The country doctor

By Kate McCarty
Sun contributor

When you think of a typical doctor, local chiropractor Jessica Carden might not come to mind. Carden, who set up shop in Glen Arbor in 2008, offers a unique perspective on healing, health and wellness that can at times be more holistic and sustainable than our western society’s medicine-first approach.

A transplant to Michigan from New Hampshire, was recently named one of the 40 most influential people under 40 in our area by Traverse City Business News.

When I visited Carden for this interview, the doctor greeted me outside her office on M-109 in bare feet and accompanied by her dog, Diesel. This is common practice for her. She greets most of her patients in Glen Arbor, Lake Leelanau and Beaver Island the same way. She wasn’t wearing a white coat, and she didn’t carry the intimidating presence of an ER doctor.

It was obvious to me why locals are drawn to her. Carden’s easygoing personality was apparent from the first moment. Her warm smile immediately puts the patient at ease — an attribute that’s often absent in our troubled healthcare system.

Carden came to Glen Arbor after receiving her chiropractic license from Palmer College of Chiropractic in Iowa. Her grandfather, Dr. Victor Myers, was taught by the developer of chiropractic, BJ Palmer. Carden writes on her blog that when she was four years old, “Grampy used Applied Kinesiology to demonstrate how ice cream was toxic to my body. It was the biggest tragedy I had yet experienced!”

On her first day at Palmer she met her now husband, Jesse Carden, who grew up in Leelanau County. Today they live on a small farm in the heart of the county where they tend the soil and the land.

“I didn’t grow up here, and I’m just figuring out how the Midwest works,” she admits. “The challenge is the big changes coming here from another place. I’m trying to get organized for the winter.”

Carden’s busy schedule, commuting from near Maple City and working not only in Glen Arbor (on Mondays, Wednesdays, Fridays and Saturdays), but also Lake Leelanau (Tuesdays and Thursdays by appointment) and Beaver Island (every other Thursday), don’t give her much spare time. But she doesn’t complain. The people keep her busy and she loves the people.

“I love the patient part, I really look forward to the people part (of my job.)” Carden got her start in the chiropractic world while working on student teaching.

“I had a boy with a sublexation (misalignment in the vertebrae causing improper nerve function) and I saw how chiropractic care could help him. I really wanted to do it after that, I knew I had to.” Despite the hard work required to become a chiropractor, she’s not the first in her family to follow that path.

“I didn’t want to run a practice where I was turning patients every 10 minutes, I wanted it to be laidback and that’s why we (she and her husband Jesse) came to this area,” she explains.

Though far from fringe, chiropractic care is still a new concept to many.

“People don’t always see the benefits of preventative care. If your nervous system is functioning at 100 percent, it makes everything better,” she says. Chiropractic care isn’t just about your back or your neck, which many people don’t realize. It’s a whole body medicine. “Misalignment can reek havoc on your entire body,” Carden continues. “Wellness is the direction the practice is heading in.”

Carden’s work boils down to her passion for people.

“People have accepted me,” she says, “and that’s how a practice community grows. I’ve gotten a warm welcome from the people in the community and when they share their good experience, it brings others in.”

For more information on Dr. Jessica Carden and her practice, call (231) 334-3123 or visit her website at ReviveChiropractic.com. Carden is available in her Glen Arbor office on Monday, Wednesday, Friday and Saturday, preferably by appointment. Tuesdays and every other Thursday she practices at the Yoga Studio in Lake Leelanau, and every other Thursday and Friday, she practices on Beaver Creek.