Early Orthodontic Treatment for 6-8 Year Olds

Jim, I really appreciate your providing this piece to Lumigrate. I'm hoping it will help people who have an influence on children, whether parents, grandparents, teachers, school therapists, therapists who see children, etc.

I believe a lot of people use what was 'of their day' as a point of reference.  Doing orthodontics on such young children is likely something a lot of people aren't aware of.  

I have a longtime friend who has a child who has some special needs, nobody's quite sure 'what or why' really.  It was not in their mental 'budget' to factor in the costs of interventions that insurance does not pay for, and I've repeatedly suggested thinking of it as an 'investment' that will reduce their costs in the long run.  This is what early orthodontics sounds to me to be.  I don't know if, when I was 6-8 this would have had an impact on whether I went further into adrenal fatigue and eventually chronic fatigue and fibromyalgia, but I suspect strongly it would have made a difference.  I know the treatments I've had the benefit in my 50s from you have helped, so I can only imagine that more would have come from treatment in those formative years.  I know that my mother thought something was odd about the way I spoke, and had the school speech therapist screen me, who found nothing wrong.  However, my MD/fibromyalgia specialist found my tongue to be scalloped, which can indicate swelling from low thyroid and you've found that the space in my mouth is scrunched up (my term), as things simply didn't move out correctly in my formative years, as you said 'for whatever reasons'.  

I've never sat down and calculated the direct and indirect costs fibromyalgia and chronic fatigue and the previous adrenal fatigue caused me; I don't know how you can really 'measure' that I didn't do this or that because of ..... But suffice it to say, I'd estimate that an ounce of correction at age 6 is worth a TON of 'cure' for a person in their lifetime overall.  I hope that all parents can find this information and find a way to afford the treatment that can help their child BREATHE, be pain free, eat all the nutritious but difficult items and be able to speak eloquently and with confidence. 

Live and Learn! Learn and Live Better!! Mardy

great post you have here..:) thanks for sharing it with us.. There is really a great difference between the practice before that what is usually done today. So let's go for innovation and embrace change, after all it's for a good cause..:)

another good thing which will improve our child's health is the recent law that  the United States Department of Agriculture has lately been making efforts with. The nutrition of school meals can often be an issue of much debate, so a new law is now in the process to make meals in schools much healthier for our kids. The restrictions on school meals would have integrated an important restriction on the amount of potatoes that could be served. The Senate, however, has been blocked by the Senate. Source of article: Potatoes will stay in schools, for now
 

Sarah, thank  you for making that comment and bringing a link in that you like to back up what you're commenting on. GRATE stuff!   I went and got the link for the piece on Lumigrate for The Renegade Lunch Lady, Ann Cooper.  She 'virtually' came to Grand Junction this spring (2011) for a FUNdraiser for a public school garden project, and Lumigrate had a booth at the event to support this VERY critical issue of school lunches.  

It's really funny that you would read this and comment today; on Saturday I had stopped off after getting my hair cut clear on the other end of town and was enjoying a healthy fish/food place when Dr Kennedy and his wife and another golfing couple happened along! I joked that he caught me without my oral appliance in but I WAS eating and at least I was eating something healthy! (and chose a more healthy of the wines too, I might add.  We ARE living in Wine Country here in Western Colorado.)  

Not having had children, and having chosen not to work in public schools based solely on the way they would pay on teacher's scale not 'therapists scale' as other states do (and I was heavily recruited to work in the school district The Renegade Lunch Lady/Ann Cooper is  head of food services for), I'd not seen a school lunch since 1978 when I graduated from Evergreen High School here in Colorado. It's the biggest school district in the state and the mountains west of Denver had become a destination for many very well off people to move and raise their children in 'nature'.  So I likely never saw an 'average' school lunch in my life in the FIRST PLACE.  

Then I started watching the TV show by Jamie Oliver about school lunches on the east coast/southern part of the United States and I was just stunned! When I formed the LumiGRATE Groove of the Grand Valley in 2011, Monica Cullinane was one of the first people I asked to help me start the group.  Her children go to the school that was starting the garden and she was very active in the fundraising for it, and I always participated.  She told me after our first meeting, in her Brazilian accent "I am passionate about nutrition like you are about getting providers and the public to understand what fibromyalgia and chronic fatigue are." And she's always made her space available for us to meet but unfortunately always has to go off to companies and teach employee eating/wellness! (or maybe yoga too, she's extremely qualified in both).   

And then this comes BACK to Dr Kennedy, as he and his wife R.N. wife Liz, who consults with people related to cardiovascular status and remedies via nutrition as well as other interventions and also is an incoming contributor at Lumigrate, have become active in participation at events for the LumiGRATE Groove of the Grand Valley.  So please find them here at Lumigrate for more pieces in their unique and diverse yet overlapping specialties (nutrition and eating), and find the LumiGRATE Groove of the Grand Valley on facebook if you like! It's intended to be for locals to find the top providers in our area but the links take you to their pieces on Lumigrate, and this allows people anywhere in the US or beyond to perhaps find a similar provider in their area.  In Dr Kennedy's case, looking up The Cranial Academy as I've suggested would get you, Sarah, oriented to a similar 'holistic' dentist.

I would imagine he'll be able to provide us with other websites that he likes to direct people to as well; I know I've learned a great deal from the educational material he has in his waiting area, if I remember to go to my appointments (eye roll) and get out of the house early enough to not be on time or squeeking in a little late.  Expanding my head, as I teasingly call what he does, is a GRATE thing but it's changed how much I sleep and how well I sleep and it's just thrown my whole little routine right out the window!  I'm NOT complaining, it's like 'wow, I guess I need to catch up on 50+ years of not breathing right so not sleeping well!' 

Again, Sarah, thank you for this outstanding statement and helpful/supportive link! Here's the one I referenced (below) ~~ Mardy

www.lumigrate.com/forum/renegade-lunch-lady-chef-ann-cooper-grate