Good Neighbor Podcast for the Greater Chattanooga Region

Dr Rai Harris on Transforming Young Lives: The Impact of Pre-Natal & Pediatric Chiropractic Care

• Scott Howell

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What if a simple adjustment could lead to miraculous health improvements for your child? Join us in a heartwarming and informative episode of the Good Neighbor Podcast as we sit down with Dr. Rai Harris, D.C. from Skyline Chiropractic. Dr. Rai's journey from St. Louis to the heart of the Greater Chattanooga Region is both inspiring and touching. Not only do we delve into her personal life, filled with a love for sports and community spirit, but we also explore the crucial role her chiropractic practice plays in supporting local families and businesses.

Dr. Rai opens up about the profound reasons families seek preconception care at her practice, shedding light on the innovative Healthy Human Program designed to optimize health before conception. Her story takes a poignant turn when she recounts the dramatic birth of her daughter, Kaya, whose severe medical challenges were miraculously improved through a gentle chiropractic adjustment. This life-altering experience ignited Dr. Rai’s passion for pediatric chiropractic, showcasing the incredible impact such care can have on young lives, from resolving colic to improving digestion.

Our conversation also delves into the vibrant chiropractic community in Chattanooga, where collaboration among practitioners ensures the best care for patients. Dr. Rai passionately discusses the urgent need for radical changes in children's health, addressing concerning trends in life expectancy and envisioning a healthier future for the next generation. The episode wraps up with a heartfelt call to action, encouraging listeners to support local businesses and engage with the community to keep the vibrant heartbeat of Chattanooga alive.

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Speaker 1:

This is the Good Neighbor Podcast, the place where local businesses and neighbors come together. Here's your host, Scott Howell.

Speaker 2:

Hello, good neighbors, welcome to the Good Neighbor Podcast brought to you by the Friends and Neighbors Group of the Greater Chattanooga Region. Again, my name is Scott Howell. I'm your host for today. I'm your host for today.

Speaker 2:

The reason for that we have the Good Neighbor podcast is just simply that we desire to bring an awareness to the residents who live in our communities regarding locally owned and or operated businesses in your neighborhood, your city, maybe all the way across the Chattanooga region, however it might be, we want everyone to know.

Speaker 2:

You know local businesses are the backbone of our communities, way before corporate giants, way before these large retail names. You know local owned businesses were the one that the people, everybody shopped with, the people, everybody you know done business with, took their medical help to, and so we just want to keep that in the mind's eye of all of us that we could continue supporting local businesses. And, of course, you know, every store excuse me, every local business has a story to tell, and here at the Good Neighbor podcast, we just want to help them to shout it loud and proud so all you good neighbors out there can hear. And you know, today we've got one of our good neighbors here that not only lives here but also has a business here, and we'd like to introduce her, dr Rye Harris, and she is with Skyline Chiropractic, and so we'd like to introduce you today, dr Rye. We're glad to have you on the Good Neighbor Podcast.

Speaker 3:

I'm so happy to be here, Scott. This is going to be so much fun.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, absolutely, we were talking before we started recording. I was trying to get her name right. If y'all that don't know it, it's spelled R-A-I. I just want to make sure I had it right. And she told me it was. What was it you said?

Speaker 3:

I say rye like the bread, but since I moved to the South, people told me it's actually rye like the whiskey. So you know, depending on the person you know, you got to see what's better to pronounce it.

Speaker 2:

Whichever one you like rye bread or rye whiskey. That's Dr Rye. We are glad to have you, dr Rye, and looking so forward to hearing about you, know all your practice and all your journey and all that you do.

Speaker 3:

But before we jump into the business side of it, I like to give you an opportunity, if you want to, to say a little bit about yourself and your family. Oh yeah, um, I that's. That's really exciting. I don't think I've ever been asked that on a podcast before. I feel like people usually jump right into. Like let me talk about your business. Um, so that's really exciting. I am 32. So a lot of people find, and our business has been open for six years. So my husband and I were really young when we opened our business, which was a lot of fun, had a lot of hurdles. We have two daughters. They are five and a half and one. Yeah, they're so cool, the coolest kids. I feel like everybody probably says that about their kids, but you know, we're like overly obsessed with our kids. We love them. Um, let's see, what do we like to do for fun? We um my husband is a gamer, so we like games. We really love sports. That's honestly that's kind of our jam, okay so we're big mizzou fans.

Speaker 3:

It's football, so we're big Mizzou fans. It's football time, so we're big Mizzou fans. We have we can be converted to Vol fans since we live here, so we, we root for the Vols. You know it was since we're here. We think Neyland stadium is one of the coolest places on earth. So yeah, we, we like all sports, though We've been to some softball games at UT. We have yet to go to like a Titans game or a Falcons game or anything like that. But we have gone to a lot of college sports, been to a couple of UTC games of various sports.

