Good morning Readers!

Today I’m here to write a bit about a little talked function related to the Lung in Traditional Chinese Medicine: the Notion of Limits.

Let’s recap some functions of the Lung for Oriental Medicine:

• It is a power plant, capable of producing Wei Qi (defense energy) and Ying Qi (nutritive energy)
• It is the main connection of the body with the external environment, capturing the energy of air through breathing
• Controls breathing, skin and the passage of water
• Is responsible for smell
• Receive energy from the spleen

When we think of the Lung, we cannot ignore that it belongs to the Metal Element. Metal, in Chinese Medicine, is considered gold, the wealth found in the deepest part of the earth, and as we are talking about human beings, Metal is what is found in the most intimate part of us.

Observing its functions, we can say that the Lung captures the energy of air, joins it with the energy received from the Spleen and transforms it into energy that circulates in the most superficial region of the body, that is, in the Wei Qi, our defense energy, known as our immunity in Western Medicine. Therefore, we say that the Lung is responsible for our protection, not only of the skin, but also protection against factors that can make us sick (cold, heat, wind, dryness, humidity or perverse Qi).

However, whenever we study the classics of Chinese Medicine, we never associate an organ only with a physical function. All of them, without exception, have a psychic function. An easy-to-understand example is related to the Earth Element. Stomach and Spleen are responsible not only for the digestion of food, but also for the digestion of ideas. So it controls thinking, performing tasks, learning and reasoning.

The Lung would be no different. When we say that its energy rises to the surface and protects the being through the Energy of Defense (Wei Qi), we are talking about a force field that protects us from the factors of nature, but which also gives us the exact limit between what does us good internally and externally.

When the Lung is strong, we can give ourselves healthy limits, not accepting destructive criticism, toxic or abusive relationships, self-esteem is strong and we are able to know what we are able to tolerate, even in adversity, without letting ourselves get sick.

When the Lung is weak, we let ourselves be offended, we put up with people and situations that make us disbelieve ourselves, we feel weak and incapable and we become sad, not forgetting that sadness is the feeling that relates to the Lung when we talk about 5 Elements.

In other words, the Lung is the organ that gives us the sense of LIMIT. How far can we go, what can we tolerate? A two-way street. Both what comes out of us in relation to the other and the other coming to us.

In order to remain strong, well positioned in the face of life, to impose our limits without going over the other and without letting the other affect our life, the Lung must be strong. For this, breathing exercises, meditation, Qi Gong, Acupuncture and Therapeutic Food are indicated.

In acupuncture, some points are recommended to strengthen the Lung, they are: LU7, LU9, BL13, BL42. In auriculotherapy, the Lung points must be placed.

In Therapeutic Food, the individual must be aware if he is consuming at least one neutral food  to the metal element, per day, according to the table found in the link:

https://www.facilitatingacupuncture.com/therapeutic-food-tables/

Remember when the Lung is weak and we no longer have limits, our deepest, purest inner self becomes sick. And we can become severely ill. The same will happen with our patients.

Reflect and strengthen your Lung every day. With limits, we will all live longer, healthier and happier.

I hope you enjoyed.

A big hug!

Prof. Fernanda Mara

** Meet our Youtube channel: http://youtube.com/facilitatingacupuncture

Good Morning Readers!

This week I decided to write a little about chronic pain and physical activity: when the patient is suffering with chronic pain, should he do or  not practice physical activity?

I often receive in my office many people that say their doctor recommended physical activity suspension, because of disease “X” or disease “Y”, stating physical activity will worsen the symptoms, mainly in issues related to the musculoskeletal system.

That’s why, I decided to write and give you the Traditional Chinese Medicine point of view on this matter.

In Chinese Medicine eyes, physical activity (made in moderately way), improves blood circulation, consequently muscle nourishment and oxygenation, also strengths or maintain the Spleen strong in it’s functions, such as maintain the strength of the four members, the memory and learning capacity, improve production and circulation of blood, keeps organs on their designated position (avoiding ptosis, the falling of breast, bladder, eyelid, etc).

The benefits for physical activity are so many that, generally, there are no contraindications to it’s practice. Thus, in my office, I recommend physical activity for almost every patient, in particular, muscle stretching and strengthening.

However, in Chinese Medicine, there are many pain definitions, among them:

• That ones that improve with physical activity
• That ones that worse with physical activity (minority).

To put make it simpler:

1. Pain which improve with physical activity:

Caused by energy/blood stagnation.

Energy and Blood Stagnation can be caused by emotional stress or pathological factors accumulation, such as dampness, cold, heat, wind or dryness. Dampness and cold are the worst pathological factors for skeletal muscle issues.

In this situation, physical activity shall be done everyday, for at least 20 minutes and the patient’s pain will progressively improve, as blood and vital energy return to their usual circulation pattern.

When we do acupuncture, we also move energy, blood, and remove pathological factors. Vital fluids start nourishing muscles and articulations again, pain improves.

