓ what else could be contributing? with digestion in particular, we need to look at maybe we need an outside support like probiotics, or maybe we need to consider if something in...

Deb (17:29)
There's more to this.

Yeah, what else is happening?

Hmm.

Dr. Emma (17:49)
The parents diet, if they're breastfeeding, could be contributing to some bowel irritation or upset. Maybe we're formula fed and we need to have a different formula choice, or maybe we're looking at other options like possibly overfeeding. And that could be contributing to especially reflux. And so it's usually good to kind of get the nervous system communicating and then be like, what else could be going on if the symptoms continue to occur?

Deb (17:55)
upset.

Right.

Mm-hmm.

Yeah,

yeah, that makes sense. So that just kind of leads us into like the biggest feeding hot topic right now and that we is the tongue ties, right? You knew this was coming. So I send people specifically to you for this because of the extra research and extra support that you have around that and interest in that. And

Dr. Emma (18:26)
Yes.

Deb (18:37)
I want to know what you know about that and if you could just enlighten us on how chiropractic care can help with ⁓ tongue ties, Whether they're revised or not, how, how this can help alongside with other providers of like to support that journey for families.

Dr. Emma (18:43)
Yeah.

Yeah, yeah. So the thing that I like people to think about with tongue ties initially is the tongue tie is part of a process that the body is going through in early pregnancy. As the baby is growing in the first trimester, get to a point where we should have some of the cells that we've grown taken away.

and they are along the midline of the body. And so that includes underneath the tongue. And in some cases, we can assume that that process isn't happening because babies are being born with more tissue under the tongue in some cases. In others, we've got just tight tissue, which I'll get into in a second. ⁓

Deb (19:32)
Yeah, yeah, because

the tongue and the bottom of the mouth are like basically together and then it separates, right? At some point. Yeah.

Dr. Emma (19:37)
they should separate, yeah. And we

were seeing 30-ish years ago that cleft palate was a bigger concern than it is now. Cleft kind of the opposite of a tongue tie. More midline is being taken away than we would like so this seems to be the opposite happening.

So there are different theories on why this is happening. Some say there could be a genetic component. Some say there could be some environmental components. So we're not quite sure, but we know that it is occurring more often in kids today, in today's world. so we know that this is, yeah, could be, yeah, we might have more recognition, more screening tools. ⁓ We've also increased breastfeeding.

Deb (20:13)
And or is it more recognized, right? Like and or, right? Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

Dr. Emma (20:24)
compared to formula feeding recently, so that could be part of it as well. Yeah. Right. Mm-hmm.

Deb (20:25)
Yeah, yep. Where it's a lot more apparent. Yeah, and providers, right? Of like providers who are specializing in this and having

the support that's needed. So it's like things are coming out of the woodwork of, you know, I hear a lot of, oh, my baby just stopped breastfeeding or my milk just dried up all of a sudden. And then we investigate a little more and I'm like, oh, we have some restrictions here, which could contribute to that, which we thought it was just a mom problem.

Dr. Emma (20:42)
Mm-hmm.

Deb (20:51)
your milk just dried up, you know, but it's like nowadays we see those red flags and get help a little earlier. Yeah.

Dr. Emma (20:51)
Thank you.

Yeah, and I would

say, because you just said mom problem, that almost all the things that moms like to blame themselves for with their young babies tend to actually be challenges the baby is dealing with, which is, both very sad and we would like to help them, but I say that because I want moms to try to feel less responsible for those things. coming from...

Deb (21:02)
Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

I know.

Yeah.

Yeah, give themselves some grace. Yeah.

Dr. Emma (21:26)
their baby instead of from them.

Deb (21:29)
Yeah, well, it's a team effort with feeding your baby, whether you're doing it from your body or from formula. It is a dyad. You have to be able to feed them effectively, but also they have to be able to do it effectively because you can't just passively feed. They can't just hose milk down their throat. Although some milk supplies do that for a little while to compensate, but it's a give and take.

Dr. Emma (21:34)
Yeah.

Yeah.

where sometimes

things don't get diagnosed or worked on as early because we are like, you just have a really fast high supply. But then three months down the road, you're like, all of a sudden, yeah, all of a sudden, B2B doesn't have any room to feed anymore. And you're like, what's going on? Mm-hmm.

Deb (21:56)
Yeah.

Your supply dies. Yeah, because your milk isn't being extracted. Yeah, yeah. Oh, I see that a lot about the

four to five month mark of like milk just like all of a sudden tanks, which also is around the same time that the lactating parent goes back to work. And so sometimes we attribute it to like, oh, I'm just stressed out. I don't have time to pump, you know, et cetera, et cetera.