Speaker 2:

So yeah, sports are kind of our thing, apparently. Hey, whatever someone likes and enjoys, and they can do with their family and that's great, you know, and you're talking about your big Mizzou fans. Now a lot of people might wonder why, but you moved here from Missouri, right?

Speaker 3:

I did, I did. My husband and I are originally from St Louis, missouri. We actually grew up about a mile away from each other and we were actually dated in high school, so we are both literally from the same part of town and then we moved here together. But yeah, we are originally from Missouri. So big Mizzou Tiger fans, so go, tigers, throw that in there.

Speaker 2:

I understand that I was born and raised in Alabama and so I tell Alabama of course you have the Roll Tide and you have the Auburn Tigers.

Speaker 1:

Yeah.

Speaker 2:

Well, I'm a Tide fan, but I tell people I'm also being originally from Alabama. I'm also an Alabama lover as far as the sports go. So if Auburn is not playing Alabama, I'm for Auburn. Yeah, absolutely Auburn and Alabama is playing.

Speaker 3:

Sorry, sorry, all you Tigers out there, but I'm a Tide fan you have to be specific, living now that we live in SEC country. Back when we were in St Louis there weren't a ton of SEC teams around, so now that we're here in SEC country we have a lot of shirts that say Tigers on them and you know, from far away the navy blue and the black can kind of look similar, so people are like tight, tigers, tigers. We're like the zoo and they're like, oh, okay, okay that's funny.

Speaker 3:

Now you you what brought you here from uh Missouri so when we were debating on when, where we were going to open our practice. So my husband's not a chiropractor but he knew that he wanted to work in the office with me. So we're actually. We have a different type of chiropractic office than people usually think of. We are actually preconception, prenatal and pediatric.

Speaker 3:

And so when? Yeah, so when I told him that he was going to get to play with kids all day, he was like, sign me up. He was like that sounds like the best job ever. He was like this is great. I was like, yeah, I just need you to like entertain them. Make sure that, like, while they're getting adjusted, or their siblings are getting adjusted, like, we don't have to. You know, there's not like just children running in circles or doing whatever. And he was like you need to tell me it's like a glorified babysitting gig. He's like I'm down easy.

Speaker 3:

Um, so when we were deciding on where to open, we knew that we were, we were kind of over Missouri, especially when you, when you have this opportunity in front of you to, literally when the world is your oyster right, and you're like if I could live anywhere in the world, where would I live. And we got some really, really great advice from tons of mentors at the time that said, look, you don't have to, you don't have to open your practice there just because you're from there, because you live there. Like, figure out where you want to live, where you want to raise a family, where you're going to be excited to be every day and open a practice there, like don't, don't just open it like here because you live here. And so we made a huge list of like things. We wanted things that were like that we absolutely wanted from where we lived and, ironically, my husband and I are very similar but our lists were totally different.

Speaker 3:

He wanted like mountains and outside things to explore and lakes, so he could like go go fishing and he wanted to be like, if you can't tell, we like to get outside. So you know he wanted to, like he wanted the opportunity to hunt if he wanted to or fish like he just wanted all of these options.

Speaker 3:

I really like a city, Like I love getting outside to go to, like a farmer's market or or just like walking around and seeing the sites and like seeing old buildings, and I I think that is really fun. And so, um, I said we should move to like connecticut outside of new york, like lots of old buildings, lots of people. This is gonna be awesome. And he was like I think we should move to denver, like lots of mountains, lots of like cool nature. And we were both like, okay, those things don't really jive. So we had to pick the things out of those cities that we really enjoyed and that we were really hoping to like experience and continue experiencing for life.

Speaker 3:

And as we were making that list, ironically we were driving to a wedding in Atlanta from St Louis and we stopped in Chattanooga because we saw all of those ridiculous Ruby Falls signs. Like, if you've been here and you're just like driving down, they happen every five, like five miles. So we were like, okay, what is this? Ruby Falls things Like we have to stop because apparently everyone's obsessed with it.

Speaker 3:

Um, I'm so thankful for those ruby fall signs now because, we stopped and we were like, wow, this is a really cute city, like let's just explore. And we happened to be driving up lookout mountain to go to ruby falls and, uh, my husband jake joked. He said, oh, look, there's an office space for lease, we should look at it. And I was like, oh, you're funny. And then we drove back down the mountain after we saw Ruby Falls and we were like, but what if we did open here? Like I don't know that I want to open my business on a mountain? But what if we did open like in Chattanooga? We drove around on our way back from the wedding. We stopped again. We had to go to a conference in Atlanta, so we stopped again. We ate at Champy's downtown on MLK.

Speaker 3:

Oh my gosh. We walked around, we went to Clumpy's, we stopped at the Choo Choo, we did all the really touristy things downtown in. Chattanooga and we were like, wow, we really like it here, this is really cool, we could see ourselves here, and so, you know, then we were kind of stuck.

