My Acupuncture Experience

[Today]

Today at 03:34:45 AM Lizzie - looks like I´m not too alone in this (lol)

Today at 02:40:42 AM Lizzie - 3:40 a.m. here and the nights over

Today at 01:43:01 AM uwdawg - Thanks kmarie. glad to know it's not just me.

Today at 01:32:17 AM kmarie1994 - uwdawg I have this as well hopefully it goes away soon

Today at 01:30:47 AM helpme123 - Sorry Bella I missed  you hun xoxooxox

Today at 12:11:15 AM Serene1 - Laura xoxoxo, come into chat

Yesterday at 11:07:58 PM uwdawg - my leg muscles feel like they are being tickled...does that make any sense? lol

Yesterday at 11:07:33 PM Melissa7 - come into chat

Yesterday at 11:06:24 PM uwdawg - like it's seriously hard to lift my arms and move my legs. It's scaring me

Yesterday at 11:05:01 PM Melissa7 - Yes and exhausted dawg

[bill]

Leena, Yes Cupping is something, isn't it? odd sensation. I was in for an hour and a half today, so we'll see how it affects me. Again about 80 needles. Since I'm not in the kind of bad shape I was when I wen in last week I don't expect any major changes. I had expected between last session and this to crash, but i really didn't. The doctor told me how all this anxiety we know so well doesn't exsist in the chinese, and she feels a lot of it is due to toxics in our life style. She told me since i didn't have OCD till fairly late in life (30 yrs old) that it's not part of my personality but added because of the toxins.
17 yrs on benzos - you are very courageous. My best wishes for the journey.

[bill]

I guess this is turning into a weekly update. So here it is. Went for treatment #3 yesterday. In the morning i got into a frazzled type of mood, due to a lot of little things going wrong. A familiar feeling from the last few months that I had not had for a while. The kind of thing that under ordinary circumstances isn't a big deal, but when the brain isn't quite up to coping well, can become a big thing. I taught one of my classes and went to the dr. in the afternoon. Again she left me for a long time - almost 1 and 1/2 hours. Probably 50 - 60 needles; she said there are so many because she is treating my whole body, not one area. By the time i left I felt amazingly better. very relaxed. And once again I had a good nights sleep; very little interruption.
I wish there was some way i could verify how I feel - in other words - what would i feel like if i hadn't gone for the treatment yesterday? For the last two weeks, since the first session, i have felt well. Stark contrast to the previous 10 days or so between Christmas and my first session; again, there's no way of knowing if that episode was bpought on by the wine i drank on christmas. As long as I continue to feel good and sleep well - no complaints.

[bill]

I just have to add this. I went for treatment number 4 yesterday. Hadn't slept well last few nights, after 2 weeks of good sleep. I believe it's the stress of teaching again catching up - feel like I'm in a "mini" wave of sorts - not intense like october/ december, but still...Anyway at the accupuntrists office i fell asleep for 40 minutes dutring treatment. Then, last night slept almost 7 hrs straight! like when I was 21! There's no doubt in my mind that the endorphine release - or what ever it is - can't help but relax you. In an ideal world I'd be going 2 times a week...but now I can't continue even 1x a week because the so called "Helath Insurance" son't cover this...still I'm grateful and thankfull that i found this dr., so if I do hit another rough patch - and no doubt it will happen at some point - there is  relief waiting.

[wwjd]

bill,
Thank you for continuing to update your progress regarding acupuncture. 
When you don't hear from someone, you assume they must be doing well, which is obviously not always true.

I continue to say I'm going to contact an acupuncturist in my area, but just haven't done so.  It's still in my plans.
I guess we're all apprehensive about something new, and find reasons to put it off.
I'm glad you're having good results, as it's very encouraging to think there are some types of treatments that can help alleviate
some of this discouraging symptoms like insomnia.
Thanks again,
-David

[bill]

David,
Sometimes I think it's important to do SOMETHING instead of nothing. One should never feel there isn't something we can do. As long as the something won't hurt; in the case of acupuncture, it has helped me, sometimes more apparently than others.

[tigertales]

Anyone here tried Chinese medicine?

2 days ago I went to see said Chinese doc giving him details of the fatigue, lethargy, lack of energy.  He gave me 10 days worth of mixed herbs that I have to boil for an hour and drink a fowl smelling and tasting sludge - but after the first batch I noticed late in the day that the fatigue wasn't' there. 

I'm hoping I'm onto something.

[bill]

TT,
Today i went for an emergency session with the acupuncture doctor. (My son has been going thru a mini crisis and causing me sleep loss/ anxiety). I asked her about herbs, and she wrote down three for me to pick up at the Chinese market. Haven't tried them yet but will let you know in a few days how they're working.

