February 20, 2024 • 58 mins
My guest today is Dr. Debbie Lee. Debbie is a Registered Doctor of Traditional Chinese Medicine. She is a mama to two adorable little humans and is one of my close friends with whom I can talk about my feelings and emotions.
In this episode, we talk about our Chinese mothers who used to make us drink herbal decoctions, and we might or might not have poured the decoctions down the sink when our mothers were not paying attention. My mother never found out, but Debbie got caught. :)
We also discuss herbal medicine, how COVID affected the businesses in Chinatown, especially herbal stores, how to strengthen your body with the upcoming allergy season, and what one can do as one enters menopause.
Dr. Debbie Lee is a Registered Doctor of Traditional Chinese Medicine. Her studies include completing a two-month practicum at Taiwan’s China Medical University Hospital, the leading teaching hospital in the country. Debbie has a special interest in treating auto-immune disorders. Incorporating her Kinesiology background, she effectively treats any pain issues, including sciatica, shoulders, neck and back pain, headaches and migraines, to name a few.
Debbie's website
Referenced in this episode
Book: The Menopause Manifesto: Own Your Health with Facts and Feminism by Dr. Jen Gunter
Instagram account AlterEgo Health
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:03):
So when I was savvy enough to know thatI could move the chair to the sink and
just dump that and not have to do that,I did do that and I got in big trouble.
Did you only do it once?
Oh yeah.
You kidding me?
I don't dare do that again.
You two are so good to each other, Iwould just hold my nose and go down it.
No, you needed three, you neededmore than two hands because you had
(00:25):
the cup, you can't plug your nose.
And then grab the cereal bowl, so youhad to have the cereal bowl, like the
cereal, in your hand whilst drinking it.
As we're entering menopause, we become yindeficient, and yin is responsible for all
(00:49):
fluids in the body, and blood is a fluid.
And so that's exactly whatmenopause is, the drying up of yin.
So our menses stop, we might start gettingdry eyes, like you say the skin dries
out, and then we have some skin problems.
So, when we have a deficiency,that's exactly that gas tank.
The gas tank is empty, so wheredo you have the fuel to be able
(01:11):
to do this intense exercise orthe to do list is 20 feet high?
We don't have the staminato plow through that.
Welcome to Conversations withYour Chinese Auntie Podcast.
Your host, Patricia Peterson, hasconversations with BIPOC folks about
life, shares wisdom, and discussestheir experience with topics like
(01:34):
growing up in an immigrant family,racism, and the sense of belonging.
In this podcast, we givevoice to people of color, and
learn more about their lives.
So, join your Chinese auntie, as she has.
Compelling conversationswith fascinating people.
Without any further ado, let'sdive head first into this episode.
(02:02):
My guest today is Dr.
Debbie Lee.
Debbie is a registered doctorof traditional Chinese medicine.
She is a mama to two adorable littlehumans, and she is one of my closest
friends with whom I can talk about.
my feelings and emotions.
Debbie and I have beenfriends for 18 years.
(02:24):
We went to Chinesemedicine school together.
One of our teachers from Chinathought we were sisters and
she could never tell us apart.
We share a love for food and chai tea.
In this episode, we talk aboutour Chinese mothers who used to
make us drink herbal decoctions.
We also discuss herbal medicine,how COVID affected the businesses
(02:47):
in Chinatown, especially the herbalstores, how to strengthen your body
with the upcoming allergy season, andwhat one can do as we enters menopause.
In this episode, you willhear us say a few terms.
TNT.
TNT Supermarkets is a Canadian supermarketchain that sells primarily Asian fruits.
(03:11):
We also use the term Qi, which meansvital energy that circulates in the body.
I hope you enjoy this episode.
Hello, Debbie.
Hello, Patricia.
How's it going?
(03:32):
It's going good.
You came back from vacation and youdodged a really cold, icy weather.
Or did you come back at that time?
I came back on the Saturday.
So it was minus 10 or 12 thatday, but it wasn't snowy or icy.
It was just really cold.
Yeah.
And that snowed.
Yeah.
(03:52):
I know you and I are like.
Nope.
Our South Asian blood doesnot like this weather.
Yeah, but you'll grow up back east though.
I did.
So I did grow up with it and I still don'tthink I liked the weather, but I've had
exposure to it and I'm very used to havingone to three feet of snow all winter long.
(04:16):
So please introduce yourself,who you are, what you do.
My name is Debbie Lee.
I am a traditionalChinese medicine doctor.
I am a mom of two young kids and I'vebeen in practice for 15 years now.
I'm in my 15th year.
(04:37):
Yeah.
I was thinking the other day, you andI have known each other for 20 years.
Yeah.
2005.
That's when we started school.
Started school.
And yeah, so you and I metin Chinese medicine school.
Yes.
That was good.
We did good.
We made it . We made itthrough psych and it was crazy.
(05:04):
It was because he did thefive year program too.
I did.
Yeah.
We still did the fiveyear schooling together.
? Yeah.
Oh man.
Yeah.
Those were long years.
I remember just plowing through.
Yeah, and I was working twojobs when I was in school.
You remember that?
But that was very tiring.
What did you do before that?
(05:24):
I think we were both the same.
I think we both had to work and goto school because we were supporting
ourselves through that journey.
Before that, when I graduated fromuniversity with a kinesiology degree,
I somehow landed myself in IT asa career for, I think I did it for
(05:46):
about five or six years until Irealized that I did not want to be in
that kind of career or job setting.
I had gone and enrolled in a kinesiologydegree with the intention of working
(06:06):
in the health care field, but I didn'tknow what to, what I wanted to do.
After I graduated, I thoughtabout chiropractic college.
I thought about RMT college.
I just hadn't wasn't 100 percentin to any of those decisions.
So I worked because I needed to work andthat's where I found myself in my early
(06:32):
twenties and then it wasn't until I waslike 28 when I was really having a hard
time with the whole IT stint, so I hadbeen thinking about Chinese medicine
for a long while prior to enrolling, andwhen I was ready, that's when I enrolled.
(06:56):
How did you come to, like,Chinese medicine position?
Were you single?
And acupuncturist?
No, I had a lot of influence growing up ina traditional Chinese medicine household.
Both of my parents are from China.
My mom was born, both of themwere born and raised in China.
And then when my mom was reallyyoung, she moved to Hong Kong.
(07:19):
And in Hong Kong, they're really aboutthe soups and like food, the food
therapy, the food diet, according toChinese medicine or Chinese culture,
which is really Chinese medicine.