Speaker 2:

Well, I tell you what you picked a fabulous city.

Speaker 3:

We really did.

Speaker 2:

This whole region is just beautiful and all the things that you mentioned on both your lists, I mean just check them all off. It sounds like, and it's just. It's a fabulous place and and glad to have you, glad to have you here. So you've been here six years now and I find it really interesting that you said your practice is basically pediatric, but you also said prenatal.

Speaker 3:

Preconception prenatal. So we do fertility, pregnancy and pediatric yeah.

Speaker 2:

Okay, preconception as well. So is that when somebody maybe is having difficulty conceiving? Is that kind of what that's about?

Speaker 3:

Yeah, a lot of. So there's really two facets that people come to our office for preconception Sometimes it's difficulty conceiving, so like they've had previous fertility issues as far as like maybe they've tried IVF or IUI, or maybe they've just been trying naturally for a long time and just can't seem to figure it out.

Speaker 3:

So there's that stance. There's also what we call our healthy human program, which is hey, I'm looking to have a baby, but I just want to make sure that my body, my husband's body, that our baby is going to be the healthiest that we can help and that we can figure out. So it's people that really just want to set their child up, like genetically and functionally for an incredible life, and so they look at their health prior to conceiving to make sure that, like hey, are all of our ducks in a row, Are we doing everything that we need to to set our child up for success in the future?

Speaker 2:

Wow, you know I I have been privileged enough to interview several chiropractors, but no one that's actually practicing from that point of view. So that's very interesting. I didn't even know that was. If I could use an old Southern phrase, I didn't know that was a thing. So how did you decide to become a chiropractor?

Speaker 3:

Oh gosh. So that's a really long story that I will save you the shortened version of, but you can take whatever part of it you want to.

Speaker 3:

Well, I originally was going to go to med school. I had literally said from the time I was about seven years old, people told me I talked too much, which is why podcasts are really great for me. They have always told me I talk too much, and so from that time I said you know what mom I'm going to be a lawyer or a doctor, because when doctors talk people should listen and lawyers just get to talk all the time. So apparently one of those two professions is for me. So I've said that since I was really little and once I got to undergrad, I was really little. And once I got to undergrad, taking the MCAT, applying to medical school. You know that feeling, scott, when something just like doesn't sit right.

Speaker 3:

Like things are going well, doors are opening, but it just like, yeah, it doesn't feel good, like something feels off about it. And so I was applying, I took my MCAT, I got into like I even got accepted into a really great program at our school that helped five students like really really buckle down to study for the MCAT. It was like our school investing in these students to say like, hey, we know you're going to do really well, so we're going to give you this extra attention on the MCAT. I mean, I was really blessed in that I, you know, I had a few scholarships for that that I was able to take advantage of like so many really really great opportunities to like study and and do interview prep and do really well for like all of my med school admissions.

Speaker 3:

And as I was doing interviews and as I was like just getting this information, something just wasn't sitting right and I was like I don't even know what to call it, cause I I mean I was what 20, 21, like I didn't really know about intuition or anything. I felt like so I I didn't really know what to call it. So one day we were at our pre-med club and one of and someone a representative from a chiropractic school came to talk to our pre-med club which you know, tracks make sense and she was asking me like what my plans were and like where I was going to school. So I was telling her about like my most recent medical school interview and how, like that was probably the school I was going to attend and we were kind of going on about it and she was like, really I actually was going, wanted to go to a DO school, and she said, well, why do you want to do that?

Speaker 3:

And I said, you know, there's something about that DO profession and healing with your hands. That I think is incredible. And she said I don't mean overstep, but it sounds like you want to be a chiropractor. You just don't know what chiropractic is. And so, like any 21 year old, I was supremely offended. It's like, excuse me, you don't know anything about me. Yeah, how dare you tell me that you know more about what I want to do with my life than I do? Because, like any other 21 year old, I apparently knew everything there was.

Speaker 2:

Oh, yeah, everything. Yeah, you should have been applying to NASA.

Speaker 3:

Yeah, exactly, yeah, you should have been applying to NASA, yeah, exactly. So I listened to her presentation about the school and I was like, dang it, she might be right she was presenting about it. I was like, wow, that does kind of sound like what I want to do. So I pulled her aside, did apologize, did apologize for all the listeners out there, um, and was asking her a little bit more about that particular school. Um, the school happened to be in my hometown, which made like because that was a late transition, um, because I, at this point, most people that you know like apply to med school and things like that know like if you're already applying and interviewing for med schools. We were like, well into my senior year at this point.

Speaker 1:

So I was like oh gosh we got to go Right.

Speaker 3:

And so that school happened to be in my hometown. So I was like, okay, not that big of a deal, like it's not, like I have to find housing and fly across the country, like I could always just go home. And so I started shadowing chiropractors and I was like, wow, wow, she was right, this is exactly what I want to do, like this is what I was imagining that DO school was.

