CAM Interview:
Leslie Discusses her Thoughts on Compliamentary Alternative Medicine

This is an interview I did for an academic research study about CAM (Compliamentary Alternative Medicine). It was conducted in 2006 or early 2007. Before you begin reading, I would like to state that in addition to what I say in the interview, sometimes some of the choices I make in self treatment are based on strong instinctual feelings.

For example, with certain foods I will hold them in my hand and be able to tell how I will react to them, even if they are in a bottle or other container.

In that same way, I can sometimes hold a treatment I am considering and then by noticing how my body is reacting by holding it, know whether or not I should take it.

This method is not 100% accurate, and I wouldn't recommend it to you unless you are acutely sensitive, but I felt that I would be remiss not to mention this method in addition to what I say in the interview.

I still highly advocate research, as you will read in the interview.

Additionally, I came to recognize in editing this transcription that just like the doctors I sometimes make recommendations for treatments and products (I'm sure you'll find some on this website, for example) and sometimes I even get a little money for my recommendations.

This has always been a touchy subject for me because I do feel that there can be situations where people (massage therapists included) make recommendations that are motivated by money and not the client or reader's well being.

I would like to differentiate myself by stating that a majority (if not all) of the products I mention on this site and to my clients I have tried out myself before recommending them.

Additionally, many of these treatments are so benign and gentle that one use has minimal effect.

For example, I am a regular user of Holosync for over 2 years and I'm thrilled with the effects it has had on my life.

Is the product appropriate for everyone? No. But I feel it's worth everyone trying because one use will not make much of a difference either way for 99.9% of the people that try it.

But if it is possible that it may have a profoundly positive effect on one of my readers, as I believe it has had on me, then I believe it's ethical to mention.

The difference with doctors is that they do not try the medicines they prescribe, and in a lot of cases they most likely would not prescribe these things to their friends and family.

I know I'm speaking in generalities, but I've spoken to a lot of doctors who are disallusioned with the way they are expected to administer drugs that may or may not work, and that have strong negative side effects.

So I hope my words do not sound like the rantings of a rebel massage therapist. I'm just basing my words on personal experience and I personally have made good and bad choices with both Western medicine and CAM.

The bottom line is to make your choices as wisely as possible and follow your instincts as best you can.

It's a confusing world out there, with a lot of choices. Search your feelings and you will know the right choice to make.

Let me read that definition again - "CAM is defined as methods of healing that are not commonly accepted in standard medical practices. Some examples are herbal medicine, vitamins, yoga, magnet therapy, homeopathy, and spiritual healing."

To the best of your ability, can you tell me the kinds of CAM you have used in the past?

L: All of those that you just mentioned and, okay, let’s see... shamanistic healing, massage therapy, herbal healing, vitamins (including like vitamin C, mega doses of Vitamin C), laughter therapy, how much information do you...

B: Just a laundry list of things...if they come to mind.

L: okay, yoga...meditation, visualization, color therapy, spiritual healing (I already said that with Shamanic)... the only thing I haven’t done is Reiki...

B: Is what?

L: Reiki.

B: What’s that?

L: Reiki is like a laying of hands, but I’ve done polarity which is also energy work, which balances the poles of the body. Sandlin Technique, which is also based on Shamanic healing, and it straightens out the bones of the spine energetically. Neural Linguistic Programming (NLP) I think is also CAM. And brainwave therapy -- which is by this group called Holosync. Its really cool stuff, and it keeps bringing you into a clearer, clearer mental state so you are able to process better. You are actually calmer.

B: The brainwave thing, you’ve done that?

L: Yeah.

B: Okay.

L: I’m working with it currently. You get a CD, and you work through it, and it takes about 6-months to actually feel a shift. I think it kind of increases the number of synapses in your brain. I can’t explain the science intelligently. I read all about it about 2 years ago and I was really clear on it two years ago but now I can’t describe it clearly. I’m not even sure if ‘synapses’ is the right word. But basically, the idea is that things that used to cause overwhelm to the listener don’t cause overwhelm in the person’s day-to-day life after listening to the CDs for a while. And you keep going deeper and deeper until very little in the person’s life causes overwhelm.

B: Okay – anything else come to mind?

L: Acupuncture. Magnet therapy. Crystals. I think that’s it.

