EPISODE SUMMARY
Guest: Dr. Michael Lenarz
Dr. Michael Lenarz has been a Blair Upper Cervical Doctor for about 34 years. He graduated from Sherman College in 1987. It was there that he learned about upper cervical work. The idea is to do the least amount of adjusting to get the most powerful healing.
Growing up, Dr. Lenarz didn’t hear much about chiropractors. At 25, he injured his shoulder while working in his father’s factory. It wasn't terrible, but it was a fairly painful shoulder. That was what prompted him to go to his very first chiropractic visit. He went to an acquaintance, Dr. Arthur Berman, whose brother and father were also chiropractors. They had all three graduated from Sherman College. Dr. Berman shared with him a little bit about Chiropractic Philosophy, which stated, “There is in the universe an infinite intelligence which creates and sustains life, which creates and sustains the whole universe. That this infinite intelligence actually exists within all living things. This infinite intelligence, if it expresses itself properly without anything interfering with it in the living thing, in the human being, then the result is health.” After hearing that, Dr. Lenarz realized that he needed to be a chiropractor.
Dr. Lenarz then moved to Washington State with his family. Originally to Seattle, they settled in an agricultural and logging community known as Sedro-Wooley, Washington. His focus throughout the years has been Blair upper cervical care. He began to take care of patients and just saw the miracle that it was supposed to be.
Dr. Lenarz recalls one case that has stuck with him through the years. It’s a story about a little baby that he took care of named Sarah. He had previously taken care of her mother and grandfather. When Sarah was born, it was a difficult birth, and the umbilical cord was wrapped around Sarah's neck three times. The problem was that every time Sarah tried to nurse or feed, she stopped breathing and had to be resuscitated. They left the hospital and went straight to Sedro-Wooley to see Dr. Lenarz. The whole family came and wanted to be checked! The baby was up first and was now 6 or 7 weeks old. After finding a misalignment in the upper neck and getting x-rays, he adjusted. He took Sarah and her mother to the resting area. After checking the others, he returned to check on Sarah and was shocked to see her mother feeding her.
Dr. Lenarz recalls a patient with Trigeminal Neuralgia, the suicide disease. After an adjustment, her pain went away within a day. It did come back mildly a couple of times, but after just a couple more adjustments, she had been pain-free for months and was able to go on a trip.
Dr. Lenarz had this to say, “ I'm just very passionate about this upper cervical work. I really love all chiropractic, and I think that the thing which is most powerful-- In fact, I've never, ever in all these years run across any other healing modality, which is as powerful as upper cervical care.”
To contact Dr. Lenarz or to buy his book, go to:
https://www.drmichaellenarz.com/
To contact Ruth, go to: https://www.blairclinic.com
ruth@blairclinic.com
https://www.facebook.com/rutelin
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
Welcome, welcome, welcome to What Pain in the Neck, the podcast. I am sitting here in South Carolina at Sherman College of Chiropractic with a great Blair Upper Cervical Doctor that has been a mentor of mine and my husband for a long time, for many years. Dr. Michael Lenarz, thank you for being here.
You're welcome. Thanks for having me.
Well, why don't we just start by, instead of me introducing you, why don't you just introduce yourself?
Well, I have been a chiropractor for centuries.
[laughter]
Well, okay, it's been about 34 years. I graduated actually from Sherman College where we're at this weekend teaching a seminar. I practiced in Sedro-Woolley, Washington. Most of that time--
Okay, I wasn't going to interrupt you, but what year did you graduate?
I graduated in 1987.
Okay. Great. That way we get a picture of these centuries.
[laughter]
Okay. One thing that fascinated me incredibly was finding out what made you decide to be a chiropractor. Why don't you talk a little bit about maybe your upbringing? Did you always want to be a doctor? What made you decide to become a chiropractor and an upper cervical chiropractor at that?
