TCM has a really good explanation for this, and it’s not “drink more water”. Okay so here’s something that honestly confused me for the longest time. You can be drinking water constantly, like, doing everything right, carrying your Stanley cup everywhere, hitting your two litres, whatever it is, and still feel parched, have dry lips,…
Category: Alternative Medicine
What Gua Sha Is Really Doing Beneath the Skin
The first time my practitioner scraped a smooth wooden tool along my skin and left those deep red marks behind, I won’t lie, I wasn’t sure what to think. It looked intense and scary, if I’m being honest. It felt strange too, and nobody around me had even heard of it before. But after that…
Understanding Yin in Women’s Health
There’s a particular kind of tired that doesn’t go away with a good night’s sleep. You rest, but you don’t actually recover. You’re functioning, technically, but something underneath feels dry and depleted, like you’ve been drawing from a well that nobody’s been refilling. I’ve been feeling like that for years, and it’s what the first…
The Link Between My Gut and My Trigeminal Neuralgia
For years I treated my trigeminal neuralgia as a face problem. It lived in my jaw, my cheek, my sinus, so naturally that is where I focused. I saw dentists, tried medications, managed flares as they came. The idea that my digestive system had anything to do with nerve pain in my face honestly would…
The Organ That Doesn’t Exist (But Runs Everything)
Okay, so here’s one that’s going to make your head spin a little. In Traditional Chinese Medicine, there’s an organ, actually one of the most important ones, that doesn’t physically exist the way we think of organs in Western medicine. No tissue. No exact spot in the body you can point to. You won’t find…
Holistic Nutritionist vs Dietitian vs Naturopath: What’s the Difference?
If you’ve ever tried to eat better, feel better, or just understand what your body actually needs, you’ve probably come across terms like dietitian, naturopath, and holistic nutritionist… and thought, okay… but what’s the difference? Because on the surface, they can seem pretty similar. They all talk about food. They all talk about health. And…
What Holistic Nutrition Actually Is (And What It Isn’t)
When people hear “holistic nutritionist,” it can bring up a lot of different assumptions. Some think it means restrictive eating, others picture a long list of supplements, and some aren’t quite sure what it actually involves. In reality, it’s usually much simpler and more grounded than it sounds. For me, it started during a time…
The TCM Organ Clock
Your body has a schedule. Here’s what it’s doing every two hours. Your body at 3pm versus 3am feels different for a reason. It’s not only that you’re tired, your body is actually operating differently in the background. Different systems become more active at different times of day, things like digestion, hormone production, energy regulation,…
When Your Mind Won’t Slow Down (A Gentle Look at Anxiety Through TCM)
Do you ever feel like your mind is busy all the time, like it won’t quiet down no matter what you try? It might not only be your thoughts. Sometimes your body is asking for a different kind of support, and that’s worth paying attention to. You finally sit down at the end of the…
Wei Qi: Your Body’s Invisible Shield
Some days I stride through the cold without a second thought. Other days I wince at the slightest breeze on my neck. It wasn’t until I started paying attention to those sensitivities that I truly began to understand Wei Qi. What Is Wei Qi? (衛氣) Before we reach for explanations, let’s begin with experience. I never really…
The Perimenopause Tea: 4 Ingredients, Centuries of Wisdom
Perimenopause can feel like your body suddenly has a mind of its own. Hot flashes, 3 a.m. wake-ups, brain fog that has you walking into a room and forgetting why you went in there. It’s a lot. And while there’s no single fix for any of it, I wanted to share something that’s been part…
One Year In: What Holistic Nutrition Has Taught Me So Far
One year into studying Holistic Nutrition. Somehow I’m already a third of the way through, which honestly feels a little surreal. I’ve got two years to go, though depending on how life moves, and how many times I have to read the same paragraph before it actually sinks in, who knows. I may finish sooner….
Feeling Off-Balance? How the Five Elements Explain Your Energy
Ever wake up after a full night’s sleep and still feel completely drained? Or just flat, unmotivated, restless for no obvious reason? Same. And for a long time I thought something was just wrong with me. It’s your body trying to tell you something, and one of the oldest frameworks for understanding those signals is…
Stuck, Bloated, and Tired? Your Body Might Be Full of Dampness
For a long time, I thought it was just the heat. Every late summer, I’d slow down. Sluggish, foggy, heavy in a way that didn’t match how I was eating or sleeping. Even simple tasks felt like they took more effort than they should. It wasn’t until I learned about Dampness in Traditional Chinese Medicine…
Light, Sweet, and Healing (Snow Fungus Dessert Soup)
We’ve been dealing with lingering dry coughs in our house lately, the kind that leaves your throat scratchy and uncomfortable. The weather has been all over the place, so I did what my mom always did and made snow fungus dessert soup, 糖水. So What Is It? It’s a light, slightly sweet Chinese dessert soup…