My time with conventional medicine was done years ago,
though I stayed on file with my GP until he retired. He had been our family
doctor since the early 1970s, when we had just landed in Victoria and my mother
found the clinic in the Yellow Pages. He was the junior partner at the time and
man, did we luck out with him. He was the one who diagnosed my bones, referred
me to the eye guy who pegged my Horner’s Syndrome, and kept the rest of my
family alive throughout his career. I liked him enough to trust him, and that
is no small favour when you’re dealing with someone’s compostable container. I
was also fortunate with most of the specialists I knew growing up; though Mum
was continually apologizing for my attitude, I think (hope) most of them
appreciated my spirit.
On leaving the nest and hooking up with Ter, my
medical route veered off the beaten path. I started seeing a chiropractor. Ter
had her allergies tested. We began paying attention to our diet, not to count
calories or fat grams, but to monitor the components of what we were eating.
Ter was reading up on alternative medicine, i.e., naturopathy, homeopathy and
acupuncture, as a more proactive approach to health care, something I agreed
with because of my control issues. I believe in pre-emptive measures rather
than calling in the experts when it’s too late; I’m unsure when this belief
took root, but it feels like I’ve had it forever.
So, in the mid-1990s, when a warning light went on
within my system, rather than call my GP, I called the naturopathic clinic
located near my home. By then I was all for natural remedies; tell me what herb
to make my tea from, point me at the right supplement, take me off sugar,
whatever, I’m good with it. Just don’t stick me full of needles, okay?
I made an appointment for that Friday morning. The
clinic was a partnership between four or five practitioners, each specializing
in something but all fully licensed naturopaths. The fellow who came out to
greet me had the purest blue eyes I have ever seen. He spoke softly, held my
gaze when we were talking, and took copious notes. I answered every question as
honestly as I could considering the personal nature of my symptoms. It takes
real courage to describe a female malfunction to a total stranger—especially
when that stranger is so attentive that you forget what you’re saying in
mid-sentence.
When he had filled up two pages with notes, he looked
me in the eye and said, “We can fix this easily enough, but I really think
you’d benefit from acupuncture. Would you be willing to try it?”
I immediately froze.
“Does acupuncture scare you?” he asked, when I said
nothing.
“Yes,” I replied. No point in lying, since he’d
already figured me out. I had no interest at all in trying acupuncture; I had
done my time with needles and it was never fun. They were all the size of
darning needles, for one thing, and blood was always a factor. Mine.
Well, my magical voodoo man explained the basics and
cleared up my misconceptions. I threw a hundred questions at him and he never
flinched. His voice never changed its timbre, his eyes never left mine, and
when he was finished with the overview, he turned up the voltage on those pure
blue eyes and said, “Will you come back and try it?”
“Okay,” I heard myself say.
I walked out of the clinic with a follow up
appointment and a disquieting sense that I had just surrendered my will to Dr.
Svengali. Only when I was in the car and heading back to work did the charm
lose its power. %&$#*%! I thought in disbelief, I got the needle
guy!
To be continued …
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