Hi everybody and welcome back to Airway First, a podcast from the Children's Airway First Foundation.
I'm your host, Rebecca Boschma.
In today's episode, I'll be speaking with Dr. Stephen Hall.
Dr. Hall is an integrated physician, teacher, speaker, and author of the book, The Seven
Tools of Healing.
His message is about finding and changing the patterns that are creating painful feelings,
harmful behaviors, dysfunctional relationships, and physical diseases within all of us.
Dr. Hall began his medical career in 1985 as a residency-trained and board-certified
family practitioner.
His practice has been shaped by his own personal journey to answer two questions.
What is healing and how can I best help you with yours?
We're also proud and honored to call Dr. Hall one of the advisory board members for the
Children's Airway First Foundation.
And now, let's jump into my interview with Dr. Stephen Hall.
All right.
Thanks so much for joining us on the podcast.
I really appreciate it.
I'm very happy to be here.
Great.
Thank you so much.
I'd like to start with, because I'd like to go through your full journey of becoming
a doctor and to kind of where you are now with your practice.
One of the things that you have said should also view you as a whole, fully integrated,
multi-dimensional being, and make good use of the best concepts and treatments from all
valid medical traditions.
The reason out of everything that I've read of you so far, that that really struck me,
along with a lot of people that listened to this podcast, I have a chronic illness that
no one seems to be able to fix.
And I understand when people come in and they look at your symptoms, and that's how they
want to just, let's just fix this thing right here.
You were one of the first doctors that I've ever heard actually say, no, it's holistic.
It's really holistic.
Let's tackle it from a different perspective.
So talk to me a little bit about how you came to that way of thinking and working in your
practice.
I remember starting to want to be a doctor when I was in sixth grade.
And then it turns out when I got into junior high, I started taking science classes that
I enjoyed it.
I really liked science and the way of thinking.
So as an undergraduate, I really thought it was important to teach myself how to problem
solve and how to really think.
And so I really liked engineering that turns out because engineering basically is problem
solving.
So I have an undergraduate degree in material science and engineering.
And back then we were working on the Jarvik heart and artificial blood vessels, artificial
tendons.
And I was kind of working on how to make these things more bio-compatible.
That was my undergraduate research.
And I was also able to double major in chemistry at the time because some of the classes overlapped
and then have a minor in physics.
So pretty science oriented.
And but luckily my summer job was I was a white, white river guide on the green and the Colorado
rivers.
And so I spent the summers basically taking people down through these incredibly beautiful
canyons and sitting around the campfire at night talking with them.
And we got into philosophy and I really got started getting interested in humans and how
they work, which I think is helpful if you're going to be a doctor, right?
Right.
And I was also not just interested in the content of science.
I was very interested in the process of science.
How do we actually know that what we think we know is true?
And it turns out that's a difficult question to answer.
And philosophers have been working on that for over 300 years.
So one of the important parts of science, a very important aspect of science is the data.
And the data is pretty much primary.
And then the models are basically designed to try to explain the data.
Okay.
And so one of the most unscientific things a scientist can do is discard data just because
it doesn't fit the model, the current model.
So once I realized that, hey, everything in your life exerts some kind of influence on
your health, right?
Right.
Which is something else that you said, which was amazing, which was try to think of one
thing in your life that has absolutely no influence upon your health.
Yeah, good luck.
And I'll tell you, yeah, when I read your book, I'm not kidding you.
I paused.
I thought I can do this.
Yeah, I still haven't come up with an answer yet.
Right.
I just, I mean, even the boulder sitting out in the field is leaching minerals into the
soil that's feeding the plants that's making the oxygen that you're breathing.
I mean, we're all, yeah, we're all interconnected on this planet.
And so it just made sense to me that we would have a system of medicine that can take your
entire life into account.
And when I looked at the medical model that I was being taught in medical school and realized
this doesn't account for quite a lot of human experience, you know, the medical model basically
sees you as a skin bag of biochemical reactions.
And the assumption is if we just knew what those biochemical reactions were, then we
could pour in other chemicals and you could be the person you wanted to be.
You could control them.
Yeah.
You could control it.
Well, right there, that violates the Heisenberg uncertainty principle.
Can never know the initial conditions exactly.
Right.
And it's astonishing how like, you know, you know, the quantum world view and eastern
traditional world views are alike in so many points.
And it's been a big curiosity over the years.
Like how could this quantum explanation that only worked, you know, it's only really needed
on very, very small scales like atoms and electrons and things.
