My Father the Medicine Man
My Life Experience with Eastern and Western Medicine
by Cynthia Knievel, RN
Those who read my autobiography may ask, "Why would I have My Father the Medicine
Man" the title of my autobiography.
It is plain and simple as far as I understand it to be and now I would like to explain why.
It all begins with my roots and experiences I had growing up with my father as a
health fanatic. His interest in alternative health and medicine formed who I am and the reason for the path I
am taking. It was the usual routine to wake up every morning and have before me a minimum of 5 herbal pills
and B pollen sprinkled atop my cereal to be followed with freshly squeezed orange juice with barely green
mixed in it. God bless my father's efforts for including the freshly squeezed OJ because I would not
have been able to drink it if it wasn't for that added benefit. I can not forget to add the night cap
of 1/8 cup of codliver oil. Little did he know that my sister and I dumped it down the sink when he was
not looking. I have to thank my older sister for teaching me how to avoid taking the cod liver oil
without our father knowing. And thank goodness this was a night cap only because my father was too tired
from farming all day to notice what we were up to. I have decided that my father's interest and use of
alternative medicine probably began in 1975 when his wife and my mother passed away at the age of
26. However, I could be wrong and maybe this tragic event has no relevence to his alternative
medicine path. I do know one thing for sure, our past always holds the key to our future and I was given two
keys that opened two doors for me. The first key opening a door to alternative or Eastern medicine and
the second key opening a door to modern or western medicine.
In February of 1975 my mother, sister, and I were admitted to the hospital for pnuemonia. While hospitalized,
my sister and I were making good progress but our mother was still having some trouble breathing. The doctor
was out of town on his vacation. One of the nurses working at the hospital at this time, states there were
attempts to contact this docotor regarding my mother's lack of improvement but no success. Evidently, someone
eventually must have been contacted because a nurse did later come in and give my mother a hypo (IM
shot). As the story goes, according to my father, my mother was alert and visiting pleasantly with him
but still some short of breath. He states he left the room to make a phone call while the nurse gave the
shot. Upon returning to my mother's room approximately 15 minutes later, he found her not breathing and
unresponsive. To this day I do not know what was in that hypo, but as a nurse I have theories. My
first and foremost thought is that it was a sedative to calm her down but instead completely wiped out her
respiratory drive. My second theory is that it was an antibiotic that she was allergic to. Her death
certificate states cause of death as Respiratory Failure. My father so devistated, did not have the wits about
him to have an autopsy performed despite several family members and even one of the nurses encouraging him
to. As a new LPN grad in 1993, I did review her hospital records but could not make sense of these records and
came home without answers to the cause of her death. Unfortunately back then I did not have the maturity or
knowledge of hospital records as I due now and those records are now long gone. This is when I believe
my father began relying on alternative medicine to treat any of our illnesses and in fact prevent any illness.
At the age of 23 months the first key opened the first door for me and it was alternative medicine. Over the
next sixteen years I followed my father's foot steps and took much interest in alternative health, whether it be
prevention or treatment. I found myself at a very young age studying health problems and what the
treatment and cure was. Any illness I had was treated by my father through alternative health and
medicine. He had everything and anything you needed. If I had a sore throat he would open up his cupboard
and have just the right stuff. I might have to rub some oils on my throat and take an extra 5 pills in
addition to my maintenance supplements but it worked and my father was proud. Ironically, around the age
of 14 I choose my career path and it was nursing. My cousin was my idol and she pointed out to me
all the wonderful benefits of the medical field. She was going to college to be a nurse and so then was
I. I was very goal oriented at a young age and I knew that the career I chose would have to be one that
made good money and one in demand. Nursing definately seemed perfect since I already had some knowledge of
pathophysiology of disease and cure passed down to me by my father. The only difference was I would be
studying western medicine.
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