Points that move Qi and Blood: LI4, LV3, SP3, etc.

2. Pain which worse with physical activity:

Caused by energy or/and blood Deficiency.

Basically, a deficiency base disease makes the patient feel worse after physical activity. Once physical activity itself spends vital fluids, which are already missing, the pain shows up and the patient condition is worsened.

In this situation, it’s recommended that the patient counters the Qi and Blood deficiency, mainly with acupuncture, therapy diet, breathing exercises, and in more severe cases, with supplements (vitamins and minerals).

Points that tone Qi and Blood: CV6, CV4, SP10, SP8, SP6, LV8, CS6, ST36.

As soon as the lacking substances are recovered, the patient should once again start doing physical activity so that his/hers circulation is normalized.

In most of the cases, what we have is an Stagnation and not a proper Deficiency, for vital substances. Thus, hardly the patient should be advised to avoid physical activity. The diagnosis confirmation can be made through tongue and wrist evaluation.

If, for any reason, the patient reports a symptom or condition worsening after physical activity practice, the therapist must pay attention to the points which may help the vital substances recover progress. If not, moving the body should always be advised, always!

Hope I helped!

A big big hug!

Profa. Fernanda

Meet our Youtube Channel: youtube.com/facilitatingacupuncture

Good morning readers!

Today let’s talk a bit about how everyday feelings affect the natural functioning of our body.

We live in a world every day more rushed, and this constant worry and stressed state society pushes upon us, just worsens our stress and our anger over our body’s limit.

This accelerated lifestyle is costy on your body, that wears out, lacking energy, in many manners will generate chronic pain that occurs in diseases such as Fibromyalgia, Arthritis, Arthrosis, and many other diseases for which the Western medicine fails to find the specific cause.

For Traditional Chinese Medicine, the Liver is the organ responsible for maintaining the harmonic flow of Energy (Qi) and Blood (Xue). All those bad emotions, in particular Anger and Stress, cause a pathological pattern known as Qi and Blood Liver Stagnation.

Thus, the larger share of energy and blood which should be circulating through the body and realizing regular function maintenance, is stuck, leaving muscles de-nourished and thus tense.

This way, the Chinese Medicine explains psychosomatic diseases, where an emotional problem quickly creates incapacitating pain in the body, such as fibromyalgia.

To clarify it, we have: Stress –> creates Stagnation of Liver  Qi and Blood –> Blood fails to nourish muscles –> tense muscles –> chronic pain and/or tense muscles.

The therapist’s goal then, is to move Qi and Blood so that the patient muscles can once again receive energy, blood, and oxygen getting over the tension and the chronic pain.

When  Qi and Blood Liver Stagnation is kept for a long period of time, following the Mother and Child 5 Element Law, the sick Liver will consume Kidney energy. The Kidney, responsible for bone strength and for articulation harmony. We may say, based on this information, when a patient has chronic stress it will, after affecting Liver, creating chronic muscular pain, also affect Kidney, causing pain, and in long time articulation deformation, such as Arthritis and Arthrosis.

Summing it up again: Stress –> Qi and Blood Liver Stagnation –> Blood fails to nourish muscles –> tense muscles –> chronic pain and/or tense muscles –> (long-time) consumes Kidney energy –> pain and articulation deformation.

After some time, there is a vicious cycle between stress –> pain –> stress that will stagnate permanently Liver’s blood and energy.

Thus, we may conclude that emotional stress and anger consolidate chronic pain in the patients, thus, we recommend that patients who suffer from this meditate, practice breathing exercises and acupuncture, mainly to diminish hyperreactivity to stress causing factors, lowering then Qi and Blood Liver Stagnation and correcting the problems in circulation of those vital substances.

I hope to have helped you guys comprehend each one of the leading factors of chronic pain.

My warmest regards!

Profa. Fernanda Mara

Subscribe to our YouTube: youtube.com/c/facilitatingacupuncture

Are you feeling stressed and angry? This video can help you 🙂

Good morning readers!

Today, let’s talk about whole wheat flour, weight loss and what is the view of Chinese Medicine about the topics, improving your life.

A vast number of people think that replacing Wheat Flour for it’s Whole variation (Whole Wheat Flour) in their daily diet will increase the weight loss speed and even believe that flour is a ‘light’ food.

Unfortunately, that point of view about wheat flour is wrong. The wheat flour, being it whole or not, as the name dictates, comes from wheat and has amid in it’s composition, thus making it dangerous for weight loss diets or even for diabetes diets.

What is Amid?

Amid is a carbohydrate, made mostly by glucose. Produced by green plants as an energy storage. It is the most abundant and common carbohydrate in the human diet, found in vast quantities in foods such as potatoes, rice and wheat.

** keep in mind: people who suffer from diabetes cannot consume huge amounts of amid!

If both of them have amid, what are the benefits of consuming whole wheat flour?