Dr. Emma (22:24)
with it.

Deb (22:31)
And then, you know, down the line, they're getting like speech issues and having a hard time with solids. And they're like, ⁓ this is part of the, yeah, the bigger picture. Yeah. Airway, yeah, sleep and apnea.

Dr. Emma (22:38)
Even bigger. Yeah. Yeah, the airway too is a really big one. A lot of kids

sleep apnea or enlarged tonsils or adenoids and some of this. it's actually changed if we worked on things earlier on. Yeah. Yeah, and research is a big one.

Deb (22:51)
being sick all the time allergies like yeah and reflux right like sometimes

yeah these babies like can't they're getting so much air and clicking that it's like they can't keep anything down because they have so much air in their tummy yeah right right and then it's so sad

Dr. Emma (23:08)
There's not so much room. It either comes out one end or the other.

The other thing, around in parents commonly go back to work, we see that the brain has a couple of pretty big development changes at about three months and four months.

Deb (23:17)
Yes. Okay.

Dr. Emma (23:26)
also a challenging time to go back to work because baby's brain is changing and their needs change and their routine changes and then parents routine changes because they went back to work and everything feels really chaotic and hard. Yeah.

Deb (23:28)
100%.

Yeah. Yep. Yep.

Well

and their sleep, I mean this is different, but like their sleep changes from two cycles to four cycles around four months. It's like they're going through a huge brain change when all of this other chaos is happening. So it's like no wonder, you know, we're having a tough time around that time. So well, I want to get back to tongue ties and how chiropractic care can help and like when to do it because there is some, you know,

Dr. Emma (23:46)
It does. ⁓

Exactly.

Yeah.

Mm-hmm. Yep. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah.

Deb (24:06)
like, we only need to do it after or sometimes before, so like tell us a little more about how you're part of that puzzle.

Dr. Emma (24:10)
So

I think about where we left off was we were talking about how sensitize can be present from that first trimester. Something that's important to remember once baby's born and you're actually able to look in their mouth, see them feed, watch how they move their body is. This isn't a problem that just started at birth. It is a problem that started

almost nine months ago. And so all the practicing that babies do in the womb, which they do a lot of practicing for sucking and movements and all of that is on this tighter, more tense tissue. And so having a release done.

Deb (24:35)
Yeah.

Dr. Emma (24:49)
doesn't necessarily mean that they will automatically know how to move their body differently, how to use their tongue differently. And it often is something that they need some help with to relearn the process they didn't get to learn in the beginning. all the most, yeah.

Deb (24:55)
Yeah.

Yeah.

and all the muscle tone that was not done, right? Yeah, the range of motion

isn't there, so they can't strengthen anything.

Dr. Emma (25:10)
Yeah,

yeah. A lot of times right after the release, I hear pretty commonly that they'll go to feed and it seems significantly different. And by later that day or the next day, it's almost worse than it was before. that's a bad thing. It just tells us that we had a little bit of adrenaline rush right during the release. We use that to feed at that moment. We know that we can figure it out in the future, but...

Deb (25:23)
100%.

Mm-hmm.

Dr. Emma (25:34)
It's like going to PT after an injury. You have to just through it. so, um, I do.

Deb (25:37)
Yeah. Yeah. And those muscles need to learn how to even work properly.

They've never been able to move in a different way. Yeah.

Dr. Emma (25:46)
Yeah. And

releasing the tongue again doesn't necessarily release. I say the word release, releasing the tongue where we are physically taking that tissue away doesn't necessarily tell the muscles in the surrounding areas that have been tighter, that it is okay to stop that protective pattern that they can release, so to speak, and be more relaxed and at ease. And that's where

Deb (25:56)
tissue away.

right.

Dr. Emma (26:09)
body work can be really helpful like pediatric chiropractic care. But what I would really prefer is to see them before the release and after so that we can prepare their body for that coming change, start to loosen or change anything that we can before the tie release, and then continue that process afterwards.

Deb (26:13)
Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

Yeah,

yeah, because sometimes even after the release, you'll see like muscle tension go down, but then the body tenses up again, because that's what they're used to. So it's like that continued care until it's kind of like, OK, we're in a good, calm state. ⁓

Dr. Emma (26:38)
Yeah.