Speaker 3:

And so at that time I wanted my undergrad degree. I went to a really cool school that allows us to self design our major. So my undergrad degree is actually in sports medicine. And so I really wanted to be like a sideline chiropractor, which you probably couldn't tell from our introduction about sports. But I wanted to be like a sideline chiropractor, which you probably couldn't tell from our introduction about sports. But I wanted to be a sideline chiropractor and I was like this is going to be fantastic. I'm going to go be a chiropractor for the pros and it's going to be a blast. We're going to have so much fun being on the sideline. I get to combine sports and I get to adjust people. This is great.

Speaker 3:

And then I call myself getting converted, when I was in school, to a family practitioner because, gosh, I just started seeing how we can change the world and change children and their functionality from such a young age. And then, as you can probably tell by my practice, I just realized that you could start changing things earlier and earlier. People would ask me well, how do I prevent my child from with this happening? And I say, oh well, that's probably more of a prenatal issue. And then and then we started to say how do well, how do I prevent these prenatal issues? And then that turned into a preconception issue, and so then we stumbled into preconception, prenatal and pediatric chiropractic and I really say it, it's honestly ordained Like it was.

Speaker 3:

It was God's gift that he just kept opening doors and those doors felt right, like it's not that the other doors you know were bad or felt wrong, but like it just wasn't. They didn't feel as easy and as seamless as the doors that were opened and like, now that we've started our practice this way, just how everything has kind of fallen in line. I mean, you're like that. That was the plan for me all along.

Speaker 2:

So by the time that you actually opened the practice, did you know then that you were going to be in that specialized field, or did that, did that kind of come later, or yeah, so when we opened, we were I would say we were more family centered and more family focused.

Speaker 3:

Honestly, it was the birth of my daughter that really swung things to pediatric chiropractic for us. So I had been studying. I had been studying pediatric chiropractic in school.

Speaker 3:

I knew, I knew that was going to be a heavy focus on my practice, but I thought you know there are parents involved, so you kind of you know the parents have to bring them, so you might as well see the parents too. And so we were preparing to open our practice and my daughter was born in January of 2019. And when she was born she wasn't breathing and she was seizing and it was just. It was an extremely traumatic situation for us and after about three days um in the NICU with her kind of sort of progressing, there wasn't really much happening.

Speaker 3:

Uh the doctors looked at her MRI and said there's a, there's a lot of brain damage here. Um, and I just don't know, I don't. I don't think she's going to make it. I think you're looking at a really tough life. I think you're looking at support for feeding, support for living. I frankly, I don't know if she's going to make it out of the hospital.

Speaker 2:

So sure yeah.

Speaker 3:

It was really tough.

Speaker 2:

No doubt.

Speaker 3:

And so, looking at her MRI, I saw there's there's a bone in your body that's called the Atlas and I could see. I could see, I could see her Atlas and her MRI and it looked different to me than other than you know, normal MRIs or normal Atlas that we looked at. So I did the only thing at that point that I felt like I had control to do and that I knew how to do, and I went and adjusted her and ideally, as a pediatric chiropractor, you know, you have this image of like adjusting your child right after birth, but like, since I couldn't touch her or hold her or like barely even see her right, after birth.

Speaker 3:

At that moment I was like you know what if? If she's going to pass, I'm going to make sure that she is totally clear. She's going to look into my eyes one time.

Speaker 1:

It's going to be amazing.

Speaker 3:

I adjusted her and the monitors went crazy. And I had never done an adjustment on a child on monitors. I had done plenty of adjustments on infants and on new babies. I'd never done an adjustment on a child that was hooked up to monitors and the monitors went absolutely crazy she started breathing. She started breathing. She started breathing on her own. And the next thing, like 12 to 15 hours later, they were calling us and saying hey, I think we're going to take her ventilator out. She's over breathing the ventilator.

Speaker 2:

Oh, wow.

Speaker 3:

And then she started breathing on room air, and then she started eating, and then she started sucking on a pacifier, and then she just started making all of these leaps and bounds and two weeks later we took her home.

Speaker 3:

Obviously, as a chiropractor I I knew the the miracles of chiropractic, I knew all about pediatric chiropractic. But my husband always says that in that situation, like in that moment, that was the moment that made him a hundred percent in. He was like, yeah, you know, you explained the job really well. I'm so glad that I was able, that I'm, you know, able to help babysit these kids and, like you know, work around the office. But he was like seeing seeing that happen to our daughter. He's like every child. Every parent should get to know what it's like to have a clear child.

Speaker 2:

Wow, what an amazing story. Oh, my goodness, I mean you know when?

Speaker 3:

you said it was God ordained.

Speaker 2:

I mean, that's proof right there. Yeah, it's quite possible. If you hadn't sought the field that you're in, that you'd have been telling a totally different story today Exactly I mean wow. Who can argue with that?

