Welcome to Millwoods Acupuncture Centre
 

首页
      English
Millwoods Acupuncture Center
102, 2603 Hewes Way
Edmonton AB,   Canada

Phone: (780) 466-8683
www.acupuncture123.ca
 













 

 

Fruits, Good or Bad?

Be careful what fruit you are eating

By Dr. Martin Wang (MD (China), Ph.D, R. Acupuncturist)

 

Nowadays people like to take more fruits than carbohydrates to maintain their health. Especially for women, they eat much more fruits, or drink fruit juices, but less other foods, with the hope to obtain more vitamins, minerals and to keep their face and body beauty. However, they do not know (from the current education system, they will never know!) that most of the fruits are Cold in biological nature after coming into the body. More taken of such Cold fruits will damage the Spleen system. This system in Chinese Medicine response to the digestion, absorption and the storage and burning of the nutrition (including fat), as well as to sense and monitor body function (including immune defense system)[1]. The result is: one feels bloating, giggling, burping, heart burn, diarrhea, and chronic fatigue. One will easily gain body weight, one of the worst things that worries modern women. Again and again, many more trouble will come since the Spleen system, in Chinese Medicine, is responding to supply vital energy to the other parts of the body. For instance, one may start to feel cold in feet and hands, poor sleeping, palpitation, dry skin, easy sweat, etc. It may also make the cancer growth easier since the Spleen system fails to pass signal to our Heart system[2] to launch a cleansing mechanism to correct the abnormal cell growth in the body.

 

Many women believe that fruits contain more water, which enable skin water-like[3]. They do not know that too much Cold fruits damage the Spleen system, the water we drink can not be evaporated to nourish the tissues and cells in the body[4]; the skin still feels and looks dry, and the hair is fragile, lips are dry too. Their skin looks no bright tint, and looks as obscure, pale and puffy. Cold things come into the body, will press the fire of the body floating up, resulting in acne, skin rash, ulcer in mouth, and sore throat. When no enough fire to warm the lower part of the body, one may feel constipation[5], frequent urine, lower desire for sexual life, and for women, may have more discharge and pain in the lower stomach before the period.

 

In some culture, people bring fruits to visit ill friends in the hospital. They are kind heart of course wishing the friends get recovery sooner by taking the fresh fruits. However, the patients are usually weak in the stomach-spleen system after heavy disease stress. More Cold fruits will make them weaker in the defense system to against disease attack. The cold fruits will actually work as spill a bowl of cold water to the fire in winter.

 In Chinese Medicine Bible, it is said that fruits can be used as assistant to health. Assistant means that it can be taken occasionally, not as routine diet. If one takes fruits as the main meal daily, they risk their health actually.

You should understand that we are not recommending you NOT to eat fruits, but recommend that you should take the kinds of fruits according to your body nature. If your body nature is Cold, you should take relatively more Warm fruits, and if your body nature belongs to Fire, you should of course take relatively more Cold fruits[6].

Cold body nature:

If you have following feelings or conditions, your body belongs to Cold:

desire to spice food, like hot pepper, garlic, onion;

like warm or hot drinks;

easy to have ulcer in mouth and have sour throat but no fever;

easy to have diarrhea with little stomach pain from time to time or easy shift to constipation;

urine is long and clear as pure water;

cold in feet and hands;

easy to catch cold or flu;

frequent onset of allergic reactions, such as skin rash, asthma, sinus problem;[7]

easy to have sweat after mild physical or emotional works;

easy to have palpitation, short of breath;

pale or dark as black in lips;

have purple or black tint in the tongue;

have white or black tongue covering;

feel chronic fatigue, drowsy in daytime;

feel less ambitions for work and life;

tend to have less talk, or with low voice in talk;

for women, the discharge is more and white in color but without strong odor.;

pulse feels weak or deep;[8]

Fire body nature:

 

If you have following feelings or conditions, your body belongs to Fire:

craving to less spicy food;

wish to have room temperature or cold drinks;

have dry mouth and eyes;

desire to drink more water;

tends to have constipation and gas;

urine is short but frequent with hot feelings in the urine tract;

no sweat but more hot flash;

or sweat follows the hot flash;

poor sleep with more dreams;

feel discomfort hot in the palm and/or sole;

irrigable, annoyed and easy to get upset;

tend to talk and the voice is loud.

For women, the discharge might be less but with strong terrible odor and the period tends to be earlier;

pulse feels floating and faster;

For quite a few people, the body nature is not so clear to make a conclusion. One may feel as to the Cold, but some other phenomenon makes him suspecting as Fire body too. This is a quite common clinic situation.[9] For one with clear Cold body nature, but suddenly have extreme headache, fever, red in face, deafness, dizziness, sour throat, diarrhea, extremely bad odor from mouth or body, bleeding from gum, nose, eye, anus… similar to the onset of a Fire, it is not the true Fire but a very dangerous condition: the body’s primary life fire[10] comes out now. If we do not know this, and misdiagnosed it to use large amount of Cold remedies for the treatment, such as Cold herbs or large amount of biotics, the doctor actually speeds up the exhaust of the one’ life.