So we grew up with alot of that influence.
We always have had to drinka soup after dinner, always.
(07:40):
And that soup, now that I know what sheputs in it, they were filled with tonics.
They were filled with chi tonics,blood tonics, yang tonics.
They were filled with lung supportduring the cold and flu season.
Also to help support our menstrual cycles.
They had a lot of that support.
(08:01):
So she always made us drink soup and the,it would always be save room for soup.
So no matter how much you atedinner, you always had to make
sure you saved room for soup.
So we drank soup every day.
So that was.
My exposure and then when we were sick,she would make her other cocktails
for cold and flu or stomach bugSo we grew up just drinking pretty
(08:25):
much what would be Roddick auctions.
So that was that exposure My dadused to teach Tai Chi at the church.
So we had a lot of exposure with Theconcept of Taoism and what martial
art looks like and what it does.
He taught my mom, he tried to teachus, but we were too young to learn.
(08:46):
So unfortunately, none of the kids knowhow to do Tai Chi, just my mom and dad.
And then my sister, one of mysisters, went to chiropractic
college in the States and she didacupuncture as one of her electives.
And growing up, we all playeda lot of sports, so we were
laden with sports injuries.
(09:07):
And I just remember one timeI hurt my shoulder playing
volleyball and she acupunctured it.
I was so scared of the needles.
She did four needles,just on the rotator cuff.
And it, I was probably 16, andit, I couldn't believe how Much.
It helped always remember that.
(09:28):
And so.
I went into a kinesiology programwith the intent, like I said, of
doing something health related, butI didn't know what I wanted to do
and I didn't want to, I really wantedto make sure when I went back to
school, that was what I wanted to do.
So I didn't want to go to school and thenquit and do something else or do it and
(09:48):
then have to go back to school again.
So that's how come I worked after.
So that was, all of that pointed,like, that's why I always had Chinese
medicine in the back of my headbecause it all clicked with me.
My, my path, and then it wasn'tuntil, like I said, I was 28 was
when it all made sense that I wentback to school for Chinese medicine.
(10:11):
Mm hmm.
And you're one of what, six kids?
Five.
Five.
And you're the youngest.
You're the youngest.
So then yours is sort ofan older when you Yeah.
So she's seven years older.
So she Was one of the main reasons whyI wanted to go into healthcare because
of that exposure into the complementaryhealth or the alternative health.
(10:35):
So seeing, learning about that ata young age through her studies
and becoming a chiropractor andwe all played a lot of sports.
So we were very active that way.
So it just made sense for meto follow that path for myself.
Do you make the soups for your kids?
(10:58):
I, I cheat and I do a lotof herb herbal tincture.
The problem with thesoups is that it stinks.
It's true.
The raw, the cooked shouldn't stink.
I do make them, but Iwouldn't say I do them often.
They also take a lot oftime, which I don't have.
Fortunately, pediatric tinctures areglycerin based, so they're very safe.
(11:20):
It's not super customized,but it's better than nothing.
So, both of our husbands are white.
Will your husband drinkit if you make soup?
Mine is not a big fan.
And the soups, maybe not somuch, but the formulas, yes.
So they come in like a patentformula as comes in the capsule.
(11:42):
So those are the easiest.
I do have granules.
Those ones taste the worst.
People do it.
They're also, I find, thestrongest, if you're not decocting.
And then there are tinctures, whichare the easiest to administer.
I don't find them as strong as thegranules, but I think when you, we've
(12:06):
been introducing it for so long thatnow it's no, it's part of the norm.
Yeah, and I also find in Vancouver, a lotof the herbal stores have shut down, so
it's really hard to find the raw herbs.
Yeah, I don't have a herbal pharmacy inmy clinic yet due to space, but I'm just
(12:29):
starting my research on how to make thathappen and how I can build one in the
current space that I have, if possible.
And I, and so that would meanoutsourcing raw herbs, and how
does that look like in my practice?
I like the option of being able towhip up a formula right then and there,
(12:51):
because the hard part of outsourcingis you don't get it right away.
Yeah, and I am excited for you to dothat, to be able to have a dispensary
in your space, because there's notmany in Nashville who are doing it.
No, and I think COVID really slammed alot of those Chinese herbal pharmacies,
like in Chinatown, or, bet you alot of them would be in Richmond,
(13:14):
but I don't go out that way at all.
The one, the main one in Richmond that Iused to go to for years, they also shut.
I think there's a couple onVictoria Drive that I've heard.
Yeah.
But yeah, I don't, I rarely do raw,like only for myself, if that, but
like I said, it takes forever todetox and it's, my kids have sharp
(13:42):
senses of smell, so I hear about it.
My, my husband, if I makeanything like funny, he'll come
up, he goes, what's that smell?
Then I'll tell him.
Then he goes, Oh, okay.
Then he's fine with it.
Yeah.
My husband, he does it.
He, if I do make something, he'llpalate it, but I don't think his
(14:07):
taste factor is as refined in termsof Chinese medicine as ours probably.
Well, I mean, traditionally growingup in Singapore, when my mom used
to force us to drink these things.
You get the plum afterwards.
Oh, yeah, yeah.
Sour plum, and then it'ssour and sweet, right?
Yeah, we would just eat that for fun.
(14:28):
I remember those.
We did too, but for a while there,when we were younger, we didn't get it
unless she made us drink the cautions.
Oh, yeah, we, I remember my momused to make ginseng once a year
(14:53):
and it would be really expensive.
So there's five of us.
So she would spend a lot of moneyon probably Siberian ginseng once.
It'd make it once a year for usto drink and it was so bitter.
And I just wrote, I probablywas like six or seven.
(15:14):
And I remember pulling a chair upto the sink and just dumping it.
And so, no, you didn't.
I got in so much trouble becauseit's like a hundred bucks a cup.
But we, and my sisters, oh man, we,I got in big trouble for that one,
but we would have an art to it.
(15:35):
So my, I have three sisters anda brother, my old, my brother, my
oldest sister off to university.
So it was just the twosisters and I often times.
So we would have.
Ginseng, a cup of ginseng,a bowl of cereal, and the
other person to hold the nose.
And we, it would be the art.
You plug your nose, someone wouldplug your nose, you drink the cereal,
(15:56):
someone has the bowl of cereal rightthere, you grab your hand in it and
shove it in your mouth to get the tasteout, and we would do that every year.
So when I was savvy enough to know thatI could move the chair to the sink and
just dump that and not have to do that,I did do that, and I got in big trouble.
