(Narrated by Jannie, edited by Lan)

The long history of my back pain goes back to my twenties when I used to lift heavy items. The pain increased after I committed myself more in the yard work in our new home about ten years ago. On those weekends I would work on my knees long time until my back killed me. To ease the sharp pain and to be able to back to my feet again at the job site on Mondays, I started to massively take Ibuprofen pills, which was pretty effective in 2-3 days. I was able to continue the work and life routines until September of 2013, when the situation was completely out of my hand. From then, I have been forced to be on a long journey for a cure, and I felt very lucky to come across the self-healing methods.

I remember that day vividly when I was suddenly strike by an acute back pain. Hoping the pain could be taken care as usual, I swallowed some painkiller pills. Five days later, the sharp pains were still there, and on top of that, my stomach was quite upset due to the drugs that I was taking. Desperately, I turned to my family doctor for help. The doctor did nothing but subscribing some meds for me to decrease the inflammation and ease the pain. I took them for 12 days, nothing magical happened. So I had to take more subscribed pain-killer pills. As a result, my stomach pain worsened, so a new medication was added to calm my stomach. I am type of the person who is cautious on many little things. For example, I always read the description on the drug bottles to learn about the side effects before taking the drug.  Therefore, I was very nervous when I learned that taking that kind of pain-killer pills might cause constipations. I called the pharmacy immediately and explained to them that I usually had trouble in the bowel movement, asked them to find a counter measurement for me. As you can imagine, I was taking the pain-killer pills for my back, pain-killer pills for my stomach and pills to evacuate my bowel movements at the same time. Later on, per my doctor’s order, I went through X-Rays and NMR (Nuclear Magnetic Resonance), which showed that No. 3, 4 and 5 lumbar vertebra, especially the 5th vertebra herniation oppressed the nerve roots on my left leg. No wonder I also suffered from the pain on my left leg at the same time.

Followed by the required procedures, I first started the physical therapy – it was useless; then I went to a pain management clinic for a closed needle shot in my backbones on October 2013. It took the pains away right away, but the good days only lasted for over two weeks and I continued to feel the pains. Because the first shot did lessen the pain to a lower degree, I was hoping to live a normal life by keeping up the shots. However, the 2ndclosed needle in a month and the 3rd needle in four months declared that the treatment was hopeless. So I stopped receiving the shots, went back to the physical therapy for another try. I switched three different PT clinics ever since, but all the efforts went in vain. Finally I went to see a local well-known orthopedic surgeon as my last straw. He offered two surgical plans – Spine Fusion (big operation) and Discectomy (small operation). I did some online researches based on what he recommended. I felt that it would be too risky to have the fusion surgery, therefore I was more leaning towards having the Discectomy. But I was deeply troubled by what the doctor said to me, that I would have to eventually take the spine fusion no matter what because the small operation wouldn’t solve the pain problem completely.

While the doctor was waiting for my final decision, I met Lan at a friend’s house party. She introduced Paida and Lajin methods to me, demonstrated how to stretch legs in a reclined position by lining up two chairs against the wall. I tried the Lajin for 5 minutes on each leg. It was extremely painful, but my back felt instant relief after I got off the chairs. On the very same night after I got back home, I tried the stretching in the same way, thus started my Lajin experience. I started to stretch each leg for 10 minutes, then prolonged to 20 minutes, and 30 minutes. Before I had my own Lajin bench made, I used three chairs. Later, I bought a long bed bench, and asked my friend to add the height and a pole to make my own Lajin bench. I also purchased the ankle weights for better results. On September 2014, when Master Xiao came to Harrisburg for the first time, I attended his seminar and purchased the Paida Lajin Handbook. Because of the effectiveness of Lajin exercise, I became a broadcaster of Lajin voluntarily. I introduce the self-healing methods whenever I can by letting people borrow the handbook and telling them my own stories.  Nowadays, I stretch twice a day, one hour each time. Since last summer, I have felt the great improvement in the back pain management by doing the lajin exercise daily. The result is unbelievable, much better than any treatments or exercises that I have tried before. In addition, Lajin helped me with my sleep. It becomes one part of my life, a routine that I can’t miss. By the way, I tried Yoga and Zumba dance in 2010. Although it was comfortable after each exercise, I had to quit the both activities due to the severe back pain. Now that the pain is no longer bothering me, I am planning to go back to the Yoga lessons and Zumba dance.

My Supplementary –

I met Jennie at a friend’s party last summer. Her bony figure and tiny weak voice reminded me that she might have some health issues. Seeing her carrying a little pillow wherever she went to support her back, a feeling of sympathy arose strongly inside me, especially after I heard that she took an early retirement because of the back pain a few years ago. I mentioned Paida Lajin self-healing methods to her. She was very careful, didn’t try the paida, but tried Lajin (stretching). While we were doing our Lajin experiment, Jennie told me that she would be very grateful if I cure her back pain. Her words made me feel good, so I laughed and said, “Don’t thank me. If you do want to thank someone, then thank yourself, because you are your own best doctor. By using this self-healing method, you can activate the potentials in your body, improve your psychic constitution. Once the blocked meridians are smooth, pains will disappear. I am only the person to point a path to you.”

