As we age, we find ourselves facing more aches, pains, stiffness, feeling blah and ailments. We may have been morning people most of our lives, but getting up in the morning is harder than ever before, often because we have trouble sleeping. We don’t have the energy or ambition we used to and we find it much harder to rebound from illnesses and injuries.

Sometimes, ordinary doctors and even specialists don’t seem to be much help. They offer their standard recommendations but not everyone responds to those recommendations. Then there are some chronic illnesses or conditions that doctors give up on and say there is nothing more they can do.

My wife and I are fans of the television show American Ninja Warrior. Several years ago, one of the contestants shared his wife’s story. She was diagnosed with Ehlers-Danlos syndrome. It’s a disorder that affects the connective tissue throughout the body. In only a few years, she had gone from an active and vibrant woman and mother to living in constant pain, confined to a wheelchair with most of her joints being dislocated because the connective tissue holding them together no longer worked.

Her doctors had basically given up and said there was nothing more they could do. With a couple of young kids, she didn’t want to die, which was the prognosis, so she and her husband turned to homeopathic medicine and recipes. In a matter of weeks, she began to feel better and began a vigorous exercise program. She built strength and the effects of her Ehlers-Danlos syndrome seemed to diminish. In a few months, she was able to walk with a walker, then a cane and today, she is walking without assistance. As her husband competed on American Ninja Warrior earlier this year, she was on the sideline, jumping up and down and cheering for her husband.

Does homeopathic medicine really work? If you asked her and her husband, they would say yes.

Homeopathic medicine is different than what most doctors practice. In today’s world of medicine, most family doctors are general practitioners who are quick to refer you to a specialist once they have an idea what’s wrong with you. A homeopathic doctor doesn’t treat just one illness or condition, he or she will treat the whole body.

According to the American Institute of Homeopathy:

“Homeopathy, or Homeopathic Medicine, is the practice of medicine that embraces a holistic, natural approach to the treatment of the sick.  Homeopathy is holistic because it treats the person as a whole, rather than focusing on a diseased part or a labeled sickness.  Homeopathy is natural because its remedies are produced according to the U.S. FDA-recognized Homeopathic Pharmacopoeia of the United States from natural sources, whether vegetable, mineral, or animal in nature.”

“The word Homeopathy, which comes from the Greek, through Latin into English, literally means ‘like disease’.  This means that the medicine given is like the disease that the person is expressing, in his totality, not like a specific disease category or medical diagnosis.”

Can a homeopath cure everything? No! But when all else fails and other doctors give up, like they did on the woman above with Ehlers-Danlos, sometimes homeopathic treatment can work where standard medical treatments don’t.

As you get older, perhaps it might not hurt to see a homeopathic doctor as you never know what they can do for you until you try.