Well, when I was growing up, I don't remember too much ever hearing about chiropractors. Though, I think at one point my father went to a chiropractor when I was probably six, seven, or eight. We lived in Fort Wayne, Indiana. We moved around a bit. Eventually, we moved to Pittsburgh. I went through high school in Pittsburgh. I went to the University of Miami and studied Business and, eventually, ended up back in Pittsburgh. I was working at a company that my father owned. I ended up having a shoulder injury. It wasn't terrible, but it was a fairly painful shoulder. That was what prompted me to go to my very first chiropractic visit, and I was 25-years-old.
Had something happened to your shoulder? Had you fallen on it, or wrenched it, or what?
No, it was probably from pushing a broom.
Okay.
[laughter]
Because at that time, in spite of everything else I had done, I was a laborer at a factory. That's where my father owned factory.
Okay. All right. Okay. That brought you into a chiropractor.
Yes. I went to see this acquaintance of mine, Dr. Arthur Berman. He and his brother were both chiropractors and their father was a chiropractor. They had all graduated from Sherman College. On my very first visit, Alan taught me about Chiropractic Philosophy.
Philosophy? What is that?
Well, you see, people don't realize that chiropractic has this very established, formal philosophy. You can, actually, even earn what is equal to a PhD in Chiropractic Philosophy.
That's interesting. We'll get into that in a little bit. Let's continue on with that appointment.
Yes. At that appointment, Alan did an adjustment to my upper neck. That did help my shoulder, but more importantly, what he shared with me, the little bit of Chiropractic Philosophy that he shared with me on that visit was this. He told me that the Philosophy of Chiropractic stated that, "There is in the universe an infinite intelligence which creates and sustains life, which creates and sustains the whole universe."
Okay.
"That this infinite intelligence, actually, exists within all living things. This infinite intelligence, if it expresses itself properly without anything interfering with it in the living thing, in the human being, then the result is hell. When I heard that, I realized by the time I left that visit that I needed to be a chiropractor, that that was my calling in mind.
That is incredible. Can you pinpoint what it was about it that made you feel that way?
Well, yes. First of all, that already fit in with my experience in life, that there was something like that.
Yes, we have a strong drive to be alive, and live, and be well.
Yes, and to know that there is some, if you will, higher power, something which is greater, something which is perhaps infinite. To see that there was, actually, a healing profession that was based both in science and in this philosophy which was spiritual or metaphysical, that those two things coming together, that's kind of what my whole life was about anyways. It was like a bell going off in my head, and I realized that this was my calling.
That's incredible.
From that first visit.
Okay. That's incredible. What happened to your shoulder?
[laughter]
Actually, I got that adjustment. I think I went back for just one or two visits and the shoulder healed up. Great, because that healing wisdom within my body figured it out.
Yes, okay. [laughs] Because after all, that is why you went there.
That's right.
Okay. What was your journey from then on? Did you just go out and enroll in Chiropractic College? What happened?
Well, so I hadn't earned my degree yet in undergraduate and I had been studying Business. Now, I had to go back to school and get all of the sciences at the college level, so anatomy, biology, physics. I had to go back to school and get those.
That's interesting because you're here you're talking about philosophy, and now you're talking about science?
Yes.
Do you want to talk about that connection?
Well, I had to do what I needed to do to get the prerequisites to get into college, but chiropractic is a philosophy, a science, and an art. It's really multifaceted and has this incredible, beautiful depth to it.
Yes, so it's wide reaching.
That then led me to Sherman College, which is my alma mater, which is where Alan and Arthur and their dad all went. That's where I felt I needed to go because it was a college that was based in philosophy, science, and art of chiropractic.
Do you want to share anything about chiropractic college or you want to get started on telling stories? Fast forward to when you start your practice?
Well, college was a great experience for me here. I learned a great deal. I grew up a great bit. I was involved in the college. I was involved in student government. I grew more and more passionate about chiropractic.
That's good.
That's actually where I learned about upper cervical work.
That's good. Talk about that. What was that process like? What is upper cervical and what did you learn about it and what drew you interested in it?
Well, when you look at Chiropractic Philosophy, which was really my first draw and love of chiropractic, the idea is that the body has this incredible power of healing itself, like more than most people can imagine.
I think B.J. Palmer, who was developer of chiropractic and also discovered upper cervical care, so to speak. The power that made the body heals the body. Is that what you're talking about?
