A few years ago I slipped a disc and had lots of pain. Not wanting to take pain pills I went to see an acupuncturist. My insurance would cover it ONLY if I went to an MD....and we have one here who does acupuncture. I called her, there was a several month wait. So I went to a person in town who has a good rep but isn't too "out there".
My first session was odd. She had me strip down to nothing and lay on the table (I was covered up). She poked me with her hands for a bit then started with the needles, all 32 of them. Some, that were placed in my lower back and butt, made my butt/thigh muscles quiver - that was odd, my leg was "frogging" around. I went 2x/wk for 6 weeks. As I continued to go my pain subsided to nothing.
During that time I went to see a back doc, who gave me a handful of scripts. I told him that I was seeing an acupuncturist - and he freaked. I thought he was going to give me a lecture, he praised me for trying it. Heck, it worked and I enjoyed the time on the table.
Not sure if it was just the placebo effect or not but my pain went away. Sitting on the acu's table, covered by a sheet was very calming. Some soft music playing, a little fountain in the background running in a really peaceful little space. Once she took the needles out and told me to rest a bit, she was in no hurry. I laid back down - and slept for 4 hours. Woke up, it was dark.
She also gave me body weight massages after the end of each session. She'd have me lay down on my back and she'd put her hands/arms under my back and would massage me that way, using my bodyweight as the force. She is fairly petite (maybe 5', 90#) and couldn't give me a good massage the normal way. The body weight massage worked. I'll tell you wait, the massages themselves were worth the cost of the visit!
My sessions were 60/each for singles, 50/each if I did 2/wk. Pills would have been cheaper but I had a problem with pain pills once (sort of started to get addicted) and I couldn't drive while on them. Acu worked for me and worked well. I didn't think it would because I considered it to be new agey stuff but it convinced me otherwise.