The Healing Hands Peace Mandala is by Corinna Zubin Lyon, click here for link to her site

There’s a great line somewhere in the book The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down by Anne Fadiman, where the author is talking to a Hmong man about what he looks for in a doctor, and the man says he wants someone who will listen to him and care about him. That is what I found with each of these healers, who worked to alleviate or clear up chronic health problems, as well as helping me in times of crisis. None of them has a 100% success rate, but all of them have healed me of health problems that allopathic doctors had treated without success. Since most of my life has been spent in New England, that’s where they are – except for Dr. Kim, who has moved to Oklahoma City. If you live nearby or plan to get your kicks on Route 66, you can visit Dr. Kim. Dr. Moskowitz and Susan Kippen are in the Boston and South Shore area, and both work long distance (over the phone).

Susan Kippen, at South Shore Natural Healing, does energy work, including reiki, cranial-sacral, tapping, hypnotherapy, chakra clearing, etc., and even shamanic work, although she doesn’t call it that. Her ‘natural healing’ includes a kind of spiritual counseling. To give only one example of her superpowers: she was able to rid me of a recurring nightmare in about 15 minutes, by finding the reason for it, and removing it. (Yup.) The icing on the cake is that Susan is a very down-to-earth person. She is also funny, warm, smart, keeps her fees low, and is good with children as well as adults. (Actually, that sentence applies to all three of these healers.)

Dr. Richard Moskowitz, in Watertown, MA, was one of the forerunners of the homeopathic revival in New England back in the day (1970s?). He is also an MD, and if what he prescribes doesn’t work, he’ll try another remedy, and if it still doesn’t work (this is rare), suggest another kind of alternative (or not) medicine. He has no axe to grind. At the intake session, which takes 1½ or 2 hours, he asks questions, including what frightens you, what makes you cry, what makes you feel better when you’re ill, and so on and so forth, to focus in on your homeopathic type. Once he’s got that, he can work with you to clear up chronic conditions. He can also prescribe homeopathic remedies for non-chronic illness over the phone. Twice, now, he’s been able to cure me long distance of dread cold-flu type diseases I got after a cross-country plane trip. Considering how shitty I felt, and how quickly they worked (between 3 and 8 hours), these homeopathic cold/flu remedies felt like miracle cures.

Dr. Myung Chill Kim, now in Oklahoma City, uses acupuncture in conjunction with Chinese herbal remedies; he also teaches Tai Chi and Qi Gong meditation and is a martial artist. During the year I worked with him on his book about cancer I was able to see him for treatment every week, and during that time I had no insomnia. He also got me through the last time I quit smoking – talked me down after I coughed up blood, prescribed a Chinese herbal remedy that stopped that symptom immediately, and gave acupuncture treatments to help with addiction and fear.

All three of these people listen, they care, and they cure.

*The book is about Hmong in the US, focusing on one family and their epileptic child, and the lack of understanding between the Hmong and the US medical system that led to disaster.