But yet it applies to us as humans and we're big.
But so anyway, I was, I was, wanted to be a family practitioner because I kind of like
being a jack of all trades.
Okay.
And I like being able to see a person as a whole person and be able to take their whole
life into account.
So, so I was, you know, I didn't think all these things at once.
Obviously, this is an illusion.
Obviously, yeah.
Right.
And then I was a third year resident.
So I was in my seventh year of medical training and I just finished my afternoon in the clinic
and I was walking back to the residence room to dictate my notes.
And I was just thinking about the patients I'd seen that afternoon and, and asked myself
the question, well, what prompted them to actually, you know, pick up the phone, make
an appointment and come in.
But what are they really looking for?
And I thought about, you know, the person with hypertension and the person with diabetes
and, and, and then I thought, well, what if they're really looking for healing?
And I stopped in my tracks because here I was in my seventh year of medical training
and I didn't know what healing was.
I know.
I, that, that's still, you know, yeah.
And because for one thing, medicine likes to be a scientific endeavor, right?
And in science, we always define our terms so we have a precise language so that we
all know what we're talking about when we talk to each other.
Which makes sense.
Yeah.
So how could there be this multi-billion dollar science based healthcare industry with no
concept of health?
No true definition.
Right.
No true definition.
So I thought, well, I got to remediate that problem.
So I started searching for a definition of health or healing.
And seven years later, I started to get an appreciation for why nobody did it.
Nobody is that one.
Right?
So, but what I noticed in that time was that even though I didn't have a precise definition,
and I'd gone through several by that time, they were like one, there, there was a back
in that day, there was an organization called the American Holistic Medical Association.
And their definition of healing was balance in harmony with the cosmos.
And I thought, well, that sounds pretty good, but how do you do that in the exam room?
Yeah.
I mean, that's kind of like, okay, Mrs. Smith, today we're going to put you in balance in
harmony with the cosmos.
But what I realized later, yeah, exactly.
And what I realized later is, no, that's actually the effect of healing.
That's not what healing is.
That's a result of healing that you come into that balance.
Right.
And as we're going, I want to make sure people know that we're getting the point that I can
already tell, I'm going to start referencing this, your, this is your book.
I'll have it on the website, as well as in the notes from our podcast, the seven tools
of healing.
Because I know we're going to be referencing this quite a bit as we go.
And I want people to be able to, oh, what did they say?
Where did they say, let me go pull that in.
Yeah.
So, very quickly, I know we need to keep going is that even though I didn't know that
I didn't have a definition of healing, I could kind of recognize it when one of my patients
experienced it.
When you saw it.
Yeah.
And so I asked myself the question, okay, so by that time I knew healing was more than
just how your physical body functioned.
Obviously, you needed mental health too, and you needed healthy relationships and all kinds
of things, right?
Healthy sleep, all kinds of things.
So I got to thinking, well, so if, if somebody has symptoms, that's a clue that they need
healing.
And the resolution of the symptoms is a clue.
The healing has happened.
It's not the actual healing itself.
So the symptoms that clue and when the symptom goes away, that's a clue that it has happened.
So I started looking at my patient, well, what else happened to them then besides the
resolution of their symptoms?
And what I saw was that they had learned something.
And what they had learned almost inevitably had deepened their understanding of themselves.
It had given them a deeper perspective of who they were and it, it helped them be more
in their power and along those lines, right?
And so I asked myself the question, well, what if that learning about who they are is
the actual healing?
And again, that might just be a side effect of the healing.
But what that did was that got me focusing on, well, I want to, when I'm treating a person,
I want the net result to be that they also deepen their understanding of themselves,
not just have the symptom go away.
Right.
And so I started looking for therapies that both, you know, helped a person find the imbalance
that's being expressed as a symptom and correct in the imbalance, but at the same time learning
about themselves.
So that's, that's basically what I've been trying to do for the last 37, 38 years now
at this point.
And would it be wrong to classify it as, and again, this is my takeaway having read this,
you're treating the person.
Right.
That's what you do.
Not the same, you're actually treating the person.
Yeah.
And we often, and medicine has a lot of really powerful tools that they're very handy.
And so we do use them to treat symptoms when necessary, but I don't generally just stop
there.
I'll say, okay, you have your blood pressure is high, we can give you medicine to lower
your blood pressure, but your high blood pressure is not the cause of your high blood pressure.
Right.