Yeah.

humans,

even infants are creatures of habit. we also being a species of survival, we won't expend energy that we don't have to expend. So if our body knows how to do something inefficiently, but it kind of gets it done, then we will do it that way. And we will not do it the more efficient or optimal way unless we're forced to, so to speak, by pain or pleasure. And oftentimes as adults, we do this a lot. We are like, we're fine.

Deb (26:47)
Absolutely.

Mm-hmm.

Right.

Yeah.

Right.

Dr. Emma (27:11)
feel good until your body starts hurting. And really it needed help before that, but we weren't motivated to do anything differently until you're in pain. Yeah. Yeah. Exactly.

Deb (27:20)
right. The change was harder than just keep doing what you're doing. Yeah.

Yeah. That in relation to the feeding and after the release, that makes a lot of sense because there's a lot of times there's some babies who just magically after the release, they, they do so much better and you're like, okay, yeah, don't need too much body work, but we're fine.

More often than not though, it's usually like they have all this movement and they're just like, I don't even know what to do with my tongue anymore. And there's so much work that has to be done of like, they have to learn how to use it again in the proper way. And sometimes it's like, they just need help with that, of learning. Yeah.

Dr. Emma (27:48)
It was nice.

Yeah.

And depending on how old they are when this happens, you know, I, like I said, I prefer to see them before the release and after because I think that that helps to prep their body. But if we're getting to be a little older, while it still is important to do the pre and post work, it is important to also remember that we might be having to play catch up on some motor milestones that

Deb (28:11)
Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

Dr. Emma (28:25)
The body wasn't able to figure out when we were younger because we had tighter, more tense tissue, including the tongue, but also potentially other muscles or fascial tissue in the body that is connected to that area. Yeah.

Deb (28:30)
Right.

connected, which is like so many muscles. So many.

Dr. Emma (28:40)
So many, and the fashion from

Deb (28:40)
Yeah.

Dr. Emma (28:42)
the tongue runs down to the toes of our feet. So we've got that full body tension pattern that can be taking place. And we have the potential with any tension in infants' bodies to, and they're less likely to be able to move freely to form flat spots in their cranium, because we're less likely to move around. And so we've got a lot of different.

Deb (28:44)
down to the toes, yeah.

Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

Dr. Emma (29:04)
different factors going on at once and things are rapidly changing in infancy which makes it an important time to get everything done. It is a moving target, yeah.

Deb (29:06)
Yeah.

even harder. Yeah, it's like a moving target. Yeah,

yeah. Okay, so let's just say things are going really well. We don't have a tongue tie like in general, like things are great. But you know, some people use chiropractic care is just like

part of their health thing growing up as a child, what would be some of the overall health and development milestones that might be helpful with this type of care?

Dr. Emma (29:38)
Yeah,

I think the number one thing is going to be that brain body communication. So when we have the brain and the body able to talk to each other as efficiently as possible, then all the things we need to learn in childhood can happen with more ease. And if we're not seeing them happen, then we can consider other things that we might need to do to help that kid in that case. ⁓

Deb (29:44)
Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

Dr. Emma (30:03)
I like to think about chiropractic care more in the realm of how we try to brush our teeth twice a day and regularly move our bodies and choose to eat foods that make us feel good and that we know have the right nutrient balance. So we're not having like chocolate cake for every meal of the day.

Deb (30:20)
Great.

Dr. Emma (30:21)
It's more along the lines of, I'm going to do this because it's a helpful tool in taking care of myself. And it can be really helpful in times when we are dealing with challenges or pain or discomfort. But it is most effective used more regularly, like those others.

Deb (30:28)
Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

Dr. Emma (30:39)
tools of health that we have. for children in particular, infants have about 65 % of their total brain development take place between when they're born and their first year of life. And then we've got four very big development.

Deb (30:50)
Wow.

Dr. Emma (30:55)
brain changes that the brain goes through between zero and five years old. And we're learning pretty much all of our main brain skills. And then we just practice and get better at those after we're five years old. So we have a lot of development taking place in those years from zero to five. And that time in particular, I feel like if I got to choose would be the most important time for people to come in regularly and get adjusted so that we can try to create.

Deb (31:02)
Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

Dr. Emma (31:23)
a community that has more connected people, more connected both with themselves but when we're connected to ourselves, we're more likely to want to connect with others and be empathetic and understanding and just a better community. Yeah. Yes.

Deb (31:36)
Yeah, create a better world. It's like echoes, right? That's

awesome. Okay. All right, so I think we already talked about the nervous system and regulation, learning behavior, socialization. So I do want, let's move on to like the Brain Blossom program.

