Neurostimulation w Dr Emily Splichal | E047
When you can’t move the way that you want to—be it from neuropathy, old injuries, etc.—it doesn’t just affect you physically. It affects you emotionally as well.
And traditional treatments often don’t work that well even on the physical side of things.
That’s why we’re so excited to bring you this conversation today and share with you some products that are changing lives around the world by using texture to help people to feel their body again. In this episode, we’re joined by the lovely Dr. Emily Splichal, a functional podiatrist who founded a phenomenal company called Naboso. She and her company have created multiple products that are revolutionizing the treatment of neuropathies in the body and foot health in general.
We’re diving into why this is so important (even if you don’t suffer from a neurological medical condition!), how Dr. Emily’s work is different, and so many amazing recommendations for you to improve your physical health no matter where you’re starting from.
Let’s dive in!
In This Episode
00:00 Secret 2-Point Discrimination Neuropathy Remedy
02:18 How Dr. Emily’s methodology differs from traditional podiatry and why it’s so important
06:40 The various chronic neurological conditions which can benefit from Naboso’s products
10:43 Toréa and Dr. Emily break down the power of touch and the plasticity of our nervous systems
12:26 The fascinating science behind why the Naboso ball and products work
15:22 How Dr. Emily’s products can help you in your day to day, even if you don’t suffer from a neuropathy
17:26 She shares her thoughts on how you can experience different textures in nature and the amazing benefits of it
19:46 Dr. Emily’s favorite tips for you if you live and work in a concrete jungle
23:08 Where to start if you’re interested in Naboso’s products
27:19 One of the #1 contributors to persistent plantar fasciitis cycles and how to stop them
30:55 How Naboso can also help with children and adults with sensory needs like ADHD and autism
31:37 The powerful ways these products can also be used when doing emotional release work
Resources Mentioned
Website: https://www.naboso.com/
Naboso Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/naboso_technology/
Dr Splichal Instagram https://www.instagram.com/thefunctionalfootdoc/
Connect with Dr. Emily
Website: https://www.dremilysplichal.com/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thefunctionalfootdoc/
Get your copy of Dr. Emily’s book, Barefoot Strong: Unlock the Secrets to Movement: https://www.amazon.com/Barefoot-Strong-Secrets-Movement-Longevity/dp/0692380906
Connect with Toréa
Website: https://www.torearodriguez.com/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/torearodriguez/
Connect with Evie
Website: https://holisticallyrestored.com/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/holisticallyrestored/
Join the Optimized Wellness Community: https://torea.co/Premium
Submit a Question for the Show: https://www.torearodriguez.com/podcast-question
Transcript
Toréa Rodriguez 0:08
Welcome to the Wildly Optimized Wellness podcast. I am your host, Toréa Rodriguez. And I’m joined by the lovely co host, Evie Takacs. Both of us are Functional Diagnostic Nutrition practitioners and we love working with women from all over the world, through our virtual programs, helping women not only feel better, but actually achieve that vibrant, no holds barred version of themselves, they’ve been missing for a long time, and how we actually get there. Well, that is what this show is all about. Now, please keep in mind that this podcast is created for educational purposes only and should never be used as a replacement for medical diagnosis or treatment. And if you like what you hear today, we would love for you to hit that follow button, leave a review in Apple podcast, share with your friends, and keep coming back for more. Let’s start today’s adventure shall we?
Toréa Rodriguez 1:10
Okay, everybody, welcome back to the Wildly Optimized Wellness podcast, we are joined by the lovely Dr. Emily Splichal, who has this really cool company that we want to share with you today. That has everything to do with I would say neuro stimulation. Is that right, Emily?
Dr. Emily Splichal 1:28
Yes and welcome or thank you for having me on. Yeah. Yeah. It was everything based around neurosensory stimulation, or specifically two point discrimination, which is texture.
Toréa Rodriguez 1:40
Okay, cool. So, tell us a little bit about I would love to know, what's the backstory behind Naboso and does Naboso mean something specifically, it's kind of a fun word. But what's the backstory? How did all this get started?
Dr. Emily Splichal 1:57
Yeah, so the background of Naboso which is a Czech word that means barefoot so now you know a Czech word.
Toréa Rodriguez 2:06
Excellent.