Did you only do it once?
Oh yeah, you kidding me?
I don't dare do that again.
(16:18):
You guys are so good to eachother, I just, I would just,
just hold my nose and go down it.
No, you needed three, you neededmore than two hands, because you had
the cup, you can't plug your nose.
And then grab the cereal bowl.
So you had to have the cereal bowl, likethe cereal in your hand whilst drinking
it, and then you, and it wasn't evena lot, it was like maybe half a cup or
(16:39):
three quarters of a cup, just shoot itdown and drop the cereal in your mouth.
Yeah.
But you'll explain deficiency.
So you, you're like.
The bitterness made it worse.
Now that I know what I know about herbalmedicine, I do, I did challenge my mom
once about the decoction that she made me.
(17:01):
And growing up, I don't, yoursprobably grew up very similarly.
You don't challenge any authority.
And so I had to do it in a very Ina non challenging way, so I came
home after moving out to Vancouver,I'd come home every year and
she always made me these tonics.
And this was when I was probablyin school and or finished school,
(17:26):
so I knew a lot more about herbalmedicine than I had before going in.
And she made me this soupand it was all tonics.
And I knew I had some stagnationsand heat in my system.
And so I told her, Mom, I can't drinkthat because it's going to flare my heat.
And she, No, you gotta drink it.
(17:47):
It's good for you.
And so you don't argue with mom.
And she, I flew five hours tosee her and she put so much
effort into making the soup.
So I drank it and then I was there fora week and over the next couple days,
few days, I start breaking out in zits.
Oh.
Asian moms, why do you, whatdoes your face look like A lot.
(18:08):
Yeah.
So too much heat.
You know?
Too much heat.
Why do you have so many pimples?
And so I was like, mom, Itold you I had, I have a heat.
And then I drank the soup and nowit's manifesting the heat to come up.
. My mom used to make those herbaldecoctions in those big hots,
like a cauldron with a lid.
(18:31):
And my mom was a midwife.
So she would do either themorning shift that starts at 6:00
AM or she would do, starts at.
Noon ish to eight, and she would make apot of like, herbal decoction that big.
Wow.
And then she would, she was,okay, I'm going to work now, I
(18:53):
expect the three of you to finishthis by the time I come home.
You had to drink it all?
Drink it all.
And like you say, when you'reChinese and you're brought up by
strict parents, you don't argue.
For a while there, I wasquite afraid of my mother.
So I would like, every time Iwalk by it, I would do a cup.
Walk by it, I would do a cup.
And then I look at mysiblings, they're not doing it.
(19:13):
I'm the youngest too.
And like, you guys never drink thiswithout mom's going to be really upset.
Nobody's drinking it.
But as you get older, you learn that.
Maybe we can just pourthis down the drain.
Oh, you did the same, andyou didn't get caught.
And it like, black in color, and it waslike, things got quick sticking out.
(19:37):
And when you're like 9, 10, 11 yearslooking at it going, what is this thing,
and then it's better, and then it smells.
Okay, now you and I have the education,we like, we appreciate it now, but
at that time you're like, Yeah.
And they don't tell you what it is.
They just say drink it, right?
There's no explanation.
It's do this and you have to do it.
(19:57):
You follow orders.
I mean, there's a, I was talking toanother Chinese medicine practitioner
friend the other day and I wastelling her I used to go to these
herbal shops with my mom and Iwould see the herbalists packing it.
You know, they use a packet in thispaper and sometimes I will see what he
(20:18):
put in there, like insects and stuff.
And as a child, you don't know, like,some of these, like, insects have.
Good properties.
Now, a lot of these are all banned,but I'm standing there looking at
the package going, Oh no, you justgot to make the cautions out of this.
And she's going to makeus drink it and stuff.
(20:48):
I wanted you to talk about how to withChinese medicine to prepare for the
upcoming spring season, especiallyallergies from an acupuncture standpoint.
And if you're susceptible toallergies and you know, the month
of when Something would bloom thatyou're sensitive to like for me.
It's I'm very sensitiveto cherry blossoms.
(21:10):
We're Typically who knows now withglobal warming would bloom around April.
So I normally tell people To prepare forthe allergy season a month in advance
and that's just to improve circulationDecrease inflammation as best as we
(21:31):
can When you do that, then your immunesystem works a lot smoother, and so not
necessarily am I boosting it particularly,but those are the methodologies
that I think about in boosting it.
There are lifestyle and dietary stuffthat you can do, so in Chinese medicine,
the spring season belongs to the liver,qi, so in Chinese medicine, We use
(21:59):
the names of organs to describe the qiof the meridians and how we go about
diagnosing according to Chinese medicine.
So the spring season is also a goodtime to maybe do a liver cleanse or
think about cleaning out the liver.
A lot of bitter foods go to the liver.
(22:19):
There is a lot of liver cleanses outthere that are mainly supplements.
So a lot of I find a lot of liverherbs that Western supplement
companies use are dandelion, bootplura, um, what else is there?
Yeah, so basically a lot of those,if you were to go to like Finlandia
(22:42):
or Whole Foods, a lot of those liverherbs are those kinds of Western
herbs that also are Chinese herbs,but they're named in their Latin name.
So.
They basically all havebitter qualities to it.
Any food to avoid?
Sweets.
What's sugar?
(23:02):
Sugar is a real sticky product.
And so if you're tryingto clean things out.
Imagine trying to clean out somethingthat's sticky and has goo on it.
It's really difficult to clean out.
Now, when you say sugar, are youtalking, for the listeners, are
you talking about processed sugar?
(23:25):
White sugar?
Are you also talking about like fruits?
Like, sweet vegetables.
It depends on the constitution.
So everyone has a personalconstitution that, uh, is very unique.
So some people might be okay with fruits,and then even with fruits, there's Some
(23:46):
fruits that kind of are more sticky forme than others, like tropical banana,
yes, or bananas are very sticky as well.
We call that dampness.
Um, and so there are a lot of foods thatcreate more dampness than other fruits.
Berries are typically, I find prettygood, like the more, less sweet the
(24:08):
fruit, like granny smith apples, theless damp it will form, in my opinion.
Refined sugars, no one shouldbe eating in my opinion.
It does nothing helpful for the system.
And then some people are evensensitive to like honey and maple
syrup or even natural sugars.
(24:28):
So it really depends on the constitution.
For myself, I have the TCM constitutionthat's very sensitive to all sugars.
And so my system createsdampness really quickly.