Let's dig deeper and figure out what's causing it.
Your high blood sugar is not the cause of your high blood sugar or whatever, right?
So your arthritis isn't the cause.
So basically almost anything that somebody comes in with, there's something causing it.
And in my mind, so like for example, a chronic disease is basically chronic because it resists
our attempts to treat it and make it go away.
Right.
And if you, you know, the NIH, the National Institute of Health does these surveys every
once in a while and the percentage of Americans living with chronic disease is just going
up and up and up.
Yes.
Yeah, staggering.
It's like, I think it was 54% less study I saw.
And half of those folks are living with more than one chronic disease at a time.
Right.
So this progression is happening on conventional medicines watch.
So it turns out conventional medicine is great if you need your appendix out.
Right.
But it's not very good at dealing with these chronic diseases.
And so the thing that's helped more of my patients, more than anything I've learned in
medical school is this ability to get, help them listen to, okay, what is my body trying
to say by generating this constellation of symptoms?
And can I really find the real imbalance and, and get that imbalance aligned, get it corrected.
Get back in check.
And over the years, I kept trying to, you know, peeling down through the layers thinking,
oh, this is the root.
This is the root.
And every time I would think this is the root, then I'd find, no, there's something behind
that too.
And then the person would come in with something else when we find that something behind that
too.
And so luckily I've had a pretty stable practice.
I've been able to follow.
I've got some patients I've been seeing for over 20 years.
And so I've really been able to see their life evolve.
And you know, a lot of doctors, I think can't see these patterns because they don't see
the same person very often.
A lot, you know, because doctors move around, people's insurance change, they have to change
doctors.
Or if you're chronic, you just get tired.
You get tired of going.
And go somewhere else.
Yeah.
And in general, yeah.
So the, but being able to see these, you know, follow these people for a long term and has
helped me help me really keep peeling back through the layers until we got to the roots.
And I know this might sound a little outrageous, but the root of almost everything I've, in
my opinion now, after watching all this is actually how consciousness is getting expressed.
Really?
So what do you mean about that?
Well, I think that there's a, I mean, there's a consciousness behind all of creation.
Okay.
And you might call that God, you might call it Purusha or, you know, one can talk.
I mean, there's lots of names for it, right?
So, so you might, and everything in physical, in the physical manifestation like this clip
here, this microphone and this computer, they're all expressing aspects of that consciousness,
including your disease processes.
And so there's basically, I mean, the consciousness that we have access to is essentially unlimited.
But how many people do you know are living an infinite life?
Right.
And so some things limiting our access to that consciousness and some things determining
what aspects that consciousness kind of come through and become our life.
And so I call those determinants of conscious expression.
And there's lots of them, like your genetics are determinant of consciousness expression,
right?
Sure.
And, and, but the, the determinants that we have the most say over that we can actually
maybe control are your beliefs.
So your beliefs basically determine what becomes your life.
And that's why Gertz has said, man is as he believes, as he believes so he is.
Right.
And Henry Ford said, if you think you can, you can.
If you think you can't, you're right.
You're right.
Exactly.
So there's all these things.
Yeah.
All these quotes and sayings about how important beliefs are, right?
And so I would say, I mean, not always, but majority of the limiting beliefs that are holding
people back in their lives and creating these imbalances are generally belief imbalances
where they're holding some kind of belief that says they're smaller than they really
are.
Right.
And the assumption is.
Oh, no, go ahead.
I was just going to say, I mean, think about how many of us go through our everyday lives
like that.
Oh, exactly.
And you just don't think about it.
It just it's it's somewhere along the lines.
You decided you couldn't do something or you weren't as good as somebody for that or you
could only go this far.
And it stuck.
Yeah.
And studies have shown that most of the major beliefs that make up our worldview are in
place in our psyche by the time we're seven years old.
And so how many of those beliefs are we going to consciously know about?
Right.
You just carry them with you.
Yeah.
And so they're back here in unconscious.
And now unconscious.
Working away and how we see the results feeding out which we can we interpret as reality.
Right.
And so this the practice, the way that you come at things, you call it and it's integral
medicine methodologies.
Right.
And one of the things that I know that you practice is it's cranial sacred, but you it's
actually mentioned at some point in the book is cranial osteopathy.
Am I slaughtering that?
No.
I said it correctly.
Yeah.
Exactly.
What is this?
And what is cranial sacred work?
And how does this factor in?
So I did my residency in Saginaw, Michigan.
