Yak Attack

To See With Different Eyes

Last September, I treated a young man who stated he had two problems. One, he has MS (multiple sclerosis), and two, he has a ruptured disc in his low back. He has been doing a great project that is going to help a lot of people, but has been physically limited, mostly because of his back. After he reported to our group about his project, someone at our meeting asked him about his back. And this is where I came in.

During the break, I asked him more about his back, and then said, I can fix that.

He looked at me with a quizzical look on his face, and asked, “How long will it take?”

Oh, about 45-50 minutes. Then his face became really surprised.

And so I added, Well, maybe we should allow at least an hour, depending on what else I find.

He was so unbelieving (I love doubters), but agreed to meet with me that afternoon. An hour after I began the treatment, I told him that I was finished. He said, “It doesn’t feel like you did anything.”

I know. That is how it is. But I know that you are better, because of the things that I felt. I am just taking tension off so that your body can do the work of repairing itself. And, I know what an amazing God we have, and what He can do to heal our bodies.

This young man said, “I hate that kind of theology – God CAN heal, but does He CHOOSE to?”

Well, I know what I felt, and your body is different. When you stand up, you will either say, ‘wow, I am so different’, or in a week or two you will notice that you just don’t seem to have that same type of pain. It doesn’t matter to me, because I know what I did and what I felt, and I know that you are different.

After I thanked God for the gift that he has given to me, for being able to see our bodies from his eyes, and for being his healing hands here, the man stood up, and started jumping around, “Oh, I am so different! I am SO different!” I just smiled.

Fast forward to January. I saw this young man again (we live in different countries in Asia). He said, "I don’t know what you did to me, but I am so different. My body feels like it did when I was 12 years old. I feel great! But I still have this pain in my leg.” When scanning him again, I was drawn to his right kidney. I never question these things anymore, as I have learned just to trust my hands, and I just treat what I find. His kidney was tipped forward about 60 degrees. After taking the tension off so the kidney could go back to its normal position, I asked this man about water retention, especially around his middle. (He has a slight build, but retains a lot of water, not fat, around his middle). He said that this has been a problem, but he has ignored it, as it has not been as significant as his leg and back pain. And he has had no back pain since I saw him in September. So I started to treat his portal system, starting at his spleen, and working towards the liver. And I kept getting stuck, just to the right of midline. When I started to look further to see what was going on there, I found this HUGE scar.

What is THIS?

“Oh, when I was 5 months old, they did surgery on me, because my intestines were folded back on itself.” OK. When I started to release this scar... WHOAH!!! It stimulated his leg pain!!! His same leg pain that he thought was coming from his back was actually coming from this old, old scar. And that had also been pulling on his kidney, and a host of other places in his body. He was amazed! I was amazed! He had consulted the premier MS specialist in America, and they said the leg pain wasn’t coming from his MS. He had consulted the premier back specialist in America, who said that this pain wasn’t coming from his back. But he hadn’t consulted the Great Physician – the One who Knows All. The leg pain was coming from loads of scar tissue that had built up from a surgery that had been done more than 30 years previously!

I released more scar tissue, then taught him some things he could do on his own. I look forward to the next treatment, next month, to hear about what great things have already happened, and in anticipation of what great things will happen, and how this young man's life is changing. And so that you don't get the wrong idea, I am just an ordinary person, doing an ordinary job... who happens to work for an extraordinary God.

Eye from "Ideal Head of a Woman" by Michelangelo.

Things that just won't go away...

On the trip to the plateau this past week, some things just won’t go away. One thing in particular is the lack of good health care. I visited my Tibetan family, who adopted me about 5-6 years ago. My brother graduated from medical school three or four years ago. Granted, it was a medical class for students of lower socio-economic status, so it wasn’t a full program and the students didn’t have to have a lot of prerequisites, or any college for that matter. When I visited them this past week, his 2-year old son had some bites on his stomach and leg. No one knew what to do. They said that the bites (which they thought was an itchy rash) came when the hot weather came. I asked my brother’s opinion, as he was a doctor working at the prefecture level hospital. He said that he didn’t know what the problem was or what to do. When packing my first aid kit the week before, I ‘just happened’ to put some cortisone cream in. Since we had not encountered any bed bugs on the trip, I applied the cream to the bites and gave it to them. The bites are now nearly healed.

