DO-IT-YOURSELF CHINESE MEDICINE By Zhenzhen Zhang

(Copiado a mano de archivo pdf)

Chinese doctors say we get sick when our condition is too “hot” or too “cold”. By
eating the right cooling or warming foods, you can balance your yin and yang, and get
well. Here are five balancing programs for five illnesses.

Last winter, a 52-year old woman saw me with a headache, runny nose, and cough that
she’d had for two days. Based on her symptoms, I was able to quickly diagnose her
illness. In Chinese medicine, we could say she had a “cold” condition. I told her to rest
and eat a soup made with ginger and green scallions. This “warm” remedy was designed
to help balance the coldness in her body. In two days, all her symptoms had
disappeared. When her husband caught the same cold several days later, she gave him
the soup and he was cured in three days.
As simple as this treatment sounds, it goes to the heart of what all Chinese medicine is
about –restoring balance to the body. Conditions like this patient’s cold often will fade
on their own as the body’s self-healing powers swing into action. However, other times,
the illness will drag on, maybe for weeks. Chinese medicine cas help you quickly get at
the underlying energetic imbalance that is causing the illness.
My patient’s condition, while commonly called a “cold” in the West, is only one type of
cold that people can experience. Some colds are “hot” colds, caused by too much heat in
the body, and they require a cooling remedy. Doctors of Traditional Chinese Medicine
give acupuncture treatments and prescribe herbs, exercises, and foods to help restore a
balance of hot and cold as well as dampness and dryness and other unbalanced
conditions. The simplest and most accessible of these treatments is foods. By including
the right foods in your diet for your specific condition, you can help to restore the
balance that’s needed to help you overcome a variety of illnesses.

Daily Dietary Balancing

For those who would like to experience the benefits of Chinese medicine, I’ve
developed a simple do-it-yourself program that uses foods in this way. With the
recommendations that follow, foods are used to re-balance the body’s internal
“climate”, as traditional Chinese doctors call it. In illness, this climate has become too
hot or too cold.
My food-balancing prescriptions are based on the Chinese view that the human body is
a microcosm of the Universe. Just like on the earth, where floods and droughts wreak
havoc, climate extremes in the body can create problems. When the body is sick, we try
to bring warmth to coldness, or cool off too much heat.
As a doctor of Chinese medicine, I know that acupuncture and herbs will help bring
about these changes. But I also tell patients which foods will help produce these same
effects. Every food has an effect on the body’s metabolic temperature. (This is different,
by the way, from your body temperature, which you take with a thermometer. Metabolic
temperature is the heat energy generated through all your organ systems from the food –
the fuel – that you eat and that your digestive system burns).
Some foods, such as tofu or ice cream, produce a characteristic internal coldness.
Others, such as ginger or chicken, generate internal heat. If you eat too many warming
foods, you increase the chance that your condition will become too warm. If it does, you
might come down with a “hot” illness. Some colds, for example, marked by a dry or
sore throat, fever, and sweating, can be caused by too much heat. The way to help
correct the underlying imbalance that brought on that condition is to eat more cooling
foods.
The first step toward remedying a condition – whether acute or chronic – is to add the
proper balancing foods to your daily diet. All foods are divided into three basic
categories – cold (yin), hot (yang), and neutral. (See chart on page 93). The antidote will
generally be an emphasis upon foods with the opposite “temperature” as the condition.
If your symptoms describe a warm or hot condition, then your diet should emphasize
cooling, cold, and neutral foods, and fewer warm and hot foods.
If you are not experiencing any symptoms of illness, you still can help to avoid illness
by eating a varied diet as much as possible. I recommend that people eat a minimum of
seven different fruits and vegetables a day, to avoid a cold or hot imbalance. The
accompanying chart shows the temperature ....

Hot Foods - (In Chinese medicine, foods like onions have a warming effect and eating
them will help cure illnesses that are caused by excess cold in the body).

... characteristics of common foods. (Vegetarians will want to substitute foods in the
same temperature category for crab and rooster).
In addition to paying attention to overall daily diet, people in China often use specific
foods as medicines. Certain food preparations are particularly effective in correcting hot
and cold imbalances, like the ginger and scallion soup did for my patient’s illness.
Recipes like this have been proven over many years in clinical practice to help cure a
vast assortment of illnesses and diseases.
The foods and herbs selected for the medicinal recipes that follow are intended to treat
five specific conditions: colds and flus (one category), insomnia, headaches, low back
pain, and hay fever. They are combined to make pungent teas, juices, or thick porridges,
and are taken in doses, like medicine. Some include sugar or salt. The quantities,
however, are so small they are unlikely to have any adverse effects; in fact, they are
included as balancing agents for the condition in question.
To treat the conditions that follow, you need to first identify the symptoms you’re
experiencing. That’s because there may be .....different types of colds or different types
of headaches, each with a different set of symptoms.
For our purposes, I’ve identified the most common symptoms that occur for two
variations of these five common health problems. For each condition I’ve identified
symptoms for a cold and hot type of the condition, or sometimes a “weak” type, which
requires neutral foods that tonify (strenghten).
When diagnosing your own disorder, make sure to take into consideration every
symptom. Look to see which set of symptoms most closely matches yours. In cases
where your symptoms do not match or they do not closely match those I’ve detailed
here, you’ll need to consult with a Chinese practitioner.
Even if you’re not experiencing any symptoms of illness, you may have an imbalance of
hot and cold whose symptoms haven’t manifested yet. If left unaddressed, this can lead
to an illness. At .....

Cold Foods – (....while foods like asparagus have a cooling effect. Eating them will help
cure illnesses caused by too much heat in the body).