Dr. Emma (31:54)
Okay,

that's kind of similar to a lot of those words that you were just saying. So the Brain Blossom Program is a philosophy of understanding the body that I use with everybody, but the program itself is most effective from about three years old to...

Deb (31:58)
Similar, yeah. Yeah.

Dr. Emma (32:12)
however old we are. Most commonly, I typically work with school-age kids with that. And those school-age kids are often coming in with a learning challenge or behavior challenge or socialization challenge. And so a lot of times we're having maybe some trouble with coordination or we've seen a different therapist and

Deb (32:14)
Yeah.

Dr. Emma (32:33)
parents have been told that they have a primitive reflex that's retained and so they want to more about that and what that means. Or we're having some big emotional meltdowns when their schedule changes. I've had kids come with reading challenges and let me think of another example. Another, get, probably mostly we've got behavior and emotional challenges that drive parents to bring them in.

Deb (32:36)
Mmm.

Yeah.

Dr. Emma (32:56)
But it's really a fun program where we look at how the brain develops and use that to assess these kids and figure out if we have any gaps in early learning or skills we're holding on to that might not be as efficient as the ones that we could be using at that age. And we help get the brain and the body talking to each other through chiropractic in the beginning of care. And then we add in some neuro rehabilitative exercises that essentially go through those early life learning

Deb (33:08)
Mm-hmm.

Dr. Emma (33:25)
that we should get from infancy till about five years old. And it helps to reestablish that foundation to get things back on track. And a lot of those cases that come in do need additional support. So we often will work with occupational therapy or physical therapy or speech therapy or lots of different other pathways as well. But we're...

Deb (33:29)
Okay.

Interesting.

Okay.

Mm-hmm.

Dr. Emma (33:46)
trying to get the nervous system in the brain to allow that this change and changes in development, change in the way their body's used to doing things to take place.

Deb (33:56)
So you mentioned primitive reflexes and like other exercises. I just want to know more about that.

Dr. Emma (33:59)
Yeah.

Yeah, primitive reflexes are what infants use primarily to interact in the world. So those reflexes, which can also be called infant movement reflexes,

Infant reflexes, we have a few different names for them, but they're essentially a reflex is a response that takes place automatically in the body from a stimuli. So you can probably think of when you went to the doctor and they tapped on your knees or your elbows with their little hammer and your legs should kick out or your arm should bend. And in infants, we have a series of reflexes that are the...

early skills or stepping stones for skills we need later on. Those reflexes, some turn on in the womb and are helpful for baby's part in birth during a vaginal birth. And so as mom's body, the uterus starts to contract as things take place in the birth process in the parent's body, those reflexes get stimulated and help baby to kick their legs out or twist their body or wiggle their hips.

Deb (34:59)
turn their

head. Yeah, yeah.

Dr. Emma (35:00)
or in their head, yeah,

all sorts of different things that can help make their way through the birth canal at a certain point that then also are stepping stones for skills later on. And so when infants are born, often see parents are usually familiar with like the startle reflex. But we've got a handful of other ones that I like to see are present and active at the ages they should be, and that they're also going away at about the time that the brain shouldn't need that stimulation anymore. And the thing to think about with reflexes

Deb (35:10)
Mmm.

Mm-hmm.

Interesting.

Dr. Emma (35:30)
huh.

is that the brain, never forget anything we've ever experienced. We just may not have conscious access to it. And so sometimes when kids are coming in and we're seeing retained primitive reflexes, they might have had a reflex that wasn't on or wasn't off, I mean, was never turned off from that infancy phase until maybe this is a seven-year-old that's come in with a reflex still active. But it's also possible that something happened in their life that made the brain say, that was really hard. I'm going to use what I'm more comfortable using.

Deb (35:52)
Okay.

Dr. Emma (35:59)
And so we might turn certain skills back on, like those reflexes, if the overall demand that that child is being asked is too much for them at that time.

Deb (35:59)
Yeah.

Dr. Emma (36:09)
So there are, one of my favorites, like I just mentioned, is the startle reflex. And the startle reflex, I will often see during these assessments with kids that come in when we're having emotions that seem to move from zero to 60 really quickly. And almost always that startle reflex is still active in their body when we do the assessment. And so it's...

Deb (36:14)
Mm-hmm.

Dr. Emma (36:34)
It's actually really fun with these cases because after doing the patient history with the parent, I can almost guess what I'll see during the assessment just based on what the parent has told me about their child with their, which primitive reflexes might be present, which parts of other early learning we might see challenges in or that we might see they're really good at. And maybe the other ones kind of got skipped over a little bit and they're like,

Deb (36:53)
Mm-hmm.

