Acupuncture AND Zheng Gui Shui. This stuff is incredible! I recommend getting a bottle of Absorbine Jr., with the rub-on applicator top, empty it and wash it out thoroughtly, then fill it with this stuff and use as needed. Be careful not to put anything tight or binding on it and if you use any kind of heat on it be very careful as your skin may burn more easily.

Also, topical arnica can be helpful.

They told me I had this when I was 17 and had me on all kinds of drugs for years, progressing from aspirin to prescriptions. I finally had had it and looked into other treatments, etc. I haven't taken any drugs for it in years AND found out some of it is not even arthritis, but was a side effect of a diuretic I was on!! So...be sure of the diagnosis, too.:-)

Keep moving, yes!!

Susan S. Weed's book, Menopausal Years, the Wise Woman Way: Alternative Approaches for Women 30-90 says these can be helpful:

Visualise your aching joints getting hotter and hotter, to the point where you can't bear it, then imagine them getting colder, and colder. Do this 4 times, ending at a temperature which feels just right.

For knees, hips, shoulders and elbows, find a hatha yoga teacher and attend class regularly.

Expose your knee to light shining through a blue filter 15 minutes per day.

Hypericum - St. John's wort may be helpful.

White birch is recommended, as well as black currant; swimming in warm water; moxibustion, esp. using artemesia; massage arnica or st john's wort oil into the area, or apply a fresh chickweed poultice.

Also, take essential fatty acids from flax seed or evening primrose oil. (I take flax seed oil capsules.)

Cold veggies are great to releive pain, try a poultice of tofu, raw grated potato, or squash.

Ginger baths, soaks, and compresses will sooth, as will sweat lodges, saunas, steam baths, mud baths, and mineral soaks.

Also, she says some women report dramatic improvement when they eliminate any or all of these foods: sugar, nightshades (potatoes, tomatoes, eggplant, peppers) citrus, dairy products, meat, vegetable oils (excluding olive oil), MSG, and alcohol.

She's got a bit more on making tinctures of anti-inflammatory herbs. If you are interested, let me know, and I will post them, too.

luvyakat