That's what I'm talking about. If you extrapolate that out a little bit, you begin to realize that what we're trying to do is create the most help with the least amount of intervention. The most help with the least amount of intervention. Then when you understand that that is the result of the philosophy of chiropractic, that's what it is attempting to do. When I learned about upper cervical, the idea is to do the least amount of adjusting to get the most powerful healing.
That just leads straight to upper cervical chiropractic. The idea is that by and large, for the most part, if you could get somebody better with less adjustment and give them better long-term results for their health, then why wouldn't you do that? Like that was what really pulled me into upper cervical. What you're saying is, do you want to get better with one, two, three to five adjustments, or do you want to get adjusted three times a week for six months?
[laughter]
That's correct. Less intervention, more powerful healing.
Yes. Okay.
Not only that, the thing about upper cervical and all chiropractic, I'm a big fan of all of chiropractic. But to me, the upper cervical is the epitome. It is the pinnacle of what chiropractic has to offer Humanity.
I think the other day you described it as discovering that upper cervical was the physical representation of the metaphysical concept of philosophy.
That's correct.
You said that, right?
Yes. It's the manifestation of the philosophy in the physical realm.
Excellent. All right. When you graduated from Sherman, you go out in the world and you're now an upper cervical doctor.
Then I moved with my family to Washington State.
I can't wait to ask you this question because you were talking about Indiana and Philadelphia and I've been to Sedro-Woolley, why Sedro-Woolley, Washington?
[laughter]
Sedro-Woolley, Washington is where I landed. I moved out to Washington because my wife had a sister out there. The idea was if she was going to help me get through chiropractic college, we were going to go where she wanted to go after college.
Well, it sounds fair.
Yes. That's fair.
As a wife who's helped my husband through chiropractic school, I see the fairness in that.
We moved to Washington, originally in Seattle, and then I took a job north of Seattle, about 85 miles, and that's in a place called Skagit County, which is a rural county. It's an agricultural and logging community. One of the towns there is known as Sedro-Woolley. I started working for a chiropractor for a few months in Skagit County. We loved it. We just loved that area. We loved-
It is beautiful.
-the rivers. You're right near Puget Sound, you're next to the mountains. We decided to settle there. When we studied the towns and little villages of Skagit County, we decided that this little logging community of Sedro-Woolley is where we wanted to land.
Tell us about what happened when you opened it and some stories that you have from those days.
When you first opened practice, you've been to school, you've been in the clinic and school, you've taken care of patients, but it's a whole different world starting a practice. It's a lot of work. It's a lot of scraping by for a while while you build your practice.
Truth. Truth.
I'm sure you guys know.
[laughter]
I wish I didn't know what you're talking about, but I do.
We worked at that for a while and then we just established and got more and more established and took care of more and more people. My focus throughout all of these years has been the upper cervical care, the Blair upper cervical care. We began to take care of patients and just saw the miracle that it's supposed to be.
Give us some examples.
I'll tell you a story about a little baby that I took care of named Sarah. There's a bit of a story behind Sarah getting under care. Long before Sarah was born, I took care of her grandfather and her mother. Her mother was a teenager, had no plans for kids at that point. I took care of the whole family, and they used chiropractic care for health maintenance, just for maintenance of health.
Smart people.
Very smart people. Really lovely family. A husband and a wife and five kids. Took care of them for a number of years. They ended up moving away. Kids grew up, they moved away from their parents. I might occasionally see one of the family, but then one day I got a call from Grandpa Doug. Doug said, "Dr. Lenarz, we have a problem with a newborn grandchild. I'm calling you up to see if you can be of some help."
I said, "Doug, tell me what's happening? What's occurring?" Well, his daughter, Sarah, had grown up, gotten married, and had just birthed her first child about five weeks before this phone call. When Sarah was born, it was a difficult birth. She was in labor for a long time during the birthing process, at the hospital that they were at, the medical doctor noted that serious problem was that the umbilical cord was wrapped around Sarah's neck three times.
Oh my goodness.