Speaker 3:

Right.

Speaker 2:

Wow, you know, man, I just want to stop a minute and cry after hearing that. Wow, that's amazing.

Speaker 3:

Now we get to show people pictures of kaya and I mean she has, you know, she has her deficits and you know she's uh, she is in a wheelchair and she's a little bit non-verbal. I say a little bit because now she's like five and fiery and she doesn't have words that most people can understand, but we understand her perfectly yeah.

Speaker 3:

And so you know, now she's, like you know, mostly typical five-year-old and yelling at people and pushing over her sister and she she is not ambulatory, so she doesn't walk because she has some spasticity issues in her legs, but she crawls like a mad woman and so she like, is all over everything. She gets in and out of like chairs by herself, and so she like, is all over everything. She gets in and out of like chairs by herself. She loves water, so she swims all the time, like she just does all of these amazing things and she's such a light to so many people's lives and you know, sometimes we we just have to sit back and wonder we're like man, what would happen if Kaya wasn't here?

Speaker 2:

and wonder we're like, man, what would happen if kaya wasn't here? Oh wow, yeah, true, I can't imagine. I can't imagine how that makes you feel to think about that, because it's such an amazing testimonial of of what that you know, your craft, your practice, uh is able to to do for people. I mean that little baby, uh, hanging on life or death, and I mean you couldn't, there's nothing you could do about the damage that had already been done. You're talking about the brain damage. There's nothing you could have done about that, but now, now it was a difference between living or not.

Speaker 3:

Right.

Speaker 2:

And now you, there she is. I don't know if you get a chance to bring her to the practice with you or not.

Speaker 3:

Well, yeah, every day.

Speaker 2:

That's what people love about our practice.

Speaker 3:

Both of my kids are there every day. She's in school now, so she doesn't she's not there all the time every day. But yeah, we, um, we bring our kids to the practice because you know we want people to see what it's like Like you know we're.

Speaker 3:

we're just like them, freaking crazy kids that scream at people and eat everything and you know. But but we want people, we want to show people what it's like like, hey, our kids get adjusted and they're clear and they, they function well. And I usually say there's three things that kids are supposed to do they're supposed to eat, they're supposed to sleep and they're supposed to poop. And if they're not doing one of those three things, that's a pretty good indication that they need to get adjusted. If they're not eating well, sleeping well or pooping, that's pretty much your guide right there, like let's go see what's going on because their body, at a basic level, is not functioning the way it's supposed to.

Speaker 2:

You know I hate to bring a negative into this, but I want to bring the negative so you can turn it into a positive. So a lot of people you know are really reluctant as adults to go to a chiropractor. So what kind of myths and misconceptions do you hear and help people through when they're, when you're talking about bringing their child?

Speaker 3:

Oh yeah. Well, the big one is you can probably imagine, it's probably the first thing that popped in your head. People are like. I've seen those crazy videos of chiropractors on tiktok and youtube and they're like so you do that to my baby, like everyone's imagining me just like dangling their baby upside down, being like all right rip them and crack them and I was like that's not what that looks like at all at all.

Speaker 3:

Um, so that's probably the number one myth and misconception is I and it's funny because, like, so I tell people's kaya story and we talk about pediatric chiropractic and you can tell when they're looking at me in the eyes that they're always just kind of like, and what does that look like? Like, how does that? How do what do you mean? So that's the number one myth. When, in fact, when I'm adjusting babies, most people laugh once, especially if they've had that misconception and they bring their babies into our office. They laugh because when I'm holding a baby and adjusting them, you probably can't even tell that I'm adjusting them.

Speaker 3:

Like people literally just think I'm walking around our office carrying babies while I'm adjusting them. It's really gentle, it's a light touch. In fact, when people watch me adjust babies, they're like this is really boring, like I've had students come watch and I've had interns come watch and they're just like there is nothing interesting about adjusting a baby Because it's mostly a lot of like sustained pressure, it's a lot of holding. So I'm literally just like holding their spines. Um, it's a lot of like tone changing on their spines Like they're. It's they're very delicate being so there's not much doing. I mean I'm talking like it's moving my fingers like this much Right. I had a mentor that told me it's kind of like checking the ripeness of a tomato. You can't over squeeze a tomato. You're gonna get tomato juice everywhere.

Speaker 3:

So, it's literally just like that light little squeeze, you know so very small movements. In fact, most parents, if they're super reluctant, they'll bring their kid to get adjusted the first time and they're like staring at me, they're like what's happening? And I'm like, yeah, the adjustment's almost done? And they're like, oh, to the point where, like by their second, third, you know, fifth, tenth adjustment, their parents are like, here, while you're adjusting them, I'm gonna go to the bathroom, I'm gonna go get a drink. Can I run?