So I have to really be mindful of thesweets that I eat, even including natural.
naturally producing sweets.
Yeah, I'm similar with you todeafness and my allergy season
(24:51):
starts March and goes to June.
The other thing you can do, yeah,I'm like April to June as well.
There's something in June that kicked up.
Cottonwood.
Yeah, I don't, I, yeah, it was, Idon't know, it was the last five
years that something kicked up.
The other thing you can do is youcan also strengthen your lung chi,
which is usually a lot of white foods.
(25:13):
In Chinese food options, thisis where TNT is really helpful.
You have the lily bulbs,which you can buy dried.
You have water chestnuts, whichyou can buy fresh or in the can.
You've got the white fungus thatlooks like a pink flower with
a little bit of orange in themiddle, and it's usually dried.
(25:34):
There is, like, a lot of those, like, in,at TNT, they have those, like, soup mix
that has a lot of the white things in it.
Yeah.
There's huangchi, which is a stragglers.
Shanyao, which is Chinese yam,usually has those little apricot
seeds, xingren, which is, they'relike heart shaped little tiny ones.
Those are all really good for the lungs.
(25:56):
And so you can prep yourselfby cleaning out the liver as
well as strengthening the lung.
And I would also say that itis important to remember this
is not like a one time thing.
You got to build up to.
It's true.
And so I like acupuncture whenyou're using, um, the food approach
(26:17):
because acupuncture can help.
My analogy of the system is like a car.
And you've got your gas tank, whichneeds to be full all the time, and
that's where if it's low, then we havethese deficiencies or these weaknesses.
So, the lungs are often low, sothen we don't have that, that
(26:40):
defense system to stave off.
an allergy attack or an allergy invasion.
Then you have the pipes in thecar, which are usually blocked.
And so no matter how full the gas tankis, it will be difficult to go where it
needs to go if the pipes are clogged.
So that's where I findAcupuncture really helpful.
It's a really great way to unclogthe pipes and get circulation moving
(27:04):
to where it needs to go and evenit out so that the immune system.
Is working properly, there's lessinflammation, and so hopefully that
builds onto that immune defenseof allergy or pathogen invasion.
I don't know if this works foreverybody, but for me, when you
(27:24):
talk about the blockages and thecirculation, sometimes I find if I'm
having a really bad allergy day, ifit's not too horrible, I go for a run.
It helps to move things.
And not like a super long run, but evenjust 20 minutes, half an hour, then I
(27:45):
feel better for the rest of the day, andI don't have to take any antihistamine.
Yeah, so that's, as we get older,we're bound to have pipes clogged.
That's just how we age.
And we're bound to haveour gas tank half empty.
So we would call that Uh,deficiency with a stagnation.
There are some, what happens is like whensomething gets stuck, there's a backup.
(28:07):
So that does become excess kind oflike when a pipe is clogged, then
this becomes this backup or buildup.
So then that area becomesexcess, an excess we call it.
So moving your chi is.
Always important, in general, evenif everything is smooth running,
(28:27):
and for people who have low energy,like their tank is just empty, but
they still have these pipes clogged,these, this cheese stagnation, usually
what I tell, My clients is to movetheir chi if they can do that five
minutes a day, that way you don'thave to gear up, go outside for a run.
So that's something that's like doingsome jumping jacks or burpees or if you
(28:51):
have stairs in your house, you can justgo up and down a step, even one step.
I had to do that when I had gestationaldiabetes to work off my meals.
I would just go up and downa step for ten minutes.
If you do 10 minutes after everymeal, that's 30 minutes a day.
If that's even hard to wraparound, start with 5 minutes.
That's 15 minutes a day.
(29:13):
I was able to keep good weight fromthat protocol alone while pregnant.
Because I basically worked out 30 minutesa day, I did a 10 minute thing after
every meal just to break, just to workoff the meal, the sugars, that build up.
Which I also think that is brilliantbecause oftentimes we think
(29:34):
working out needs to be intense.
Yeah.
But, and also that I find trickytoo, oftentimes when I was
still practicing the puncture iswhen you talk to clients about.
Don't go and do intense exercise.
If your energy, your chi is already lowbecause then you're texting the body.
So I love that you say that evenif you just do five minutes after
(29:55):
every meal, three meals a day.
It builds up and it helps to movethe qi to circulate the energy
and helps to move the stagnation.
Yeah, and it gets the heartpumping and the heart.
What does the heart do?
It provides, it produces bloodand provides blood to move
everywhere where blood is redblood cells and that's oxygen.
(30:16):
So you're oxygenatingthe whole system too.
And there's the endorphinsthat come with it.
You feel good, your brainfeels a little bit more clear.
So I usually try to get people tobreak a light sweat whenever possible.
And if that's five, 10 minutes atyour home, I, for me, it's difficult
to do things at home as well.
So I get it.
That's why I try to.
(30:38):
Get people to get introducedto the concept of it by really
having it be a light thing.
Five minutes.
Aim for five minutes a day.
I use an app called FitOn, because theygive you workouts according to time.
And then you can tailorwhich one you want.
Do you want cardio?
Do you want stretching?
So, that's a good intro into it.
(30:59):
Now I know the exercises thathelp with providing that cardio
flow, so I just stick with those.
That's good.
Walking is great too, like walkingis better than nothing as well.
Maybe do a little brisk walk fora minute and then walk normal just
to try to get the heart rate up.
I, yeah, and I love thatstretching too, right?
(31:19):
For people if mobility is harder forthem, but even stretching or doing some
gentle weights that can also start tohelp them with some of that circulation.
One thing I might add, so I had two Csections, so I, I was really laid out
after the second one, and my Chi wasso deficient, the cardio workouts or
(31:40):
anything that I did, I would just researchand find how I can do that all while
laying on the ground, and there are,there's lots out there, so I I just had
no energy, but I knew I needed to movemy blood and my chi and my circulation.
So I just tried to find a lot ofthose exercises on how I can get that
(32:03):
while laying on the ground so that Iwouldn't tax any more energy working
out because the whole point of itis for it to do what it needs to do,
but not tax the system even further.
So we're looking at intensity,duration, and positioning.
Mm hmm.
I love that.
Very unique to every person.
(32:23):
Cool.
Yeah.
I forgot you had two c section.
Yeah, that was horrible.
The recovery.
I don't think I'm fully recovered.
, we should be starts into the next talk.
I just went to a pelvic floor physioyesterday because I'm like, I think I
need to start addressing the C-section
(32:44):
And they're great.