So I just up the state.
Just a little bit up here.
Right there.
Exactly.
Yeah.
Exactly.
And it turns out that down in Flint or Lantz, sorry, East Lansing, there's a medical school
where osteopathy and MD share a medical school.
Okay.
And they even take classes together the first two years of their training.
And so they offer a 40 hour basic manual medicine course twice a year, I think.
And so I use some of my conference time in my residency to just go down there and take
their course in basic manual medicine.
Okay.
And that taught me a whole different way to think about the body.
And I like working with my hands.
So I came back to residency and started applying the osteopathic manipulations and getting really
good results.
But I just had a very basic rudimentary understanding of it.
But I was able to diagnose things that I couldn't treat.
So I went to the residency director and explained the situation.
I said, oh, I took this class and now I can diagnose these things, but I can't treat them.
Is it okay with you if I refer clinic patients to chiropractors?
This was back in the 70s, right?
Right.
In the early 80s.
And he said, well, you know, you're liable for your referrals.
So if you get to know them and trust them, I'll back you up on that.
He was a great programmer.
Yeah.
No kidding.
Dr. Kelly, yeah, very open-minded.
And so I started calling, get out the phone book.
This was before the internet.
And got out the phone book and started calling chiropractors and said, hey, can I meet you
for lunch?
And you just hear their jaw hit the ground on the other side of the phone.
Right.
But that was my first foray out of conventional medicine.
But what I found was a whole group of practitioners who were highly trained and caring about their
client, their patients and knew it, most of them knew what they were doing.
And so I started referring people and seeing how it worked for them and when it didn't work
and when it did and just learning that way.
So that sort of set the stage.
And then I did my only, my first practice, I went to a small town in rural Maine and
was the only doctor in a small town up there about two hours north of Portland.
And again, I took some time to go down to Boston and I took a course in clinical hypnosis.
And that taught me a whole different way of thinking about the mind.
I bet.
Wow.
Because in residency, I was very interested in psychology too.
So I act, the residency actually had a psychologist on staff and most of the residents ignored her
all the time.
So I had had plenty of time to sit and chat with her.
Dr. Yeah.
Pick her brains.
Yeah.
So I was really interested in that.
And so I didn't learn cranial work till later, like seven or eight years later.
Actually it was 91.
I started studying the cranial work, which is a subspecialty of osteopathy.
Okay.
And, but then it's very gentle.
There's no popping or cracking.
And it turns out the body elaborates these three subtle rhythms and by, you can palpate
those rhythms with your hands.
And when you can feel where they're stuck or asymmetrical or out of balance and there's
therapeutic techniques, you learn to sort of encourage the, the rhythms back into balance.
And then that frees up the body's own innate healing capacity.
So between the, the cranial work and then really doing.
Well, what I found, what I noticed was when I started doing cranial work on people, they
would sort of automatically go into a hypnotic state.
Oh wow.
So I didn't even have to do an induction or anything.
And, and so what I would do is I just ask people, okay, I'm listening to these rhythms
while I'm working on you.
I ask you to listen to your body from your side and, and then the way I learned to do
hypnosis was very allopathic where we were just taught all these post-hypnotic suggestions
to leave people with.
And, and again, it's very symptom oriented.
It didn't get to the root, but, but there's another form of hypnosis kind of called Ericsonian
hypnosis where you literally can go into the unconscious mind like on a safari or I think
of like a fact finding mission, you know?
Oh wow.
And, and since the unconscious runs your body by combining the body work really allows a
person to kind of raises a curtain between the conscious and the unconscious and they
can actually get really good information from their body and, and basically understand
the body language the body is using.
And so over time of doing this and, and I noticed that everybody I worked with had this
deep inner wisdom that was running their body.
So you don't have to think about your potassium levels or your sodium levels or, right?
Right.
And your body, your body just takes care of that stuff.
And so people that were able to connect with that could ask, okay, well, what should I
do to solve this problem in my life?
What'll help me with my sleep?
What'll help me with all these allergic reactions I'm getting now?
What would help me with whatever problem that my headaches or whatever, you know?
And then if they got really still and could listen and answer.
They would get the answer.
Yeah.
Wow.
Yeah.
And over time I noticed that there was a pattern to how this inner wisdom helped people and
that's what the seven tools are.
Yeah.
It was basically that, that pattern.
That pattern.
And I had a whole string of patients that really couldn't listen to their inner, they
couldn't connect with that inner knower part.
