Tough Love

In the past several weeks I’ve found myself being a real hard-ass.

One of my clients has neck pain and headaches. I have advised her on several occasions to wear a scarf and hat in the cold wind of winter, because her head and neck pain were exacerbated by cold and wind. Last week she came in with a wet head (she got up late and washed her hair and didn’t dry it be fore leaving the house, and then didn’t cover it before heading out into 25 degree weather.) Her expectation was that I would “fix” her headache and neck pain.

Enter the hard-ass. I told her that if she refused to wear a hat and scarf, or went out with a wet head, I would refuse to treat her and that her pain was her own damned fault. Yesterday, she came in with a scarf and hat. I was relieved, and, it turned out, she was in less pain.

Sometimes getting tough is the only tool I have left. Acupuncture WON’T fix a problem that we are continually creating by our behaviors. Acupuncture won’t make you thin if you continue unhealthy eating habits. Acupuncture won’t help you sleep if you stay up all night on the computer and don’t help yourself with good nighttime sleep habits.

So look at what you are doing to sabotage your own health. We are all in the position to make changes that help us to achieve the results we are looking for.