Dr. Emily Splichal 2:07
It's based off of my background, being a functional podiatrist and looking at feet from a very integrative perspective, I love human movement. And I love specifically the sensory side of human movement, versus traditional podiatry, we're taught very much biomechanical while you're thinking, we're just bones and joints, we pronated supinated, we have flat feet or high arches, it's very mechanical. And I started looking very early on in my career at just the neurological influence of human movement, and how it actually overrides a lot of biomechanical assumptions. And then I started specializing in chronic movement disorders and chronic patients, where then sensory stimulation and the neuro influences are really important, because that's where you get some really exciting gains. So I actually launched Naboso, as a way to help people find the sensory side of their feet, versus just telling people to take off their shoes and thinking that that's the only thing you can do to access the nerves in the bottom and the feet, I started playing around with different surfaces and stimulation to try to optimize the feet. And then Naboso kind of evolved from there.
Toréa Rodriguez 3:21
That is such a cool story. And both Evie and I a lot of our own practice, we've now recognized how important the nervous system actually is, in all of overall wellness, which is part of the reason why we're obsessed with your company and your products. And so did you have a personal experience with anything with neurostimulation for yourself? Or was it really just brought out of the kinds of clients that you were working with when you started working with the chronic cases?
Dr. Emily Splichal 3:54
Well, so I'll answer that in a kind of a twofold way is that I started specializing in chronic conditions earlier in my practice, because I've had chronic injuries, and I could really empathize and just listen, and most chronic patients just want to be heard and have someone listen to them versus Yeah, yeah, we're kind of poopoo in some other stuff. Yeah, exactly. Or it's in your head, you know, the psychosomatic side of things is very complex. And I would be very patient on that. And most patients would just be very appreciative that I was just listening to them and validating what they're experiencing. And that was just based off of my own chronic injuries and having to go through very complex rehab from these or sports related injuries. But they floored me in a way that I was like, I understand the emotional impact of not being able to move the way that you want to, so I listened to them. And then at the same time, I started speaking about barefoot science and footwear science. This was in 2008- 2010 and the Barefoot I mean, boom when the minimal shoe market was exploding, oh, yeah,
Toréa Rodriguez 5:03
I had my libram, five fingers,
Evie Takacs 5:05
I still have some of those.
Dr. Emily Splichal 5:09
I started really specializing in just that aspect and then listening to people respond to the number so product, some of our earlier products. And it really was making this impact in unexpected impact in the MS Parkinson's stroke, neuropathy space that I was like, whoa, whoa, I need to step back and see how we can really target certain conditions such as those, because the athletes are fun, fitness is fun. But when you're you, like, literally change someone's life. By having a really simple interface, such as our insoles or socks, is profound. I mean, that that's a big part of what makes me keep pushing to grow this company is seeing these authentic responses of people that can now feel their feet again, and what that does to their life.
Toréa Rodriguez 6:03
That's amazing. And it kind of leads into one of the questions that I had for you is, you know, what did people discover? Or What specifically can people discover if they are coming to to start with say, just the ball, right, just for like foot rehab, that's the first thing that they get into. But then they start to notice these other things, what kinds of specific, I guess, discoveries are people making, especially in those areas of the more chronic neurological conditions like the Parkinson's etc.