In his great effort and wisdom, he pushed the baby back up the birth canal, cut the umbilical cord, and Sarah was able to be born.
She was alive.
She was alive.
That's a good thing.
Thanks to the good care of the doctor, but there was a problem. The problem was that every time that Sarah tried to nurse or feed, she stopped breathing.
Oh.
Of course. That's a serious problem. Of course. She had to be resuscitated and they kept trying to see if it would work, but it wasn't working. She couldn't eat.
Oh my goodness.
She was being kept alive intravenously. This is when Doug called me, he said, "So, Dr. Lenarz, do you think that you could help?" I was like, "I don't know, Doug, if I could help or not." He said, "Well, how about this? How about, I'll fly you--" This was the other side of the state that Sarah lived in a place called Wenatchee, and he said, "I'll fly you out to Wenatchee and then you could come to the hospital and see if you could help." And I said, "Doug, I don't think anybody in that hospital is going to let me within 20 feet of this child."
I know. That's a problem.
It is a problem.
I know in some countries they have chiropractors in hospitals, but as far as I know, no states in United States do that.
Well, there are some, but you know, pediatric care of a newborn who's, basically, struggling to survive. I said I don't think they're going to let me do that. He said, "Okay, well let me get back to you." Then about a week later, Doug said, "Okay, they've agreed to let Sarah and the baby out of the hospital, and we're coming over there as soon as she gets out of the hospital."
They drove straight to your clinic.
What they did is they hooked up Sarah to a monitor, a portable monitor that Sarah and her new husband took the baby out of the hospital with a monitor and they showed them how to resuscitate.
Wow. This is intense.
It's very intense. They got out of the hospital and they came straight to Sedro-Woolley. It was Doug, his wife, Elaine, all of the aunts and uncles of Sarah, the whole family showed up. This was the middle of winter. It was like 15 degrees out. It was the end of a work day and it was dark out and the whole family comes traipsing. It was a great reunion. Rebecca was the mom, and Rebecca brought what came in the door and she had this waddle of blankets with little wires running out of it. They went to this little briefcase-size thing that this young gentleman was carrying on his shoulder. I assumed it was Rebecca's-
Husband.
-husband. They all came in and all the family wanted to get checked. First, of course, we had to attend to Sarah. We went to the adjusting room and mom took off all the blankets and there was this, just this amazing little girl. She was now six or seven-weeks-old. She had these wires attached to her body.
Poor little thing.
Her face was all scrunched up and she was like irritated, and just not happy. I was a little nervous because I didn't really know if I could help this child or not. I really had to do some tests. I took Sarah through these pediatric tests and checked for misalignment in the upper neck. Indeed I found on the test that there was misalignment in the upper neck. Then we had to get x-rays and it's not easy to x-ray a seven-week-old baby. First of all, their bones aren't formed yet. They're all cartilage and they're wiggly.
There's tubes and things.
There's these wires and things coming off her body. We got her back to x-ray, and we went through that process. I found what was really a very large misalignment in the upper neck. Very large on a very tiny little baby.
Yes, very large in a tiny little baby. I knew then that I could probably help. Once I got those, I met up back in the adjusting room with the mom in the family, and we proceeded to do a pediatric adjustment. It's just a very light adjustment using a small child headpiece.
Yes. It's almost more like just a teeny tiny little tap, right?
Yes, it's a little tiny little tap or a little pull, basically, with a drop. Really, probably less than a pound of pressure. As soon as I did that adjustment, all of the wrinkles in Sarah's face went away. Her face became smooth-
Wow.
-and she fell asleep immediately. I thought to myself, "Oh my goodness, did I just killed his baby."
[laughter]
I really didn't think so, but I was like, "Oh my goodness."
I'm laughing, but [laughs] it wouldn't be funny if you did.
She was, of course, still breathing at that point, and I said, "Okay." I had Rebecca take Sarah back to this resting area in the clinic and was resting with the baby while I checked the rest of the family. About 15, 20 minutes later, I went back to this resting area and Rebecca was nursing Sarah-
That's beautiful.