Speaker 3:

to my car really fast, like I'm not just gonna sit here and stare at you and watch you adjust them. Um, so that's probably the biggest misconception or myth that we see all the time. That's really common, honestly, because there are like tons of videos on the Internet and there's just not as many videos adjusting babies. Because once again, you would not stop and look at that on your TikTok feed. You might look at it because the baby's cute, but like you're not going to watch me adjust a baby, you're going to be like you're just holding head, like what do you want? What do you want me to look at?

Speaker 3:

There's no wow factor in it. You know the wow factor comes in in the physiology. Later the wow factor comes in like the screaming colicky baby that is not screaming colicky anymore. The wow factor comes in the baby that hasn't pooped in a week, that literally has blowout five minutes after they get adjusted. The wow factor comes in babies that are struggling with nursing, like literally walking into our office, not latching, walking out of our office, latching to their mom's breast, perfectly Like. That's where the wow factor comes in. There's no wow factor in what it looks like to get adjusted.

Speaker 2:

So you mentioned something I want to just now that I want you to touch on a little bit more. Yeah, colicky.

Speaker 3:

Oh yeah.

Speaker 2:

So what, man? I guess almost probably every parent goes through that. You know where the baby gets to colic and screams all night and can't nobody sleep. You know, yeah, what is your solution or treatment, maybe is a better word for that.

Speaker 3:

Yeah yeah. This is a really funny question in chiropractic, which honestly kind of goes back to your other questions on myths and conceptions and misconceptions. We're we're so used to the traditional medical model that has a, that has a treatment for everything you know. That's like, hey, here's this diagnosis and here's how you're going to treat it, or you can have this thing and this is how you treat it.

Speaker 3:

So once again, I tell people like it's it's kind of boring when you look at it from a from a bird's eye view because I'm like, what's my treatment? I'm going to adjust them. Like, oh, are you colicky? I'm going to adjust you. Oh, are you having trouble latching? I'm going gonna adjust you. Oh, your kid's being really picky and eating and they're like they can't seem to eat anything but macaroni and cheese and dino nuggets. We're gonna adjust them. Oh, your kid has add, we're gonna adjust them. It like it doesn't really change that much of like all of the things that kids have come into our office with. I'm like, yeah, okay, cool, we're also gonna get them adjusted right.

Speaker 3:

Like of course there are other things that we tell parents about how to support that adjustment based on what's going on with their particular kid. But yeah, it all boils down to there's a dysfunction in your nervous system. With colicky babies in particular, it's usually a digestive dysfunction. Right? So there's a dysfunction in your nervous system. We're going to remove the interference so your body knows how to do what it's supposed to do, and then they're not going to be colicky anymore.

Speaker 2:

Wow, so how, when, when you make that adjustment and with a baby, that's colicky, just, and I I hate to just ask for specifics. So you correct me again, which is like you did just now, if I ask it the wrong way. But how soon do they usually see a change?

Speaker 3:

Yeah, sometimes immediately. I mean there's all the times. I literally just had a mom tag me on social media not too long ago. She said my kid hates her car seat. Like she puts her. You put her in the car seat, she is going to scream. She left our office and slept in her car seat for four hours straight. Like mom was like I don't want to take her out of her car seat because she's still sleeping. Like I don't know what to do. She's sleeping Because in chiropractic I, I, I in particular I'm not doing any of the healing.

Speaker 3:

It's the body that's doing the healing. I remove the interference, so I make an adjustment to remove the interference. What I'm doing is really just think about it like opening up a floodgate. I'm just allowing the body to in the brain to do what they normally know how to do. There has never been a human body that goes. You know what I really hate doing basic functions of staying alive, like I really hate being able to eat, I really hate being able to sleep and I really hate being able to poop. It's terrible. I would never want to do that. Like that said, nobody ever the human body at a basic biological level wants to continue to survive. That's how biology has continued to go on the interference from that particular organism. Right, let's remove the interference. Their body, biologically, is going to do what it needs to do to survive, so that it can procreate, so that the species can continue.

Speaker 2:

So that's a good way of removing the interference yeah.

Speaker 2:

I love the way you explain that removing the interference. I love that because sometimes you know, just like you said, you see these videos out there where you hear all the cracking and the popping and you hear all these things. You know people making remarks about being adjusted. But when you explain it that way just removing the interference so the body can work like it's supposed to that makes total sense. I mean, it just kind of opens your understanding to say, oh, wait a minute. Okay, I see.

Speaker 3:

now you know it takes a lot of mystery away, you know exactly, and, like I, in particular, I obviously I see a lot of kids, because that's just where my heart lies, and especially I can write are, like we said, I think that's just, that's just ordained.

Speaker 3:

But I look at it from adults perspective too. When people tell me, like, oh man, I would never get adjusted, or I don't know what it's like to get adjusted, and I'm like do you like to eat, do you like to sleep, do you like to poop? I mean you don't have to say yes, but most people are going to say yes in their brains, right, like yeah, you like to do all those things. Right, are you not doing those things? Well, I mean, you could blame it on 15,000 things, but like, at the end of the day, is your body doing fundamentally what it needs to do? If the answer is no, then you should probably get adjusted.