I saw a 2019 for a whileand it was really helpful.
Yeah, that's, it's, uh, it's alway.
I always love.
Learning from other practitioners and howthey view the body and how they approach
healing and try to put it all togetherfor my brain to make sense of it all and
(33:07):
with the kinesiology degree is helpful tohave that background so that I understand
the language, I understand the anatomyand the physiology, and I love learning
about pathologies of how the system works.
So it's nice to learn a newway of looking at the body.
And then how do I translatethat into Chinese medicine?
(33:35):
My dad passed away in 2017.
Well, even though we've known eachother for 20 years, it was only
around that time that you and I reallystarted talking about mental health.
Yeah, we were young and we didn't havethese big jolts in life that made us.
Look at our mental status and alsogrowing up in a Chinese family.
(33:59):
I don't know about your family,but my family that was exist.
It did.
90 exist.
No, depression was not a thing.
You just swept it under therug and you deal with it.
Just, just say you ignore it.
It's not there.
Right.
I would say starting Chinese medicineCollege, because they do talk about the
(34:21):
whole, you know, mind, body, spirit.
In a, in, in school, that was when Istarted learn, like, really exploring
my mental health status, and in general,not just my own, just how do I view the
body, and how do I maximize results.
(34:42):
With my clients with each treatmentthat they come in for and that
emotional psyche is huge in my practice.
It's, we don't have to talk aboutemotions, but I definitely use that as a
major tool in terms of my treatment plan.
(35:03):
And, but I don't know whether you didthis and I did when I was practicing.
I did what you did.
I would consider the clients.
mental health, where they were and stuffand they connected to the organs, right?
Because each organ houses an emotion.
Houses an emotion.
But I didn't apply it tomyself for many years.
(35:23):
Did you?
I didn't think about it.
I think over the past 20 years,I, I've been in and out with
counseling just for various reasons.
It didn't ramp up untilmy dad passed away.
So he passed away two years ago,and that was the first major loss.
And having two young kids makesit really difficult to grieve.
(35:47):
And process that grief.
And I was having a hard time doingthat because I had no space or time
to myself to be able to grieve.
And so it would hit me in theseweird moments where all of a
sudden there'll be a trigger.
It could be a song.
It could be something that I saw.
It could be something someone said,and then I just would start crying.
(36:10):
And that happened for quite some time.
And it was.
Like, it was okay.
I welcomed it and I know that's whatneeded to be done, but I knew I wasn't
dealing with it as best as I wanted to,um, and I knew that if I were to continue.
With that path in grieving thata lot of inflammation would get
(36:33):
stored in my system and that I am sosensitive in terms of, um, my nervous
system that I feel all of that.
That's when the counseling kind of rampedup just to help put a lot of things.
Just give me some tools and alsojust to talk to somebody about the
grieving, about grieving and the law.
Exactly.
(36:54):
Right.
And also, what you say that just nothaving two kids, you're busy and running
your practice, oftentimes there's no spaceand it's good to have someone to talk to.
But and even as friends, we didn'ttalk about it for many years
for mental health because wedidn't have the language for it.
And I am grateful that youand I can talk about it when
we go for soups and chai tea.
(37:17):
Which is our thing.
Yes, but let's go back.
We're gonna go back.
Oh, and I love that we talk about itas if there's no stigma attached to it.
I think that's the hard part isthere's still a large stigma around it.
And, and in my practice, Ireally try to make it a safe
space, um, with no judgment.
(37:37):
And if there is.
Like an emotional component that'spresent, we can talk about it
or we don't, and that's okay.
All I want, biggest thing for meis to know how that is stuck in
the system and how I can move that.
Mm hmm.
It doesn't create more of thisinflammation that I'm talking about
and I think all of that goes somewhere.
(37:58):
Like you've touched upon every,according to Chinese medicine,
every organ houses an emotion.
So with the lung.
But if we talked about the lung earlier,the lung houses the emotion of sadness,
grief, there's a control aspect to it,guilt is a big one, and if someone is
(38:19):
Grieving for a long period of time, oras often feels guilty about stuff, which
was my pattern and probably why I'msusceptible more to catching colds and
being affected by the allergy season.
I just try to work on all of it.
How do I strengthen my lungson a physiological standpoint?
(38:39):
Exercise, eat foods that support thelungs according to Chinese medicine.
And then on the emotionalfront, maybe take a look at Is
there anything I can't let go?
Is there anything I'mfeeling really guilty about?
What am I grieving oram I sad about anything?
And just look at it as awhole picture kind of a thing.
(38:59):
And also that, which you, you talkedabout it just now, it's also that
seeking out other practitionersto help you to move forward.
Not even move forward, but to movewhatever you're feeling so you're not
having to deal with it on your own.
Totally.
When I was, I still get thisquestion sometimes, but when I was
(39:20):
practicing, people would say tome, do you acupuncture yourself?
Do you put needles in yourself?
And I say, yes, when I'm desperate,but it's not the same as going to
see your own practitioner and havingthat 60 minutes where it's just your
time and you're being looked after.
And so your body can do the healing whileyou're there and in time for yourself.
(39:44):
Agreed, yeah.
I didn't, it takes a village.
And that, after having kids,I definitely own that saying.
And with your health team, I'm fortunate.
I have, I built my health team,including those friends that
are of support too, like you.
And.
That's part of it, too.
That's healing in and of itself.
And exactly like you say, I acupuncturemyself, but it's not the same.
(40:08):
I'll acupuncture, like, my knee if ithurts, but I'm not doing I do try to set
the intention every once in a while, butit's, you're right, it's not the same
as fully letting go and letting someoneelse see you in their own eyes and
treating you in terms of what they see.
Because I have, I have my image of myselfof what I think is stuck, but someone else
(40:29):
might see something totally different.
And that's And they'renot incorrect either.
Yeah, for sure.
Um, so the next thing I dowant to ask you is, um, because
two of us are getting older.
Now, now
(40:51):
that I'm in it, I, and a lot of my clientswho have grown with me are also in it.
I realized that it is.
There is not a lot of talk about it.
There's not a lot of education.
It's not talked about.
There's also a littlebit of a stigma, I think.
And I think it's just not well known tothe general Can I say this in the sense
(41:12):
of, like, working moms who For example,it might be in the corporate structure
and they're, they've got young kids andwhen you're going through perimenopause
and menopause, everyone is different.
Everyone goes through it differently.
For me, my brain doesn't remember thoselittle fine details like it used to be.