Dr. Emma (36:59)
I can do that, but only if I do it while I'm also moving my body, that kind of thing. ⁓ Other things that, not to say that everything is a primitive reflex, but other things that can be signs that you might have a retained primitive reflex could be toe walking, could be kids that have a really hard time sitting still in a classroom. Every time they sit in a chair, they're just wiggly. Could also be the kids that like to sit on the edge of the chair and then stick their leg out to the side or

Deb (37:03)
Interesting.

Mm.

Dr. Emma (37:27)
kids that have to really lean down in order to write anything or end up sticking their tongue out while they're doing other activities. We can see a lot of little signs that some of those might be active. And again, like I said, that's where I was going next. Like I said, we use the skills that we're most efficient at and these skills we learn right after our, you know, our

Deb (37:38)
Well, I think I have a lot of primitive reflexes then, girl.

Dr. Emma (37:54)
Brainstem is responsible for breathing and heartbeat. The skills on top of that are these reflexive primitive skills, kind of our lizard brain, so to speak, or our animal brain. And then we learn more about movement and touch skills, and then we learn more about language skills, and then we learn more to use our big cognitive skills, like our mind's eye, and we learn to use our eyes, our vision, differently. so any time...

Deb (38:18)
interesting.

Dr. Emma (38:20)
And we're actually seeing this a lot more because the world has been very stressed lately that, yeah, didn't you notice? And so it's pretty common for adults to, when they're stressed, kind of have an activity that they need to do. Like some people might want to go for a run or some people might want to sit and read or listen to music. Or some people, if they're feeling stressed, can't just read, but they need to have the audio book and the regular book going at the same time in order to focus.

Deb (38:24)
it has? A little bit, a little bit.

Dr. Emma (38:49)
or sometimes we have a little bit more of this primitive reflex response and it's kind of a spectrum and it also to me isn't just the reflexes on or off. It's that the brain is using that pathway for some reason and our job is to figure out why does the brain feel like it needs to use this skill that's not as efficient as skills that we could be using at that age that child is. And so that's kind of the...

Deb (39:13)
Interesting.

Dr. Emma (39:16)
The overall goal is to try to make things as efficient and easy and stress-free as possible for each individual person, but it doesn't necessarily always require fixing it, so to speak. Yeah.

Deb (39:28)
Yeah, it's like

teaching the brain new things and be like, it's okay to do this this way now. Yeah.

Dr. Emma (39:33)
It is. Yeah. And as we're better

at these skills that are more efficient, then usually that means we don't use the other ones as much and shouldn't be stimulated by them as much.

Deb (39:44)
Okay.

Yeah. my gosh, this is all making very much sense. This is great. This is awesome. Because I mean, I think the general feeling about chiropractic care from parents is it's just a little scary.

Dr. Emma (39:46)
Yeah.

Deb (39:57)
of like messing with alignment or messing with bones or like this and that. And it's like, we're learning today. It's like, it's so much more than that. more, it's not necessarily bones and cracking. It's the brain and the nervous system and feeling safe, which is what we want for all our kids, right? And us. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Okay. So we did just talk about this, but like, can you explain what it makes your approach to chiropractic care for

Dr. Emma (39:57)
Yeah.

Thank you.

Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah, that's for us too. Yeah.

Deb (40:21)
babies and children so gentle and supportive. ⁓ And then like how you deal with like the parents because it's not just like the baby like, hey baby, we're going to touch you. You have to deal with this other, you know, thing the parents of like making sure they feel comfortable and like explaining what you're doing and how it's helping and all of that. So just explain a little bit of that.

Dr. Emma (40:24)
Yeah.

Mm-hmm. You know.

Yeah,

in my practice, I first of all don't do a lot of the manual adjusting techniques that people associate with chiropractic care, the popping, the cracking, the twisting your body around. And when I do some of those manual tools, there are certain places in the body that I might find that most effective or

Deb (40:51)
Yeah

Dr. Emma (41:02)
certain stages in people's lives. I find that a lot of times pregnancy and postpartum, we have a lot of that hormone relaxin making ligaments looser. Those bodies tend to not need as big of a forceful adjustment. Even though a lot of people think as adults that popping and cracking feels good, or if you don't hear a pop or a crack, then maybe we didn't get the adjustment. But that's not the case when we're, when we're thinking about working with stimulating the nervous system. We're not

Deb (41:05)
Mm-hmm.

brace. ⁓

Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

Dr. Emma (41:32)
moving bones, we're telling the brain like, something needs your attention in this area, and then your brain does the job of fixing it, not me. If it doesn't over time, then we need to look at like, what else could be going on? Yeah, is there something you're doing that I don't see when you're not in the office that you, maybe you sit like, pretzel on the couch, or maybe you sleep in a super weird position, or maybe you do the same thing at work every day over

Deb (41:42)
That's so interesting.

