Third Acupuncture, and Improvement.

I had the biggest victory so far last night when I blew a 360 on my Peak Flow Meter!

The reason 360 is such an important number, is because that officially puts me in the range for 'healthy' lung capacity. Albeit in the very very LOW range, but in the range nonetheless.I should always be in the numbers between those yellow squares, and this is literally the first time in years that that has happened. I spend my life breathing numbers below the red.

This is the kind of win I've been looking for since I started acupuncture, and I'm so happy to finally have something to look at and say "I did this! I work hard, change my diet, get stabbed with needles twice a week and it's all for something!" The best thing is that we're far from finished. Far, far from finished.

My acupuncturist felt the strength of my organs today, and was happy that all of them are stronger, which I certainly could have told him myself! He was very happy, as was I.

As of late, my energy levels have been higher, my nose isn't running as much, and I have suddenly lost the urge to drink coffee. I have been drinking coffee damn near everyday since I was 14, and just a few days ago I stopped craving it. Usually I wake up in the morning thinking about the way coffee tastes, and how it wakes me up, but lately it just hasn't had the same appeal to me. On an even cooler note, I've been drinking green tea if I ever feel like I need something to wake me up, which is probably a pretty damn awesome alternative.

So things are finally happening. It's not a lot, but it's noticeable.

Soon I will have a post about an at-home allergy test, and might start filling in some gaps with vegan and vegetarian recipes.

Second Acupuncture, Diet Restrictions, and Some Herbs

My second acupuncture seemed....different, somehow. I felt a little anxiety going in, but absolutely none while in the chair. While I was being stuck, I felt calm, tired, wonderful, a little inspired. He put pressure on my knee, asked me if it did anything for my congestion, (which, it didn't, not really), then put pressure right above my ankle, and my nose cleared up in an instant. He put a series of needles in my feet and ankles, and for a solid 15 minutes I was able to breathe in and out of my nose! It went away after a little bit, and he said he wasn't too surprised considering all of my sinus/chest congestion.

He 'prescribed' a couple herbal tinctures for me, one for the asthma itself, and one to detox my body of all the bad stuff in my liver, I guess. I'm supposed to dilute it in water and take both of them twice a day. I have yet to try them, but my money is on the fact that they are probably disgusting. I peeked at the list of ingredients, only to see a bunch of Chinese herbs I couldn't even begin to recognize. So, this should be magically mysterious.

I was also given a list of dietary restrictions to help my asthma and congestion, and let me just say that 'overwhelmed' does not even begin to cover how I feel about it. Considering I've been a vegetarian for a solid 5 weeks, more diet changes are really really scary to me. Here are some of the things he is asking of me:

1. No dairy of any kind, ever. Since I watched Forks Over Knives the other day, I've been very aware of how much dairy I've been taking in, and I've been managing to cut back on it, but he's telling me none, whatsoever, or I'm going to stay congested pretty much forever, and the acupuncture won't do as much for me as it could.

2. Eat less soy. Pardon my French, but: FUCK. After becoming a vegetarian, AND cutting back on my dairy, I've been turning to soy for a lot of things. I've been getting a lot of protein from soy products (including at least 1/4 cup of soy nuts almost every day), and replacing milk with soy milk when I have the opportunity to at work. I bought some Almond Milk today, so hopefully that should give me some freedom with something somewhere.

3. No coffee. Not sure where to go with this one. I love coffee. LOVE IT. It's my favorite thing, possibly ever, and espresso even helps my asthma if I'm having a bad lung day. Every single one of my instincts are telling me to just say OH NO. HELL NO. But, there is tea, and liquid ginseng, and other things. I can certainly try, and I will.

4. 'Congee for breakfast daily'. Not sure what this is. Must investigate.

5. No carbs. Upon tracking my calories lately, I have found that I eat too many carbs every single day of my life. So, certainly this will be worth looking into.

6. No sweets. Fuuuuuuuu, why won't you let me have anythinggggggggg?! I mean seriously, at this point, I feel like if I'm not eating vegetables constantly, I'm going to be doing something wrong.

7. No food with artificial coloring. Okay, I'm cool with this one, because I know it triggers my asthma in weird ways.

8. Cut back on nuts. ABSDGODWG*OGW((*)HRE@(*)R@YG*. I can't have soy, meat, or nuts. I just don't know what you want from me anymore. Truly, I don't. Although, I did not realize that peanuts contribute to phlegm production. I can certainly cut back on that.

9. Sleep my 10 PM. Err....no. Most nights I'm done with work at 10:30, and get home around 11. However, I think I get the concept. I HAVE been going to bed around 4 AM for the last 6 months, I can certainly aim to move that back to 1 AM.

10. Among all these things, he also suggested getting an air purifier, washing my sheets once a week, taking a probiotic called "Floragen", meditating twice a day and avoiding other things I am already avoiding (such as meat). These things I know I can manage.

