I just got cupped

I am trying to live by a new philosophy :"When in China, do like the Chinese". But sometimes I do something and afterwards I think it probably wasn't such a good idea. I'll give you an example. Last week my back was really bothering me. It was so bad that if I bent the wrong way I would literally cry out in pain. One of my Chinese friends, Jason, swears by this traditional Chinese medicine doctor so upon hearing of my predicament, he talked me into going with him to see her. He warned me that she is currently living with her elderly father so their place isn't so nice and she is retired so she works out of her dad's apartment. Ok, I thought- what a great opportunity to see how the locals really live.

Most people would have turned and ran at the doorway. We entered in through a rusty old gate and then went up two flights of narrow concrete slab stairs. Upon entering the apartment we found ourselves standing in a very small kitchen. The lone bathroom was adjacent to the kitchen. To the right was a small bedroom (maybe 8ft x 8ft) which was also doubling as the "treatment room". To the left was a second bedroom- maybe 9ft X9 ft. The walls were in dire need of paint, there was no washing machine (I am assuming they did their laundry by hand which is pretty common here), and I imagine the place got quite a draft in the winter.
A man was standing outside the apartment shouting something over and over in Chinese which Jason translated as "Who has knives and scissors they need to have sharpened?" Damn, I had left my scissors at home.
Anyway, on to the appointment. We gave the doctor no prior information about my condition before the appointment. The doctor looked at my tongue and then felt my pulse. She proceed to correctly diagnose that I had both lower back pain and neck pain, that I got headaches and once in a while I got dizzy when I stood up. Spot on. Freaky. She said I had back pain because I didn't rest for one month after I had my kids (the Chinese believe that you should basically lay in bed and eat for one month after you have a kid). True, true. She said she would do both acupuncture and "cupping".
There are two types of cupping- one involves being bled and one does not. I said under no uncertain circumstances was I doing anything that involved bleeding since she doesn't wear gloves and even an untrained eye could see that it wasn't the most sanitary place. Fine, she said but it wouldn't work as well. I'll take my chances I said. I laid down and she did a very intense massage on my back which was pretty painful but bearable. Then she did the acupuncture. I have had acupuncture a few times in the US and it never hurt. This time however, was another story. (Note that the needles were new and out of a package so no worries for all you fellow germ freaks out there). She put the needles right into my lower back and I think she must have hit my sciatic nerve because a wicked pain shot down my leg all the way to my toes. She claimed that was a good thing and it meant my body was releasing the back pain. Whatever. Then she proceeded to cup me. This entailed placing glass cups (kind of looked like a beaker from science class) all over my back and then sucking my skin up into the cup. It didn't hurt but the effect is like getting a giant hickey.


She charged me $30 for an hour and a half of treatment- pretty cheap. At the end of the day, my back did start to feel better the next day but it may have cleared up on its own anyway. We'll never know. Would I go back there? Probably not but it was definitely an experience to remember.




A hickey explosion on my back after traditional Chinese medicine treatment.