[bill]

NEWS FLASH; ACUPUNCTURE WORKS FOR WITHDRAWAL SIDE EFFECTS
Now Here's the real deal: like Oscar Wilde said "Only a shallow man refuses to judge by appearances". And by all appearances Acupuncture is lessening my sx. I'm not wondering about it any more. My first visit in early jan. brought immediate relief from a 10 day wave, caused by some alcohol intake on Christmas. This past week i decided not to go on my weekly visit, and within two days i had  raging anxiety, G.I. problems, muscle tension, insomnia. By far the worst i had felt since that first visit. Went this afternoon and as the day has gone on the anxiety has just melted away...stomach better, too. Tonight i am writing this in a very relaxed mood. I'm not wondering any more if the acupuncture is helping.
If anybody has had experienced similar results - or not similar - feel free to post.

[leena]

Hello Bill,

I am SO glad that you are having such success with your acupuncture experience. Does your doctor do your acupuncture the same way every time you go?  I think you may have mentioned having something like 80 needles used.  I would love to know if it is the very specific way that your doctor places the needles that is helping you get such relief.

I wish I could report having the same success.  I was very hopeful at first, and I still very much like my Chinese doctor.  But I have found the last 2 times that I have gone I seem to actually experience more pain the next day.  It may be purely coincidence.

The way my doctor determines where to put the needles is by applying pressure to different pressure points on my body (or to places where I have drawn a "dot" on myself with a sharpie...it looks silly, but I am to the point where I don't care   He doesn't use all my dots, but he does use some of them.  He also places them in my hands and feet in certain places...and once he put them in my ears.  But he has never come anywhere close to using 80 needles.  I would guess the max he has used is 30-40. He has used electricity in my back 3 of the 7 times that I have gone.

I don't know if I have just become extra sensitive to the needles, OR if my back starts getting more muscle spasms as a result of the way that I lay on my stomach on the table.  This is such an uncomfortable thing for me to do that I am sure I am tensing up while laying there.  I went to a chiropractor yesterday for intense muscle spasms in my back (thinking this could only be a helpful thing).  He could not believe the tension in every muscle he touched in my body.  He worked on me for over an hour...and last night I felt worse than when I went in.  I am pretty scared now to try to do anything that involves anyone touching my body!

Anyway, I wonder if your doctor would care to share some tips with you that you could pass on to us to share with our doctors.  My doctor seems very willing to listen and is very humble...but we do have a distinct language barrier.  I would just be curious to know if your doctor knows something special to do for people like us.

Again, I am very glad that you have found relief.  It seems you have found a practitioner who is very intuitive in helping your situation!

Kind regards~
Leena

Oh...I might add that he has worked very hard trying to come up with the right combination of herbs for my kind of pain.  He always asks me if I am burning, or aching, or if there are stabbing pains, etc.  Since I have been burning more and more, he gave me a new concoction (these are powdered herbs that are blended in the pharmacy right next door to where he works).  I am going to start being faithful taking them as prescribed tomorrow (which is 3 times a day in boiling water).  The thing that I appreciate so much about his approach is that he REALLY seems to want to make me better.  And he goes above and beyond the time limits to do so.

[bill]

Hi Leena,
Well, first of all it sounds like your dr. is trained in China? ( you mentioned language issue) (I have a little of that going too). That's a good thing if he/she is. My dr. puts about 70 needles in. I asked her why, when others here say they get many less. She said she is treating the entire body, not just one or two symptoms. She puts them in my back, sometimes, usually around the naval, always in my hands, my ears (unfortunately) , my feet (double unfortunately for the achilles' spot), my head. She diagnosis me thru the pulse - others use the tongue. She leaves me for between and hour and an hour and a half, I usually fall asleep ( no matter what time I go) for 20 - 30 minutes. Under a heat lamp.

Now, there's been a subtle change lately. The first times i went in early mid january I felt extremely relaxed afterward, and slept fantastic for a few nights. The last few days I've been experiencing a 'wave' I think, and , even though i went to see her on monday, I haven't slept quite as well. I don't think the treatment is going to make an incredible difference if you are in the throws of a bad wd. What I have found is that it makes for me the symptoms much more tolerable. For instance monday I had been plagued with a lot of anxiety, which was greatly reduced after i saw her. So instead of having a terrible night's sleep - 3 hours, say, I will get 6 interrupted hours. I'm comparing pre- acupuncture 'waves' with 'waves' while getting the treatment ( this week). The one time in the last 5 weeks that I didn't go for a treatment within a week i got hit pretty hard, which, though anecdotal, is proof enough for me right now.

Admitedly, the $80.00 a session is a burden, but the way i look at it if i go for 12 sessions to get me thru the roughest part and spend a thousand dollars, and if  it really helps, it's worth it.
One thing that i am confused about is the dots that you draw. Are you drawing them because you know the organ meridian pathways? for instance, I think the soft part of the ear is the liver meridian.
One more thing - I used to go for massage on a regular basis for chronic neck tension. In withdrawal, i can't stand the idea of it. So you could say the acupuncture is replacing that for me.

Hope you find relief from the sx soon - and stay the course!
Bill