So, that's a lot. I am basically 'allowed' to eats fruits and vegetables, and whole grains. Again, I know this is for my health, for my asthma, but it's a lot. He told me to start slowly, to not overwhelm myself, but that is clearly not working.

He also keeps talking to me about lowering my stress levels. To meditate, to get away from things. I've never considered myself "stressed", but I get uptight, and kind of controlling, maybe that's what he means. Ah, anyway. I can't think about all of this right now.

Post-acupuncture was certainly different from last time. Where on Tuesday I almost took a nap on my kitchen floor, today I feel riled up. I feel like running, and maybe punching something. I feel careless, and I feel like eating a gallon of ice cream, eating a cheeseburger, and smoking a freaking cigarette. I feel like sprinting across town. I feel like listening to metal. I feel...weird. I feel like I'm 14-years-old, and spiting everything around me. I'm hoping a lot of this is related to my stress regarding my new diet restrictions, and I will hopefully calm down soon.

Correlations

I'm so excited today, for a few reasons!

First of all, I have made the decision to become a vegetarian (who eats fish), once and for all. I tried it a couple months ago, for about two weeks, and I felt really great. Not only did my asthma improve, but other facets of my life improved, too. I started to crave meat, and tried to promise myself it would only happen once a week, but it was a slippery slope, and the next thing I knew, I was eating meat every day, and feeling horrible about it.

After I ate meat (especially meat like bacon and hamburgers) I would just feel terrible, and sick, and honestly, kind of scared that what I was eating wasn't high enough quality to keep my asthma from getting worse for the night. So, finally, today, my love of delicious meat was surpassed by the memory of how nice I felt when I wasn't eating it. I'm very excited for it, and I can't wait to see how much it will improve my well-being in the long term. I have read case studies where veganism has helped asthma, but I know I don't want to be a vegan, so I can't wait to see how strong the effects of simple vegetarianism has on my asthma.

Also, speaking of asthma, I blew a 300 on my Peak Flow Meter today! For those of you who aren't familiar, a Peak Flow Meter is a way to test lung capacity in the measurement of Liters per Minute (L/min). And now, to give you an idea of the severity of my asthma, someone my age, height, and weight should be able to blow about a 450, while my average is 250. I have been blowing a 250 on a consistent basis for the last few months I've started regularly using the Peak Flow Meter (occasionally hitting 275 on a good day). Now, whether it's my diet, or my new Traditional Medicinals tea, I can't be sure, but I'm hoping I can get it up to 350, which is the suggested bare minimum of lung capacity for me.

The final reason I find myself so excited today, is that I had my first day as a janitor today, and my lungs were actually able to keep up with the stamina I needed to get everything done. This is very rare, and I was surprised I wasn't coughing at all, either! Certainly good things are coming my way, as far as my asthma goes.

An Introduction, and My Newest Tea Discovery

 

This is the tea I drank tonight that finally inspired me to start this: my first blog on my adventures with discovering holistic and traditional medicines (as well as the idea of using diet to help control my ailments). So after trying only a few teas, and finding this one to be the best one so far, I figured it would be a good post to start with.

My initial interest in medicinal herbs was actually started with an onion (we'll get to that story another day), but a close second is my lungs. Anyone who knows me knows that I have a pretty bad case of chronic asthma, and that having no insurance certainly doesn't help anything. I have done a handful of things to ease my pain, and to minimize my inhaler usage (my OTC inhaler actually says that it destroys the ozone...), but I have found that tea is one of the single most helpful things when it comes to asthma.

As you have probably noticed, I chose the domain name of "SteepFor10Minutes" for this particular blog, and there is an amazing reason behind that. If you are drinking tea, any kind of tea, and what to take advantage of the healing properties of that tea, to make it 'medicinal strength', you must steep the tea bag for at least 10 minutes. Most boxes of tea suggest 2 - 3 minutes, but not Traditional Medicinals. These guys actually SUGGEST a 10 - 15 minute steep time (so you know they mean business).

The actual taste of this tea is rather earthy (as opposed to the Yogi 'Breathe Easy" tea which wins the taste test between these two, as it tastes like orange Pez!) However, a little honey goes a long way, and even I could manage to drink it without anything in it (although the tea box reassures you that honey may actually ENHANCE it's effects, something I will certainly have to look into later).

It's a little expensive for tea (just over $5 for a box of 16 tea bags), but so far I think it's totally worth it. My chest congestion cleared up immediately, along with any other wheezing I had. The tea box and bags even look medicinal, which is very reassuring to be drinking a medicinal tea made by people who specialize in that area. This yea (like almost every other respiratory tea) uses licorice and eucalyptus, which helps with coughing and chest congestion, and is almost immediately effective.

I have yet to try any other kind of their tea, but now that I know who they are, and what they do, I am certainly going to keep my eye out for more of them and their teas.