Since I have met many people either laughed away, or did minimum attempts to give me a face when I introduced Paida Lajin self-healing methods to them, I didn’t expect anything different from Jennie after that party. We traded a few emails afterwards, and I even invited her to Master Xiao’s seminar and our Friday night’s Paida home gatherings, but I wasn’t confident at all that she would make any major difference because I didn’t know how seriously she would practice at home every day. Until the end of last year (2014), words traveled to my ears that she was telling many people about her success in stretching. Around the same time, I received a thank-you email from her. I was thrilled to know that she saved herself by believing in this method. I was so touched by her persistence that I wrote her back saying that the gratitude was mine because she had proved that Lajin self-healing was not a joke. People will believe in her story more than my words. So I asked her permission to write a blog story about her. She agreed, came to my house and told me about the stories of fighting the back pains and how Lajin relieved her and gave back her normal life.

This afternoon as soon as she entered the house, she told me that her best friend in the college came to visit her in USA a few months ago. The couple stayed with her for several days. After she learned that her classmate had the similar back pain, Jennie introduced Lajin exercise to her without any hesitations. Her friend read the entire Paida Lajin Handbook, also tried the Lajin bench while she was in America. After she got back to China, she tried the same stretching method, but saw little improvement. Looking at me quite puzzled, Jennie carefully asked me, “Is it possible that Lajin works better on me, but not others? Because I also taught other friends to do the same stretching, but none of them have the same result as I do.”

I didn’t respond her question immediately. After a few seconds, I asked Jennie what kind of sports her friend usually does. Without any thinking, she told me, “She swims every day.” “That’s the problem.” I confirmed. “Why? I don’t understand, swimming is supposed to be beneficial to our health, isn’t it?” For an easy answer, I played the video clip that was recorded during our last year’s Paida Lajin workshop. In the video (https://youtu.be/d1p66q7LNm4), Master Xiao explained that none of the sports items can one size fits all, so does the swimming. It is not a suitable exercise for some people, for example, the elders, and people who are lack of Yang Qi (especially women). The water temperature in the pool (even indoor’s) is much lower than our human body’s temperature. This is why our bodies shiver when getting in the water because there is an exchange of the heat. By the time when we no longer feel the water is cold, it means our body temperature has been lowered down to the level of the pool water temperature. Although the swimming exercise increases the blood circulation, generates the energy, to an elder or a person who is already lack of Yang energy, it can be a disaster to lose the body heat every day. Based on the theory of thermal expansion and contraction, our meridians contract every time when the normal temperature is lowered. After repeatedly doing so, wouldn’t meridians start to be clogged? This explains why your friend hasn’t seen any effectiveness in her lajin experience.

You should see how her face lit up as soon as I finished my comments, “That’s right. Now I remembered. I have a friend who knows acupuncture. I went to her for a few treatments. But the results were not obvious except feeling better at the moment. Her husband knows how to do the bone-setting. He did on my back a few times. I was terrified with the nasty sounds that came out of my body, so I didn’t dare to try more bone-setting. He once suggested I go to swimming to strengthen my back, but he made it very clear that the water temperature should no less than 86 degree. I went to several YMCA, tested the water temperature, but found out that none of them met the requirement (the highest temperature is 83 degree). I even wet my feet by stepping into the water, it was too cold. So I didn’t try the swimming. I found what you and Master Xiao said are very reasonable.”

She went quiet for a while, seemed to be lost in her own thoughts. I asked her the same question that she asked me early today. “Why do you think that you have the success in Lajin?” “Persistence,” she smiled at me, “because I have tasted the sweetness of the stretching. I didn’t let the idea go but have practiced it every day. Lajin has become one part of my life. Besides, I am retired now, have more free time than those “work ants”. I don’t have any excuses not to Lajin.” I echoed to what she said, “That’s right. Perseverance absolutely makes the difference. Few people are as serious as you are when practicing the self-healing methods. Many people expect a quick fix, forgot that the healing process takes time just like how we developed illnesses over the years’ of abuse of our own bodies and/or living in a unhealthy life style. Some people give up easily because they take few actions or have little patience, instead, they dream too much. The self-healing methods were not invented by someone for any specific type of diseases. People have practiced them over thousands of years. We owe many thanks to people like Master Xiao who are promoting the self-healing around the world. Remember that all diseases are compound diseases. Self-Healing methods are green and humane when treating our bodies holistically with sincerity. When someone holds a hostile attitude toward the self-healing, the methods won’t be effective. Now you see, you were brought together with the methods.”

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