B: Okay, if others come to mind later on, you can just say, “Oh, I remember one other thing I did. It was this...” So how did you get interested in CAM -- in other words, please share with me how you started using CAM?

L: I have two answers for this. The first is my dad was very sick for a very long time, and it seemed like the doctors would like cure him, and then hurt him. And then they started doing the same thing with me, and then the same thing with other people I know. And it just kind of became consistent. It was a gradual progression toward CAM, but I’d say that I’ve always been oriented that way, anyway. I’ve always felt that the natural way is the best way to do things unless it’s a real severe case... Unless you need to be, you know, in an emergency room. Otherwise, I’ve always felt that the more gentle stuff, which is what CAM offers, is the first step to take.

And then, after my dad died, I had a sinus infection for about four months, and my doctors put me on like a number of different antibiotics. Nothing cured it, it would go away a little bit then come back again. By the way, all those antibiotics wrecked my digestive system, which I found afterward. But then, one of the people who worked in the new-agey shop said, “Why don’t you try flushing your sinuses with salt water and eat some very strong garlic bread?” And I did that for about five days and it cleared up like [snaps] instantly, and I was just completely won over from then on.

B: Okay, and roughly how old were you?

L: At that time I was twenty-two, but I really started with the herbal remedies at 16 when I was in high school. I was very much a hippy and I thought that was the way to go. So I used to buy herbal medicine type books. I used to be very much into essential oils. I’m still very into essential oils, and I’ve always been very affected by everything so I when put some lavender on, it would change my system immediately. That impressed me very much, and I said to myself, “That’s as powerful as it needs to be because I based on my sensitivity, mainstream medicines would probably wreck my system.”

B: Okay. So, really around the time you were about 16, you kind of started moving toward or utilizing CAM?

L: Yes.

B: Okay – Do you also use traditional medicine, for example, what we might call Western medicine?

L: Only in dire situations.

B: What would a dire situation be?

L: Well I haven’t...knock on wood [knocks]...haven’t had a dire situation recently that I can recall. The last time I went to my doctor it was to get blood work done... to check on my cholesterol and stuff. Preventative, and a bit cosmetic, I suppose, because I’ve gotten some moles removed, but my preference… could you repeat the question?

B: Sure – it’s just that.... Do you also use traditional medicine, for example, what we might call Western medicine?

L: Yes.

B: Okay...and even if you had just said yes, I would said “like what?” So you explained some of that.

L: Moles removed.

B: In what case would you consider using traditional medicine?

L: Okay, so moles removed, skin stuff, to run testing like blood work, gynecological exams...as a form of preventative or testing or in an “A kidney will save my life” situation, but those are the two extremes.

I guess I’m saying whatever I feel is best to used at the time.

B: But you did mention the extremes. You said preventative, like checkups and stuff like that, or rather serious....

L: Rather serious.... yeah.... but even then, unless my life was... If someone says I have 24 hours to decide, I would still go the alternative route if I could. I like to think I would. You never know until you’re in the situation. But I think I'd feel safer that way.

B: Okay. All right. I’d like you to think back for a moment to a time when you had a serious cold, and you treated it primarily with CAM. Describe for me the type of ailment you were suffering, your symptoms, etc.

L: I used CAM for a sinus infection, and I cured it with salt water. Oh, Ayurvedic...I forgot to...I also do Ayurvedic medicine.

B: What’s that?

L: It’s a...it’s is a CAM medicine from India, based on herbs, and what kind of temperament your body has. Oh, I forgot to mention that I’ve done detoxes...like that water and lemon juice and cayenne powder mixture.

B: In that case you put lemon and cayenne pepper and you just drink that, you don’t eat other things and that detoxifies the system? You do that for like 3 days – something like that?

L: Yeah. I wasn’t thrilled with that one, though. But I tried it out. So in terms the cold, it was a sinus infection, and I ate tons of garlic bread, I also took garlic cloves, and I would like crush them a little and swallow them like pills. I ate tons of Vitamin C (chewable ones since I like the flavor), and then I basically didn’t put any stress on my body. I watched a lot of fun movies, and I flushed out my sinus with salt water, and I gargled with salt water, and I also did something called oil pulling, which is Ayurvedic, and that was basically swishing sunflower oil in my mouth for about 20 minutes. You kind of swish it around. What it does is it pulls the – again I can’t speak scientifically about this – but basically all the bad stuff that’s in your body is centered in the mouth, and so what it does is pull all that out of the mouth, and off the teeth and off the gums. You spit it out, and you make sure you rinse thoroughly ‘cause if you don’t, all that bad stuff you’ve pulled from the mouth is in the oil and it’s toxic, and if you swallow any of it, it will make you very, very sick. And I did once, and I got very sick. Threw up. But that only happened once. Generally I felt a lot better after oil pulling.

