Traditional Chinese Medicine
Cinnamon (Donuts?!) for Common Cold
Last week my daughter was sick—it feels almost bi-weekly since starting pre-school, which I understand is relatively par for the course. Sometimes my wife and I both catch it, other times only one of us does, and occasionally we both sort of manage to fight off an apparently diluted version of it for a few days. Fortunately, this time around was the latter.
There is a saying in the west: No cure for the common cold, implying of course that we can take over the counter meds to manage symptoms but there is no actual medication to resolve the virus itself—the best we can do is rest, take care, and let it run its course. This is false. As is the case almost anytime biomedicine claims no cure exists, what it really means is that they have nothing to offer it. Whereas every Chinese Medical text ever written describes countless different viral patterns and presentations and their corresponding prescriptions, complete with the dosage modifications as indicated.
One of the most common herbal formulas given is called Gui Zhi Tang (gway-jer-tong), which contains simply cinnamon branch, paoniae root, ginger, red dates, and licorice. It is often indicated when there is congestion and/or headaches, chills, mild body aches, and mild sweating. If there is no sweating at all and severe body aches, we are more likely to use an ephedra-based formula, as gui zhi tang would be incorrect here.
Cinnamon branch warms the interior of the body and brings healthy fluids and the immunological cellular energy contained within them to the surface of the body. Ginger complements this function, whereas the licorice, dates, and paoniae counterbalance it, regenerating healthy metabolic fluids, preventing the cinnamon and ginger from creating excessive internal dryness and thereby prolonging imperfect health. It’s quite brilliant. Paeoniae has the additional benefit of entering the body’s muscle layer to reduce aches. This is often applicable to chronic pain as well.
Classically it is recommended to drink the formula then immediately eat a bowl of congee rice porridge, get under the covers, and induce a mild sweat to fully and finally resolve the cold. Personally, I have done this in the past with great success. If congee’s not your thing, a bowl of ramen or pho can work just as well—just please no smoothies, yogurt, or salads while sick!
My wife, daughter, and I went to one of the local farms last week, gathering pumpkins and apples for the season, and although refined sugar is a rarity at home, I was compelled to grab some apple cider cinnamon donuts as a seasonal staple. When Peyton came down with her cold I hid some Chinese herbs inside one of the donuts, and almost instinctively she took it over to the couch, sat down, and got under a blanket to indulge.
Surely, the donut did more harm than good, but that doesn’t mean it didn’t do any good at all. In conjunction with the herbs, I spent whatever time I could rubbing and tapping her upper back, over her lungs, a similar premise to using gua sha or cupping techniques at the same location for when people come into the office sick. Some of these techniques might have to be dusted off, as 2023 marks the first in the past few years that people with colds are welcome back, preferably with a mask of course.
As we enter cold and flu season, I hope folks will consider Chinese Medicine, as opposed to taking over the counter symptom suppressants that push the pathogen deeper into the body and potentially create the more notorious pattern, the “unresolved exterior pathogen.” This can be seen in everything from autoimmune to migraines or skin conditions, and often demands the cinnamon branch ingredient as well, though within much more complex formulas, taken over much longer periods of time, and never within a donut.
What is Electroacupuncture?
While you might be familiar with what acupuncture is, have you ever heard of electroacupuncture? Just like traditional acupuncture, electroacupuncture uses needles on various acupuncture points. The difference comes in that with electroacupuncture, a small electrode is attached to the needles which allows a small amount of electricity to pass through, giving a slight vibration or low hum during treatment.
The Importance of Bland, Sour, & Bitter Foods
There are three flavors that are resoundingly unrepresented in the typical, daily, western diet, whose void is arguably part of the cause of our leading all first world nations in major disease. Sour foods, bitter, and bland foods all induce important healing mechanisms in the body that can only be fully understood through Chinese herbal medicine.
Sour foods have an astringent effect, which makes it very curious why so many Americans drink lemon water or tea when they have a cold or virus, which we want to do anything but astringe. From our perspective foods like lemon, pickles, (apple cider) vinegar, and sauerkraut might be great for improving immune function to prevent contracting colds, but once we are sick, acrid foods such as cinnamon, ginger, and garlic are more advisable.
Sour foods help to conserve (by astringing) the body’s cellular energy and healthy fluids. If we are completely burnt out, or experiencing symptoms such as muscle cramps, or getting a second wind late at night that prevents a healthy bedtime, these might all be requests from our body for more astringing of resources. Personally, I enjoy lemon water, or sprinkling it on kale, broccoli, and/or asparagus. Tomatoes are great this time of year and sauerkraut is especially balancing with spicy foods. Since the spice will naturally bring fluids up and out, we can use the kraut to counteract this effect and keep nutrients inside. Of course, sauerkraut is generally taken raw, so it is important to eat in conjunction with cooked foods or hot tea to fully digest.
The bitter flavor must be hands down the most unpopular in America, and the reason I figure it to be healthy is because my 2-year-old hates it more than anything—while obviously preferring sweet to anything. In Chinese medicine the bitter flavor clears heat (or inflammation) from the body, which is especially important for the next two months of the year. Scutellariae root clears heat from the lungs, Coptis root from the microbiome, and phellodendron from the urogenital microbiome.