One day we stopped in at a nomad tent for tea. In America, you might drop by your neighbor’s house for a cup of coffee – if you called first and it was OK. In the UK, you might pop in for a cup of tea. But this is not tea like you would think of in the west. What was served was milk tea – complete with yak milk and salt. They often add yak butter to the tea as well, and since the nomads don’t have refrigerators, the butter is often rancid. Definitely an acquired taste! The tents of a clan are often clustered, though not right on top of each other, as there is so much wide-open space on the plateau. So while we were having tea, the rest of the family dropped in to see the foreigners who were traveling with some Tibetans. One woman had a child who was six months old. The baby had a cold and a chest infection. The woman was concerned for her baby, as she had lost two other children previously. I asked if I could give the baby a treatment to help him, and the woman agreed. I did some techniques to help clear out the chest, and the baby responded very quickly. As the tension was taken off the lungs, the baby took a deep breath and started to breathe free and easy. The mother could see that this treatment was helping. I instructed the woman to wash the baby’s head, as it was filthy, with encrusted cradle cap, dirt, and who knows what all. My student told me that they probably wouldn’t wash the baby’s head until he was at least a year old! I told the mother to keep the baby out of the wind. Even though it is summer, at 13,000’+ the wind can be brutal. She kept bundling the baby up in her chuba (sheep-skinned lined wrap-around dress-coat), but never got his head out of the wind. I am afraid that without proper care, this baby too, may not survive.

Several years ago, a village doctor lost his son due to a cold. The doctor made the equivalent of US$5.00 a day and he couldn’t afford any cold medicine for the child. The cold turned into pneumonia and the child died.

In another medical clinic a few years ago, I was teaching village-level doctors some basic principles of health care. “Wash you hands between patients, and after toileting”. “This is how to lift someone so that your back doesn’t hurt”. “People with arthritis can also do exercises”. None of the doctors had ever heard of these things.

So often, it is just simple things. Wash your hands. Use simple cold medicine. Keep the baby clean. Put anti-itch ointment on things that itch. Things that are taken for granted in the west are often a totally foreign concept out here. So little goes such a long way. It saddens my heart to see so much disease and death, which could easily be prevented. I guess that is why I am here, to help so that there won’t be so many stories that won’t go away.

A story yet to be finished...

A few weeks ago, I wrote about a friend of mine in the hospital. His story continues... Joseph was released from the hospital after 64 days, with no signs or symptoms of his TB. He feels so much better, and will continue his medication. He is still in the process of evaluating his life and the choices he has made. Please continue to remember him and his decisions. His story is not finished yet...

An unfinished great story!

A friend of mine has been in the hospital for 54 days now with tuberculosis. After finding out which hospital he was in, I went to see him, and to see if I could help. The hospital turns out to be only about a 15-minute walk away from me. This friend of mine has really been struggling with many things lately, the least of which is the tuberculosis. Over the past few days I have been able to do a lot of scar tissue release work on his lungs, connective tissue release, lung segment mobility, and have helped to restore circulation to the damaged parts of his lungs. “Joseph” has really been amazed at how his breathing improves with each visit. Over the past 54 days, Joseph has seen three roommates come and go, and from them he has learned many things, especially about how his people can get financial assistance for the tuberculosis medicine. Tuberculosis is quite rampant, especially among the nomads. Statistics in small villages have reported that 10% of the population may have TB. I think that this report may be a little lower than what is actually going on. My hope is that when Joseph’s doctors come in this week, that they will see actual clinical improvement which supports the subjective improvement that Joseph (and I) have seen over the past few days. This story will continue…

A great story

December 26, 2004 was a day that changed the world -- at least part of it. That was the day of the great Sumatra tsunami. Three weeks later I was fortunate to be able to go to Indonesia to help out. I worked in the refugee camps, at the hospitals, and with some of the organizations, which were working there. But I felt that I was supposed to do more. One day, I had this vision of a man caught up in the water, being bashed around and thrown into fences and buildings, and now walking around thinking that he is OK, but he really isn't. Later that day, while helping one group move into a house that they were going to rent for a year, I met the young man who lived in that house. His wife was dressing some of his wounds. I asked about his story. He said that when the earthquake hit, he got into his car and drove to his mother's house to see if she was OK. He saw the water coming so got out of his car and ran. The water pickup his car and destroyed it, then picked him up. He was bashed against fences and buildings, and finally thrown up a side street, where he grabbed a light pole and his shoulder dislocated in the process. He held on until a young girl helped him on top of the building where they waited until the water receded. He was flown to another city for surgery on his shoulder, and now, three weeks later, he thinks he is OK. When I offered to look at him, he agreed. I was able to treat his head, shoulders, pelvis, legs and ribs. Then, I felt drawn to his heart. I can't totally explain the next bit, other than it was a God-thing. While my hand was over his heart, it was like my hand went into his chest and started to work on his heart, which felt like raw hamburger meat. My hand just kept smoothing it out. Later when he was walking around, he kept smiling and thanking everyone for coming to help his people. His wife was amazed and asked what I had done to him. She had never seen him like this, and they had been married for five years! He had been a quiet man, reserved, and since the tsunami, very withdrawn when he lost his mother and four brothers. I believe that this man had an experience with God that day, and that he was physically and emotionally healed.