B: Okay. And then, you’d also mentioned with the nasal infection you were describing here how you treated it. You said you watched something?

L: Oh. Fun movies. Funny movies.

B: Okay, so you watched funny movies.

L: With the intention of that helping me... not just sitting there and watching. Like, I’m doing this to heal. Program myself.

B: Okay. So, because you are a CAM user, I’d like to ask you some questions about the advantages of CAM. Please share with me the advantages of self-treating with CAM. And then this might be compared to Western medicine, ya know....

L: CAM is based on the principle that the body is built to heal itself, and sometimes it needs a little bit of assistance with that. But CAM is really empowering that its meant to assist the body in healing itself, as opposed to Western medicine, which implies something outside myself is going to heal and I’m at the mercy of that. Because doctors do not prescribe CAM, I feel like it entails a lot of research. I guess some people don’t research, but I do my research when I use CAM treatments. I look for the sources outside the medical regime, because they’ll say none of it works because they don’t make any money from it.

I’ll look at the pros and cons, and its very empowering in that regard. It really encourages the person to stay in power as opposed to just getting a little slip of paper with a hastily written note on it with a drug that sounds scary and is difficult to pronounce and usually has as many side effects as it has benefits.

B: Okay. Are there any other advantages you can think of – self-treating with CAM?

L: Cost, convenience, gentleness (most of the time). I think I pretty much said everything – self-empowerment, too.

B: okay. Why do you think CAM works? What leads you to think CAM is actually working to help with your ailment?

L: I have a few answers for this one. The first is a more practical reason in that a lot of CAM treatments involve practices that have been learned over thousands and thousands of years, long before the Western medicine was even created. Therefore its been tested thoroughly.

The second thing is that I think the people, including myself, that are drawn to CAM, are very interested in educating themselves about what is going into their body. It goes back to being able to heal oneself and the belief in the medicine is half of the healing in it, or can even mean more than the medicine itself. It’s the belief that the medicine will work that is equally as powerful as the medicine that is actually physically taken to work. And I think so many people have been let down so many times, and haven’t gotten enough facts from the doctors on why it works or what exactly it was that they were consuming. They are just handed medicine. I think that the mind plays a large role in healing, and people can say “Well... Chamomile tea has a calming effect on me when I drink it for enjoyment, and we’ve also come to know this for thousands and thousands of years. So it seems natural to look to it when one needs to fall asleep.

People can also test CAM relatively easily and see what works for their body and what doesn’t. Buying a box of chamomile tea costs about five bucks and they can take one tea bag and throw it out if it doesn’t work for them. You don’t need a prescription.

B: Why do you think CAM works? In other words, what leads you to think CAM is actually working to help with your ailment?

L: I think Mother Nature knows best. It’s such a simple cliché it’s laughable if it weren’t true. Yeah. I believe the body is the best healer for itself and anything that’s too strong or synthetic gets in the way of that healing.

B: Okay. So, let me reword this question just a smidge here on the fly. Do you feel like then you actually get results using CAM?

L: Absolutely.

B: Okay, so let’s say your nasal infection. Do you think then CAM works because you actually got better?

L: Yeah. And actually, you know what? When I first did that, when my friend suggested it, I didn’t think it would work. So maybe it’s not even the mind, it’s just really powerful because all medicine is taken from things in nature anyway and they’ve just, you know, messed with the components of it. Which, I think generally has a negative effect on the body. Not always, but often.

B: Now please share with me any disadvantages of CAM use.

L: A lot of misinformation. And a lot of...well, it goes back to doing research. And because you’re administering basically on your own, and you’re doing research on your own there’s no overarching authority. But that’s sometimes better because what works for one person may not work for the next. I would hate for it to be regulated. What I’m saying is there’s no one source of information saying “Well, I think you should take this amount or dosage of, say, fennel tea for your soar throat” or whatever. But you can’t really do that, anyway, because one person is different from the other. If someone wrote the book about the proper fennel dosage and it became law, saying, “this is our rule”, I don’t think that’s the best thing either. But, sometimes people can overdo on things, and there really is no safeguard against that.

