Nowadays, so many people want to lose weight. Some tell you that you don’t need to change anything and can lose weight easily. You just need to take their nutrition supplements, which in most cases are laxative theory-based products.
I want to tell you that these are more for marketing. There are two main reasons for being overweight, and whether it is for treatment or for daily maintenance, the theory is the same. One, the intake is bigger than the output, meaning you eat too much. Sometimes the client couldn’t realize this issue by him or herself, as he or she was so used to that amount. Second, your metabolism is getting slower and weaker, and is basically lacking energy.
For the first reason, it means you have to eat a bit less so that your body can really digest and absorb it, and not overburden your system. You have to eat a bit less each time until your overstretched stomach shrinks back to its normal status. For the second reason, you have to boost your energy, by doing exercise or by doing moxibustion. This is the proper and healthy way to manage your weight.
How to Shed the Excess Weight
Other than maintaining, you have to shed the excess weight. First, there are two types of issues with being overweight, from a Chinese medicine point of view.
One is due to water retention. Or simply put, you have too much unutilized water. This could be related to the fact that you drink too much water, or there could be a spleen or kidney yang deficiency, thereby not being able to steam the water to be utilized as clear qi. This type of weight loss is very easy and fast. You can just do moxibustion on the back and then on Shui Fen (CV9), Shen Que (CV8) and Shui Dao (ST28), as well as San Yin Jiao (SP6), Diji (SP8) and Yinlingquan (SP9) points.
The other is due to turbidity accumulation. Like the sputum that you can spit out through coughing, there is a similar kind of sticky and formed waste tissues under your belly area. In Western medicine, it may be called fat. This is a bit harder to get rid of as we have to think of ways to dilute and break this turbidity sputum into a fluid form, to go back into your body’s system in order to get it out. This will normally take longer.
I think weight loss needs your determination in addition to treatment.
I have a client who is a moxibustion fan. She often buys moxibustion stickers from us. One day, I saw her and was very surprised by her. She was much thinner. She had told me she wanted to lose weight. So, she ate less, did exercise and moxibustion. In about a month, she lost about 10 pounds. Now she feels less tired.
My mom struggles with her weight a lot. She just listens to those TV advertisements and asks us to buy those weight loss products. I told her that these products normally might show some results as they move the stuff out of the digestive tract. But in the long run, they will cause clear qi deficiency. I explained the theory behind it. She would overeat a lot. But she didn’t realize that. My sister and all our relatives, as side observers, could see the problem. So, gradually, she started to listen to our advice and was eating a bit less.
Together with my herbal tea and moxibustion, she lost near 8 pounds in about 10 days. She was very happy. But she gained a bit back as she forgot about her eating control again by the next month.
Overall, she lost some weight but not enough.