(41:36):
And I can just imagine, I'm okay.
I still can remember, but I remember beinga lot sharper when I was non transcripted.
Not in this stage, but I just thinkof those working in high, really high
profile jobs that have to perform, andespecially if they're in a work culture
(41:57):
where it's very male dominant still,
is there education in and aroundwhat females go through during
this period to the co workers orto the workplace or employers?
There isn't many, right?
And even on my own research, I'm like,okay, these symptoms are happening.
(42:21):
Okay.
And I know it's a hormone decline, butthere's, it's, there's so much to it.
There is, and also they, and you'reright, especially for those of you in
the corporate, say, workplace, there'sno support, not forgiveness, but look
at it, not just menopause, period.
(42:41):
Nobody's talked, nobodyreally talks about it.
And I'll, my mother didn't talk about it.
I don't know about yours, but my motherdid not initiate when I got my period.
And my mother never talked about whenshe was alive about menopause, but look
back my sister and I can guess the yearsthat she was, went through it because
(43:06):
she was more moody, she was angry,she had hot fleshes, and even living
in Singapore, you could tell she washaving hot fleshes and stuff like that.
So, our mothers didn't talk aboutit, aunties didn't talk about it.
From a TCM perspective, a Chinesemedicine perspective, any advice for
(43:30):
those entering menopause, perimenopause?
Oh, it's such a unique journey.
Two of my sisters have gone throughmenopause in totally different
fashions, like totally differentbody constitutions, so their
symptoms presented very differently.
Like one got hot flashes andthe other one got migraines.
(43:51):
So yeah, you know, just, andthat's just the physical stuff.
I, I think just recognizingthat you're going through it is
the first thing because thingsjust start getting different.
Like my vision started changing.
I would say a couple of years ago andbecause I had kids late, I couldn't
(44:13):
tell if this was like a postpartumthing or I knew my hormones were
changing, but why were they changing?
Was it because I had kidslate or because I was.
In perimenopause, or all of the above.
So the first thing I noticed wasmy eye, my vision fluctuating.
And sometimes it would beokay, normal, and other times
it would be, like, strained.
(44:35):
And so back and forth of going tomy sister, who's an optometrist, so,
just, do I need new glasses, do I not?
And she was like, I thinkyou're just, like, fluctuating
out, just Let's just see.
So I think I ended up getting newglasses and it was helpful, but then
(44:56):
comes that vision fluctuation came a lotof headaches, which I don't ever get.
Headaches is not a thing at all.
So now that I am in, I would say I'mactively in perimenopause and the
symptoms are now pretty consistent.
So the vision, that'sbetter now that I have it.
Upgraded my prescription, but I doget more headaches than I used to.
(45:20):
And that is, like I said, a new thing.
I don't get any hot flashes.
So not every womangoing through menopause.
So it is, it's definitely personal.
I started getting like these,the snippets are the beginning
stages of frozen shoulder.
And that's very common.
If you look at the research,it's like women like age.
(45:43):
45 to 54 or something like that, which ismenopausal years or perimenopausal years.
So is that a coincidence?
I don't think so.
I'm able to acupuncture my shouldersand have it within bay, but that was a
weird thing that doesn't, and especiallylike my left shoulder, which is my.
And Western, becausewhen I was practicing.
(46:04):
A lot of my practice was hormones, right?
And fertility, and for a few years,it was women going through menopause,
frozen shoulder, and then I makethe link because Western medicine
doesn't really talk about it.
But nobody talks about it.
The one great thing that is happening,especially in the digital age, is There's
(46:26):
a lot more awareness around perimenopauseand menopause, so that's very helpful
in terms of support and even education.
Like one of my friend's sisterin law started her own online
presence called Alter Ego, andit's all about perimenopause
(46:48):
and menopause education support.
She has naturopaths.
She has dietitians.
And that's, that's what.
We don't talk about.
And all of that can help with the journey.
One of my clients picked up a bookcalled The Menopause Reset and I think
there's, I haven't read it, but shejust told me about it this week and
(47:08):
there's information in there about foodsto eat and around hormone regulation.
Again, I don't know what it says inthere, but the point of it is that
there's a lifestyle and diet thatmight be conducive and helping with
the symptoms that people may have.
Um, a lot of acupuncture.
Actually, it was one of the clientsthat when you shut down your practice,
(47:29):
Um, uh, talks about how great yourtreatments helped her along menopause.
I actually take that information andthink about acupuncture in a different
light now that I'm going throughperimenopause and I need to increase my
treatments just to help this journey now.
(47:51):
And I, if I don't want to go on hormonereplacement therapy or inundate my
system with a whack load of supplements.
Acupuncture is a really great wayto approach hormone regulation.
So that was very helpfulinformation that I already know
but needed to be reminded of.
(48:12):
Yeah, another good book isthe Manipulse Manifesto.
Have you read it?
I'm halfway through it and to be fair,a lot of the information on that you and
I already know because of our Chinesemedicine education, for example, some
of the advice like reduce stress, don'ttake on too much, don't over exercise.
(48:39):
And you and I, when we look at itfrom our Chinese medicine training,
that makes sense because whether it'sexercise or it's working too much,
being on social media, being on screentoo much, all that depletes your qi.
And Uh, some of the advice in the book,when I read it, I was like, okay, that
(48:59):
makes sense because what you want todo is you want to manage your nervous
system, your body, and give your bodya chance to be able to deal with what's
coming up, what's going to happen.
And like you say, everyoneis different, right?
(49:19):
You get more headaches.
Mine, I noticed about twoyears ago was my skin.
I've never had issues with skin.
That's not my thing.
Yeah, I've never had issues with skin,but this book she does talk about skin
is one of the things that start changingbecause your hormones are different.
Yeah, and you talk about the deficienciesand the first thing that came to mind
(49:43):
in terms of Chinese medicine is, Aswe're entering menopause, we become yin
deficient, and yin is responsible for allfluids in the body, and blood is a fluid.
And so that's exactly whatmenopause is, the drying up of yin.
So our menses stop, we might start gettingdry eyes, like you say the skin dries
(50:05):
out, and then we have some skin problems.
So when we have a deficiency,that's exactly that gas tank.
The gas tank is empty, so wheredo you have the fuel to be able
to do this intense Exercise orthe to do list is 20 feet high.
We don't have the stamina to plowthrough that, and that will just
(50:27):
keep adding to that deficiency.
So during this hormonal shift, it's thisfine line of moving the chi as well as
restoring it, picking what has to be doneon that to do list, which is the overload.
