Dampness and food choice

Brain fog. Sluggishness. Digestive woes. Bloating. Constipation. Sweet cravings. Nausea. Edema. Sore joints. Swelling. Sleep difficulties. Feelings of overwhelm. Phlegm.

These are all signs of what is called dampness in Chinese medicine.

What is dampness?

From the Chinese medicine perspective, we are slow when our digestion is slow. We feel sluggish and tired. Our moods are low. We’re not motivated or inspired. We might experience brain fog or cloudy thinking.

Dampness is an accumulation of fluid in the body that can slow digestion and lead to these symptoms. Dampness has a direct effect on digestion - it creates heat in the body and taxes the spleen qi, which is central to digestive capacity. Once digestion is weak, it becomes easier for dampness to accumulate. It’s a loop.

Who has dampness?

Dampness is very common in our modern lives. This week in my practice, everyone I met with was experiencing some degree of dampness. Most of the dampness I see clinically is related to food choice. One person talked about a feeling of heaviness and lethargy that has been with her for a while and won’t seem to go away on its own. She doesn’t feel like her normal sharp self; she’s often tired and cloudy in her thoughts. Another person mentioned his frustration with chronic slow digestion and constipation. He has digestive challenges that affect him daily.

The Standard American diet, processed foods, sugar, raw food trends and smoothies, an abundance of breads and iced, creamy drinks - just to name a few - all contribute to dietarily to dampness, and given their ubiquity in our food supply, it’s easy to see why dampness is so common. Overeating can also contribute, as the digestive system cannot tend to all of the food we take in if we eat beyond our needs.

There are also emotional factors that contribute to dampness. Life stressors and emotional strain (e.g. trauma, longstanding workplace woes, interpersonal abuse) can create internal heat and slow digestion, which can contribute to dampness as well.

Dampness in ancient texts

Li Dong Yuan, a Chinese master who lived between 1180 and 1251 CE, wrote extensively about the way that illness can originate from inside the body, rather than only from external pathogens in his seminal work, The Treatise on the Spleen and Stomach. I’ll write more about him next week, but his teachings on the critical importance of dietary health are incredibly relevant today. Many of us experience a pathology that arises within, and oftentimes, our symptoms are closely related to the foods we choose to eat.

Resolving dampness

We can resolve dampness with herbal formulas, but it’s essential that we put food and dietary practice at the center of our health plan. It is not a wise strategy to work with herbs in such a way that simply makes one’s pathology more comfortable. For example, if someone frequently drinks to excess and wakes up with hangovers, there are herbal formulas that can help to resolve the hangover. But it would be a misuse of herbal medicine to work with plants this way. People don’t really get better when we do this. Symptoms might resolve for some time, but the behaviors don’t change and the root causes of the issues aren’t addressed. In this case, the symptoms come back once the formula runs out. We are more interested in longstanding, lifestyle change. Herbal formulas can help and support lifestyle changes, but they’re not a substitute.

Here are a few dietary strategies that can help to resolve dampness. These strategies, paired with herbal formulas specifically designed to address the presence of dampness, can effectively help your body move toward the balance it needs and desires. Whenever possible, it will be helpful to prepare your own foods at home as opposed to fast foods or restaurant foods.

Include more warming, aromatic herbs and spices like ginger, cinnamon, clove, cardamom, turmeric, nutmeg, tarragon, rosemary, oregano, scallions, and mustard seed in your regular cooking

These herbs aid digestion. The warming energetic notes support the transformation and transportation that the spleen needs to do with food during digestion. Some of these herbs are also carminative (help to relieve gas). For example, you could add fresh or ground ginger to your rice or lentil dishes, mix ginger and scallions into your srambled eggs, add cinnamon to your oatmeal or yogurt, include rosemary, tarragon, or oregano in some of your protein recipes.

Eat mostly cooked foods and few raw foods

Chinese medicine centers cooked food in dietary practice. Raw foods introduce cold^* into the digestive tract and are very difficult for the stomach and spleen to process. When raw foods are habitually part of the diet, the body responds by creating heat internally because strong digestion relies on warmth. So the body overcompensates as a reaction to all of this cold and produces heat, which slows digestion. If you eat a lot of raw foods, try lightly steaming or sauteeing your vegetables or cooking your fruits. These methods of preparation gently warm the foods, making them easier to digest.

*In Chinese medicine, cold and hot refer to multiple energetic aspects. In this scenario, the raw foods might actually be room temperature (an apple that was sitting out on your countertop) but the energetic profile of that food (the raw apple) is cold. To change the energetic influence of the food, it has to prepared, through various cooking methods, which adds warmth to its energetic profile.

Greatly reduce or eliminate added sugar from your diet

Sugar slows digestion, weakens spleen qi (which is integral to digestive function), introduces heat to the body (which contributes to inflammation and slow digestion), and changes the makeup of the microbiome such that sweet cravings intensify (more on this in another newsletter). I know we have all heard so much about the negative effects of sugar, but the reality is that the dampness will not resolve - in fact it will continue to accumulate - if added sugar continues to be a regular part of the daily diet.

This doesn't mean you can’t have a piece of cake on your birthday (as long as your digestion can handle it). However, it is important to be clear that there is no healthy way for added sugar to be a regular part of life. Check your labels. It’s not just treats and sweets that contain added sugar. Many condiments, bread products, and even meats have sugar added.

The same goes for other “sticky” foods, like breads and gluten

These foods literally stick together, trapping heat in the body, which slows digestion as a result. Further, some people find these foods too difficult to process or experience reactions when they are introduced into the body (e.g. gluten or lactose intolerance). This doesn’t mean you can never have bread - for some people, it will be ok occasionally. For others, it may really help you to stay away from bread. It depends on your digestive status.

This medicine is incredibly personalized, which means it is important to know about and understand your current health. Next time you want to have one of these sticky foods, check in with yourself and ask “How is my digestion doing?”.

Food can be a beautiful and enjoyable part of life. Even if you don’t particularly like to cook, food is still a key part of your life. You’ve got to eat every day. One of the parts I like most about my work as a clinician is the opportunity to speak with people about Chinese medicine food theory. The classical teachings show us how to choose, combine, and prepare foods so that we can have balanced digestion (and in this medicine, digestion is supreme, it affects all parts of health).

Dampness does not have to stick around forever. If you’re struggling with dampness or feeling curious about how dietary therapy might support your health in this season of life, feel welcome to respond to this email or get in touch through my website. I’d love to hear from you!

See you here next week 🙂 

Artemisia

Clinical Herbalist | Chinese Medicine

innervillagehealth.com

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