Re: Well, if they cannot make money pulling, filling, root canaling teeth...

BH!

I could not agree more. It is a tricky relationship for me -- especially around my kids, because in a way I am going to a doctor in part to tell them that I won't do what mothers usually do at those visits, so it raises the question of why I go at all.

But I also believe that if you set boundaries clearly and get comfortable with them, i.e., "I am working on this tooth with some alternative practices and I would like your help, but I am unwilling to do XYZ," and the practitioner is worth his or her salt and willing to set aside ego, they can learn and you can have a relationship with someone who can offer services you want or need (better to have these relationships established than to try to develop one in an emergency with a stranger).

I have had to shop around because that willingness is hard to find, but when I have found it, I have also found that those people are ones I trust when it comes to making decisions around allopathy that I would not trust from others, if that makes sense. When I am supported through my own efforts, but then my doctor steps in and says, "You need to take some conventional medicine here because the homeopathy is not acting fast enough," for instance, I feel OK with that because I have been supported through my other efforts.

I did not see a doctor for several years after taking medicine after medicine for a condition that I don't think was ever properly diagnosed, and which left me ultimately fighting for my life in and ICU in kidney failure. And I say that because I had problems during that no-medical-treatment time where I would have benefitted from a doctor's advice, but I was really of a closed mind and in complete anger at that time. And then I had a great experience with my OB/Gyn around the birth of my twins, who basically just was very understanding when he was telling me how the birth was not going to go the way I had hoped, and I saw again how a good relationship with a skilled practitioner can really make a difference in one's life. And then I really felt led to our current doctor, who is a family practitioner so can treat all of us (sadly, these days, me more than the twins!).

Anyway, don't mean to diatribe here! I have recently struggled with this stuff around migraines, and it was SO helpful to have a doctor who keeps an eye toward a long-range solution, but who is willing to direct me to a path of aggressive prevention, too. I did not feel like he was pushing drugs on me, but instead offering some different plans of attack and that he really listens when it comes to how bad it got with being really sick and trying to take care of my daughters.

Of course we live in a town that supports a progressive and multi-faceted practice like his, which helps. But I have also run in to such people in out-of-the-way places, and I do think it helps to keep in mind that the average patient wants to go to the doctor, receive a Dx and an Rx, and have it all over, so it's important to give doctors the benefit of the doubt and assume the best -- that many would cure patients if patients would do the work.

Hope you all are having a wonderful weekend!

Laura Tweet