And so I taught them the seven tools and they went home and practiced them.
And after a few months of practicing them, they were then better able to connect with
that inner knowing.
Do you think that from your experience, pretty much everybody can get there even though it
takes a little time?
Yeah.
I think it's possible.
I do believe there are certain worldviews that block it and as long as you're holding
onto those worldviews, it's going to be challenging and maybe blocked.
I mean, for example, I've never seen anybody heal and remain a victim at the same time.
So a victim mentality is a very, it's a hard block.
Right.
And what I say is being victimized is a universal human experience.
And we've all had things happen to us that we, right?
But being a victim is a way of seeing yourself.
And that's what holds you back.
So it doesn't say anything about all that you've experienced.
That can be worked with.
But the conclusion that you're a powerless, you're a victim, then that's what you've got
on.
That's the one that impacts your body that you're carrying with you.
That will become your determinant of conscious expression.
And so you'll have experiences where you're powerless.
Bad things happen.
Wow.
So it's not that simple, obviously, but that's just the example.
Obviously, right?
So to me, this is so fascinating.
I just have a myriad of questions, but I want to tie this a little bit into newborns if
we could, because one of the things that we really advocate for with children's every
first is we can get to these kids before the age of six.
You really could have this dramatic impact on their airway, which leads to their sleep
quality and their health quality and all these things throughout their life.
And from my understanding, your cranial work is one of the things that could be done to
help some of these kids.
Yeah.
So a couple of examples.
So one of the things we see if a baby's tongue tied, because babies suck when they're inside.
They see it on ultrasound, kids are sucking, right?
But if they're tongue tied, then they're sucking an abnormal way and they literally
train their whole mouth and throat muscles to work in this abnormal way.
And so even after you release the tongue tie, they may still not know how to tongue thrust
or that sort of thing.
And so what we found is if they have some cranial work right after the release, it often,
again, frees up that natural balancing mechanism and the babies start nursing a lot better.
And so I really like to see babies.
I mean, it might be good to even prep babies before, but I personally think the sooner you
can do the release in a baby, the better.
Not wait till they're a month old or two or three months old or whatever.
Even do one or two cranial visits to get them in, get their whole oral pharyngeal area
in balance often helps them a lot.
And getting this work for older children as well.
If you've got a child that's four or five and has a mouth breather or is having sleep
issues or how would you approach something like that?
Yeah.
By that time, they've already probably changed the growth of their mandible and changed your
maxilla and all that sort of thing.
But what we found is if children are going through orthodontry, for example, to expand
the palate or to move teeth around and stuff, that the cranial work helps the orthodontry
work a lot better.
Really?
Yeah.
Like I had a patient as a teenager, one of her insiders came in behind the tooth that
was supposed to be in front of.
And so they were doing this treatment to literally move the tooth out and around and drop it
back into place.
And the orthodontist said, well, this is going to take 16 months to get this done.
And she was in a lot of pain every time she went and had her braces adjusted.
And so the mom set up deployments to have her come in to see me the next day afterwards.
And after treatment and releasing tension patterns in the mouth and gums and alveolar
bone and everything, she wouldn't have any more pain that month.
And she got through the treatment in 10 months.
Wow.
Instead of 16 months.
Well, and do you think part of that is her body wasn't in pain?
And so she was processing things different.
Maybe is it possible that she was more open to the adjustments?
Well, and releasing the strain patterns each time allows things to just move better.
And I also think it removes any forces that want to make the tooth go back to where it
started from.
So nowadays they're asking people to wear their retainers their whole life.
And I think if they were to get cranial work as they went through that, the orthodontry,
there wouldn't be any reason why their mouth would go back towards the resistance from
their body would go away.
Exactly.
I mean, I don't think there's any studies to prove that.
That's just a theory that I have.
A theory, right.
Yeah.
You're listening to Airway First with today's guest, Dr. Stephen Hall.
You can find out more about the Children's Airway First Foundation and our mission to
ensure that every child has access to screening, evaluation, and treatment of all children's
airway disorders before the age of six on our website at childrensairwayfirst.org.
You can also find a ton of great resources for parents on our website, including videos,
blogs, recommended books, comprehensive medical research, and other podcasts.
As a reminder, this podcast and the opinions expressed here are not a medical diagnosis.
If you suspect your child might have an airway issue, contact your pediatric airway dentist
or pediatrician.
Now, back to our podcast.
