How to tell if your body has dampness?

Dampness is a TCM condition caused by pathogenic dampness that can trigger diseases such as eczema. There are quite a lot of clinical methods that can be used to drive away moisture from the body, such as some Chinese patent medicines. Of course, dampness does not mean that the body feels damp, because excessive dampness often causes other symptoms, such as fatigue in the limbs, headache, weakness, etc. So how can you determine if there is too much moisture in your body?

1. Look at the stool:

What kind of stool is normal? "Golden yellow, cylindrical; banana-shaped, and very smooth."

(1) If the stool is unformed and loose for a long time, it must be due to dampness in the body.

(2) If the stool is formed, but there is always some sticky material on the toilet bowl after defecation that is difficult to flush down, this is also a sign of dampness in the body, because dampness has the characteristics of stickiness.

(3) If it is not convenient to observe the toilet, you can also observe the toilet paper. If the stool is normal, it can be wiped clean with one piece of toilet paper. But for people with dampness in their bodies, one piece of toilet paper is not enough, and it takes three to five pieces to wipe it clean.

(4) If you are constipated and your stool is unformed, it means that there is a lot of moisture in your body. The stickiness of the moisture causes the stool to stick to the intestines and be absorbed by the intestines, preventing it from being excreted from the body. In this way, fecal toxins enter the blood and all kinds of diseases arise. However, general doctors often treat the disease based on symptoms without understanding that the root cause of the disease lies in the dampness in the body, and they treat it indiscriminately, which is an even more terrifying thing.

2. Look at the state of getting up:

Some people still feel sleepy when they should get up at seven o'clock every morning. They feel like something is wrapped around their heads and makes them unable to concentrate, or they feel like something is wrapped around their bodies and makes them too lazy to move. Then, without looking at the tongue or the stool, you can judge that there is a lot of dampness in his body. In traditional Chinese medicine, it is said that "dampness is heavy like a wrap." This feeling of being wrapped is the body's perception of dampness, which is as uncomfortable as wearing a washed but not dried shirt.

Dampness can be divided into damp-heat and cold-dampness. If it is damp-heat, the tongue coating should be yellow and greasy, and the tongue quality should be red, while if it is cold-damp, the tongue coating should be white and greasy. Most importantly, the tongue quality is not that red, and is often very light in color, pale white. This is one way to differentiate.

Dampness is heavy and sticky in nature. It can block the flow of Qi and hinder the spleen's function of transporting and transforming energy. This is called "dampness blocking the spleen" in traditional Chinese medicine. If it is exogenous dampness, common symptoms include chills and fever, sweating but the fever does not subside, drowsiness in the limbs, joint and muscle pain, etc.; if it is internal dampness blocking the stomach and intestines, common symptoms include chest tightness, difficulty urinating, loss of appetite, loose stools, etc.

Where does dampness come from? In traditional Chinese medicine, there are two types: external dampness and internal dampness.

1) External dampness is mostly caused by humid climate, wading through water and rain, and damp living environment. Humidity is highest in the long summer, so there are many damp diseases. In the misty rain in the south of the Yangtze River, people on the street don’t carry umbrellas at all, which will allow moisture to enter the body. If you sweat at this time, problems will be more likely to occur. There are also people who were in good health in the city, but later moved to live near a reservoir in the countryside. They thought the air was good, but they were always sick. In fact, this was also caused by not being able to adapt to the humidity there.

2) Another type of dampness is internal dampness, which is the product of pathological changes of the disease. It is mostly caused by alcohol addiction or excessive consumption of raw and cold food, which leads to the malfunction of spleen yang and the internal generation of dampness. For example, frequently drinking ice beer, cold drinks, etc. will damage the spleen yang, which will cause heavy dampness; sometimes people lack exercise, which will lead to insufficient circulation of qi and blood, and then the yang qi will not rise well, which will also cause heavy internal dampness, because yang qi is the most important means to control dampness.