Just call me Kookie

How many times in a row do you have to get tonsillitis before they decide it's time for you to get your tonsils out? I've had tonsillitis at least 3x / year since I was about 9. I still have my tonsils. This year, since moving to the great white north, I have now gotten tonsillitis (self diagnosed thanks to WebMd, then verified by visit to Doc first time) twice in very quick succession this new year and it's not even March.

I was so proud of myself that I was fighting this last time so hard, trying not to let the cold reach my chest which then can escalate (for me) into bronchitis really quickly. Wednesday night I went to my spin class and did the best I've done thus far and it was hard. The trainer was awesome and kicked our butts. I came home feeling so proud and felt so good. Then...a night of tossing and turning and coughing my head off followed. I was so wiped out the next day during my training class I thought I was going to die. After lunch my colleagues around me were telling me to go home as I was white as a sheet.

It was snowing like crazy and what should normally be a 20 minute drive took me an hour. Once I got home I took so much cold medication and sleep medication that I slept. I slept all day Friday and all Friday night. I finally feel human today.

I'm so tired of being sick. I had really hoped that working out would build up my immune system, but we'll see. Speaking of building my immune system, I've started taking Kundalini yoga. Kundalini is a type of yoga that focuses not only on the outside but also the inside. According to Wikipedia (for what it's worth) Kundalini yoga is a physical and meditative discipline, comprising a set of techniques that use the mind, senses and body to create a communication between "mind" and "body". Kundalini yoga focuses on psycho-spiritual growth and the body's potential for maturation, giving special consideration to the role of the spine and the endocrine system in the understanding of yogic awakening.

Now, all of this felt a bit "woo woo" to me the first class. We do a lot of chanting and focus on our "auras" and our "chi". I'm not sure I really buy into all of this, but I have to admit it has grown on me and I love it. I like the meditation (as I am awesome at the corpse pose - essentially laying on your back). But mostly I like it because a lot of yoga focuses on breathing techniques and I now have asthma - which really concerns me. So I asked my yoga teacher if she had any additional exercises to help me out. She then asked me if I would be interested in homeopathic medicine...uh...well...I guess so.

I've never been interested in homeopathic medicine. I am the quintessential American girl - if a pill will make me better, bring it on. When I lived in Japan, the doctors there often wanted to use "the foreigner" as a guinea pig and try Chinese medicine on me. As if I was an alien and it would react differently on me than them. I hated it. Why deal with nasty tasting crap for 2 weeks when a pill will cure me in 2 days?

But I thought I really hate dealing with my inhalers and it's really expensive and I would love to figure out a better way to deal with my asthma. Little did I know what that would entail. So I fill out this "intake" form for her. My yoga teacher has some type of homeopathic certification. So last week, after class she pulls out all of these vials. She then sits next to me and takes my pulse while dropping different liquid herbs on the pad of my thumb. Uh yeah...whatever. I'm like la la lah. I feel nothing. She's making typical doc type noises, switching vials around and such. Then, all of the sudden, she looks up at me and asks, "do you smoke"? I'm like, no. Then she says, "but did you smoke". Uh...yeah. She goes, I knew it! I was like, am I suddenly at a Tarot Card reading? WTF? So she recommended 2 herbal remedies for me. I looked them up - they are legit old school remedies.

She sends me to this herbal shop to buy them. I was meeting a friend for lunch, so I made her go with me as my yoga teacher said if you think I'm out there, the people who run this shop are "kooks". Lovely. So I go to the shop, find my stuff and get out of there before it gets busted as it is clearly a head shop. Well, actually I have no idea, but it was bizarre. Incense and books and herbs everywhere. Freaky-deeky people "working" there as well. I think one guy was actually a witch doctor.

So now I'm supposed to drop these two herbal liquids under my tongue twice a day. First off, they are NASTY tasting!! I have a very low tolerance for that. THEN, one of them BURNS!!! Completely unpleasant and it creates canker sores in my mouth.

To top it all off she gave me some dietary recommendations - basically things she wants me to stop eating. First on the list is all cow dairy and eggs. UHHHHHHH!!! NO CHEESE?!!! It's like my go-to snack. I LURVE cheese, just about any and all cheese (except stinky blues). Then, a laundry list of vitamin supplements. We'll see how long it lasts.

So here's to becoming a kook. Om.