B: Okay – and where do people find this information?

L: The Internet. Books. Companies trying to sell products. Sometimes ‘snake oil’. But that’s not a good source of information. That’s marketing. Although more times than not I’ve found that the ‘snake oil’ kind of works, you know, its interesting, or maybe I’m just good at picking out snake-oil that works. But I’ve gone to intros like about certain healing modalities, and I didn’t buy it. You know, maybe it worked, but it can be hit or miss because what works for some people, won’t work for other people, but that’s true in Western medicine as well.

B: Please share with me any family or friends who take CAM.

L: Okay, I’ve a friend named Kerry, and she’s come to sweat lodges with me, which would be Shamanic healing. She’s done herbal remedies. I don’t know if you’d include, using foods with a healing intention, like the salt, or like coconut oil… viewing it as a medicine rather than as just a food. If that’s included she does that. I think my mom has taken some herbal stuff for certain things, but I’m not really sure what.

B: Other friends?

L: Leonardo’s done meditation, massage. Oh, I forgot, my moms’ done massage, too (obviously). Leonardo has done Shamanic healing, spiritual healing and chakra work.

B: Have you done chakra work?

L: Yeah. He’s done more CAM than that, but I’m sure. I believe he’s done magnet therapy, herbal therapy, a lot of Shamanic healing, an Iowaska medicine thing…

B: Did they get you started on CAM, or did you influence them?

L: With Kerry, I influenced her. With my mom, I’m not really an influence on her aside from.... I mean, she gets more massage. And Leonardo is...we influence each other.

B: Okay. In what manner have you, let’s say, influenced Kerry or you and Leonardo influence each other?

L: One of us will try something that is really effective in our own healing experience and we will tell each other about it. For example, he was recently doing, a Kundalini yoga class, and then he was encouraging me try it out because he said I would feel dynamic afterward.

B: So, in other words, if you feel like you tried something and it worked, you’d share that with people around you who are close to you, and then that might influence people to give it a try? And visa-versa?

L: Yeah.

Bill: Are there any influential people in your life that you that may have influenced you regarding CAM besides the people you talked about? Anybody else come to mind?

L: The woman who worked at the new age shop when I was 16. When a new age shop opened in my very conservative home town, and this woman and I would have these long conversations and I felt like she was one of the few people I could relate to. ‘Cause on the East Coast its much different. Here in L.A. it’s a little more accepted. On the East Coast it’s so like looked down upon, although things getting better and changing over there, too. Especially in the ‘90s, it was very looked down upon, so I found refuge in a new age shop. And this woman... I mean I still know her...and she and I would have long discussions. And she was very sensitive to things, like I am, and I’d watch her be affected by these gentle treatments like essential oils and crystals. And she really showed me how to heal oneself in a more gentle and effective way through CAM.

B: Alright. Anyone else?

L: I know we’re not talking about acupuncture, but my acupuncturist. Very wise woman, again, she’s all about gentle healing. That’s basically it.

B: Okay. Where do you get your information regarding CAM treatments?

L: Books, massage school, other people. The Internet. Stores. And experts that I already know are working in the field of CAM that I trust.

B: Okay – word of mouth?

L: Yeah...word of mouth, but it’s usually word of mouth from the people who I know are well informed. Some people may say, “You should try juicing” or “You should drink, you know, whatever, for 20 days, its incredible” and if it sounds interesting I’ll go do more research on it. But typically its gonna take somebody who I feel is really an expert whose previous advice has had a very positive effect on me. And even then, I’ll usually go and do research.

B: Okay. Alright. Besides the Internet, any other media outlets – you mentioned books. Any magazines come to mind?

L: I’m an essential oil distributor and they have a magazine that comes out once a quarter, so they’ll tell how to best use the oil. And even though they’re selling, I trust their information. I learn mostly books, though. But not like one book, which is just like such a bad idea, ‘cause you always have to like cross-reference.

B: Okay –multiple sources....

