Pin Prick

Due to my natural upbringing I have always been a bit leery of going to the doctor. Don’t get me wrong, I make my annual appointments for my eyes, teeth and girlie parts, but I don’t enjoy them, and I am glad to check them off my annual “to do” list.

Amazingly in the 70’s, my small southern hometown had a health food store that is still in business today. My parents were always of the persuasion that you should try vitamins, supplements, and sweating it out (Dad’s prescription), before you resort to taking pharmaceuticals. As a kid, treats in our house consisted of carob chocolate, sliced carrots, and fruit juice frozen into plastic Popsicle containers. When spending the night at a friend’s house I would gorge myself on sodas, sweetened cereals, and greasy chips. Delicious.

As an adult, I believe that a large amount of your health and general well bring is connected to diet and exercise, but I do realize that sometimes that isn’t enough. So for the bulk of this year I have spent an absorbent amount of time in doctor’s waiting rooms, taking pills, and hoping that modern medicine would serve up a “quick-fix”. I have a better understanding of why drugs are so heavily consumed in our culture, because it takes little discipline to take a pill. As long as you can ignore the long list of side effects that are sometimes worse than what you were taking the medicine for in the first place. After months of taking the modern medicine route with no success, I have decided to go back to a more natural approach. As of June I am drug free, for the most part.

So tomorrow I have an appointment with an acupuncturist. I am anxious and excited. I went to Wikipedia to read up on the subject. There are opinions on both sides as to the effectiveness of acupuncture, but there are always two sides to every story. Honestly, I don’t love the idea of tiny stainless steel needles which resemble nails, being inserted all over my body, but I am willing to give it a shot. At least the lists of side effects are short (minor bleeding, bruising, and dizziness) and don’t include rectal bleeding.