So the overload will always bethere, and it does keep piling high.
And that's what I consider stress.
(50:49):
So when people talk about stressor if I ask someone in the
clinic, what are your stressors?
Immediately we go to this, Oh, I'mnot stressed or I'm not anxious.
We go to this frazzledfeeling that comes with it.
But to me, what I mean bystress is that overload.
How's your to do list?
Yeah.
You have it 10 feet high, that weighsyou down and stresses the system, right?
(51:09):
Like putting a hundredbricks onto your shoulders.
You're going to stress the bodyand therefore what comes out of it.
Fatigue, chronic pain, especiallyof the neck and shoulders.
insomnia, then you start gettingmaybe some gut disturbances.
Those that are going throughmenopause might have more
heat flashes or night sweats.
(51:29):
The brain fog is real.
So what we don't want to do is havethose stressors on our shoulders.
That to do list, that overload compilesso much that you're, you know, sinking.
So that's what that deficiencyis, a sinking feeling.
It's a downward energetic flow.
So with menopause We're trying to keepit at baseline because there's so many
(51:54):
shifts that are happening, that arewaning in the body as is, and then
once the body stabilizes with its newconstitution, then we will have a bit
more wiggle room to be able to buildand restore, or move, or have longer
exercises, or there's more stamina.
Mm hmm, and Also, as most of us, bythe time we go, we are going through
(52:19):
menopause, it's also some take on thecaregiver role because of aging parents.
Yeah.
Like you say, it might not seem Stressfulfor some because they think it's my duty
to look after my parents, but it doesadd on to that weight in the shoulders.
And last thing I'll say before wrap up isto, I always remind my younger clients is,
(52:43):
if you're able to, when you're younger,in your twenties and thirties, starts
to build, start to build the reserve.
Don't wait until it's too late.
If you keep depleting your body as youget older, it's going to take more work
to go to what you call the baseline.
(53:05):
When things start shifting, so takecare of yourself when you're younger,
if possible, with dietary, withlifestyle, with trying, don't do
too much, don't take on too much, beaware of light pollution, be aware
of sound pollution, stuff like that.
(53:33):
Last question for you, as aChinese auntie, any advice?
I wish I had done this when I was youngeror I wish I, someone helped me along
with this or brought it to my awareness.
And the concept of yin, I always tellpeople to pick a one yin activity.
So a yin activity is a very slow,calming kind of activity like yoga.
(54:00):
There's yin yoga and there's power yoga.
It's like the slow yoga.
And I wish I had harnessed somethinglike that more or maybe more of yin
activities when I was younger andto care to follow me through life.
I say this because I was really activeas a kid, played a lot of sports.
And I tore my ACL whenI was what, 17, maybe.
(54:24):
And that was how I let off steam andmanaged stress and I couldn't walk.
And I think I was like really down andI got depressed cause I was, I couldn't
place, I didn't have a release and thoseYIT activities can help move the chi in
a different way that can still help withventing like how sports or exercise does.
(54:50):
So would you call this advice to people isfind, build your toolbox of inactivities
because if you're an active person or youuse exercise as a stress relief and you
hurt yourself, it's really difficult toattain that release by not exercising.
So then you need other tools tohelp with moving your chi the same
(55:14):
way that physical exercise does.
So would you say forsomeone who's really active.
The yin activity wouldbe like slow walking.
In terms of physical exercise, it couldbe like I said, the yin yoga, it could
be tai chi, it could be qigong, it couldbe swimming, if joints or injury permit.
(55:36):
Walking would be yin as well, um, if,like I said, injury allows for it.
Other yin activities that I oftenrecommend to people are, like, if you play
a musical instrument that's really yin innature, journaling, meditating, drawing,
painting, those sandboxes with a rake.
(56:00):
Yeah.
Just something to calmthe nervous system down.
Guided meditations I find the easiestbecause you can do that anywhere.
You can as long as Youcould do it in the car.
You could listen to it.
Breathing exercises are the best.
You could do that anywhere.
And no one even knows you're doing it.
That's what I do.
(56:20):
What about napping?
I'm not a great napper, but you like naps.
Yeah, I'm an excellent napper.
I wouldn't say that's a yin activity.
Stop teasing.
I am so teensy.
Oh, I'm just teasing you becauseyou're a great napper and I'm
not, so I'm slightly jealous.
Oh, yeah.
I unfortunately, fortunatelygot born with that gene.
(56:42):
Thank you Debbie.
Thank you.
I hope you enjoy this episode.
I had a lot of funcatching up with Debbie.
This week's advice from me, yourChinese auntie, is to be proactive
about your health if you can.
I remember my dad used to say to me,I think he was in his late 60s or 70s.
(57:07):
One of his regrets was that he didn'tlook after his health when he was younger.
By then, he was suffering fromsome health issues, heart disease,
and his digestion wasn't the same.
So, if possible, be proactive aboutyour health, get sufficient sleep, turn
off your devices at night, move yourbody if possible, and take care of your
(57:30):
mental, spiritual, and physical health.
Have a great week.
Wishing you lots of love.
And peas this week.
Thanks so much for listening tothis episode of the Conversations
With Your Chinese Auntie podcast.
If you're enjoying the show, pleasefeel free to rate, subscribe,
and leave a review whereveryou listen to your podcasts.
(57:52):
That helps others find the show,and we greatly appreciate it.
Also, remember to sign upfor our newsletter to receive
free materials and updates.
Links in the website, patriciapeterson.
ca.
That's patriciapeterson.
ca.
P A T R I C I A P E T E R S E N dot C A.
Again, thanks for listening.
(58:13):
We hope you have a great week, andwe'll see you in the next episode.
So when I was savvy enough to know thatI could move the chair to the sink and
just dump that and not have to do that,I did do that and I got in big trouble.
Did you only do it once?
Oh yeah.
You kidding me?
I don't dare do that again.
You two are so good to each other, Iwould just hold my nose and go down it.
No, you needed three, you neededmore than two hands because you had
(00:25):
the cup, you can't plug your nose.
And then grab the cereal bowl, so youhad to have the cereal bowl, like the
cereal, in your hand whilst drinking it.
As we're entering menopause, we become yindeficient, and yin is responsible for all
(00:49):
fluids in the body, and blood is a fluid.
And so that's exactly whatmenopause is, the drying up of yin.
So our menses stop, we might start gettingdry eyes, like you say the skin dries
out, and then we have some skin problems.
So, when we have a deficiency,that's exactly that gas tank.