If you cannot make clear decision, ask your Traditional Chinese Medicine doctor. [11]

Many times, the nature of the body can also change after medical treatment/intervention. If you take too much Cold medicine, such as Cold herbs[12] or antibiotics, the body could shift to Cold; and if we take too much Fire medicine for a long time, such as Hot herbs or Steroid compounds, the body may turn to Fire.

Now let us see what kinds of fruits belong to Cold and what to Fire:

Fruits that belong to and have biological property as Fire (or warm):

Plum (mei); Peach (tao); Apricot (Xing); Chinese date; Langon (long yan); Chinese hawthorn (shan zha); Litchi (Li zhi); Chinese Flowering Quince (mu gua); Chestnut (Li zi);

 

http://www.wellpict-european.com/12-plum.htm

(Fire fruit – Plum)                 

 

Fruits that belong to and have biological property as Cold:

 

Apple; Pear; Persimmon (Shi zi); Banana; Straw Berry; Watermelon; Orange, Kiwi, and Mango.  

 

                                (Cold fruit – Apple)

Fruits that belong to neutral property (neither too Cold or Fire): Grape and Pineapple.

Cold fruits balance the Fire body nature[13]; but worse the Cold body nature, resulting in the slow down of the transport and metabolism of the fat tissue, and then the bad result is: over weight.

 

(Grape is neutral in nature)

 

On the other hands, Fire food balance the Cold body[14], but makes the health condition worse for the body nature that belongs to Fire already. It will makes the one more dry in mouth, having red eyes, burning session in the urine, poor sleep, irrigable, or more acne, or skin rash.

Now you understand that fruits affect our health not only by supplying us vitamins, minerals, pectin and water, but also cause some troubles if we do not take them in a proper way.

Now we turn back to the old Traditional Chinese Bible and realize that for most people with over weight, the reason is mostly the stagnation of the function of the Spleen system in the body, which has been damaged by long term taking of Cold beverages (include ice cream) and Cold fruits[15]. With the Warm herb therapy, combined with acupuncture and special losing-weight massage, our lose weight program works much better than ever!

Now, if you know that your body nature is Cold, so you take much more Hot fruits and no Cold fruits at all, or if your body nature is Hot, so you take only Cold fruits but no Hot fruits, you are wrong again. We should not go from one extreme to another.

The best way concerning the fruit taking is if your body nature is Cold, you should take two parts of the Hot fruits but one part of the Cold fruits, wise versa. We mean relatively, not absolutely yes or no. We should also consider the nature of other food we are eating and drinking together with fruits.

Also we mean the relatively balance of the Cold and Hot nature of the diet within a day or two, not means within every meal. You do not need to do things so precise. In one meal, you may take more apple, and in next meal, you can take more plum or some other Hot food or drinks.

Considering that we also take vegetables every day and the vegetables may also be Cold or Hot in nature. If you have taken more Cold Fruits, you can take more Hot vegetables to balance it. You can still enjoy your fruits!

Hot vegetables:

Hot pepper; ginger; garlic; leaf mustard (Jie cai); rutabaga (Da Tou cai); pumpkin; sword bean (Dao dou);

http://www.sciencenews.org/pages/sn_arc98/5_23_98/food.htm        http://www.umassvegetable.org/soil_crop_pest_mgt/crops/rutabaga.html

 

http://www.lifebeginsat30.com/jen/2005/10/index.html  http://scienceblogs.com/clock/2007/07/hot_peppers_why_are_they_hot_1.php    frozen green sword beans

Cold vegetables:

Tomato; bitter gourd (Ku gua);celery (Qing cai); spinach (Bo cai); amaranth (Xian cai); rape (You cai); radish (Luo bo); Eggplant (Qie Zi); Cucumber (Huang gua); Wax Gourd (Dong gua); Towel gourd (Si gua); Mushroom; Green bean spouts; Romaine lettuce (Sheng cai);  

 

http://aggie-horticulture.tamu.edu/extension/Texascrops/root_tuber/index.html            outdoor,  gourd 
family,  abundance, 
 the world of 
vegetables,  food. 
fotosearch - search 
stock photos, 
pictures, images, 
and photo clipart

 

Vegetables not Hot or Cold (e.g. balanced):

Cabbage (Juan Xin Cai); Sweet potato (Yu tou); Carrot (Hu Luo bo); Potato; Hyacinth bean (Bian dou); pea (Wan dou); cowpea (Jiang dou); Young soya bean (Mao dou); yellow bean sprouts (Huang dou ya); Kidney bean (Yun dou); Black edible fungus (Hei mu er); Xianggu mushroom; Straw mushroom (Cao gu); Cauliflower (Hua cai).