Dr. Emily Splichal 6:39
Yeah, so I think one of the most profound is that people can actually feel their feet. And this is what I try to educate people on, especially, let's say the neuropathies, is people will have neuropathy, it could be any type of neuropathy, idiopathic small nerve, MS, diabetic, etc. And they'll say, I can't feel my feet, quote, unquote, I can't feel my feet, my feet are numb, right. But then they'll use our textured product and say, Oh, wait, I can feel my feet. And it's very awakening and eye opening to them. So I want them to understand that, because you have this perceived lack of sensation or awareness of your feet, our nervous system is very complex. And maybe you can't feel the temperature nerve, or the pain nerve. But you could still feel the two point discrimination nerve, or you could feel the vibration nerve. So there's actually this complex stimuli that our nervous system responds to, and it's you understanding the differences and how you can target them. And just because you have this sensation of numbness, you do have sensations still, you just have to know how to specifically stimulate it. And that's what we try to provide. So I think sometimes people are initially think that the number so products are like snake oil, or like a gimmicky thing
Toréa Rodriguez 8:07
That doesn't make sense. I just hold on to a ball or I step on a ball and I get what,
Dr. Emily Splichal 8:12
Yeah, wait, what's it gonna do. But it has to do with the specificity of our product. So I just want people to not think that it's snake oil, some of the videos with like Parkinson's specifically, I could see why people say that, because people are running again. And they're, they just like, drop their cane, and then they start running. And people are like, what, and I'm like, trust me, this is authentic. This is not as you know, manipulated in any way. It's just how powerful neuro stimuli has to be very dialed in to see positive results. Yeah,
Toréa Rodriguez 8:50
Yeah. That's, that's amazing. Because I think when we start thinking about those more advanced neuro degenerative diseases, right, we forget that there are things that we can do to help stimulate the nervous system in that way, so that the brain remembers those body parts basically. And, you know, I was working with a movement coach a number of years ago, which is when I discovered your products, and he noticed that an injury that I had when I was maybe 13, or 14, I had a horse accident and injured my knee pretty badly and went through traditional PT rehab, all of that stuff, but because my body compensated in particular way, fast forward a couple decades later, my overall balance and stability when I'm doing movement exercises was greatly compromised, like I couldn't do a single leg squat, right. So and so he really helped me by explaining this, this dynamic between the brain and these inner injuries in the compensations where the brain starts to forget, so to speak, these by body parts, and then we just overcompensate over time. And so part of the rehab with him was lighting up different parts of my whole foot, we started with the foot, actually, we started with the big toe, we did a lot of toe exercises, we started there. And then we started working with the foot, and then we moved into the ankle area, and then we moved into the knee area, and then the hip area. And lo and behold, like, very short amount of time, I can now do single leg squats, which is crazy for me, because it's been decades where I've been off balance and wobbly and having difficulty with that move. So that's how I discovered it. And that is really, I think what fascinated me so much is that our brain and our nervous system is so neuro plastic, that we can do a lot of really good rehabilitation in a very short amount of time. And all we're doing is we're accessing our sense of touch.
Dr. Emily Splichal 11:03
Yeah, touch is very powerful to, to touch and to be touched is. So it goes both ways, right. So that's where it kind of virtual is a little bit hard is there isn't value to in person therapy and to wake up those nerves. And you know, the nerves on our hairy skin, which is the rest of the body are really powerful. And then obviously, the nerves on the palm of the hand and the bottom of the feet are very powerful. And bringing it through a myriad of ways. I also really like vibration. So when I have people who, maybe their post surgical, they have a knee replacement, I'll just give that as an example. You can use a very light, almost like a hand massager to the knee, let's say, or around the incision, and you're starting to wake up the joint capsule and the complexity of the nerves while you were still maybe non weight bearing. It's really fascinating how powerful and plastic the nervous system is, as you just described.
Toréa Rodriguez 12:05
Yeah, yeah, it's really cool. What inspired you for this texture, because I have never found anything like it. And so for those that are on the video on YouTube, this is I have the Naboso ball in my hand. And I'm sure Dr. Emily will show us some other fun props. Look at that. Oh, insole, right?
Dr. Emily Splichal 12:26
Yep, and then the socks. So they all actually have the same pattern. So you can see there's a pyramidal pattern. And the height, shape and distance of the pyramid. And why we use a pyramid is to create a very dialed in a cute, I won't say sharp because I don't want the listeners to think as painful as non painful weights. It's a finite, right, so it's an acute point. And if you take the ball, or if I'm on on the inside, I just push my hands up, do it on the socks, it's a little bit harder. And then for the you can see the little tiny indents Yeah, we are mimicking Braille, so we're stimulating the same nerve in our fingers that we have in our fingers that we use to read Braille, we're just stimulating it in our feet. So it is a pattern that our brain recognizes. And the distance or the acuity of that nerve is the point cannot be closer than one millimeter. If it's one millimeter, your brain will read it as one blob, not two points, right? So it's called to nation, that being able to decipher and differentiate two points is kind of like you reading braille, let's say. So we did it off of looking at textured insole research. So there's over 100 textured and so research articles, if anyone wants it, I have a whole dropbox folder of all of them, then the work for you. And it's mean stuff, right? And then the difficult part was okay, you can look at research research is interesting, but research does not mean something equals a consumer product, right? Like how do you make it real world? Right?
