bloodsucking needles

so, still feeling a little sore from my fall a few weeks ago i decide today to try my hand at some oriental medicine. my adopted korean mom offered and i accepted to invitation to allow her to take me there herself. so here's how it went:

at 11:30am i arrive with kmom. i remove shoes, put on slippers and wait. kmom and receptionist are amazed that a foreigner knows her bloodtype. score 1 for foreigners.

11:45 am i go in to talk to the doctor who is also a professor at a univeristy out of town. he seems nice enough and speaks a little english. i tell him about my ankle and numerous falls and also about my left wrist which has bothered me for a few years now. he holds onto my wrists and tells me that i have a problem with my kidneys and stomach. this is why i hurt my wrist. i was confused about this until he told me that due to the terrible state of these organs my body was in a fragile state and suffered strain easily. i'm not so sure, but am a little amazed because i recently fought off a bladder infection. so either that was a lucky guess, or there's something to this.

no more time because i have to take off my watch.

so after i lay down on the bed, kmom explains that they'll stick needles into me. this i knew. nurses ooh and ahh about how beautiful i am. ha, score 2 for me (later to be cruelly taken away). he not so many words i'm told that my chi basically sucks, or is out of whack. he begins with my ankle. can i just say that acupuncture hurts?! this coming from the girl who loves to get piercings. actually the pain was more of a shock feeling that a sharp pain. when he stuck the first needle in i felt lightning go up my leg. kmom is comforting me the whole time telling me i'm being a good girl. after the ankle they do my wrist, which promptly goes numb. i ask and am told it's normal and to just relax. so i lay there for 15 minutes afriad to move at all. (i accidentally did once and it brought shocks all through my body)

after 15 min...

they remove the needles. kmom is getting treatment beside me so she is able to talk me through the rest. they then put very hot towels on me. i liked this part the best, and this calming feeling would only last a short time.

kmom then tells me that they want to suck blood out of my ankle. i guess i gave a look because all the nurses laughed at me. i made foriegners look weak. minus 1 point. so she takes some more needles and then sucks some blood out. this actually hurt less than the beginning needles. then she rubbed something brown on me that came from a brass tin.

after this i went to another room where they lit incense and placed it on my ankle. i've never heard of this part but it was relaxing and smelt good.

i think this is where the process usually ends, except i mentioned that i get tired a lot. it's true.. i feel as though i'm unusually tired most of the time, especially considering the mass amounts of sleep i get. so this let them to think i need to take herbal medicines. cool, whatever, i'll try anything once. i'm pretty open minded with holistic healing. but, to have the medicine this requires tons of more tests.

first, the blood pressure, then height, then weight. heh, i'm 161.5 tall. my drivers license says 160. plus 1 point.

after this i take the strangest test i've ever taken. first i had to remove all metal (normal) and then had to sterilize the soles of my feet (not so normal). then i had to place my feet on these metal pads and hold on to these metal poles. then the machine started to run tests i guess, but it would mark the responses right infront of me. they were all very proud that it was from germany. the test confirmed the dr.'s notion that i have kidney and stomach problems. i'm told that i get these digestive problems from my parents. THANKS A LOT MOM AND DAD. so what i found most interesting about the test is that it also tested me psychologically. well they said psychological, but it was mostly just general personality traits, similar to what you'd read in your horoscope. according to the test i'm diligent, organized, guilty feeling, thrifty but with no sense of economics and have an explosive personality. how they can tell that from the soles of my feet i don't know.

so, the dr. and kmom chat about me for awhile. he says these herbs will help with the stomach, and that i should come back 6 times to clear up the wrist and ankle. he also told me that for my height i should be 98 pounds. 98! minus 1 point, at least for my self-esteem. kmom seems to be quite excited about the idea that i will lose weight from the herbs and wants some for herself. i don't know if i'll ever get used to how much importance they put on that number here. in anycase, i'm taking the herbs, but certainly not long enough to become 98 pounds. i don't want that. i don't even know if that's possible.

so i am going back on wednesday to get poked again and to get my medicine, which i'm told tastes bitter and that i must take it 3 times a day for 10 days. it's a cleanse, so i will only be eating fruits, veggies and rice as well. that's pretty much all i eat anyways. no drinking aloud either, or chicken, flour, sugar etc etc..

so that, in a not so small nutshell, was my first experience with eastern medicine, in the east. i will keep you updated.