I admit without reserve that my background is with herbal medicine. My first master was very well known within the Hurstville Chinese community and was one of the amazing practitioners that makes his diagnoses with pulse and tongue inspection alone. He was the first Chinese practitioner that I've met and I am yet come across anyone as accurate with their diagnoses and formula prescriptions or as generous with imparting their knowledge as he was. I was first his patient and then his student. Most of what I have learnt was not covered in uni (not surprisingly, since Chinese medicine was traditionally an apprenticeship type deal). It was from him that I learnt the important art of diagnosis: being able to recognise patterns of disharmony in an often complicated and sometimes conflicting set of signs and symptoms.
I had weekly consultations along with my mother (and any one else that I was able to drag along), took herbal decoctions every day, and developed a collection of raw herbs very early on in my career. This allowed me to become familiar with herbal medicine. Despite having practiced acupcture in class and at uniclinic, I feel like my relationship with it didn't really kick off until my internship in China. Being in the busy acupuncture department of a government-operated Chinese medicine hospital, I developed point location and needling techniques to sweatshop efficiency. Perhaps some practitioners out there think that this is 'it', but I am personally convinced that these are just the very basics. Hence, I often beef up my acupuncture sessions with a channel massage and cupping routine that I have learnt from another master whose career was based on this practice. It is very effective for many health conditions that involve pain. In a lot of chronic cases, I will teach the patient the routine, as well as any lifestyle observations so that they are able to manage things at home. This also goes for my patients that come to me for internal issues, long term management involves diet therapy and lifestyle observations, as well as exercises that are suitable for their body type. This is my dream: to help bring healing into every day life through conscious living practices.
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