L: Multiple sources. You don’t just sit down and say, “Well, it tells me to drink turpentine” so I’m going to drink it. You go and read the other things and find out what other people are saying. The process goes like this: I’ll read about CAM in a book usually. Then I’ll check my on-line resources. I’ll go on the Internet and find like, for example, chamomile tea, and then I’ll do a search for “chamomile tea” and “contraindications” And then I’ll go and talk to somebody I trust, you know. Maybe one or two people. And then maybe I’ll test it a little bit. I’ll find out what other people have done with it, and then I’ll try it once and see how my body reacts. I’m sensitive, so I’ll administer as small a dose as I can the first time. Then I’ll try it twice and see how my body reacts. And that’s basically it.

B: Okay. Can CAM ever be harmful? And if so how or why?

L: Yes – overuse. And again misinformation and inappropriate use. And also contraindications for certain conditions. Things that aren’t assumed to be dangerous are still medicine and drug and should be treated with respect. So, like someone taking licorice for a soar throat shouldn’t be taking that if they have high blood pressure because licorice will raise blood pressure. And a lot of people don’t know that. So if you’re sitting there, drinking five cups of licorice tea a day and also have high blood pressure, your body may react negatively to the tea and cause a major medical problem. It’s very important to do research.

B: And can Western medicine be harmful and if so why and in what ways?

L: Oh yeah, I mean, do we have time for this?

B: You can summarize it.

L: Western Medicine is harmful because it’s usually an extreme treatment. It’s usually an extreme treatment. It pops people into categories that people may or may not be apart of. It doesn’t work often on some symptoms that cannot be specifically diagnosed, which is important, because often works on the symptom and not the cure. Drugs are approved that I’ve seen people get sick from. Like vaccines that shouldn’t have been passed. I’ve seen extreme treatments where the drugs have worked and then they’ve just been left on the drug for the person to just die, you know, and it took the person standing up to a doctor, which isn’t common in this society and this is probably one of the most deadly things. The trust that somebody has in their doctor – because, you known, they’re human too, and they’re guessing, too, because it’s still based on theory and trial and error. People think “WOW SCIENCE”, but we must remember that everything is still hypothesis and theory in science. And maybe its been tested 100 times, but its still hypothesis and theory. And people do not realize that. And they really have to feel -- ‘How is this making me feel? Is my instinct telling me this is the right choice?’ And a lot of people just go “Naw – I’m just going to trust the doctor” even when they’re feeling much worse than they were without the medicine. And you don’t know what the doctor’s alternative motive is. I’ve seen this cartoon that has a doctor standing next to a man in a hospital bed and it says something like, “If I keep this person sick, I get a new Mercedes.” I’ve heard there’s a lot of corruption in and the sicker our society gets, the more money is made and (groans) the surgeries! So many of them and they help the original problem that is going on, but all that scare tissue creates a whole other problem, and when it could have dealt with in a more gentle way that actually solved both the original problem avoided all that scare tissue created by the incisions, which, hampers the body in another way.

And I just think that...I’m sorry, I’m just gonna say it...the absolute pigheadedness of a some of the people in Western medicine that think they don’t need to know anything else about the emotional or psychic well being of the person because all they need to know about is cutting people open is really disturbing. And even though that person is dying of infection, they insist to pump him with drugs and not even bother to think “Hmmm....maybe Vitamin C would work?” It’s harmless to try, especially when someone is going to die anyway, but they can’t do it because it’s not a prescription. And that’s that. But then the person dies, and if the Vitamin C could have saved their life… I mean, I’ve watched it happened. I’ve watched it happen. Do you want me to keep going?

B: You can finish your thought with this.

L: Okay...I’ve seen in ERs.... where they put people with immune deficiencies next to people with pneumonia. And then they wonder why the person is getting sick. The exact science of Western medicine is kind of randomly applied. Like the logic, its kind of like throwing shit at a wall and seeing what sticks sometimes. That’s Western medicine in nutshell. Sometimes CAM can be like that, too, but at least CAM does not proclaim to be exact or scientific, so people are watching what’s happening more closely.

B: Okay. Recall that the general goal of this study was to investigate CAM use. Do you think that there is anything that I should have asked, but didn’t? In other words, is there anything else, you know, that you would like to add?

L: I think there is a place in this world for both forms of medicine. But, in my opinion, I think Western medicine is overused and more people should look into alternative medicine as a safer and more empowering choice. And I’d love to live in a world where there were people who had very accurate information to help people to be empowered in that way.