Why?

Yeah.

Mm.

Dr. Emma (42:01)
and over and over again, or always carry your baby on the same side, you know, all sorts of things. Yeah, yeah. Maybe you really love this old pair of shoes and one heel is lower to the ground than the other, so you're always walking crooked. Like, we've got different stuff that we do that I don't get to see. But that's kind of my main goal is to see your body every time you come in.

Deb (42:07)
or your 20 pound bag on one shoulder all the time.

Yeah.

Totally. Yeah.

Dr. Emma (42:28)
And your adjustments might be similar visit to visit, but not exactly the same. Maybe sometimes we do a manual adjustment on an adult and the next time we only use instruments. On younger kids and babies, I tend to do more tonal techniques only, which is going to be no instruments, no popping, no cracking. And so I just use my fingertips and from an outsider's point of view, it looks like we're just kind of holding a baby. You're giving a little massage and that's where it can be really

Deb (42:38)
Mm-hmm.

Dr. Emma (42:58)
gentle and relaxing. In addition to that with all ages I like to try to incorporate looking at their fascial system and if we have any muscles that are really tight or tense but the fashion in particular has been really fun lately and can be

really rewarding when we work on that, with infants whose bodies have not held on to patterns as long as adult bodies. We can watch their fascia unwind and they just become so relaxed and more peace looking.

Deb (43:18)
Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

it's so cool. Yeah.

it's so cool to see when there's a baby, they got their shoulders all up by their ears and they're just so tense and just look so uncomfortable all the time. And then they do this like they unwind and you're just like, whoa, they have a neck.

Dr. Emma (43:43)
I had

one yesterday who came in with a very large tummy and the whole time I could feel just gas bubbles. And like we were just saying, shoulders up by their ears and by the end of the visit they had a long neck and her tummy was all slim and looked proportionate to her body. We did have a lot of farts come out, but you could just tell them that, yeah.

Deb (43:53)
Yeah.

And yeah, elongated.

Yeah, and probably some bowel movements in the next 24 hours. That's

usually a feedback I get after these visits is these babies will have like massive poops for the next 24 hours and be like, we didn't even know that they could poop that much. Like we didn't have no idea that was all in there. And then they're just so much happier because they're not retaining all that stuff in there. No, no, move it on out. Yeah.

Dr. Emma (44:08)
Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah.

None of us like to keep poop stuck inside.

Deb (44:28)
So you have lots of different certifications. And this question is kind of, we've probably gone over this already, but how with using all the different things, how do you decide what to use for each family? Like, is it pretty intuitive that you do or depends on what's going on in their body from what they're complaining about or?

Dr. Emma (44:37)
Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah,

it often depends on how they're presenting. So both from their personal history and just how their body is that day. I have some people who, let's say an adult for example, comes in and they are reporting that they are not stressed.

They're like, I can handle it. I think I'm doing pretty good. But the whole time we're talking about their history, they're showing stress posture and they can't sit still and their pupils are a little dilated, like which happens when we're a little bit more stressed out. so for them, I might do a little bit more tonal technique in the beginning until we can get their body to calm down. Or some people that want...

Deb (45:17)
Yeah.

stress.

Dr. Emma (45:31)
help during pregnancy but are hesitant. Like you said, a lot of people are kind of nervous with chiropractic or getting adjusted and so sometimes we'll start with the very most gentle technique and just work into using instruments as they feel more comfortable. ⁓

Deb (45:38)
Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

Dr. Emma (45:46)
And sometimes it's just that the nervous system is stressed and needs a light gentle touch to feel safe. And as the nervous system calms down and feels more regulated that they're more receptive to other types of touch or other types of care. But yeah, I try to do kind of just what

that person needs. The different certifications have helped give me more insight on different age groups. Like I have the certification for infants and the Webster Technique certification is more for prenatal clients and the Brain Blossom program is the Focus Academy certification so that's more school-aged kids but they can definitely intertwine.

