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Acupuncture Strut
Anyone ever go for the needles? I was dating a girl last year who was in school for Oriental Medicine, she did some treatments on me and they worked. I had the worst allergy to freshly cut grass, she treated me one night and the next day I mowed my lawn with no problems, whereas the week before I sneezed for the rest of the day. She also fixed a bad shoulder, and would sort me out with some general re-balancing treatments too.Now I have to call her up to get the phone number of this one master that she apprenticed under and see if he can fix my brutal shin splints that I've been dealing with. So who here has been treated for anything?
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I was going to scrap the whole thing, but a friend suggested I try a traditional Chinese accupuncturist before giving up, and indeed I asked around and people swore this guy had worked wonders for them -- especially friends who were trying to quit smoking or reduce stress-related symptoms.
I started going to this dude and everything was cool. The benefits felt more substantial and the spot was closer to my house, and even if I couldn't be certain there wasn't some higher-order placebo shit going on here (i.e. this guy will have more OG "ancient wisdom" to impart since he's actually Chinese), I felt like I was getting my $$$'s worth.
Then one day the doc had me roll over on my stomach. This was normal, most sessions involved some needles in the lower back. But without warning, what felt like a jackhammer started pounding into my spine with incredible force! I screamed with pain and turned around as the accupuncturist withdrew what did indeed look like a miniature jackhammer from my back. What's worse, he started laughing and only said by way of explanation "New toy."
I paid for that session and never went back... although I sometimes regret not pursuing accupuncture further (with someone else).
About 7 years ago, I was very involved in learning Shaolin Kung Fu from Sifu Shi Yan Ming. A 34th Generation Shaolin Temple fighting monk. I had already been training there for a couple of years and was pretty skilled considering the amount of time I had been training. As a result, I was among the students Sifu chose to push harder than others. The classes were 2 hour sessions in torture and pushing your chi to its very limit. One day, I felt a pop in my back while I was practicing forms and I KNEW something was wrong. At that point, I was used to being sore or barely able to walk after class, so I tried to brush it off and continued to train by putting tiger balm on my lower back before training. It didn't get any better and pretty soon I found it hard to get through my day to day routine because the wrong movement would trigger this shot of intense pain through my body like an electrical charge. I went to see a sports medicine specialist, he checked me out, took an MRI and told me a I had a herniated disc in my lower back. He also told me the only treatment was to have it removed by surgery and on top of that, would never be able to return to that level of activity.
I was bummed but determined to overcome this injury. About a week later, I had my routine checkup with my internist. I told him about what was going on and what the specialist had told me. He then mentioned that I should try acupuncture. I expressed my skepticism and he told me that he took his son for acupuncture to treat a knee injury he received from a bad fall. I figured as a last resort, I would check it out, though I was still unconvinced.
I made an appointment at Soho Herbs & Acupuncture and mentioned my doctor's name as a referral. I went and upon entering his office, it had a cd playing of ocean waves or something like that. I was shown to a room and the doctor came in and introduced himself. He was a white guy, an italian american who was taught chinese medicine and herbology from a chinese master who also taught him internal martial arts. So he asks me questions about my general health and lifestyle habits. I stick out my tongue, he takes notes, he looks at my eyes, he takes notes, he then grabs my arm directly above the wrist and places three fingers at different spots along my inner arm. He's silent for a minute, takes more notes and says "so you messed up your back, huh"
I was amazed. I later asked my internist if he had talked to the acupuncurist since my checkup. He didn't. He though for sure I wasn't going to go, so he didn't think of mentioning anything. So anyway, back to the story. He asked me how I injured myself and when I told him, he laughed and said, "yeah I've seen a fair amount of business from Shaolin Temple over the years". He assured me would be able to fix it if I followed his instructions. To make a long story short, a few months later, I was fully cured and am still very active to this day with no sign of reoccurrence or back pain from that nasty injury. I went back for more treatments for a badly sprained ankle I got from a car accident, a bad bout of acid reflux and stomach troubles from stress. All were treated successfully. Needless to say, I am a believer in the effectiveness and in many ways, superiority to Western medicine.
For real, given my general aversion to needles, the mere concept of acupuncture is a non-starter to me. Plus, I have serious doubts that it actually does much more than put some money in the acupuncturist's pocket and maybe provide a nice placebo effect. ("Where do we get these placebos?!?!? Maybe they're on this truck!")
I did get reiki treatment once. It didn't do anything--I felt like I had paid to take an hour-long nap.
So...none of that zany stuff for me. I'll stick with magnets and energy vortexes, thank you!