CLOUD PINE
-NATURAL SOLUTIONS-
Meet Steph, MSOM, Dipl. O.M. (NCCAOM), L.Ac.,
your Chinese medicine practitioner specializing in online pain management for Illinois residents.
You don't have to figure this out alone.
I fill in the gaps in your pain management care for autoimmune pain, musculoskeletal pain, injury-induced pain, and hormonal pain.
What to expect when working with Steph
Where the best of both worlds meet.
Your care draws on Eastern medical wisdom. This is a time-tested system developed and refined over generations in Asia, known as Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM). I pair it with modern, evidence-based research and your unique circumstances. This integration is what's known as Evidence-Based Practice, and it's at the heart of everything I do.
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No cookie-cutter protocols. No guesswork. It's a process of personalized care designed to help you move beyond the pain.​​
My Why
The Steph mission.
My story starts the way chronic pain tales usually do: a life full of passion, derailed by crippling pain that arrived without warning or explanation. Despite my licenses, degrees, and training, the first thing I asked my doctor was the question every patient asks: "Will this ever go away?"
I wasn't ready for the answer. ​ So I did what many of us do when faced with a "no": prove them wrong. I scoured the internet for a fast cure, tried everything I could find, and came up disappointed every time. Similar to the story described at the top of the Program page.
The turning point came during a late-night YouTube spiral. Feeling broken, lost, and my hands too swollen to finish my work, a woman in the video described my symptoms so precisely that it stopped me cold with connection. She spoke something I didn't know I needed to hear: hope. She said, "This isn't the end. It's going to get better, and you're going to figure out how to manage this."
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From that point on, I stopped searching for the unattainable. I started building a life alongside my diagnosis, using every tool my education gave me to build a toolbox that works alongside my doctor. Which brings me to my mission...​
I see you, I get you, and I'm here to pay it forward.
I believe
you have a story
worth telling.
01
​In Eastern medicine, your story is our starting point. Your history, your patterns, your lived experience of pain - all of it guides how we approach your care. You're not treated for symptoms in isolation; you're understood as a whole person. That way, we can adapt with you as your needs change.​​​​​​
02
I believe an integrative approach is better than an alternative.
Eastern medicine complements your conventional care team rather than replacing it. Conventional medicine provides a strong foundation, while Eastern practices enhance its effectiveness and help address the complex aspects of pain, fatigue, sleep struggles that may be hard to manage with a single approach.
Here's what I believe about Chinese medicine
My background
Licensure & Certifications
Illinois Licensed Acupuncturist
198.001325
National Certification Board for Acupuncture and Herbal Medicine
162180
Education
Currently obtaining Doctor of Acupuncture with a specialization in Chinese Herbal Medicine
Master of Acupuncture and Oriental Medicine
Bachelor of Kinesiology with a specialization in Movement Science
Associations
Arthritis Foundation volunteer
What's in the name, "Cloud Pine"
Bent by the wind.
But never uprooted.
A cloud pine doesn't grow the way it does by avoiding the wind; it grows that way because of it. Every twist in its trunk is a record of what it's survived, and it's still standing. That's what we believe pain management can look like too: not undoing what's happened to you, but helping you grow strong and rooted around it.
