Many girls in real life are particularly fond of sweets, and many overweight women are even more addicted to sweets. Traditional Chinese medicine believes that the craving for sweets in women is mostly due to spleen deficiency and spleen preference for sweetness. Therefore, if a woman becomes overweight due to eating sweets, she must treat her spleen in order to lose weight.
The spleen and stomach are known as the "wine sac and rice bag" and are responsible for the function of receiving and transforming food in the human body. However, sweets can produce phlegm and sweetness can produce dampness. The spleen is afraid of being trapped by phlegm and dampness, so frequent consumption of sweets will damage the spleen yang and affect the spleen's ability to transform food. The "Four Saints' Heart Source" states that the spleen rises and is good at grinding, which means that the water and grains entering the stomach rely entirely on the spleen yang for digestion. The better the spleen's digestive ability, the stronger it is. In addition, the spleen governs meat, so excessive consumption of sweets will hinder digestion in the stomach.
In traditional Chinese medicine, spleen deficiency is often manifested as spleen qi deficiency and spleen yang deficiency. Most patients will experience symptoms such as bloating, poor digestion, edema, obesity, and diarrhea. So what are the common symptoms of spleen deficiency?
1. Decreased appetite
We all know that the spleen is responsible for digestion and a deficiency in the spleen can weaken the body's ability to digest and absorb food, thus affecting appetite. Some people may have a good appetite but feel bloated after eating. This is also a manifestation of spleen deficiency.
2. Changes in tongue coating
The tongue is an external manifestation of the spleen and stomach, and the coating on the tongue is a direct reflection of changes in the spleen and stomach. Generally, people with spleen deficiency will have a tongue with obvious teeth marks on the edges. The tongue coating will also be thick, smooth, and moist, indicating a cold body. If the tongue coating is rough, thick, yellowish, or greasy, it indicates dampness and heat in the body. If the tongue is red without coating, it indicates that the body has already been heated to a certain degree and yin has been damaged. In the summer, people with spleen dampness often feel sticky in the mouth and have a dull, yellowish complexion.
3. Edema and obesity
Spleen deficiency can lead to poor digestion of water and grains. This includes poor digestion of fluids and poor digestion of grains. The former can cause excessive dampness in the body, making it difficult for waste water to be eliminated, resulting in edema. The latter will inevitably lead to the accumulation of carbohydrates and fats in the body, leading to obesity.
4. Difficulty with bowel movements
Many people with spleen deficiency experience difficulty with bowel movements because of excessive dampness in the body, which causes stool to be loose, soft, sticky, and undigested. Some people may also experience a combination of hard and loose stools, as well as constipation.
