Hi Ben, all,

Well, I have a quite few things to say about this, as a person who has
been in this business for a long time.  I obtained my first certifcation
in acupressure in 1980, eighteen years ago.  I have since gone on to get
as thoroughly trained as possible in natural treatment methods things
that seem useful to me, including a formal education in acupuncture,
Chinese herbal medicine, self study in many areas of nutrition, qi-gong
and similar areas.  The most I ever learned was by hanging out in the
clinic of California's first acupuncturist where my mom worked as office
help, when I was young.

It is indeed very hard for someone with an education limited to one
modality to make a living, and while my practice is a successful one it
did not get there overnight.  The biggest problem for people like me who
sincerely want to help people become and stay well with natural means is
that people have insurance coverage that excludes many useful natural
modalities; and the second is that people have been generally
brainwashed to trust only their MD's recommendation.  I consider myself
highly educated, very well trained, extremely experienced and very able
to help patients with the myriad of problems they bring to me.  Still,
people are very reluctant to try something their MD doesn't do
himself/herself, even if it works.

Ben Odom wrote:

> Where will alternative medicine end up?
> ==============================
>
> While I applaud how well alternative medicine has done in the last 10 years,
> I'm afraid that quite a few of the holistic practitioners I've met up with
> are almost as tied to profit as the medical doctors.  For example, the
> naturopath that I went to for a few months went on and on about how she
> respected my own personal views on health, and that she hated how doctors
> were so bent on "pushing their drugs."
 <<snipped>>
> I'd be interested to hear what others have to say on this subject.  Perhaps
> I'm a little out of line, or too cynical, or both.  But my gut feeling tells
> me that many holistic practitioners are following in the footsteps of the
> pill-pushing western medicine.  For the time being, I have traded my massage
> therapy for yoga, which I can do at my own leisure, without someone pushing
> their pills down my throat.
>
> Regards,
>
> Ben

I think a lot of practitioners don't have answers they need and don't
know where to go to find them, and wind up recommending a supplement
that they get sucked into selling.  In general I neither recommend pills
nor any normal supplement which many so-called natural or holistic
practitioners do.  Usually I do acupuncture and Chinese herbal remedies
(handmixed individually for each patient, each one usually unique). But
I also teach qi-gong, and offer organic foods, and nearly always
recommend a mostly raw foods diet to my patients.

The truth is, however, patients generally don't want the truth, which
IMO is that you have to take responsibility and the primary one
responsible for your health is YOU, especially if you have a chronic
problem, and eat unconventionally, eat lots of fresh foods, do qi-gong
or a similar energetic-based exercise; and, that my job is often to find
out what it is that an injured or sick body needs and educate the
patient about that.

For example, I have one patient who has had back pain for years. First I
treated him for hypertension and after 2 years he was able to get off
all meds for this problem even though he was in stroke territory prior
to treatment.  Then I kept telling him for 3 more years he had to
exercise to help his back problem.  He didn't want to hear anything
about it until he gained 20 pounds.  I did treat him with acupuncture
and kept saying he should eat fresh foods, which he didn't want to hear
anything about.  Acupuncture helped him a lot with pain, but it kept
returning.  I kept telling him the same thing, he had to start
exercising.  Finally this year he did start exercising and eating some
fresh foods and for the first time in over 5 years he is completely pain
free for a few days at a time.  What can I say?

People have to be ready to become more well.

As far as educators and people like me eventually putting themselves out
of business, I can't even imagine it happening in my  lifetime.  In our
area there is a huge demand for our services, and I am always training
and hiring people to do acupressure therapy or therapuetic massage; I
had turned away more than a dozen clients last week because we're
swamped.  I also wind up teaching qi-gong, creating raw foods recipes
for specific ailments and so on, so I see my job as having endless
possibilites.

In generally I believe the single most important thing people can do to
help themselves is to fix their diet - the foods they eat are just
killing them.  IMO people are becoming so ill on so many processsed
foods, refined flour and diets that we are not at all genetically
designed for; I say this from pratical experience since sometimes most
of what I do is to change the food someone eats and they really get well
fast.


regards

Roberta