Acupuncture can stop your pain quickly

IF YOU'VE BEEN SUFFERING WITH CHRONIC PAIN, YOU WANT SOMETHING THAT CAN GET RID OF THE PAIN.

It doesn’t matter if your pain is from A PINCHED NERVE, MIGRAINES, ARTHRITIS OR an old injury. Acupuncture can help.

I know this from first hand experience.

I was just out of college and working in New York city, when I first experienced debilitating pain. I was an avid martial artist practicing two and half hours a day, three times a week - So I knew what it was like to kick around and get pummeled. I often thought my old instructor was secretly a sadist plotting new forms of torture known as drill, before he’d throw us into the fire of full contact sparring. Being young at the time, I thought I could handle pain. But I was wrong.

A few weeks into my new job I got one of the worse cases of sciatica I’ve ever had. What was once a simple task like getting ready for work now became an agonizing ordeal. Just getting pants on caused me to break out into a cold sweat. Every step brought searing fire down my leg. Every flight of steps looked like it was Mount Everest.

And while each day was hard, the nights were harder. I couldn’t sleep - no position was comfortable and if I managed to find a spot and drift off I was quickly awakened when my body decided to shift positions.

With each passing day, my will to push through each painful day was slowly eroding because of pain and sleep deprivation.

I stopped hanging out with friends and going to my martial arts class. The pain was slowly consuming my life and draining my energy.

Doctors told me I was just getting old. I wasn’t buying it, I was only 25 at the time. They also prescribed pain medication. But they had little effect and made me feel slightly drunk.

I knew there had to be another way.

I found the answer when I was treated with acupuncture. Almost immediately my pain was gone and I felt like myself again. The effects lasted a few days but I knew I was headed in the right direction and with each treatment, I felt better and better. At the end of my recovery I felt stronger, more alive and vibrant than I ever had.

It’s because of my experiences with Chinese medicine that it’s the first place I turn to when I have difficulty in my life.

I’m telling you this story so you know I understand first hand what it’s like to suffer with chronic pain.

You might not have sciatica - maybe you have migraines, neck, back, or knee pain. I’ve treated thousands of people in pain. And while the story of how the pain started is different, the effects are the same.

You stop feeling like yourself.

It becomes hard to concentrate at work; some days it’s impossible to work.

You have to tell your kids “I’m sorry I’d like to be able to play with you, but I can’t because my back hurts.”

I want you to know.

Acupuncture can help.

You’re probably wondering how can acupuncture help when so many other things you’ve tried have failed.

If you’ve tried nerve blocks and didn’t get the results you wanted.

Let me explain how acupuncture works.

Eastern explanation

Chinese medicine is full of creative metaphors to describe how the body works. So I’m going to give you a modern metaphor to describe a classical concept:

“Where there is pain, there is obstruction” - classic chinese saying

Think of your body like a highly connected network of roads. There are roads that carry resources and supplies, information, and manpower to get a job done. When the body is healthy this circulation takes place smoothly. When it falls out of balance we can get traffic jams (obstruction) which lead to pain. Remove the traffic and everything moves freely again. Voila, you're pain free.

There are 19 basic ways these obstructions can occur. Depending on how and where these blockages are, different herbs and acupuncture points are used to re-balance your body. Without a successful diagnosis, there isn’t much of an effect.

So, if you’ve tried acupuncture before but haven’t had much effect. It may mean the diagnosis wasn’t correct.

Western explanation

In order to understand how acupuncture works, we first need to understand how your brain processes pain.

In order for the brain to register pain, there has to be two types of neural signals hitting the brain at about the same time. The first signal is from the sensory nerve or the nerves themselves. The second is from the proprioceptive nerves which are also firing right next to the sensory nerves. The proprioceptive nerves tell the brain where your pain is emanating from. If everything is working properly, the brain will release a torrent of what are called enkephalins. These chemicals are the body’s natural painkillers, and they plug up the pain receptor sites in the brain, all along the spine, and on the the capillary beds where you feel the pain. They stop the chronic pain and allow the body to return to normal function.

Obviously, with those patients who suffer from chronic discomfort, this mechanism is no longer working. There are many reasons the body’s natural pain-relieving mechanism is not working. However, the number one cause appears to be a chronic signal strength problem in the proprioceptive neural tissue. If the neural threshold level (signal strength) is too low, the brain will not know exactly where to release the enkephalins and thus the pain continues. Acupuncture will raise the signal strength on the proprioceptive pathway and the result is a sudden and dramatic relief from pain. For this reason, we can treat an incredibly wide variety of pain problems.

How acupuncture works

Acupuncture works by reducing inflammation and stimulating the nervous system and allowing for the body to regain balance. Results of scientific studies on acupuncture are conclusive, acupuncture is effective in relieving certain kinds of pain.

What we can’t treat

I’ve seen miraculous results with acupuncture, but some things are beyond what I’m capable of treating. For example severe structural damage is beyond the scope of acupuncture.

Pain in the shoulder or knee due to severely torn cartilage or severed tendons cannot be healed without surgery. What we can do is keep the pain down until you are ready for surgery.

I have an MRI of my back showing 2 herniated discs. Does this mean that acupuncture can’t treat my back pain?

Actually, in most cases of chronic pain, there are no structural reasons for the pain at all. Yes, your back can look like a pretzel, but the neural impingement that your doctor is telling you about is inferred from a radiology report. An MRI or X-ray cannot see a nerve. Consequently the medical profession is assuming, based on their idealized knowledge of anatomy, that your pain has to have a structural cause. However, in most cases the sensory nerves are swollen and firing on their own with nothing pushing on them.

Here is a small list of types pain we’ve had success with:

  • Arthritis & Joint Pain
  • Back Pain
  • Neck Pain
  • Sciatica
  • Shoulder Pain, Frozen Shoulder
  • Intercostal Neuralgia
  • TMJ (Temporomandibular Joint Disorder)
  • Sports Injuries, Tennis Elbow
  • Peripheral Neuropathy

Feel free to call us at 972-517-6277 if you would like to talk more about your pain, or if you are interested in scheduling an appointment today.