Deb (46:16)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah, yeah, depending on what's going on, I'm sure. Yeah. Okay. Well, I think that's all my questions. So before we wrap up, what is like one piece of advice that you would want to share with parents who are curious about chiropractic care, but maybe a little nervous, whether it's during pregnancy or for the babies, children, or even, you know, after pregnancy, where it's like we have these aches and pains, like what kind of advice would you give to them?

Dr. Emma (46:26)
Yeah.

Yeah.

you.

Yeah,

I would say my number one advice for chiropractic care would be you're never too young or old to get adjusted. And so just because you didn't start as an infant or you wanted to wait till you were an adult, like you can start whenever and.

Deb (46:58)
Yeah.

Dr. Emma (47:07)
And the other thing I like to say is not every, and this really applies to all of your providers, not every provider is the right person for you. And if you go and you feel like for whatever reason, you're like, I don't know, this is just not the person for me.

Deb (47:15)
right.

Dr. Emma (47:22)
then it's worth trying to find somebody that you connect with more. And I find with chiropractic in particular that because it is a service that involves me touching another person's body, I need to touch your back and feel your muscles and ask you to let your leg relax. If I want to pick it up and move your hip around that it's important to be with somebody that you feel like you can trust and that you're comfortable letting them touch you. And so if that's not me,

Deb (47:25)
Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

Dr. Emma (47:50)
that's okay. I'm not for everybody. If that's not somebody else, that's okay. And I do really think that goes for all providers. If you don't jive with your birth provider, you can change. If you don't jive with your dentist, you can switch. Like, we have a lot of great people in our community and not everybody is the one for everybody.

Deb (47:52)
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah, yeah, I think that's a really good point because I've been to several different chiropractors and you know, they're fine. I usually feel good after that. But like when you find somebody you really connect with, like it makes the care so much more impactful and worth it to go. Yeah, especially when you're talking about the brain and the nervous system, it's like you have to be in a place of being able to calm and safety. ⁓ So if you've gone to somebody and you're like, you're just like, well, chiropractor never really helped me.

Dr. Emma (48:21)
Yeah.

Thank

Deb (48:36)
It's worth a shot going to someone else to see if you can have a better connection.

Dr. Emma (48:36)
Yeah. Yeah. And part of the

healing journey, like we've talked about, is the chiropractor facilitates, but then your body does the rest. So you do need that person that's going to help your body be like, okay, I'm ready for this next step. And that's where it's important to find somebody that you can feel that connection with.

Deb (48:55)
Yeah.

Yeah, well that's a really wonderful place to end. Thank you so much for your time. This has been so eye-opening, even more than I thought that we would get education about. So this has been so helpful. I hope everybody got something out of this. what do you have going on right now? Let's just give you a little plug. Tell us about what you have going on, where you're located, how we can get in contact with you.

Dr. Emma (49:05)
Yeah, thank you for having me.

Okay.

Okay,

I'm in Central Tacoma on Sixth Avenue and my practice name is Lumos Chiropractic, L-U-M-O-S, which you can find. The website is lumoschiro.com or Instagram is Dr. Emma Swartling for my Instagram handle. And right now, probably my biggest exciting change is finishing a certification for a technique called dynamic body balancing, which is a combination of myofascial release,

Deb (49:47)
Okay.

Dr. Emma (49:50)
and a little bit of energy work. And that's what's been really fun, especially with the infants lately. So it's not a chiropractic technique, but I'm weaving it into my chiropractic care. And I'm really excited to use it more on some of my prenatal clients. We're dabbling in the water right now, but...

Deb (49:53)
Okay

Yeah.

Amazing.

Dr. Emma (50:11)
hopefully working towards a little bit of longer sessions for some of those people to just essentially like the word we used before was unwind. We just want to unwind. The more that we are even and balanced before birth, oftentimes the easier baby comes out. Yeah.

Deb (50:20)
Yeah.

the better. Yes,

yes. I'm really excited about that. That's really cool. Awesome.

Dr. Emma (50:29)
Yeah, yeah, so I've got one more class for

the certification. Yeah, thank you.

Deb (50:34)
That's amazing, congrats. Perfect, I

think I know a lot of people who would really take you up on that. And especially in the birth world with the pregnant people, like, I mean, every little piece to help with the delivery, I think it's awesome. Yeah. So why don't you tell us what you're offering right now?