Dr. Emily Splichal 14:11
Yeah,
Dr. Emily Splichal 14:12
That was the most difficult because I tested the products that was used in the research studies. And I mean, it destroyed my feet. It was super hard, like really hard plastics. And I was like, Okay, this is cool, but you can't walk on this, right? You cannot actually use this, especially if you have neuropathy or something like that. So I had to do a lot of material research. That's when it took two years to play around with materials and the tooling process. So how are you going to make is that like a waffle iron? Is it injection molded? Is that right? Yeah. And because the pyramids are so pointy or acute, the process to do that accurately and consistently is very difficult. To end we would have a very high failure rate. This is the fun of innovation. That's right. That's right. Right. So now a lot of our manufacturing processes are patented, because they are quite complex, to figure out how to get it on the sock took another two years, so it's on the inside of a sock. And that was very difficult to do it.
Toréa Rodriguez 15:21
But they're amazing, by the way, and we're in studio right now. And I love that studio socks, because I just I feel I do a lot of standing when I work on purpose. But I also noticed that if I stand too much standing is the new smoking, right? So you got to make sure that you get a lot of variation and movement. But what I noticed wearing the socks is that my legs and my back and my shoulders aren't nearly as tired. At the end of the day. Yeah, love it,
Dr. Emily Splichal 15:51
You could say that you just keeping your feet, I say part of the party, and you defeat part of the standing party the whole time you're standing. Many people start to become passive. I've actually found through my practice that a lot of people are just subjected to gravity. And they're just like, okay, gravity, and they just like, it's just like literally a burden on their shoulders, which becomes weight on their lower back weight on their feet. And we need to be constantly opposing gravity through our fascial system. And I tried to use the number of soy products and then teaching foot exercises to teach people how to find the lift, just a slight lift in their feet, and then their fascial tension to then oppose gravity. Very cool.
Toréa Rodriguez 16:38
The pyramid? I'm just curious, because I'm curious about all sorts of things. But the pyramid? Why not that cone? Why not a circular cone? Was it more stability just in the manufacturing process? Or was there something else? Some other magic there?
Dr. Emily Splichal 16:55
No. So it could have been a theoretically I suppose it could be. We were just playing around with pre existing patterns, and then trying to find what was actually reproducible in a consistency and ease the tooling process.
Toréa Rodriguez 17:15
Yeah. Cool. So one of my other questions, and I promise I'll let Evie ask some questions, too. I'm gonna log in the conversation, but what are your thoughts about experiencing different textures in nature? Because that is something that I really love to do personally. And it's something that I encourage, but what are your thoughts about that?
Dr. Emily Splichal 17:37
Love it, love it, love it, love it, I would say go barefoot, go on the trail and the dirt in the sand, right and bring this natural component of textural experiences, it might not be exactly two point discrimination in the same way of how we create it. But you are experiencing it in kind of that real world kind of in the trenches way. I also like that you can Earth at the same time. So I'm very grateful to earthing. So you can, you know, essentially check several boxes at the same time. So I really love that. And there's something just, I'm sure you guys know, very natural and freeing and kind of like childlike of taking off your shoes and being outside in nature and on the grass and dirt and stuff like that. So I do advocate that to a lot of my patients.
Toréa Rodriguez 18:26
Beautiful. You're in the right place, because we advocate it all the time. Like we talked about that all the time. And I was actually curious if the pyramid texture or the texture that you have on your products was inspired by nature in some way.
Dr. Emily Splichal 18:40
It is not. But I think that that's a fun, fun exploration that I could try to find that is right next to it.
Toréa Rodriguez 18:48
I think the closest thing that I've been able to correlate is like core surf sand. When you're walking on a beach, that's coarse sand, not fine sand. It feels very much like an Naboso ball. Yeah, yeah. So cool. Evie What questions do you have?