 

http://www.goodnessdirect.co.uk/cgi-local/frameset/detail/F10900.html http://www.britannica.com/eb/art/print?id=97726&articleTypeId=1    http://www.1-language.com/eslflashcards/carrot.htm

 

    http://www.seedfest.co.uk/seeds/cauliflower/cauliflower.html click to enlarge

\

You may ask what about the main diet every day. Yes, we know that corn is Cold and millet is Hot in nature.

Green tea is Cold but fertilized tea, such as Wu Long tea, Tie Guan Yin tea, are neutral-warm. Coffee is Hot, of course, which causes constipation,  - just let you know.

You know what you should do.

Now you may feel easier to understand that not every one should take more garlic[16]; not every one should drink at least 8 cups of water every day; and not every one should take hands of vitamins and mineral tablets (especially if they are artificial products). [17] Each people is different.

We are the product of Nature God, not the product from automatic resembling lines!



[1] This is one of the reasons that a cancer cell can exist in the body without being prevented for abnormal growth. The biological function of spleen, heart, lung, kidney and liver in the Traditional Chinese Medicine is largely different from the conventional medicine.

[2] One of the functions of the Heart system is as the king, control and make sure that every part of the body functions properly. The spleen responsible to report to the Heart any abnormal situation in the body.

[3] They do not test if there skin will be such water-like when they drink much water per se. How humidity the skin is does not depend only on the amount of water coming into our body, unless we are in a extreme thirsty condition. If we do not feel thirsty, more water will damage our Kidney system, making the kidney cells work hard to filter the extra water, and the circulation system working hard to transport the extra water too. You should know that the water that comes into the body, can come into the circulation, but not necessarily into the space between the cells (we call it connective tissue) or into the cells.  

[4] This is another function of the Spleen system in the body.

[5] No wonder there are so many people in the North America having constipation!

[6] Note that we mean “relatively”, not “absolutely”.

[7] Cold herbs are needed from time to time to make a quick control of the allergic onset, but for prevention, the Hot herbs to correct the Spleen function are more important. In our clinic, we also use Hot herbal formula to control the allergic reactions.

[8] Normally, pulse is deeper in winter but floating in summer, and deeper in overweight one than in slim one. So doctor should be careful to identify the normal pulse and the abnormal pulse.

[9] This is true when disease come deeper into the Shao Yin and Jue Yin stages.

[10] There are two kinds of life Fire in the body. One is the primary life Fire, which comes into the body during the birth from heritage and is hidden and stored in the Kidney system. It comes to work to assist our body to combat life threatening stress in extreme conditions, such in extreme cold, hot, stress, trauma, hungry, tired, less sleep, etc.. Hormones such as cortisones are part of the primary life Fire. Our daily life is maintained by the later life Fire, which comes from the diet though the works of the Spleen system. The later life Fire from the Spleen system nourishes and maintains the primary life Fire in a rich condition ready to work anytime when our body is under extreme conditions, such as extreme cold, hot, hungry, tired, fear, stress, etc.  If the Spleen system is weak, so less the later life Fire and also the primary life Fire. It will result in less overall defense system of the body to again life stress including the virus and bacteria attacks.

 

[11] Here is one of the challenges for a TCM doctor to identify the patient in a true or false Yin Xue and Yang Kang condition.  “Xue” means deficiency and  “Kang” means “extra” condition. If it is in a true Yin deficiency and Yang Kang condition, Gingseng products work well, otherwise it is forbidden. The Yin-Yang diagnosis is much difficult to learn than the Five-Element diagnosis system – the writer’s clinic experience.

[12] As we know that many women with over weight is under the Cold body condition. The major reason for their overweight is the weakness of the Spleen system. However, many lose weight program works to cause diarrhea. It will further more damage the Spleen system. Here we have to remind that never evaluate a herbal therapy to see its ingredient, but its final function. For instance, the herb Da Huang belongs to Cold herb, it is one of the major ingredient in many weight loss herb formula, but if there are other ingredients in a formula work together to warm the Spleen, the whole formula might be the good one to loss weight but also make the Spleen system stronger.

[13] A good example for this is the taking of Cold fruits by people who drinks cow’s milk or take lots of dairy products.

[14] A good example for this case is the taking of hot pepper by people who usually like warm water, feeling cold in hands and feet.

[15] This is especially wrong in summer, in which the inside of the body is already in a “cold” condition. More Cold beverage and fruit or other things will further more ‘freeze” the inside of the body, retard the function of the Spleen system, resulting in the slow down of the fat tissue metabolism to cause accumulation of fat in the stomach area.

[16] Garlic belongs to “Fire” food, as other spicy food. It is not suitable for one with Fire body nature.

[17] Any ingredient, once isolated from its nature source, may have different therapeutical property compared with its original source, so may yield different hazard to the body. This is why a so called “active ingredient” of a herb, once isolated and purified, no longer functions as its original form for the treatment and shows more side effects – it becomes as many artificial chemical drugs. To isolate “active ingredient” from herbs has been proven completely wrong effort in last decade!