-for the first time in her life, she was able to eat and she didn't stop. [crosstalk]
Okay. As a mom, I'm getting chills and let tears in my eyes. That's pretty huge.
It was astounding. We see really amazing things with children. I could tell you more stories.
That is so near and dear to my heart because a lot of times upper cervical is the last thing that parents think of. Can you address why should parents consider upper cervical? Maybe upper cervical first, but most certainly a part of regular wellness care for any child. I know I have four babies and I know for us, that was the first thing we did. We also saw the pediatrician and other normal care, but definitely upper cervical checkup within the first week of life.
You know it just makes the most sense. When I take care of adults, people in their 20s', 30s', 40s', 50s' or older, who are oftentimes dealing with traumas that occurred starting with birth that never got corrected or happened when they were a year old and they fell off of the changing table, or when they were two years old and they fell out of the height chair, or when they were learning to walk and kept banging their head against things. Care for children is so critical to help them grow up with a healthy spine and nervous system and a body that's functioning at its highest level.
Yes, all the suffering that can be avoided. I'm, actually, a case like that myself. I was injured as a very young child before I could even remember, and all the suffering that I had as a child, if this type of care had been available to me and my parents, which it was not, and they had known about it, which they didn't, my life would definitely have been a lot better. You said you had some other stories, so why don't you go there?
Well, I'll tell you, there's just so many overall these years. I'll share a recent one. I have a patient that came in last fall. It was a woman in her 50s, and she came in, her son brought her in, and she was suffering from a condition known as Trigeminal Neuralgia.
Yes, horrendous pain.
It's terrible, it's known as a suicide disease. It's the result of some kind of neurological dysfunction in the nerves, what's called the Trigeminal Nerve, which is one of your cranial nerves. It has nerves that go to the faCe and there's three branches to it. If this dysfunction in the trigeminal nerve leads to intense pain, and it can be intense and unremitting or intense and intermittent, and things like eating or breathing or talking could just set it off.
There's very little medical care that's effective. There's some surgeries that people do, but those only tend to be so successful. This patient came in and I took her through the procedure that we do in the Blair upper cervical with the exam work, and the x-rays, and the precise diagnosis. We figured out which way the upper neck had gone out of alignment and corrected it, and then the pain went away within a day.
Amazing.
They had to travel a bit to get to my office, and it came back a couple of times mildly, but just a couple more adjustments. Then, she has been pain-free for months and got pain-free just before she went for a three-month trip to India, which is where she was from originally.
Wow.
That's an example of the kind of thing that we see.
Yes, my favorite thing is just watching people get their lives back. Not having a life to speak of, and then be able to go and do what makes you happy.
Maybe I'll share one other story, which I think is not quite so dramatic, but I think it illustrates a lot of what we see. I have a patient that I just saw again recently who I took care of many, many years ago, probably 20 years ago. I took care of her mother. I took care of her, and then I hadn't seen her for about four or five years. She had neck pain was the main thing. Neck pain and headaches, and she decided about a couple of years ago, maybe a year and a half ago, her neck pain had come back and the headaches had come back, and she decided to go to somebody who took her insurance because we didn't.
Okay.
She wanted to save money.
Yes, right.
[laughter]
I've heard that one before.
She had then been going to this chiropractor, who I'm sure is a fine chiropractor for nine months, visit after visit after visit. The problem might get better temporarily but kept coming back. Then it seemed like the generalized manipulative therapy that the chiropractor was using just wasn't helping at all. It had been many, many months. Her husband said, "Why don't you just go back and see Dr. Lenarz?"
Okay.
[laughter]
She came back, we did two visits, and she's been pain-free since then. Did she save money?
Yes. That's a good question to consider. Dr. Lenarz, how many lives like that have you touched by now? We'll break it down. How many have you in your practice seen?
I've probably seen about 15,000 people over 30 years.
Yes, that's amazing, but then as a leader in the profession, I know that you have trained up many other chiropractors, and you have started clinics and sold them and handed them over to other doctors, and many yet more, you have coached new doctors and existing doctors to be able to be more successful, and, basically, what that means is help more people. If you were to estimate how many people do you think that is that because of that decision when you had a bum shoulder, have been changed by it now because of that?
