My healing journey 1

 

My Healing Journey 1

In January 2021, I began mentioning to some friends that I was becoming more and more interested about the philosophy and the workings of Traditional Chinese Medicine because I had heard a lot of success stories about treatments for ailments that had been unsuccessfully treated through Western medicine. I have always had an interest in medicine and the human body. I completed a degree in Public Health in 2017.

In February, I met a girl who was studying an introduction to Chinese Medicine and acupuncture. I had never been treated before but had watched many videos on YouTube videos as an educational resource and had talked about friends experiences in detail with them.

When I had the panic attack March 2021, I thought it had severely and perhaps permanently impacted my life forever. I was in a very dark place, finding very small windows in the day where I could find the words to speak, myself or the ability to have any stimulation (light, noise, conversation).

After months (perhaps years of suffering) and my panic attack I went to the hospital to seek professional help (with the help of friends) and managed to express my concerns about the severe anxiety that I had been suffering with for months (vomiting, anxiety attacks, poor time management, noise bothering me more and more); the Western doctor (GP) diagnosed me with anxiety and depression (I had no idea I was depressed) and prescribed an anti-depressant “escitalopram” alongside a anti-anxiety pill “tofisopam”. I was aware that these pills were not going to have immediate effect and the pills work differently for everyone but my illness had gotten so bad at this point that the extreme side effects of the medication (anti-depressant) became too much for me to handle. I experienced sickness, dizziness, insomnia, derealization, depersonalization and severe hypersensitivity (in my opinion; this was the worst side effect). During this time, I was afraid to be left alone or I needed to be left in silence in a dark room. The derealization and depersonalization also scared me because I felt disconnected from the world and was afraid, I would never recover. That’s when I called my Mom and described feeling like an autistic child with severe sensory issues (I couldn’t tell her the real experiences I was having, in that moment I truly felt like I might never recover, the fear of losing your mind is the scariest thing I have ever experienced in my life).

Through somehow finding the strength to share my story on Instargram, a lot of people reached out and opened up about their recoveries through acupuncture. Its ironic, because back in January/February I had booked an appointment and cancelled because I was going on my holidays (when I was already struggling).

It was a sign- I believed that this could be my only hope and I immediately booked another appointment. In my video on Instagram, I described how I was a “shell of a human” at my first appointment. After a few initial introduction questions from the TCM doctor (MORE questions than the Western doctor had asked). She asked about my physical body, how are my usual reactions to certain scenarios, and have I suffered any digestive issues throughout my life? YES, and so on.

She spoke about the 5-element system in our bodies and then spoke about how our organs can hold trauma from childhood in our bodies. She was able to talk about how she would be treating my liver and spleen to try tackle the IBS I have suffered with since childhood (I have seen so many doctors throughout my life for my digestive issues), and she said she would be treating pathways around my liver that controls the fight or flight response. She asked about head aches and in my 4^th appointment, she said she would help treat my chronic headaches. I can’t believe the miracle work she has been performing.

In the 30-minute sessions when the needles are treating different pathways. I use my own experience of meditation, breathing and relaxation techniques to work on my inner child.

I will talk more about the “inner- child” work in later blog posts.

Since beginning acupuncture and taking the herbal medicine (all made with natural ingredients) I have lowered the dosage of new prescription pills the doctor prescribed (Tofisipam and Zoloft).

I want to express that this is MY experience. Every person is different, recover differently, have different traumas to work through. I just wanted to share MY experience. I’m in no way undermining Western medicine practices. For me, I didn’t want to take medication long-term and rely on it to be a functional human-being, I wanted to explore a method that could provide me with longer lasting results. I have suffered with poor mental health for a long time.

I have found that this experience has and continues to connect my mind, body and spirit and i'm thankful to have found a treatment that is suiting me. I also would like to add that I have used talking therapy many times throughout my life (I attended my first therapy session at 12 years old), and I knew this time that talking was not going to help in this situation. I do however believe that talking therapies did give me important ground work my current treatment.

I have completed now 5 out of a possible 12 sessions of acupuncture.

Feel free to contact me for any questions through my instagram @itsmedannig