Dr. Emma (50:48)
Totally, I think so too, and it's really fun.

right now my practice works primarily with infants, children, children from infancy through high school for the most part, prenatal and postpartum clients. And at the moment I have a more full schedule. So I'm trying to be very careful with those new clients that I accept being in those categories.

and visits with me, we usually start with a longer appointment so I can get to know you. If it is for your child in the school age range, we actually break that first appointment into three parts. I like to do a phone call or an in-person talk with the parents so that the kid doesn't have to hear us talk about their challenges.

And then we'll do the in-person assessment in the office, and then we'll do a post-assessment phone call or in-person chat with the parents again so that we can talk about my findings and what I suggest, again, without the kiddo having to hear us on about some of the things that maybe they were not as good at or not quite there yet with those skills.

Deb (51:48)
Yeah.

Right, it's like embarrassing.

Dr. Emma (51:55)
So

that we can focus more on what they are good at and give tools to help with just making things easier for them. And then typically office visits when we're coming, once we have a care plan to get adjusted are about...

Deb (51:59)
Hmm.

Dr. Emma (52:08)
15 minutes long, do offer a shorter session for some of the younger kids and a slightly longer session that sometimes I'll use to teach activities or right now we're using that for that dynamic body balancing to have a little bit of practice in.

to see if it's worth it for some people, if we're liking it. And so I can learn as well what works and what doesn't. And eventually I'd like to offer a longer session for the dynamic body balancing. Cause typically fascial release in adults takes a little bit longer than just getting adjusted. have to let the body really feel like it's willing to let go of certain things. Yeah. Yeah.

Deb (52:45)
Yeah, yeah, for sure.

Dr. Emma (52:47)
I also am a co-author to a prenatal and postpartum journal. And those journals are really fun. They only require journaling once a week. So we tried to make it a low commitment, but with a lot of value. And so each week you'll get some educational tips and kind of talking about what your body's going through during pregnancy and one journaling prompt that you can write about. Or you could just think about if that's, if you want to just use it for reading in the prenatal journal, in the postpartum.

It's set up just a little different with slightly more writing prompts or again you can use them to just think or maybe chat with somebody about and then we've got a page at the end that's got some bonding tips for you and baby some special tips that might be applicable to that week postpartum and then a resource that may also be helpful like an app to use or another website that could be useful in the postpartum period so trying to make things accessible and easy to do

but to still be supportive and to offer some extra tips and support during a time that can be, you you got a lot of information coming in from different people and a lot of stuff going on in your brain. And sometimes it's helpful to just take a moment, be with yourself, write it down. Yeah. Yes. Yeah. And that journal brand is called Mindful Mama Guides. And we are working on

Deb (53:48)
I'm

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And it's so cute. I love it. Yeah.

Dr. Emma (54:06)
just getting the word out there more about that. They're available right now on Amazon and also you can find the link through Instagram from Mindful Mama Guides. There is a Mindful Mama Guides website if you looked on Google. So there's a lot of different avenues for seeking them out or you can ask me as well.

Deb (54:08)
Yeah, where can we buy it?

Okay, great.

Perfect.

Yeah. Well, and I'll go ahead and just link them all in the show notes. So just take a peek there and we'll get you all hooked up. Perfect. All right. Well, thank you so much for your time and I hope you have a good day. Bye.

Dr. Emma (54:31)
Okay, great.

Thank you, you too.

Deb (54:41)
Did your nervous system just take a deep breath? Because mine did. Let's recap the golden nuggets that Dr. Emma dropped. Chiropractic care isn't just about cracking bones, it's about supporting the brain-body connection and helping the nervous system do its thing. And the Webster technique, it's a game changer for pregnancy alignment and easing pelvic pain.

Infant adjustments are gentle, everything from feeding issues to poop problems,

Because let's be real, nobody thriving when your baby can't Tongue ties aren't just about the tongue. They're about the tension patterns, brain development, and the importance of pre and post release body work. And last but not least, trust your gut. provider doesn't feel like the right fit, it's totally OK to keep looking. This journey should feel safe and supportive for both you and your baby.

If you want to connect with Dr. Emma, check out the show notes for all of her links, including that dreamy Mindful Mama journals that she co-created. And if this episode made you go, ooh, that's why my baby hates the car seat, then send it to a friend, rate the show, or leave a little love in the reviews. And hey, if you're looking for more support in your parenting journey, especially those sleep-deprived, milk-leaking, what days it phases, come check out my first year support program or my virtual sleep offerings.

Until next time, stay grounded, trust your intuition, and remember, you're doing such an amazing job even if your baby just pooped up to their neck. Good luck with that. Bye friends!