Speaker 2:

OK, so, and one more question about the children's aspect, not your children aspect, but the other side of it. So if a parent needs adjusting, do you have someone you refer them to, or do you do that yourself, or how does that?

Speaker 3:

work At this point in time. We take care of our parents too.

Speaker 3:

Um they're the only people. Honestly I'll be totally honest with you, scott the only people who feel really awkward in our office are single men. Because they come in and they're like everyone is either pregnant or has a baby or is like in a couple that is actively trying to have a baby in this office. So they kind of walk in and they're like, um, it feels like I'm not supposed to be here and we've actually been asked by men. Often they're like do you see men? Because, like, I was referred and I would really like to see you, um, but it feels like this isn't the place for me. I will usually see them. I don't enjoy turning people away. I will see them. But some people have found they're like I don't mean this in a terrible way, but is there anyone you can refer me to? Because this just doesn't feel like I like the aspect of chiropractic, this just does not feel like the fit for me, which is totally fine.

Speaker 2:

Have you made a lot of good connections in the chiropractic community in Chattanooga.

Speaker 3:

Oh yeah, like chiropractic is one of the most amazing fields, because, because we all think a little bit differently, right, we're all friends. So people will say like, oh well, I used to see this doctor and now I see, you know, now I want to come see you and I'm usually like, oh yeah, like we've talked about that like you know, like, yeah, like we figured you were gonna come over because, like, most of us are friends and like we know that there are people that don't jive with us.

Speaker 3:

You know, like there's there's there's personalities for every situation and like sometimes they're just, they're just people.

Speaker 3:

That it's like you like the concept, but you just you don't jive very well with me. You might jive with like seven of my other friends in town, but it's just not me. So yeah, we talk about it often. We actually really love when people jump from like our friends offices to another friend, because then I can talk to them and I know exactly how your care was going, exactly how you've been progressing, like we can co-manage it together and make sure that you have a smooth transition. I mean, we always want people to be comfortable, so, yeah, we have tons of people to refer to because, yeah, we're all friends.

Speaker 2:

Dr Rye. I always like to ask this question before we wrap up a podcast, regardless of the type of business or practice that it is. If there was one thing that you wish our listeners knew about the heart of Dr Rye and Skyline Chiropractic, about the heart of you and your business, but they probably wouldn't know unless you share it with them and you'd like know, share it today, loud and proud, on the good neighbor podcast. What would that be?

Speaker 3:

Oh man, that's a really good question.

Speaker 3:

Um, you know, I think for us and I'm going to speak for my husband too, cause he's usually like the spokesperson of our office, and I'm going to speak for my husband too, because he's usually like the spokesperson of our office OK, I would say it's that we just we have a heart for the kids in our community, you know, and the kids of the future.

Speaker 3:

I think. I think we are seeing now, because we have so much access to social media, we are able to really see how the world is progressing on a generational stage, are able to really see how the world is progressing on a generational stage, and I think this is the first time in life, you know, in human existence, that we've really been able to see that, because we can see multiple generations interact with each other and we can see the way that they are going to commit to the world. And I think that that has just increased our passion to say, like we need to take care of our kids, because our kids turn into the people that are going to take care of us, and so, if we're going to pass the torch along to them, because, you know, this is actually the first generation of kids that I don't know if you know this, scott that is not expected to have a longer life expectancy than the generation previously no, I didn't know that Wow.

Speaker 3:

So this is the first generation of kids that have a shorter life expectancy than their parents. So if we continue to down that trend, we would get to a point where parents were outliving their children by decades. Oh wow, we got to a point where your parents were outliving children by decades.

Speaker 3:

We got to a point where your parents were outliving children by decades. The human race will not survive. I mean, frankly, like you can tell, I look at things from a biological perspective. If we got to that point, generation after generation after generation, we have no more humans Right, and so we need radical change, like there is something we have to do to make big changes in our kids so that we can take that trajectory and move it back to where it's supposed to be. Before this generation, before Gen Alpha, every generation previously had been expected or had a longer life expectancy than the generation previously. Like right, like Gen X has, I think their life expectancy was in the 80s and baby boomers were in the 70s, and then millennials it's like mid 80s, and then, you know, gen Z was like mid 90s and then Gen A now is like, I think, mid 80s or something like that again. So it's I mean, it's not a huge trend difference in this, like in this particular generation, but, holy cow, if we don't make a change soon, that's a problem.

