Drinking & Acupuncture don’t mix!

As I mentioned yesterday I did venture to an acupuncturist last night out in St. Peters…this was actually my second appointment with her, where I assumed she’d check my pulse points, my nails, my tongue…and ask me all the personal questions you would expect to get a good diagnosis and treatment plan in place. Instead though she just asked if I had filled out “the survey” last time I was in (I believe she was referring to the Chinese Health Survey…not sure that is its technical name, but something similar) and when I said no, she was like ok….and that was the end of it. She never asked me to fill it out, or any questions about what issues I’m having, what I’m trying to accomplish with acupuncture, etc. She just asked if I had any questions for her as she led me out into another room. As an aside, I must mention that this other “room” is actually just a large open space where I was originally waiting for a half hour and counting the NINE patients they had laying on various tables hooked up to all sorts of machines, several of them without their shirts on…men of course…but not, by any stretch of the imagination, what you picture when you are thinking of getting acupuncture to help relieve stress! And exactly the place where I told her I did NOT want to have my acupuncture done. But before I knew it I was laying on one of the tables with her quickly feeling my pulse and looking inquisitively at me asking what I had eaten in the past few hours. When I said popcorn and diet pepsi she immediately began yelling at me…telling me I have to cut out all soda now if I want to even think about having a healthy pregnancy! After she feels I'm sufficiently reprimanded, she begins jabbing the needles in to my hands…and it HURTS! Everything I’ve heard and read about acupuncture is that it does not hurt so when I asked her if it was supposed to she was like “well it’s because of that soda you drank…it’s tearing up your gut!” Whatever…I don’t believe her. Yes, soda is not exactly a health food drink, but having one or two a day is not going to be the death of me. There are far worse things I can think of that I know I should cut out now to improve my health…and soda is not at the top of the list...atleast not yet. So anyway as the needles continue to go in (I think I had three in each hand and three in each leg and one directly in the top of my head) I try to relax, but at this point I am really worked up…and as you all know my hormones are out of whack so…on come the water works. Yep, that’s right…I start crying…right there on the stupid chiropractor table…out in a big open room with likely nine other people staring at me…luckily I have needles everywhere so I can’t sit up to see them. But I was just overwhelmed and was not expecting this. I was sure I was going in to figure out our plan of attack to get me in the best physical/spiritual shape possible for when we can begin trying again in August…not to just be a pin cushion for the normal acupuncture protocol…because I am sure the needles she put in really had nothing to do with infertility (especially as none of them were placed in my stomach). She was just rushed and didn’t have the time to dedicate to me so was just trying to push me through to her little chiropractor assistants…who finished up everything else.

So I guess the good news is I tried it…which I’ve wanted to do for a while. But as I sit here enjoying a nice cold diet pepsi *smile* writing about my experience, I know one thing for sure…I will not be returning to Dr. Crosby’s office. If I do decide to give acupuncture another try I am going to head out to Maplewood and go to The Wellbody Clinic…it is obviously the only place you can get good acupuncture/infertility treatment in St. Louis!