The Chinese Herbalist

Welcome to experiment #3! Over the next two weeks, I will be taking herbal remedies in conjunction with my regular medication to determine if Eastern medicine enhances my results. For reference purposes, it's probably a good time to actually share my weight with the public world. This is scary for me - only me and my doctor know how much I really weight. My husband might have a clue, but I never told him, either. (Sorry, hon! Some things are too difficult to face.) I realize that my success, if I ever have any, will have more impact if people actually know where I started. So, casting my fears aside and exposing my ultimate secret for your reading pleasure, I proudly (ok, not really) announce to you that my starting weight when the blogging began was 268 pounds.

Well, that was certainly anti-climatic. The sky did not open up to the sound of angels laughing, nor did anyone say "how could you let yourself go like that?" You may be thinking it, but I can't hear you. That's a good thing, so I'll continue. I've been stuck at 261 or higher since the end of 2005. I want to break past that number. In the recesses of my mind, once I get below 261, the weight will just start to fall off. That may not happen, but one can hope.

Last month, I went to New York City on a business trip. Since my sister lives there, I stopped by to visit her, too. She is a proponent of Eastern medicine and uses herbal remedies to help treat her son's asthma after traditional medicine failed. Now, I have to wonder about one thing...if herbalism and acupuncture have been around for thousands of years, and Western medicine for just a few hundred, how is it that we call Western medicine the "traditional" method? Shouldn't it be the other way around?

Anyway, at my last visit to New York, my sister and I were discussing all of my health problems and my medicine regimine, and she thought I might benefit from Chinese herbs. I didn't commit to trying it at the time, but she broached the topic again during my business trip, and asked me just to try it. I conceded, thinking that it really couldn't hurt (I hoped).

So, off we go. The one she went to for her son is closed on Wednesdays, and my flight was in 5 hours, so we tried another one who was recommended by a friend. The consultation was free, but the herbs were expensive, so it ended up costing the same as my nephew's herbalist.

I sit down with a very quiet, elderly Chinese man to discuss my health. He looks at my hands and my tongue, and tells me I am thirsty. Ok, that's fair - we just walked 2 miles in 90 degree weather to get there. Yes, I'm thirsty...but I could have told him that. I bite my tongue and wait for him to impress me.

He takes my blood pressure and listens to my pulse. He puts my finger in a little plastic case and opens up his laptop. It's all in Chinese - very cool. He goes on to tell me that I get thirsty every day at 3:00 pm, and there are three possible reasons for this. One is diabetes, one is high cholesterol, and one is fire in the liver. I wait for him to tell me that I have diabetes or high cholesterol, because I just had my labs done, and the Western doctors tell me I do not have diabetes or high cholesterol. He tells me the same - it's not those...it's fire in the liver.

Intriguing. My chiropractor told me he thought I might have some liver toxins and encouraged me to do a cleansing program (he's a nutritionist, as well). But I never got around to doing it. Maybe I should. The herbalist explains that there are many reasons for fire in the liver: drug use, alcohol abuse, stress, heavy work (like construction), working with chemicals, or just working too much. I wait to hear that I drink too much and sniff too many chemicals. He tells me instead that I work too much and am under too much stress at home.

Ok, he's been right on everything so far - I work too much, and I am under stress at home due to working too much, and I get thirsty every day at 3:00 pm. Part of me is impressed, and the other part believes that he could have guessed and gotten that right. I was, after all, hundreds of miles away from home, thirsty, and in a hurry to get to the airport.

He tells me to take Visily but ups the recommended dosage on the packaging. At $60 a box, I'm not sure I want to take more than the standard dose, but I'll give him the benefit of the doubt. After I do some research, of course. He also sells me some tea that looks like a small joint without the rolling papers. I'm afraid to bring it to work, but he assures me that it will help eliminate belly fat. I am warned that the tea is bitter, but I should continue to sip it all day. One leaf per day, and in 30 days I will be thinner. I balk at the cost of everything, so I get a discount.

My trip to New York is over. I pack my bags, praying that airport security doesn't confiscate my newly purchased but suspicious-looking herbal tea wrapped in black plastic, and head off to the airport, $150 lighter already.

Up next: What's in an herb?