Speaker 3:

That's a big problem moving forward, and so we're just so passionate about kids and making sure they get a good start to life, because you just never know where that's going to go. Sometimes I wonder you know, like I made an adjustment on my daughter and it was the difference between life or death, but how do I know that I'm not adjusting? I mean, we're in a, we're close to an election. How do I know I'm not adjusting the next president of the United States? How do I know I'm not adjusting the next, the next Supreme Court member? How do I know that I'm not adjusting the next CEO of a big company that that makes huge decisions for our economy? Like, how do I know that that's not the brain that I'm clearing out in that moment? We have no idea.

Speaker 3:

We have to create that potential for our kids to make sure that the world that we've created continues to function. So it's a big deal, it's a big responsibility.

Speaker 2:

Good point. Wow, that's a. That's a. I didn't know that, I hadn't heard that. That's, it's kind of eye opening. But you're right, I mean, and I'm glad there's people out there like yourself that are focused on children, because you know, the children are innocent victims of, of even even neglect that is not intended, intentional neglect, you know, and so they are those innocent victims intentional neglect, you know, and so they are those innocent victims. You know, I've thought about before, you know, the big debate about seatbelt laws. You know why should I be forced to do something as an adult? But then, when it comes to putting babies in car seats, we call it in those car seats, and you see that, because they can't protect themselves. Right, they can't protect themselves. So nobody argues that point. You know, although when I was a kid there wasn't such thing as a car seats, you know my mother was the seatbelt, you know right.

Speaker 3:

Exactly.

Speaker 2:

But yeah so. But you know, I really appreciate you today. You, you've been fabulous and so explanatory, but in a real fun way as well. You know, getting across to everyone. And when you, when you say, I guess if I take away anything from this, that it's that you're moving to interference. That's one thing that just stands out to me. When you said that, I thought, wow, what a wonderful way of describing what you do. And before before we leave here for just a moment, I want you to take the time to tell people how to contact you or, if they want to find out more about you online or offline, spread the word here.

Speaker 3:

Absolutely so if you want to learn more about anything that I talked about today, a bunch of that is on our website, which is wwwgoskychicom, so G-O-S-K-Y-C-H-Icom, I am working on improving our social media presence. So you know I'm not a big fan of social media. I really struggle with it, but I am working on improving our presence. So at Sky Chi Chat you can find us on Facebook, Instagram and Threads I think is a new one I'm working on. So yeah, and on our website.

Speaker 3:

It actually has a really great place where you can schedule a consultation with me. Those are totally free. It really just helps us figure out if we're the right place for you or if if this is even the appropriate next step for you. Um, so if anybody is just wondering, like, hey, I don't know if that really fits me, or my kid, or, um, if that's the office for me, but if you could help me find the office for me, um, we love serving our community in that way. So you can just schedule a consult for me, and those are 15 minutes and we can chat about everything that has to do with your life, you know as much as we can get in 15 minutes where are you located?

Speaker 3:

we are located at 6025 lee highway, so if pretty much everybody in chattanooga knows where sam's club is, we are in the business park, the executive business park, right next to sam's club okay, okay, great good location, too Easy to find yeah. Yeah, right in the middle of the city.

Speaker 2:

Well, Dr Rye, it has been a pleasure talking to you today and hearing all about you and what you do and your family and your daughter. That was an amazing story and thank you for just going into all the detail that you did today. I know that people are going to enjoy listening to this episode, especially if they have children or grandchildren, or even anticipating having children in the future. So thank you for all this good information.

Speaker 3:

Oh, thank you, Scott. Thank you for having me, it was really fun.

Speaker 2:

It was my pleasure and to all the good people, all the good neighbors out there in the greater Chattanooga region. You know, after listening to Dr Rye explain, you know Skyline Chiropractic and what she does and how she goes about doing it, and I mean, couldn't you just a lot of y'all are only hearing this through audio, but couldn't you just hear her passion for what she does? I mean, if you those of you who will see the shorts, reels and clips you'll see that passion as well, but but you know, there is such a passion in what she does and the story of her, her daughter, just wow. I mean wow, that's all I can say about this episode. Wow, it's just such a blessing to know that there's people like Dr Rye out here in the community serving your children and serving you as well. So I know she hopes that you'll, you know, take a moment to consider what she does, what she has to offer and, you know, to schedule that initial consult and give her a chance to explain and talk and you know, and see, maybe see your child as well, to explain and talk and maybe see your child as well.

Speaker 2:

However, all that goes with your consult, and I would like to also stop for a moment and just thank all of you listeners out there for taking the time out of your day and listening to the Good Neighbor podcast. Always remember to support the locally owned and operated businesses in the greater Chattanooga region. As I always like to say, from Cleveland to Dalton, from Jasper to Benton, it's a beautiful place here in this great, this greater Chattanooga region, and let's all do all we can to support our local businesses. Everyone, go out, try today and try to make this a remarkable day.

Speaker 1:

Thank you for listening to the Good Neighbor Podcast. To nominate your favorite local businesses to be featured on the show, go to gnpclevelandcom. That's gnpclevelandcom, or call 423-380-1984. 8-4.

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