[chuckles] I think about this from time to time. The thing that I want to say is, I'm just very passionate about this upper cervical work. Like I mentioned, I really love all chiropractic, and I think that the thing which is most powerful-- In fact, I've never, ever in all these years run across any other healing modality, which is as powerful as upper cervical care.
I will agree with that.
To get this out to the world is a huge task. It's like the world is really a very big place.
I agree. It's, essentially, the reason I'm doing this podcast because we can maybe reach one or two more.
Inch by inch, step by step, right?
Yes.
I don't really know. I tried to calculate this at times. It's probably a few 100,000 people. I think of the people that I've trained and the people that they've taken care of, and practices that I've opened, and the people they've taken care of. [crosstalk] Because in addition to being a clinic doctor, you're also teaching and mentoring.
Yes, and it's just so important. We're still barely, barely scratching the surface.
Yes, but despite that, you're changing lives and you're motoring on. What would you say to a young person that is maybe considering this as a career? Do you have any advice for that person or they don't know? It's like, it seems so big, it seems daunting, it's difficult. You alluded to, it's a lot of work. They're not sure maybe they don't have the confidence. Do you have any advice for that person?
I do. I do. You have to figure out your calling in life. I don't know whether that's chiropractic. There are times when I think, "Why would anybody want to do anything other than be a chiropractor?"
[laughter]
Yes.
I realize not everybody can be a chiropractor, which is because I love what I do so much. If you really want to have a life that you get to or have to live with miracles on a regular basis, and if you really want to have a life where you can find your passion and you can look at really making a difference in people's lives and, potentially, making a difference in the world by making a difference in people's lives. Upper Cervical Chiropractic needs people who are passionate. The other thing I would say is that I've now been doing this for 34 years, and I am as passionate or more passionate about this than the day I walked out of that first chiropractic visit office.
That's amazing. I think, takeaways from this conversation is, you can make a difference in your life. You can make a choice and be a healer and make a huge difference. Also, if you're just like me, a mom out there or a person who's suffered, there's help available, and that help is available at any age.
That's correct. As long as you're alive, you can heal.
Yes. All right. Yes. A mutual friend and mentor of both of us, Dr. Muncie, I remember he said, when people are asked, "How old do you have to be to come, or can you see an older person, or how old do you have to be if you're a baby?" He would always say, "Well, you have to be born first, and you can't be in the box, but in between there, I can help you."
Yes, that's, that's great. Dr. Muncie was such a great mentor. Just in the last two weeks, I've seen somebody who was 101-years-old, and I've seen someone who was five weeks old.
Yes, that's beautiful. That really is beautiful. Dr. Lenarz, is there something else that you would like to share that I haven't asked you?
Well, I just want to thank you for the work that you're doing, and the difference that you're making, and- [crosstalk]
Oh, thank you.
-getting this information out to people.
Thank you. That means a lot. One last thing. Do you have a life verse or a quote or something like that, that motivates you on a day-to-day basis?
There's two things that come to mind when you ask me that. In my chiropractic life, one of my heroes or mentors is B. J. Palmer. One of the things he would say is that, "The properly adjusted, upper cervical spine," I'm paraphrasing. "The proper correction connects the finite person to the infinite person."
That when your body, and your spine, and your nervous system are working, it literally helps you connect to that larger picture of what life is all about. That's a huge part of my life, and when I think about taking care of people, connecting the finite person to the infinite. Making sure that that infinite wisdom within the body is expressing itself, and that the person gets to experience that. That's what keeps me going.
Yes. That's beautiful. You said two things. That was one.
[laughter]
Well, I think that and I can't really think of a quote per se, but I know that for me, my relationship with God or the higher Power, and my ability to connect with that part of my life is so critical, and I strive to do that in my personal life and in my own personal practice. Those two things just tie together. I think that would be the second thing, is that I feel like people really need to discover deep within themselves their connection to the Creator.
Yes. Thank you so much for your inspiration, and your stories, and your time. We appreciate all of it.
Well, thank you, Ruth.