But I've had a lot of patients.
I can tell you lots of stories, but where the craniowork really dovetailed nicely with
orthodontics, they get better outcomes more quickly with less pain.
That is amazing.
Now, what about with sleep?
Have you found this craniowork assist people, especially kids, but anyone with sleep issues
as well?
Or would you approach that completely different?
What we can do with craniowork is just get your system into balance and then step back
and see what happens.
It's different for each person.
But you have a little bone right above your voice box called your hyoid bone.
And that hyoid doesn't touch any other bones.
It's suspended in space by the force of three different muscle groups.
So I think of it like where the three legs of a Y come together.
That's where the hyoid sits.
And so the bottom leg are these muscles that go from the hyoid down to your sternum and
herosashita manubrium there and then your clavicle and stuff.
And then the one leg of the Y are the muscles that make the flurry of your mouth.
Because when you look at a skull, that's all open space there, right?
And then so there's this floor of muscle and then your tongue sits on that muscle.
And then the back part of the Y are the muscles that go from the hyoid bone up to your...
There's this little...
It's called the stylohyoid, a little stylus that comes off the temporal bone.
It looks like a...
Let's see.
What is it?
The mites go up, the tides go down.
So it's like a stalactite hanging down from a cliff, a cave wall, right?
And there's a little muscle attached to that.
And then they also attach to C1, the front side of C1, your first cervical vertebrae.
But those are the muscles that keep your trachea and your sockets from falling down into your
chest.
We've ever wondered why your trachea doesn't fall down into your chest.
Now you know why.
Right.
There you go.
But because it's a Y, all those forces play off each other.
The kind of...
And...
But there's excess tension in the floor of the mouth that will then pull...
Can pull the neck out, for example.
And that kind of thing.
So, getting this whole hyoid...
I call it the hyoid complex.
Balanced can really help the oral pharyngeal muscles work properly.
And one of the things that affects airways is when your tongue falls back.
Right.
And your braces can be so dangerous.
Yeah, which is what I had actually.
Now that I've learned about all this stuff, it's like...
Right.
In this horrible...
I did the same thing.
I have no chin.
What is happening?
Yeah.
And...
But anyway, I was lucky.
You know, my braces aren't till I was 15, so I probably was already had a big enough
airway.
I didn't suffer from it.
That was safe enough.
Yeah.
But no, I work a lot with this whole area to help people with snoring problems with...
But I think it's very important in this process to make sure this whole mechanism, they call
the orthoenathic system, is balanced and working to its proper...
As best it can.
And I think cranio work along with the training that they do can be really helpful in that.
So that the training actually works and holds.
Right.
So it doesn't regress.
Exactly.
It would be the right word.
As far as pediatric medicine right now, where do you think we're missing the mark?
Well, from my experience, my observations in office, I think...
Most pediatricians are doing a really great job.
And where I think would be helpful for these kids is if we had airway exam, you know, tongue
and oral airway exam, be a part of the newborn exam that the delivering doctor does in the
delivery room.
Right.
I think people will be surprised to know it's not.
It's not.
I've had some kids six months old coming in and nobody's ever looked in their mouth.
Right.
Okay.
But I mean, they're listening to their heart and lungs and they're checking their hip displacement.
I mean, there's...
But they're just not opening their mouths and really looking in there, moving their
tongue.
Sticking their finger in there, looking around.
Yeah.
And it would just take a very short, you know, just add a minute or two to the newborn exam.
But it could really change the baby's life if they could get the proper treatment started
at that age, you know.
Right, because they could take a palate, for example, that was really high.
They could actually adjust it while they're still malleable or like you said, release
the tongue ties so that they could nurse properly.
Yeah.
And again, so we work a lot with the mandible and with the temporal mandibular joints and
you know, the mastodermuscles, temporalis muscles, people that clenched their teeth in
their sleep.
It's called bruxism.
You know, bruxism is interesting because it's happening in your sleep.
Right.
So you have to get into that unconscious mind to figure out why.
To make a difference in it.
Yeah.
So just getting a bite plate and people just bite on the bite plate all night.
Right.
And it saves their teeth, but it's messes with their...
But it's still happening.
Yeah.
It's still is compressing their whole cranial rhythm and still messing with the temporal
mandibular joint.
So the thing I would like to see, and I know we're working with this as part of the Children's
Dairy First Foundation is getting that to be an acceptable part of the newborn exam.
