This article is not an ad for your mom and pop donut shop or any of the big name donut houses.

Here is a recipe for donuts: bleached white flour so the vermin won’t eat the flour, refined GMO sugar, refined fats full of toxic aberrated trans fatty acids, maybe a little egg, add water and stir. They taste wonderful don’t they? I eat one of these “death to health bombs” about once a year as a reminder of where the bottom is.

Between almost all of the spinal vertebrae is a disc. There are 23 in all. The outside of the disc is like a tire with many layers of fibers going in a variety of directions on the outside surface of the disc. In the center is a gooey, viscous material. The discs allow for the spring in your back and allow you to turn your neck and back. These discs are wonder devices except when they go bad. You may have seen the 2-time Russian men’s ice skater withdraw from competition at the recent Olympic games after attempting a practice triple loop jump. That was a previously injured disc that had been surgically repaired gone bad again.

There are two ways discs go bad. One way is called a bulge and a severe bulge is a herniation. The bulge is a weakening of those tire-like fibers and the gooey jelly donut stuff pushes into the weak area. A herniation is where the tire fibers rupture all the way through and the gooey jelly donut stuff pushes through the rupture

Here is one piece of lifting advice that would lessen your chances of getting a disc bulge or herniation of a disc when lifting. First, don’t lift things that are two heavy. Second, when lifting something heavy, don’t turn your upper body to move the object. Turn your lower body to face where you want the object to go and then set it down. Don’t bend at the waist. Bend at the knees to pick the object off the floor.

The second way discs get injured is that they slowly decay. This occurs most often at the base of the back and in the lower neck. As a chiropractor, I have adjusted tens of thousands of backs. It is very common for the joints to get stuck at the base of the back and the lower neck. The discs start a slow decay when joints fixate, even if they don’t hurt. So, get checked regularly for stuck joints at the chiropractor. Herniated discs and degenerated discs can cause chronic pain. This is not fun for the chiropractor as it is a long battle and even then the results are often limited or partial.

It is absolutely not fun for the patients. Stretching of the low back and lower neck is important. Ask me to show you on your next visit, or you can check on the internet, too, but I will show you a couple of tricks. As for nutrition for discs, Ligaplex II directly helps strengthen them. Other supplements help existing degeneration, painful inflammation, stiffness and this sort of thing. Again, take steps to keep the “jelly donuts” between your spinal vertebrae in excellent health throughout your life!

Dr. Mike Spearman