These make up the “three yellows,” and if I’ve ever put them in your herbal formula you’ve likely complained to me the following week. Instead, regular consumption of unsweetened green and/or dandelion tea, most leafy greens, and cabbage can help to mature your palette all while reducing the kind of systemic inflammation that tends to rise eventually into the chest or central nervous system later in life. If you must have sweets after dinner, do so with either hot dandelion or barley tea to counter their effect.
The bland flavor is the toughest for me, because like most people with “damp heat” internal body types, I love spices and flavors, and especially love cooking vegetables in a way that is delicious and not so boring. But while there is a time and place for culinary creativity and indulgence, plain steamed vegetables were a staple in the diets of most human beings for centuries prior, which happened to be centuries of much fewer diseases. Sure, people weren’t living as long, but chronic illness in 40-year-olds was much rarer than it is today.
Poria mushroom is one of our most commonly used bland herbs for draining dampness from the gastrointestinal and urogenital microbiomes. Its bland flavor helps to modulate urinary function and reduce pathogenic fluid retention, and by doing so it has the additionally desirable side effect of calming our minds and spirit. How does this work? By reducing the proverbial internal traffic jams of unwanted fluids, our healthy fluids can then more easily circulate up to and from the central nervous system without diversion or congestion. If spicy foods ramp us up, it should be pretty deductive that bland will calm us, and who couldn’t use more calm?
One idea to incorporate this all into a meal is steamed or boiled broccoli (dress with olive oil if you like), sauteed leafy greens with garlic, salt, and pepper, any tofu or animal protein prepared to taste, and a glass of lemon water, and/or sauerkraut on the side; followed by a hot cup of dandelion or barley tea, with honey if you must.
Three Reasons to Add Deep Breathing to Your Daily Routine
You might think breathing is second nature, right? You’re doing it right now as you are reading this. But did you know that there are different kinds of breathing and that what is called deep breathing can have important health benefits? Read on to learn just three of the most important reasons you should add deep breathing to your daily routine. continue reading
Arthritis: What is the Cause & Cure?
I can’t tell you how many times patients have either inquired to me about a cure for arthritis or informed me that there is no cure, that the cause is objectively unknown, and of course I must laugh to myself at the obtusity of the latter in the context of our dynamic.
First I want to reiterate, I am not one of those (alternative) medicine clinicians who believes biomedicine has no place, nor that my own paradigm of medicine can cure all. If someone has a brain tumor or stage 3 liver cancer they need a biomedical doctor—not me (though they’re best advised to utilize someone like me for complementary support).
I am, on the other hand, absolutely one of those alternative medicine clinicians who believes that biomedicine’s understanding of the human body is limited to structural and literal objectivities, wholly in neglect of its intangible dynamics of physiological substances. This is what Chinese Medicine is almost entirely predicated on, and more relevant to arthritis.
Synovial fluid surrounds our joints. Healthy body fluids surround everything, in perfect illustration of our microcosmic embodiment of the world we exist in. When fluid circulation is impaired it coagulates, like a traffic jam in the body, and equally frustrating to our global agendas. First fluids stick and accumulate, then to the point that they obstruct the thinner, healthy fluids from doing their job of lubricating the joint, creating the ironic illusion of dryness. We hear cracking and feel dry, and label arthritis as a “dry condition,” when in fact it is the opposite. Stress and fatigue, along with sugar, alcohol, dairy, gluten, raw/cold foods and drinks, all induce fluid accumulation, so is it any wonder how arthritis is rampant in the modern world?
Arthritis is very personal to me, as it was the first condition I attempted and failed at treating in my father, as an acupuncture student many years ago. Dad was a great dad, but his diet was poor, stress was high, and he drank daily for a very long time; not to mention that he had a son and student as his practitioner. I think we peaked at temporary relief of symptoms each week.
Conversely, I take great pride in my own management of the gout disease that I inherited from Dad. I was diagnosed with the men of our family’s condition at the premature age of 25, and after suffering several painful attacks many doctors told me that I should live on Allopurinol, or whatsoever was the drug being presently recommended. Instead, I went on to learn Chinese Medicine. I all but completely abstained from refined sugar (exceptions for holidays, birthdays, and Paris) and obviously follow a very Eastern diet. My stress and fatigue inevitably wax and wane, as goes life. I know gout is something I’ll always have to be mindful of, but the fact that I’m now 45 and have never lived on medications or with annual attacks is a feather in my cap.
Without dietary modifications arthritis cannot be cured, in my opinion. That doesn’t mean one has to be completely abstinent from all of the aforementioned usual suspects. Just that the diet should be highly impressive 90% of the time.
Without internal herbal medicine arthritis cannot be cured, in my opinion. Acupuncture is fantastic, but it is rarely powerful enough to break down fluid accumulations or deposits, or adequately restore metabolic function the way herbs can. As always, with herbs there is no one size fits all prescription, no “herbal allopurinol,” nor even one prescription that one would take throughout a course of treatment. As the body changes, the formula changes and adapts to the patient’s evolving presentation.
While organ function is being restored through internal medicine, acupuncture can be invaluable to pain relief and improving local circulation. Committed patients must come for regular treatments for 3-6 months and modify their diets. In the first month acupuncture and moxibustion should be used twice a week. In subsequent months, once a week, and eventually every other week is fine so long as we are consistent and accurate with herbal formulas.
There is my best explanation for the causes and cure for arthritis.