And so, you know, pediatricians, neonatologists, pediatricians that attend births, even the
OBs, because sometimes the OBs are the one doing the new baby exam.
Right.
And then the pediatricianers, midwives, whoever's doing an initial new baby exam just to have
an airway check, oral, you know, the mouth and airway check be part of that physical
exam could make all the difference in the world.
It really could.
It's fascinating.
And again, you know, as a mom of two, I had no idea.
I was assumed, you know, they're going off, they're doing their thing, they're going to
check, my kid, we're great.
And having, you know, been a part of the foundation now for a year and started to learn what goes
on.
It never occurred to me no one looked in their mouth.
No one checked.
And then also being trained to notice the, like when a baby's a mouth breather.
Yes.
That, I mean, I never got trained to do that when I was in residency.
But you know what?
The Navajo women never got trained.
And I know you've probably studied this.
They know to just come up and close their mouths.
So we're back to that kind of inner consciousness somewhere along the way.
And figuring it out.
They just close them and that's why they didn't have the issues.
Interesting.
Yeah.
So it'd be something simple like that.
And even just a piece of that white micro-pore paper piece really is a great way to get
encouraged for breathing.
Right.
So, but I personally think a good cranial evaluation early in life can help.
There was an unpublished study that was done by an osteopath in Waterford, Maine that there
were two hospitals that did deliveries in his town.
And every morning for five years, he got up and went into one hospital and did a just
a 20 minute cranial treatment on all the babies that were born that day.
And then he didn't do them on the babies born in the other hospital as a control group.
Okay.
And then he followed those kids till they were five years old.
And what he found was the kids that got the 20 minute cranial treatment on the first day
of birth were hospitalized half as often as the other kids.
Wow.
For all different causes, whether it was respiratory, sensual virus or whatever, hospitalized half
as often.
So, talk about inexpensive preventative medicine.
Unbelievable.
Yeah.
No kidding.
Yeah.
And he didn't get it.
He wasn't able to publish it because he didn't like go through an institute review board
or any, you know, it wasn't a formal study or anything.
But I met him when I was back in Maine.
Wow.
Pretty interesting.
That is, that's incredibly interesting.
So, when we're talking about moms and newborns, you know, talking to them specifically, you
know, what can they do to protect their newborns and guide them as they're growing older?
Can, could they actually ask for an airway evaluation at birth?
I think that would be helpful and or do their own.
I mean, moms can tell if their babies have a tongue tie.
They might not be able to assess a high palate.
They might not know what that is.
But, but educate, you know, moms can observe nasal or mouth breathing babies.
So, just a little bit of that education could happen in a prenatal class.
You know, this is what you watch for in your newborn if they're a mouth breather.
Right.
Show a few slides or something, you know.
That wouldn't be that hard to include that in the curriculum for prenatal classes, for
example.
Yeah.
And the other thing is, you know, parents and I think a little bit prejudiced, but especially
moms is really have this knowing about their kids.
This is almost intuitive kind of knowing and to trust that.
Yeah.
If you think something's off, then be like a dog on a bone and don't give up to get
an answer that you trust.
And you know, it's just you being a patient advocate for your child.
You know, and I spoke with another guest on a previous podcast and that's the only way
that she got help and finally got somebody to really dig into her issues.
She was patient advocate.
She was your little less.
And I think it's not a knock on the doctors if you can't see it, you know, right up front.
Right.
And, and the system is really hard.
It doesn't really support doctors doing their job well.
And that's right.
They don't have the time to really dig in and look and do these.
But the medical system is so complicated now that anybody who interfaces with the medical
system needs an advocate.
And my own opinion is that's one of the jobs of the primary care practitioner is to advocate
for their patient to the rest of the medical system.
Okay.
You know, the hospital is the insurance companies, hospitals, everybody or.
Well, I personally don't like dealing with insurance companies, but as far as anybody
talks, but specialists and, you know, like if somebody needs to be hospitalized, they
need an advocate to make sure that, that everything's going correctly and stuff.
That's just my opinion.
And it's just because the system has gotten so complicated and everybody's overworked,
especially now after the pandemic.
Oh, absolutely.
Real labor shortage.
And, but, but yeah, just, and parents often have to start out being the advocate for their
babies and hopefully their, their pediatrician or family practitioner can help them with
that if the child needs specialty care.
Okay.
So that's my opinion.
And then, you know, the last question I'll have for you.
And again, I recommend your book to pretty much anyone.
You're seriously.