Whole wheat flour is obtained by grinding whole wheat grains and maintains the structure of the bran and germ, which are the main nutritional sources of the grain. The main advantage over white flour is that it retains nutrients such as fiber and iron that are lost during the processing of common wheat flour.

As a result of this, the whole wheat flour has lots of health benefits, such as improvement on the intestine functioning (due to fibers), extension on the time that it takes for you to be hungry again (since it takes a bit longer to be processed), reduction in blood bad cholesterol levels and glucose reduction, if it’s consumed with moderation.

What about Chinese Medicine? How is the Whole Wheat Flour seen?

In Traditional Chinese Medicine, the wheat is considered a fresh food for Spleen and Stomach, and the wheat’s germ is a cold food. Thus, in huge quantities, it will consume Yang (heat energy) from Spleen, which is the main energy for weight loss.

Besides that, it has the potential to “cool down” Stomach, slowing and making the digestion process harder, resulting in an accumulation of sugar and fats in the body, prejudicing weight loss.

Spleen has the function of removing inner dampness from the body. Due to it’s cold and fresh essence, wheat’s germ and the wheat, are easily associated with humidity, being able to interfere in the Spleen action of removing it (prejudicing it) and in medium-term the patient may present phlegm accumulated on the body.

Phlegm is what creates the “masses” on the human body, such as located fat, cysts, snot (phlegm), tumors, and others.

Therefore, the whole wheat flour, used moderately, in the eventual replacement of other carbohydrate in the diet, will have nutritive benefits, however, if consumed frequently it will harm the metabolism and according to the Chinese Medicine the weight loss is gonna get harder day after day, may even result in further health complications.

A good option for the wheat reduction is the consumption of roots that have neutral energy for Spleen and Stomach and helps strengthen their functions.

You can consume wheat. Preferably the whole (wheat flour). AND ALWAYS with moderation.

My warmest regards!

Profa. Fernanda Mara

*** Come to meet our Youtube channel, and please, subscribe: youtube.com/facilitatingacupuncture

Click on the link to watch:

Hello dear readers!

Today I’m going to talk a little bit about the effect dairy products have, during Autumn/Winter, in particular for those who suffer from repetitive sinus inflammation.

The Autumn and Winter on the view of Tradicional Chinese Medicine, are seasons characterized by coldness and dryness. Therefore, those are the seasons where we usually feel the skin, hair, mucous of our body more dry. The skin may suffer scaling and get itchy, the hair loses it’s brightness, brittle, and the drier mucous, creating eyes and nose inflammations, mainly.

In Chinese Medicine, we know that dryness is a pathological factor. Owning the potential to consume body fluids and create inner heat symptoms, such as inflammations.

Given the mucous dryness, breathing becomes harder, the air filtering process loses efficacy, thus making the body prone to respiratory diseases, such as sinus inflammation.

During this year period, the body, trying to balance itself, gives his owner the will to consume foods considered wet (or humid), in special, milk and dairy products. Those are even a recommendation, in small quantities, for people who suffer from inner dryness, however, there is trouble once we exaggerate in these kind of food.

Milk and dairy products are hard to digest, according to the Chinese Medicine. Due to their humid nature, they block Spleen’s ability of removing the excess of humid and for the remains of this incomplete digestion, we call Phlegm.

The Phlegm, is a pathological factor, resulting from the inner humidity kept in the body without proper circulation nor elimination, for a long period of time. Is a mass creator, cysts, polyps, located fat, secretion (including the one that clogs the sinuses).

In addition to milk and dairy products having a humidity essence, predisposing to the situation described above, during autumn/winter, external dryness will cause the body, for protection reasons, to retain the humidity it obtains from outside. Therefore, these foods become even more the villains in the cause and worsening of sinusitis.

Thus, Chinese Medicine professionals must go against the consumption of milk and dairy products during all winter for patients that usually suffer from Sinus inflammation.

And, what should we recommend?

Foods considered fresh for the Earth Element are recommended to make the body promotes a bigger Jin Ye (body fluids) production, those basically are, healthy to the body. We usually say that Jin Ye are cleany, while Humidity and Phlegm are uncleany.

These are fresh foods for the Earth Element: cucumber, tomato, tangerine, apple and other, found on the link below: https://www.facilitatingacupuncture.com/therapeutic-food-tables/

Is also important that during the Autumn and Winter period, the patient keep Spleen and Lung strong, once that our body’s defense energy, the immunity, is dependent on the good functioning of these two organs.

Thus, I recommend the acupuncture points: SP3, SP6, LU7 and LU9. They can be treated with needles and also worked with moxibustion or acupressure.

Keeping the body hydrated with healthy foods, removing foods that worsen the perpetuation of Phlegm, leaving the immune system strong, without a doubt, the patient will spend many, many months without suffering from sinusitis.

I hope to have helped, and I hope that you liked it.

Big tight hug.

Profa. Fernanda Mara

** Don’t forget to subscribe us on Youtube Channel: youtube.com/facilitatingacupuncture