Evie Takacs 19:05
Yeah, well, first I, I want to kind of take it back to Trey, you were talking about the movement stuff you're doing with your movement coach. And that's exactly what I'm doing with my trainer. Now he works very much. I'm not sure if you're familiar with PRI. But he does a lot with like breath work and basically working on the nervous system and retraining your brain and movement and a lot of things Toréa was saying about working on the toe working on the foot, the ankle than the knee. Like that's a lot of what I've done because in our assessments, it's like I can't feel my glutes. I can't feel this. And so really working backwards in that way has been really interesting. And so hearing that you have a product to also help with that's really cool. And tying in the what you just said about getting outside being barefoot. For someone who may be like people who are more like a concrete jungle type like, they're working, they're working in the city. Do you have specific things regarding shoes that you recommend? Because I yes okay. Barefoot could be ideal out in nature and things like that, but someone who is walking a lot or what What's your take on that? Because it is more like, let's have the arch in the foot. What is your? What's your perspective on that?
Dr. Emily Splichal 20:05
Yeah, so for the most part, I generally like more minimal shoes, right? Let me call them natural foot function shoes, as close as you can. So with a more natural shoe or a minimal shoe, sometimes people come barefoot shoes, you're really taking away the structure, the cushion, the drop, you're adding a wide toe box, all of that I am in supportive. However, having lived in New York City for 20 years, I understand High walking in a concrete jungle. Perhaps not every one's foot can tolerate a minimal shoe in that environment day after day after day. So it's been released smart about balancing, foot stimulation, which is technically foot stress, right. So the me pounding the pavement is bringing stimulation to my foot, but it's technically also bringing a form of stress, I need to make sure that I'm balancing that with sufficient foot recovery. And the full recovery with the neuro ball, if you want would be releasing the feet in the morning and the evening so that you're getting a little bit of massage, you are supporting the circulation to the feet so that there is just that little bit of a reset. If people do not have sufficient foot strength to tolerate the stress of pounding the pavement in minimal shoes, then that's where I would do focused foot strengthening, a lot of that is, I mean, technically, you could say the number of sub products are a way to strengthen the feet. But then there's other exercises like short foot forward lean, if someone takes Pilates or yoga, technically, those are barefoot practices. But you're trying to strengthen the small muscles of the foot themselves, not by just walking in minimal shoes, but in addition, and then typically you can offset that stress. So I would say just balance the balance your footwear decisions based off of your goal to achieve more natural foot function. But understand that too much may be could tip you past the point where you get a little bit of a plantar fasciitis. So then balance in that reset. And you know, maybe it's every other day, every couple of days, you try to go into those minimal shoes. Or if you're at the gym, wear minimal shoes at the gym, maybe a little bit more cushion, if you're pounding the pavement. And it's all about balance. Honestly, that's what I did. My message is very real. Minimal shoes, but I also haven't completely drink the Kool Aid that I'm all the way over here that I become biased in my recommendations to a patient or an individual. I tried to be very real and say, This is your reality. This is where we want to be how do we kind of merge them a little bit that works for you as an individual? And then try to guide them that way?
Evie Takacs 23:05
Okay, nice. That's helpful for someone who's interested in the products. Is there one particular one that you would recommend they start with? Is there you mentioned morning and night? Like is there some sort of protocol that you would recommend?
Dr. Emily Splichal 23:17
Most people who are new to Naboso and bringing textured stimulation to their feet, we'll start with the neuro ball. I think that's one of the easiest products to understand. Thank you again, my model in the neurobiology provides,
Toréa Rodriguez 23:31
It's magical, because it's kind of hidden surprise inside.
Dr. Emily Splichal 23:34
Yes, it splits into two pieces. So it's not just a ball, but it'll crack in half, essentially, or split in half, and then you have two domes, and then there's a smaller ball hidden inside, you get a very unique release to the feet, then what we would say is okay, if you understand and you're starting to incorporate foot releasing every day, you get to feel what texture feels like, then maybe you want to walk around in our socks, or studio socks or recovery socks. Or you could put one of our insoles, like the activation and sole, which is the blue one in your everyday shoes, or maybe even in your slippers or your house shoes. So you start to kind of sprinkle it in. And then some people will go all in and they'll want our standing mat and then they use our yoga mat and our sensory sticks and becomes you know, a much more broader integration to their lifestyle. But if you can do something every day, that allows you to tune into your feet. And even if you don't use any of the Naboso products, but you're walking outside for 15 minutes and you're getting some earthing and you're noticing the different sensations under your feet, I'm happy. Right? That that's just what I want is for people to notice and to support the sensory side of their feet every day to support the neuroplasticity of the nervous system.
