Traditional Chinese Medicine

"Medicine can only cure curable diseases, and then not always" - Chinese Proverb

I have had the great privilege of living in Asia twice during my career as a software engineer.  I spent 5 months in Japan, living part of the time in Tokyo and part of the time in Osaka working for the Grain exchanges in those cities.  I spent 13 months in Hong Kong working on a project for the Stock Exchange of Hong Kong.  It was such a wonderful opportunity to take in a culture much different than mine and to see how life is lived in both these countries.  I simply loved it and remain friends with people I met during those projects.

While in Hong Kong I noticed there were Chinese herbal stores on nearly every corner, like CVS or Walgreens are here in Florida.  There were also big Western hospitals since at the time Hong Kong was still British.  I asked my co-workers who were natives to Hong Kong when you would go to a Chinese herbalist versus a big Western Hospital.  They told me if you get hit by a car you go to the Western Hospital for everything else you go to the Chinese Herbalist.  This conversation that took place many years ago pointed me in my second direction after some very unpleasant meetings with Western doctors.  I searched out doctors of Chinese medicine locally.  I found one at my local health food store advertised on the wall.  OK, probably not the best place to find one, but for some reason this advertisement appealed to me, but then that is what they are suppose to do.  I saw this practitioner for about 8 weeks, I did weekly acupuncture and took Chinese herbs in a tablet form 3 times a day.  After the 8 weeks, I went for a mammogram and they saw marginal improvement.  That was not good enough for me so I sought out another doctor of Chinese medicine.

Ann Fonfa, who heads the Annie Appleseed foundation, gave me contact information for Dr. George Wong in New York.  Since I grew up in New York I decided to make the trip to meet with Dr. Wong. This was in December of 2013.  As I said in a previous post, I met Dr. Wong on a street corner in Astoria, Queens.  We then went to a cafe nearby.  Dr. Wong spent nearly 2 hours with me, read my pulses (yes we have more than one) and reviewed all of my mammograms, blood work and pathology reports. He told me my adrenal gland was dead, which I knew since I was born with a genetic disease where my adrenal gland does not function properly.  He told me I had too much stress in my life, well I had just been diagnosed with cancer so that made sense. Also, my job had been really bad for the past 2 years, so I am sure that caused a lot of stress.  He told me I did not have cancer but I was in grave danger of developing it. He asked me why I had come from Florida to see him and I said that my gut feeling on the Western treatments being offered to me was not favorable and I wanted to try Chinese herbal medicine to reverse this DCIS.  He said he could help me but could not promise that this would not turn invasive. I started the Chinese herbs when the first batch arrived about 1 week later.

At first the taste was unbelievably bad.  The herbs arrive pre-brewed in a small pouch.  You take them 3 times a day after every meal.  At this point I do not feel the taste is bad at all, I guess you can get used to anything.  I treat them like a shot of tequila and just knock them back.  The herbs are to both build my immune system and balance my hormones.  I feel great since I started taking them and while my DCIS is not completely gone, the MRI report from January 2014 compared with the one from January 2015 showed no significant change.  Since the last MRI Dr. Wong has strengthened the herbal formula, I will have another MRI in the next 2-3 months and hope for improvement at that time.  I really like Dr. Wong, I think he is fantastic.  He has done so much for me for so little money.  I have also met several women who have had complete remission while taking his herbs.  In addition to the herbs I go to a local practitioner for acupuncture mainly to reduce stress.

In addition to the Chinese herbs, I am taking a large amount of supplements which I will document in my next post.