Traditional Chinese medicine and weight loss
Author: Dr. Lee
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Time: 2010/12/4 16:00:37
When it comes to weight loss, the most important difference between Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) and Western Medicine is that Chinese medicine does not espouse the theory that there is a one-size-fits-all solution.
A good example of this is our Western tendency to insist dieters consume cold salads and fresh, uncooked vegetables. In TCM, this practice would only be suggested for people who were considered hot, (a term that identifies a person whose body metabolism is active, maintains its warmth and has high energy).
A person who feels cold and fatigued all the time needs foods warmed in order to assist in digestion and assimilation.
Traditional Chinese Medicine looks at the causes differently, as well. Although they agree eating an overabundance of food will increase weight in most people – why are there those who seem able to eat anything and not suffer malady?
Chinese medicine calls this fortunate group of people hot-dry. In contrast, an obese person is normally hot-damp or cold-damp. They believe the reason behind these differences begin with the spleen. Our spleen is the organ that directs food moisture to the appropriate body structures after cleaning. The spleen may become damaged by many factors, among them an over-abundance of a single food group, an improper amount of both exercise and time between eating again, and emotional factors that cause us to hold our body’s breath, (analogy), therefore thwarting natural internal functioning. If the spleen fails in its efforts to move and clean fluids in foods, these fluids compile and transform into excess dampness, congeal in phlegm and become fat tissue.
Once the spleen is thus encumbered, other organs follow. That is why diagnosis becomes so imperative to weight control. Chinese medicine delivers treatment that will address the body-imperative functions first. The heart, liver, kidneys, etc. Those organs correlate to emotional factors which will also be addressed. Their treatments include herbs and foods, (often in combination), that soothe the affected parts and bring them back to their normal state. They will devise a personalized acupuncture regimen, designed in part, not only to block the flow of unnecessary heat or cold to affected areas and to soothe affected organs, but also to assist in taming the desire to eat during emotional turmoil, or because the stomach is sending false signals. The spleen, the organ that reacts to all these changes, will be healing along with fellow organs. Indeed, when the spleen is finally functioning properly, the body is once again in balance.
This simplified explanation does not address all the variables that will present themselves in one person and not in another. But one truth about Chinese Medicine is that they never separate the person from the equation. Headaches, a tendency to succumb to sudden bouts of anger or depression, an inability to focus, timid-ness and frustrations, synchronize with internal imbalance. When emotional signals are not examined and treated alongside the physical manifestation of weight gain, the remedies can remain temporary.
Traditional Chinese Medicine is a medicine that must be studied to be completely understood. Although the potential lies within its structures to self-medicate, correlating the foods and herbs that bring our mind/body/spirit back into balance must be administered ever-so-gently. In America, we tend to grasp a single concept and run with it until it no longer pertains to our situation. Why? Our body has amended with the initial treatment. We need to make an on-going determination of the subsequent foods and treatments that will take us to the next step, and the next. Like life, healing is a fluent and ever-changing process.