Toréa Rodriguez 24:59
Love it. it. Can we talk a little bit more about plantar fasciitis for a second. A lot of people that I talked to who have been diagnosed with it, basically tell me, Well, I just need to get orthotics, can can we enlighten that there's another option for people?
Dr. Emily Splichal 25:19
So plantar fasciitis is, in my opinion, a, it's an overuse or an injury of being disconnected to the feet, or lacking sufficient foot strength to offset impact forces. impact forces are perceived by our nervous system as vibration. So it's technically a vibrational based injury. If I'm walking and I strike my heel on the ground, because I'm walking, and that's how you strike, you walk, you just strike your heel, the heel vibrates. But if there's not enough tension is what it is. So it kind of a damping effect of the muscles to the vibration, the vibration will go into your bones and into your soft tissues, specifically, the insertion of your plantar fascia, or the origin of the plantar fascia, and then you start to get little micro tears. So to prevent or offset plantar fasciitis, some of it has to do with building foot strength, understanding where a neutral foot position is, if you have flat feet or over pronation your feet collapse, then orthotics are essentially mechanically holding your foot in a neutral position. But could you build the strength to do that? Maybe, right? Yeah, do you build the awareness to do that, that could be through the Naboso products, it could be through exercises that I teach, it could be through you holding yourself in neutral when you brush your teeth. And that's just kind of rotating. I have videos on my YouTube on how to find neutral. And then brush your teeth and neutral, cook the dishes or cook the dishes, cook your dinner or wash the dishes in neutral, things like that. And then it's getting insufficient massage and reset to the feet. And then really what I actually find is one of the number one contributors that persist people in a plantar fasciitis cycle is that stress they're not. They're not taking away the stress sufficiently, which means they might take it easy for a couple of days, the plantar fascial symptoms start to go down and then they're like, oh, yeah, and then they go right back to stressing it. And it's literally almost every patient that I see is there like yeah, it started to go down. It was like a two. So I went and played pickleball again, and I was like, Oh my God. And then they rest again, it's kind of add to and then they're like yeah, my time clear. Back to pickleball just as an example. And then it just perpetuates the cycle. So oftentimes, we almost have to over treat certain conditions, because it's a very slippery slope, especially with foot injuries, such as plantar fasciitis.
Toréa Rodriguez 28:07
Yeah. Great. Thank you so much for that explanation. So it's not always just one prescription of orthotics. So yeah, amazing. Amazing. I'm also curious, do you notice, when you're working with your clients, when they start actually stimulating their nervous system in this way, that there is sometimes an accompanied emotional release? Or an emotional response? Are you noticing that with your clients at all,
Dr. Emily Splichal 28:37
There can be so I have seen I'll give an example on the in not a negative way, but a guarded way, is sometimes people will touch our map or products and be like, Oh my god, oh my God, oh, my god, like, That's painful. That's too much like a, I'm gonna say an allodynia response. So allodynia is when something that's painful when it shouldn't be painful. And sometimes that has to be based off of the lens at which they're associating that stimulus, right? It's a garden, perhaps they've had painful neuropathy. They have thin skin on the bottom of their feet, they have a history of foot pain, I totally respect it. But if they understood the benefit of the product, and changed the conversation or the association that they're having with that stimulus, because they so want the positive benefits of the product, like the microcirculation, and the full awareness, decreased false things like that, that they would then allow the time to do that, where some people will be kind of rejected and then no, and then that's not for me that is negative, painful, I could never be on something like that, which is a very small percent. ain't very small percent that respond like that most people are sensory seeking. So there's a positive association with the stimulus almost a, you know, a fidgeter, like a popper could be really addicting in a sense, right? Products, people tend to shift a little bit more towards that. And I've been in many meetings, trade shows, events, conversations where people just start, like, they're just like petting the insole on the table, and they don't realize it.
Toréa Rodriguez 30:33
I am constantly like holding on to this and like playing with it, when I'm thinking about something, or I'm trying to brainstorm or think through, you know, program strategy or something like that. And I love it.
