The sleep specialist I know said the important part of good sleep is the time you get up in the morning. The brain controls the sleep cycle and rarely uses much sleep beyond a hour or two after first light in your room. I have always been a night owl (it's 1:15 am) but I wake up routinely at 8 to 8:30, sometimes 9 am. She said there definitely are night owls and early birds but early birds get up at 5 to 6, maybe 7 while night owls should be waking up 2 hours later or so.

But, she said the most important thing is to sleep the same hours and times each day so the brain's sleep clock is not disrupted.

What vitamins are you taking already ? How much Vit C are you taking ? The B's are the most important plus good fish oil.

btw, Stomach issues can manifest from lower neck injuries. CT's and MRI's rarely show these subtle neck injuries. Some specialists can diagnose them with chiro or osteopathic techniques. Other times, you need to try a treatment protocol and stay with it for a time to see if things improve. Prolo therapy can help if the therapist can first diagnose the problem location. No use treating an area that is not injured and miss an injured area by a few centimeters.

I saw a TMJ specialist who wanted to sell me an expensive appliance, but I finally found a physical therapist who used in the mouth pressure points and such and helped me get relief. I was locked to only an index finger width. She got me to two fingers width and over time, I am almost three fingers width.

For clenching, there is a Botox protocol that weakens the jaw clinching muscle to allow healing. I was about to try it when I found the PT.

Yeah, I have been dealing with small intestine slow motility for over 10 years. I used to have terrible asthma as a kid and was frequently pumped up with several meds from 7-13 years old. Was in critical care on more than one occasion. I think that all of the cortico steroids and misc. other drugs may have impacted my central nervous system over time.

I can currently only stomach the Centrum multi's at this time. I top up on extra complex B's and C's most days and I regularly take a high quality Omega 3. I do find sometimes though that the Omega can make the lightheadedness a little bit worse. I can attribute this (possibly) to slowed heart rate/lowered blood pressure when taking the fish oils. I also take a high quality and expensive probiotic daily to help with the ongoing stomach issues.

The person I saw was also a TMJ "specialist" and just wreaked of used car salesman, throwing out scare tactics and rationalization as to why I need to spend thousands of dollars with him. He was horrible and in looking at reviews, I'm not the only one. Odd as he came recommended by a contact of mine. That's the other big issue with this stuff is that all of these alternative therapies/treatments come with some pretty shady people that don't give two sh***s about your well being, rather their own pocket book. Granted there are a lot of good people out there who really do care. I've seen both. The one's who only care about their own agenda really get to me, as they're wasting my healing time.

So, I saw the Neuro Chiro. Pointed out obvious vestibular issues and honed in on my left eye being an issue. Tracking an object coming towards my nose being the worst.

He did a series of eye tests, balance tests etc. with the help of software. Also took feel of my neck and concluded that he is confident that neck manipulations will help me immensely. Went as far to say that he only sees about 1 in 15 or so with PCS symptoms that he would recommend manipulations before vestibular rehab. This being one of those cases. He was very confident that although wouldn't be an immediate cure all, would help a lot based on his exam.

Now the difficult part...With all of the neck manipulation/stroke stuff online and in the media I have been getting worried about neck manipulations. Although complications appear to be extremely rare, I just want to ensure that I am taking precautions to avoid potiential long term issues.

Any insight on the safeness of neck adjustments and anyone have success with them? Supposed to go back soon and need to make a decision and the last thing I would want right now is more complications.

There are many different ways the neck can be manipulated. Some are very aggressive. Others are very gentle. The standard twist the head and pop the neck can be too aggressive for many. Either way, any neck manipulation should be followed by icing to contain any inflammation cause by the manipulation.

Thanks Mark. At this point I am ready to give it a try, as my neck has been pretty bad for over 3 years and based on his feedback, worth it. I believe it would be the twist and crack manip.

Will keep you posted.

Hi Random

Did you ever start the neck manipulations? How is it going? I am thinking about trying chiro again too.

Thanks