WHAT IS YOUR RELATIONSHIP TO ILLNESS?

By the time many are willing to try acupuncture, this is how they come in the door:

"I have tried everything."

"My blood work is fine...but I still feel this way."

"I have no choice except to add a little more balance to my life now."

"I just hurt."

Acupuncture is as much about the physical body as it is about the mind and spirit. Pain, physical and emotional, is what most commonly brings people in the door for treatment. Acupuncture can indeed help with pain management. The lens through which the practitioner sees you seeks to not only help you with your pain but figure out what the relationship is to your pain or illness. Acupuncture does not seek to find "what is wrong with you". It looks for what is off-balance, how to adjust that, and clear the way for your body to heal itself. We often ask questions like: When did your pain begin and what were the circumstances around it? How are you currently affected and what changes would you like to see? What effort are you willing to put in to make changes happen? When approached from that level physical ailments are sometimes relieved, stress reduced, and the mood around the situation improves.

Acupuncture will adjust where you are currently at, but what will you do to keep moving forward? Will you change your eating habits to help align your health? Will you adjust your sleep schedule so that you are able to recover? Acupuncture and any form of medicine, eastern or western, require that you make changes to progress and benefit fully from treatment. Your health for the most part is up to you. What will you do to make the best of it?

Acupuncture can also be used as a band-aid, like any pill you could swallow. I choose not to use it that way. Participants that benefit the most make changes, even small ones, in their daily life to help the process along. It may be as simple as getting to bed earlier, making changes in food choices, stretching, breathing, or learning what it feels like to be comfortable in your skin.