Dr. Emily Splichal 30:51
Sensory sticks, because our sensory sticks are like the neuro ball, but they're weighted. And the combination of having weight, which is a proprioceptive stimulus. With the texture, which is a mechanical stimulus, you're stimulating to different nerve pathways, it is very, not addicting because that's not the right word. But drawing and engaging and people alike will not put them down, we actually have many parents of autistic and ADHD children that will use our sticks to center the child. And then when they study and things like that, they'll have them actually fidget with it. And it's the texture with the weight that's really helping these children. If you don't mind, I want to go back to where you said, people potentially releasing emotion, we actually work with several cranial sacral therapists that will use our products. And when they're resetting the cranial nerves, which there can be a heavy release of emotion, they will use our products to re-anchor the individual. So they will use the hands and the feet, hold our sticks or a neural ball, be barefoot on our mat and then say, okay, if there's a flood of emotion as they're clearing the different cranial nerves, they'll reconnect them to their physical body and say, feel your feet, you are grounded, you are safe, feel your hands love it. So that's how they actually use our products in that way, versus our stimulus evoking the emotion. It's a grounding and anchoring tool.
Toréa Rodriguez 32:22
Love it, love it. Because, you know, I know that through physical motion and certain types of modalities, you know, whether or not that's like fascial release or whatever. Sometimes that can be a release of an emotion, but it's just as important to have that grounding sensation to, I just got back from a week long practitioner training. And in that practitioner training we were sitting with, you know, our partners, so also practitioners, but we were playing client and practitioner and allowing them to feel into deeper emotions and ride the wave through it so that they can return back to that, like I'm safe. It's okay to feel these like bigger, energetic emotions. And so knowing that these products can help with that grounding piece of it at the end of that wave is amazing, actually. So that's really cool. Very cool. Anything else, Evie that you'd like to ask Dr. Emily while we have her?
Evie Takacs 33:29
No, I just this has been really helpful for me to learn more about and hear the science behind it. Because I know that the products are really helpful and great for a lot of people. But knowing the backstory is really helpful to this, then I can also share that with people.
Toréa Rodriguez 33:41
And Dr. Emily, I'm assuming you have links to some of these studies on your website.
Dr. Emily Splichal 33:46
We do we do. There are like I've mentioned many, many, many studies. But we do and if anyone reaches out just even on our main contact, which is orders that Naboso. So it says So I'm curious to read these research studies, maybe those specifically for certain conditions. Some of the research is around performance. So very athletic based, some is chronic, neurological based, and then some is just kind of general overall. And then we've done several pilots internally as well. So several pilot studies, those are on our blog that people could find we did a neuropathy pilots on and we have a couple of IRB approved research studies that are going on right now.
Toréa Rodriguez 34:26
Very, very cool. So I know that I'll get from you the stuff to put in the shownotes but where can people find you? And where can they find out about any of the programs you might be offering or even just the Naboso website, go ahead and tell us where they can find you and we'll put all of this in the show notes.
Dr. Emily Splichal 34:46
Okay, so Nasboso all the products is Naboso.com that is our website that geo locates all around the world. We are also on Instagram which is @Naboso_technology. Me personally for my practice and how I treat patients I see majority of my patients virtually is just my name. So DrEmilySplichal.com. Check out the show notes for that spelling. And on Instagram, I'm @thefunctionalfootdoc. I do have a book that is on Amazon. It's called Barefoot Strong. And it is. It's an easy read. It's a short read, but it's kind of a cliff note to everything that I advocate, it starts to speak about the nervous system, fascia connective tissue, how to really start to connect to your feet. So I would recommend that as well. Easy read to kind of start jumping down the rabbit hole.
Toréa Rodriguez 35:40
Cool. Well, thank you so much for joining us today. We really enjoyed this conversation. And we'll make sure that everybody gets thank you all of these resources and hopefully they'll order a couple Naboso balls.
Dr. Emily Splichal 35:53
Thank you
Toréa Rodriguez 36:01
Hey, thanks for joining us for this episode of the Wildly Optimized Wellness podcast. If you’re ready to dig deeper into your health, stop playing the Whack-a-Symptom game, start testing to get better guidance, you can find more about Toréa at torearodriguez.com and you can find Evie at holisticallyrestored.com. Want a peek into what it’s like to work with us? Come join us at our Optimized Wellness Community. You can find the invitation link in the show notes below. And if you have a question for the show, you can submit your question under the podcast section of torearodriguez.com. Finally, if you found something helpful in this episode, don’t forget to leave a review, hit that follow button or share it with a friend. They’re gonna love that you thought of them. Until next time, see you outside!