....first, the imbalance may appear as a slight discomfort; you may feel tired, unable to
concentrate, or become easily angered. At such times, you should rest and eat a
balanced diet.
Chinese medicine, even in its elementary form described here, can be a powerful first-
aid technique. Foods can be potent healers when used the right way. However, these
prescriptions should never be attempted as a lone antidote for serious or chronic
conditions. The best results are achieved when dealing with temporary illnesses, instead
of chronic conditions. The latter are more likely to require a Chinese medical doctor
attention. If your symptoms are serious, or persistent, consult a doctor.

Nature of Food

All foods are cooling, warming, or neutral in their effect on the body. Below are
examples of the effects of certain common foods. These and other foods are included in
the medicinal remedies on this page.

COLD
For a Heat Type of insomnia, these are some of the foods that will cool your system.
Ice Cream, Banana, Watermelon, Tomato, Asparagus, Tofu, Crab, Soy Sauce.

COOL
For a Heat Type of headache, these foods will help restore the balance.
Pear, Kiwi, Cucumber, Mushroom, Egg Plant, Millet, Barley, Yogurt.

NEUTRAL
If you have a Weak Type of low back pain, these foods will help tonify, or strenghten,
your condition.
Lemon, Fig, Apple, Cabbage, Carrot, Potato, Rice, Black Beans.

WARM
For a Cold Type of hay fever, these are some of the foods that will warm you.
Pumpkin, Walnut, Chestnut, Scallion, Celery, Pomegranate, Ginger, Sugar.

HOT
For a Cold Type of flu, these are some of the foods that heat up your system.
Garlic, Rooster, Pepper.

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THE REMEDIES

Common Cold and Flu (Cold Type)

Symptoms: Severe aversion to cold, low-grade fever, no sweating, headache, muscle

aches, stuffy nose, cough with clear white phlegm.
Treatment: Too much cold in the body, requires “warming” remedies.
Recommended Foods: Pick mostly from “hot”, “warm”, and “neutral” foods, including
garlic, ginger, green chives, pepper, pumpkin, apple, onion, and mutton (lamb).
Medicinal Foods: Prepare a soup from the following ingredients:

2 teaspoon ginger
2 teaspoon scallion stalk
1 tablespoon brown sugar
Slice ginger into thin pieces. Chop off outer skin. Cut scallion stalk into half-inch
lengths. Add ginger and scallion stalk to two cups of water and bring to a boil. Remove
from heat. Add brown sugar and stir until dissolved. After eating the soup, cover your
body with a warm blanket until you perspire. Do this once a day for two days.

Hot type
Symptoms: High fever, mild aversion to wind, sweating, headache, dry or sore throat,
thirst, nasal congestion with sticky or yellow mucus.
Treatment: Too much heat in body, requires “cooling” remedies.
Recommended Foods: Pick from the “cool”, “cold”, and “neutral” foods, including
watermelon, eggplant, banana, plum, tomato, and tofu.
Medicinal Foods: Prepare juice from the following ingredients:

1 watermelon
6 ripe tomatoes

(Note: This type of cold usually occurs in the summer months when watermelon is
available). Remove watermelon rind. Using a cheesecloth, press 4 cups of juice from the
fruit. Set aside. Blanch the tomatoes in boiling water for one minute, remove from pot,
and peel off the skin. Use cheesecloth to extract 4 cups of tomato juice in the same way.
Mix ½ cup of watermelon juice with ½ cup of tomato juice. Drink one cup 3-4 times per
day for two days.

INSOMNIA (Hot Type)

Symptoms: Trouble falling asleep, easily angered, poor appetite, thirst with desire to
drink, red eyes, bitter taste in mouth, dark urination, constipation.
Treatment: Too much heat, requires “cooling” remedies.
Recommended foods: Pick from “cold”, “cool”, and “neutral” foods, including
mushroom, white radish, marine algae, green bean (a Chinese bean resembling a
soybean), lotus seed, and tofu.
Medicinal Foods: Make a porridge from the following ingredients:

1 small fresh pumpkin

1 cup millet
2 ½ cups of water

Cut pumpkin into ½-inch pieces. Rinse millet to clean. Add pumpkin and millet to
water. Bring to boil and then simmer for twenty minutes. Eat one cup once a day for
seven days. Note: Although pumpkin is a “warm” food, the millet makes this recipe
more cooling.

Weak Type
Symptoms: Insomnia, anxiety, heart palpitations, dizziness, poor memory, sore low
back, dry mouth or throat.
Treatment: Overall weakness, requires balanced natural foods that strengthen, or tonify.
Recommended Foods: Pick neutral foods including sesame seeds, beef, shrimp, soy-
beans, potato, kale and honey.
Medicinal Foods: Prepare a porridge from the following ingredients:
2 tablespoons lotus seeds
½ teaspoon salt

Wash lotus seeds well and soak in pot with 3 cups of water for 2 hours. Drain water,
add another 4 cups of fresh water, and cook at a boil for one-half hour. Add salt. Eat
before bedtime for seven days.

HEADACHE (Hot Type)

Symptoms: Migraine, sudden attack on left or right side, sometimes accompanied by

eye and teeth pain.
Treatment: Too much heat, requires “cooling” remedies.
Recommended Foods: Pick “cold”, “cool”, and “neutral” foods, including marine algae,
oyster, spinach, lettuce, banana, asparagus, barley, yogurt, and figs.
Medicinal Foods: Prepare a tea from the following ingredients:

1 teaspoon green tea

2 teaspoons mint powder

Put both ingredients in 2 cups of water and cook at boil for five minutes. Let cool.
Strain. Drink one cup twice a day for 7-10 days.

(Pag. 7 al principio)