Narcoleptic Knights

Tuesday, July 7, 2009

Awesome Acupuncture

Although I am still feeling the effects of my bathroom sleeping experience, I am in a significantly better mental and physical state today. While my massage yesterday is definitely a piece of the improvement, another HUGE aspect is that I had acupuncture today. I tend to look forward to my acupuncture anyway (I see my acupuncturist every two weeks), but today was phenomenal.

Two weeks ago, Sarah (my acupuncturist at Langford Chiropractic) used cups on me for the first time. Essentially, she created a vacuum seal in a cluster of places on my back. It made me feel significantly better. I was sincerely hoping that she might want to use those again today, particularly because the cups did wonders for the tension in my upper back. While I might get cups in two weeks, Sarah decided to stick (pun intended) with acupuncture today. She did "shake up" my treatment, though. She also had to wait to use electrical stimulation on the needles until half-way through my session (she had another patient "hooked up" when I started my treatment).

The different needle placement certainly grabbed my body's attention. She placed a four or five needles down the center of my torso. She also insert needles in my right ear and in a few spots on my legs and hands. Even before Sarah hooked up the electricity, I could feel energy moving in my body. While I often experience that to a small degree, today was radically different. I had not felt this level of energy movement for years. The moment that truly stunned me is that when Sarah did bring the electrical equipment into the room, I thought she hooked me up with it "on." As soon as she connected the electrodes to the needles in my left leg, I could feel the electricity jumping between them and through my leg. But, Sarah had NOT turned on the electricity yet. The energy I was feeling was the natural energy of my body.

I am positive that much of the reason for this heightened success is that I have been doing yoga frequently with my Wii Fit. When I had this experience before during acupuncture (in 2005), I was doing daily yoga. Thus, the fact that I had such a similar experience in 2009 at the first acupuncture session after I have begun to get into a yoga routine again seems like much more than coincidence. Even though the yoga on Wii Fit is simply a series of poses, probably chosen more for the stretching, it is clear to me that I am much more in tune with my body. The excitement of this experience has me looking forward to doing even more yoga and working my way back to doing Kundalini Yoga once again (as well as the Wii Fit). Although I know that I need the Western drug that help to offset the conditions of my narcolepsy, I am thrilled that I continue to use non-Western techniques to manage the disease. Acupuncture is an important part of my routine. It truly makes a major difference in the quality of my life.

1 comment:

Lewis said...

Mike, I'm so glad to hear that your relationship with your body is on the up. It makes me truly happy to hear about things going good for you, much like when you used to perk up and congratulate me when there was a bit of light in that run of problems I had. Starry nights to you, and never hesitate to call if the mood strikes you. =)