But this is actually my second copy, which, you know, of this book because I found so much
value in it.
I gave it to my adult daughter who suffers from anxiety and for other, other moms out
there and dads, but like you said, it's, it tends to be the moms.
What other advice can you give them as far as, you know, dealing with children with
hair issues and anxiety and depression?
Well, yeah, that was a really good question.
I'm thinking about that.
And I think this gets a little metaphysical, but I think it's important to know that, you
know, that, that deep inner wisdom that we all have is cause at one point I asked myself,
well, what are the characteristics of this deep inner wisdom that everybody seems to
have?
And it didn't seem to matter what their religious upbringing was, what their economic standing
was, what culture they were raised in.
Everybody worked with had this deep inner knowing and it had these kind of universal characteristics.
And in a lot of traditions would call it your immortal soul or, you know, you're there,
like I said, there's lots of different names for it around the world.
But just know that your newborn baby has that and it's just as ageless in that newborn
baby as it will be when they're an adult in a grownup body, right?
So, so just, so treat them like that.
Treat them as there, there's incredibly wise and, and deep human beings because we all
have that.
And what's interesting is humans, we tend to respond, we try to meet the expectations
that are placed on us.
And I don't know if that's cause we were, I don't know if that's cause we evolved is
in tribal situations for hundreds of thousands of years, but, but just like, like as, so
what I mean, as an example, there's a saying in parenting that labeling is disabling.
So if a kid gets a label of ADD on in their school record, at the beginning of the year,
teachers reading through their students school records and they see ADD, how are they going
to treat that child?
Right, right.
Right.
And that child is going to try to meet the expectation of ADD.
Uh-huh.
Right.
And you see that a lot.
And like we all go through the phase of stranger anxiety when we're, when we're toddlers probably.
Right.
And, and so if parents keep saying, oh, they're just really shy, you know, as you're going
behind their leg or when you meet a stranger, but I've seen six year olds, six year olds
that kept doing that.
And, and I would talk to them, I'm saying, well, just don't say that in front of them.
No.
Right.
But, but also it's, it's like, what image do you hold of your child in your mind?
Okay.
Because they're going to try to meet that expectation because it's the unspoken expectations that
are the most powerful.
And so, and I, I practice this with my patients.
I hold this expectation in my mind that, that they're competent to find their healing and,
and to live happy productive lives.
But then I kind of leave it open to what that, what that means to them.
Uh-huh.
So I think as a parent, you should do the same thing with your child is see, hold them
in your mind as being perfectly competent to grow up and live a happy productive life,
whatever that means to them.
Whatever that is to them.
Yeah.
And that your job is to help them discover their gifts and, and then, you know, expand
on their gifts and bring those gifts to the world.
And, but I think that expectation or that, you know, that image you hold of your child
in your mind, even if you never say a word about it is really important.
And it's powerful.
Yeah.
It's absolutely powerful.
And that's actually a part of like, for example, Waldorf teacher training.
Um, they try to teach the Waldorf teachers to hold the certain kind of expectation for
each child in their class.
And, and every morning they teach you're supposed to think about each child before the day starts,
you know, in that way.
And I can never have to say a word and they will do their darnedest to meet those expectations.
That is amazing.
Absolutely amazing.
Well, on that note, I would like to thank you so much for taking time to speak with me
today and being, you know, being a part of our foundation and bringing your wisdom to
what we're trying to do to help all these kids.
I truly appreciate it.
Well, thank you.
I appreciate what you're doing.
And this is going to help a lot of children once this really gets up and going.
It's a great thing.
I hope so.
I absolutely hope so.
Thank you so much.
You're welcome.
Thanks so much to today's guest, Dr. Stephen Hall, for sharing his medical insight into
each of you for listening to our episode.
If you're new to our podcast, please don't forget to subscribe.
And if you enjoyed today's episode, please remember to leave us a review or comment about
what you enjoyed most.
You can stay connected with the Children's Airway First Foundation by following us on
Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn.
And if you'd like to be a guest on an upcoming episode, shoot us a note via the contact us
page on our website or send us an email directly at info at childrensairwayfirst.org.
Remember this podcast and the opinions expressed here are not a medical diagnosis.
If you suspect your child might have an airway issued, contact your pediatric dentist or
pediatrician.
And as always, thanks to all the parents and medical professionals out there that are
working so hard to help make the lives of kids around the globe a little bit better.
Take care, everyone.
Stay safe and happy breathing.