Traditional Chinese Medicine Works

This hub is about how someone dear to me was healed by Chinese Medicine. It’s a story rather than a detailed primer on Eastern medical systems although I really should begin with my own slightly pedestrian explanation of this 5000-year old holistic practice.

From what I have gleaned from the wonderful doctor who treated my husband in China and from my own experiences with Holistic healing, Traditional Chinese Medicine is all about creating balance and harmony within the body. It’s about balancing the iconic concept of Yin and Yang.

When your body reveals that it possesses either too much or too little of either Yin or Yang, your system goes out of balance and you get sick. Yin and Yang represent concepts of Chinese philosophy, fully understood by the trained professional. These elements including positive and negative, light and dark, wet and dry, wind and calm, male and female. From what I understand, it’s really not a good/bad, or girl/boy thing, it’s about opposites and equilibrium.

In Chinese Medicine, these principals guide your doctor in diagnosing your illness. An unbalanced Yin and Yang will mirror your very state of being; from the way you look and feel, to the way you act. In addition, the five elements of Wood, Fire, Earth, Metal and Water each corresponding to organs of the body and are another important tool used by Chinese doctors to diagnose illnesses.

Another aspect of Chinese medicine is the principal of “life energy”. All Eastern medicine and I might add, modern day vibrational medicine is based on the belief that a vital energy or vibration flows through and around us. When it flows smoothly we are in good health and when it is “blocked” our good health is compromised. Life energy, or Chi as it is called in China is the source of all life and is the power that animates all things. It’s not really so far removed from modern Western scientific theories - after all, we are in essence made up of energy. We are in fact, just a tight mass of floating atoms, electrons, protons and quarks.

Chinese Medicine operates on the principal that Chi flows through the body’s meridians or channels not unlike the way blood flows through our veins or chemicals flow through our nervous system. When a meridian is blocked by an imbalance in the system, disease sets in. Meridians and energy fields aren’t blocked by plaque or blood clots. They are blocked by the restricted flow of life energy. Your doctor may translate these concepts as your having too much of the “hot” or “cold” element or too much of the “wind” or “damp” element. Whatever the diagnosis, he or she will arrive at it quickly and with seemingly little effort.

My husband was planning a routine business trip to China, but when his “a-typical” migraine headaches became severe and after he had exhausted all Western methods of treatments we made inquiries into the possibility of visiting a Traditional Chinese Medical doctor during the trip.

Our Chinese associate in Hong Kong recommended Dr. Wang Yinshan who practices at Ruikang Hospital of Guangxi in Nanning, China. Dr. Wang had treated our colleague’s wife for breast cancer and he reported that her treatments, under the care of Dr. Wang had resulted in a complete cure.

Nanning is the capital of Guangxi in southern China. This beautiful city with its abundance of lush tropical foliage is known as the “Green City”.

I liked the name immediately. My husband liked the idea that there was an alternative treatment available and that there was a chance he would find a cure for a debilitating illness that had plagued him for more than a decade.

The journey to Nanning was grueling. To my husband’s surprise, the visit to Dr. Wang’s office was to take place soon after he arrived in China. The journey from Atlanta, Georgia to Hong Kong takes over sixteen hours. The journey from Hong Kong to Nanning takes another 8 hours. By the time he and his colleagues arrived at the hospital they were all ready to check in.

As you can see from the photo, the waiting room at the Ruikang Hospital is unique. Quite unlike our waiting rooms Stateside, there are IV units stationed around the room should you require emergency assistance.

When it came time for the meeting, my husband discovered that an examination by a Doctor of Chinese Medicine is quite different from an examination in the U.S or Europe.

Chinese medicine is a holistic practice, which in essence means that the practitioner examines the “whole” person. That doesn’t mean that he rigorously studies you under a microscope; on the contrary, Chinese practitioners don’t even draw your blood or ask you to give them a urine sample. They look at the “larger picture of your being” which includes your mind and spirit as well as your body.

Dr. Wang’s method of examination (which I understand is typical in Chinese Medicine) was to analyze your "being", using only his human senses. There were no stethoscopes, ear scopes or tongue depressors. He simply used his eyes, his hands, and his sense of touch. In a way he seemed to “listen” to what my husband’s body was saying. Perhaps he used his sixth sense - his intuition as well. It’s very possible that he also ‘smelled out” what was causing the severe seizure-like migraines.

Dr. Wang took my husband’s pulse in order to observe the flow of life energy and to determine blockages. He looked at his tongue to distinguish the imbalances and he asked a lot of questions relating to my husband’s lifestyle, work situation, problems, joys aspirations and a host of other vital issues. He spoke only Chinese and my husband spoke only English, so it all had to go through the interpreter.

This examination took no more than half an hour, translations included. Dr. Wang recommended that my husband avoid caffeine and alcohol for 6 months (a major disappointment) and drink a concoction of Chinese herbs mixed with warm water twice a day for the same period of time.

Little brown pills that looked like rabbit poop were also prescribed to be taken at bedtime. The powdered medications were dispensed in little packets that looked like packaged tea bags, each one containing a different blend of herbs, spices, tree barks and an assortment of unsavory sounding ground insects, including scorpions.

There were over 5,760 packets in all! This was one instance when he wasn’t dismayed at the fact that U.S. customs does not permit you to carry in food or plants. Everything was shipped home via FedEx.

It took several uneventful weeks for the medications to arrive, but I’ll never forget the first morning of “treatment”. My husband began by tearing open 32 of the carefully organized “herb” packets, pouring them into a tall glass, mixing it up with warm water, separating it into two portions and drinking one of them.

I don’t quite know whether he was treated for excess Wind, Dampness, Cold, or Heat, but the first slug of that herbal mud cocktail sure did knock the Wind out of him. I didn’t have to second-guess him as to how it tasted, because judging from the body language, I can assure you it was revolting.

Nevertheless, my ever-intrepid mate drank two full 8 oz glasses of that muck each day for 6 months. The little rabbit poop pills were a lot easier to consume and I must say, he slept better for taking them.

After the first three months, and blessedly without a single migraine episode, he allowed himself the occasional cup of tea and shot of scotch. He also threw away the many boxes and nasal inhalers of Imitrex and other previously prescribed pharmaceuticals that he now regarded as “absolute rubbish”.

It’s been nearly two years since that trip to Nanning, China and my spouse has yet to experience any form of migraine headache. The emergency room visits, the cat scans, the terrible debilitating seizures were now a thing of the past.

Recently he visited a local Atlanta Traditional Chinese Medical professional for other, far less severe ailments, but the experience did not prove to be as successful as the visit to Dr. Wang in China.

In the States, Chinese herbal medication is dispensed in capsule and pill form. It’s difficult to say whether the formulation or ease of ingestion has anything to do with the effectiveness of the treatment, but my husband tends to think that the expertise and wisdom of the practitioner are the key ingredients to a successful diagnosis and treatment.

All that aside, the lesson that was taken from this experience was that we need to be open to the healing energies and wisdom of all healing modalities, no matter how “foreign” they may be, how strange they may feel, or how esoteric they may seem - and one must never stop seeking a cure.

In China, millions of people enjoy the benefits of both Eastern and Western medical practices. In the West, Chinese Medicine is slower to catch on, but it is changing. As success stories become known, methods of “alternative” healing practices will become more readily accepted. Hopefully when that happens, the world will enjoy a new level of health and global understanding.

© Copyright Green Lotus, 2011. All rights reserved.