Embracing the Dragon
One Mother’s Relentless Search for Healing and Hope
[Excerpt below from Chapter 4: Acupuncture]
Nine months after first initiating Russell’s acupuncture, I began to notice a distinct pattern. He was just over a year and a half and had endured a second long winter fraught with chronic ear infections and almost continuous antibiotics. His acupuncture treatments, usually geared toward rebalancing his water or wood elements, began to have a noticeable and positive effect. Almost immediately after his treatments, his appetite and energy level increased. By the next day, the mucus in his nose lessened, his coughing decreased, and smiles, giggles, and his true happy nature would all reemerge. This rebound, little by little, would then slowly dissipate such that, as the three-week intervals between acupuncture treatments came to a close, his nose would be runny again, he would be coughing again, and his energy level, mood, and appetite would all be low.
Thus, by the time Mary came back to our home to treat Russell, he was generally run-down and cranky again. This never discouraged her, even though she didn’t witness the improvements that Richard and I observed. She would listen carefully to my reports of Russell’s rebound and ask me for as much detail about his steady subsequent decline as I could remember. (This is a perfect example of how a parent’s observations are valued by alternative healing practitioners.) The acupuncture treatment he received at the appointment would then turn the decline around completely in a matter of minutes, transforming Russell back into a happy, energized, and hungry baby.
At first, I tended to dismiss the improvements that I repeatedly observed as wishful thinking. How could a tiny little needle inserted into one tiny little spot make a baby feel so much better? How could treating a point on his foot clear up the mucus in his nose, or strengthen his appetite or improve his mood? It wasn’t logical. Yet I witnessed this dramatic transformation over and over again with each successive treatment. Eventually, when the positive turnaround started to last longer and longer between appointments, the lack of logic no longer mattered.
Once four full seasons of acupuncture had passed, Russell’s uplift spanned the full three weeks between treatments. At that point, the aim of his treatments was no longer to improve his condition, but became instead to sustain the good results. I still didn’t understand how acupuncture worked, but I couldn’t deny that it was working. Everyone noticed the improvement in Russell’s energy and mood and appearance even the doctors. There was no way to explain away his rejuvenation as the power of suggestion, particularly since he was a baby and pre-verbal. And even if my positive attitude toward Mary and acupuncture caused a temporary lift in his mood, this couldn’t possibly sustain his well-being over time. Though acupuncture was not being credited by the skeptical members of our family or the doctors, everyone felt compelled to applaud the steady improvement in his health.
For that first year, Mary came out to our home in Darnestown, making the 45-minute drive from her own home in Columbia. These house calls—considered outdated and an exaggeration of a doctor’s normal commitment by many—assisted Russell in feeling that Mary was someone to be trusted. Her visits were just another part of his everyday life, and all of us were there to observe his treatments and comfortably interact with Mary ourselves. When she first began treating him, Mary came every other week for two months. Following that initial period, she tapered down to once every three to four weeks. By the time a year passed, Russell had grown comfortable with his treatments and she asked me to start bringing him to her office in Columbia instead of continuing her home visits. I was actually glad. Eliminating her commute helped to assuage the mounting guilt I felt at not paying her anything for Russell’s treatments.
After a year of acupuncture, Russell’s rebound in health and increased energy filled him with joy, simply because he felt so good most of the time. This is an ambitious goal in the context of CF—a disease that debilitates the broad-reaching exocrine system and typically causes its victims to feel consistently lousy. Strengthening each of the elements and their functions early on in life helps to keep a child in a vigorous state, especially in the context of a medical challenge where the child’s health may be compromised. The resultant good growth, assimilation of nutrients, proper elimination, protection from germs, and overall vigor make for a healthy and happy child. The earlier this holistic rebalance and reinvigoration occurs in a child’s life, the less time there is for the child’s body to fully imprint (or adjust to) any negative health burdens. Such an early revitalization, of course, improves the child’s long-term prognosis.
The major difference between the conventional medical approach and acupuncture was that Russell’s acupuncture treatments were primarily focused on the positive—building on his inherited constitutional strengths and enhancing his vigor or foundational energy—where conventional medicine sought to suppress negative symptoms and stave off the predicted decline for as long as possible. Mary sought to renew and then sustain his organs’ functionality as well as build up his innate capacity to ward off disease. Acupuncture supported him on a much deeper level than merely controlling his symptoms or slowing the progression of CF. It was premised on the belief that his body had an innate ability to change and correct the imbalances, essentially revert back to its originally intended state of good health, despite a genetic code and prognosis that conventional medicine believed to be immutable.
In the early years, Russell’s renewed vigor on the playground, his clear lungs, his ability to effectively fight off germs, and his steady climb back up the growth chart due to his improved assimilation of nutrients all contrasted sharply with the predicted decline. The doctors not only acknowledged a general lack of deterioration, they admitted that he was actually becoming healthier as evidenced by improved lab results, weight gain, and a decrease in head colds and infections. I was amazed that acupuncture was having such a profound influence on both his health and his quality of life. I started to consider that there might be a lasting impact that would go beyond the current rebound that we were witnessing. Hope began to seep in around the edges and give me relief from endless worrying.
After separating from my husband in 1995 and becoming a single parent, I realized how critical my own well-being was to my ability to nurture my children, and I decided to take proactive steps toward protecting my health. I asked Mary to start treating me in addition to treating Russell. Today, acupuncture is no longer a novelty, and licensed practitioners abound. Yet acupuncture is still surprisingly uncommon among my friends and acquaintances, and I don’t know anyone who has sought out acupuncture treatments for their baby. Thus, even though my primary aim in this book is to describe Russell’s experience of alternative healing, I share a bit of my own experience to give readers who have never tried acupuncture an idea of what it’s like.
“Lindsay’s book is a compelling and inspiring story of how a mother’s love, resourcefulness and doggedness saved her son’s life and health. I can’t recommend it highly enough! Her son Russell is now a magnificent, happy and successful young man! His mother’s journey is filled with perils and indomitable resilience. ”