The gas tank is empty, so wheredo you have the fuel to be able
(01:11):
to do this intense exercise orthe to do list is 20 feet high?
We don't have the staminato plow through that.
Welcome to Conversations withYour Chinese Auntie Podcast.
Your host, Patricia Peterson, hasconversations with BIPOC folks about
life, shares wisdom, and discussestheir experience with topics like
(01:34):
growing up in an immigrant family,racism, and the sense of belonging.
In this podcast, we givevoice to people of color, and
learn more about their lives.
So, join your Chinese auntie, as she has.
Compelling conversationswith fascinating people.
Without any further ado, let'sdive head first into this episode.
(02:02):
My guest today is Dr.
Debbie Lee.
Debbie is a registered doctorof traditional Chinese medicine.
She is a mama to two adorable littlehumans, and she is one of my closest
friends with whom I can talk about.
my feelings and emotions.
Debbie and I have beenfriends for 18 years.
(02:24):
We went to Chinesemedicine school together.
One of our teachers from Chinathought we were sisters and
she could never tell us apart.
We share a love for food and chai tea.
In this episode, we talk aboutour Chinese mothers who used to
make us drink herbal decoctions.
We also discuss herbal medicine,how COVID affected the businesses
(02:47):
in Chinatown, especially the herbalstores, how to strengthen your body
with the upcoming allergy season, andwhat one can do as we enters menopause.
In this episode, you willhear us say a few terms.
TNT.
TNT Supermarkets is a Canadian supermarketchain that sells primarily Asian fruits.
(03:11):
We also use the term Qi, which meansvital energy that circulates in the body.
I hope you enjoy this episode.
Hello, Debbie.
Hello, Patricia.
How's it going?
(03:32):
It's going good.
You came back from vacation and youdodged a really cold, icy weather.
Or did you come back at that time?
I came back on the Saturday.
So it was minus 10 or 12 thatday, but it wasn't snowy or icy.
It was just really cold.
Yeah.
And that snowed.
Yeah.
(03:52):
I know you and I are like.
Nope.
Our South Asian blood doesnot like this weather.
Yeah, but you'll grow up back east though.
I did.
So I did grow up with it and I still don'tthink I liked the weather, but I've had
exposure to it and I'm very used to havingone to three feet of snow all winter long.
(04:16):
So please introduce yourself,who you are, what you do.
My name is Debbie Lee.
I am a traditionalChinese medicine doctor.
I am a mom of two young kids and I'vebeen in practice for 15 years now.
I'm in my 15th year.
(04:37):
Yeah.
I was thinking the other day, you andI have known each other for 20 years.
Yeah.
2005.
That's when we started school.
Started school.
And yeah, so you and I metin Chinese medicine school.
Yes.
That was good.
We did good.
We made it . We made itthrough psych and it was crazy.
(05:04):
It was because he did thefive year program too.
I did.
Yeah.
We still did the fiveyear schooling together.
? Yeah.
Oh man.
Yeah.
Those were long years.
I remember just plowing through.
Yeah, and I was working twojobs when I was in school.
You remember that?
But that was very tiring.
What did you do before that?
(05:24):
I think we were both the same.
I think we both had to work and goto school because we were supporting
ourselves through that journey.
Before that, when I graduated fromuniversity with a kinesiology degree,
I somehow landed myself in IT asa career for, I think I did it for
(05:46):
about five or six years until Irealized that I did not want to be in
that kind of career or job setting.
I had gone and enrolled in a kinesiologydegree with the intention of working
(06:06):
in the health care field, but I didn'tknow what to, what I wanted to do.
After I graduated, I thoughtabout chiropractic college.
I thought about RMT college.
I just hadn't wasn't 100 percentin to any of those decisions.
So I worked because I needed to work andthat's where I found myself in my early
(06:32):
twenties and then it wasn't until I waslike 28 when I was really having a hard
time with the whole IT stint, so I hadbeen thinking about Chinese medicine
for a long while prior to enrolling, andwhen I was ready, that's when I enrolled.
(06:56):
How did you come to, like,Chinese medicine position?
Were you single?
And acupuncturist?
No, I had a lot of influence growing up ina traditional Chinese medicine household.
Both of my parents are from China.
My mom was born, both of themwere born and raised in China.
And then when my mom was reallyyoung, she moved to Hong Kong.
(07:19):
And in Hong Kong, they're really aboutthe soups and like food, the food
therapy, the food diet, according toChinese medicine or Chinese culture,
which is really Chinese medicine.
So we grew up with alot of that influence.
We always have had to drinka soup after dinner, always.
(07:40):
And that soup, now that I know what sheputs in it, they were filled with tonics.
They were filled with chi tonics,blood tonics, yang tonics.
They were filled with lung supportduring the cold and flu season.
Also to help support our menstrual cycles.
They had a lot of that support.
(08:01):
So she always made us drink soup and the,it would always be save room for soup.
So no matter how much you atedinner, you always had to make
sure you saved room for soup.
So we drank soup every day.
So that was.
My exposure and then when we were sick,she would make her other cocktails
for cold and flu or stomach bugSo we grew up just drinking pretty
(08:25):
much what would be Roddick auctions.
So that was that exposure My dadused to teach Tai Chi at the church.
So we had a lot of exposure with Theconcept of Taoism and what martial
art looks like and what it does.
He taught my mom, he tried to teachus, but we were too young to learn.
(08:46):
So unfortunately, none of the kids knowhow to do Tai Chi, just my mom and dad.
And then my sister, one of mysisters, went to chiropractic
college in the States and she didacupuncture as one of her electives.
And growing up, we all playeda lot of sports, so we were
laden with sports injuries.
(09:07):
And I just remember one timeI hurt my shoulder playing
volleyball and she acupunctured it.
I was so scared of the needles.
She did four needles,just on the rotator cuff.
And it, I was probably 16, andit, I couldn't believe how Much.
It helped always remember that.
(09:28):
And so.
I went into a kinesiology programwith the intent, like I said, of
doing something health related, butI didn't know what I wanted to do
and I didn't want to, I really wantedto make sure when I went back to
school, that was what I wanted to do.
So I didn't want to go to school and thenquit and do something else or do it and
(09:48):
then have to go back to school again.
So that's how come I worked after.
So that was, all of that pointed,like, that's why I always had Chinese
medicine in the back of my headbecause it all clicked with me.
My, my path, and then it wasn'tuntil, like I said, I was 28 was
when it all made sense that I wentback to school for Chinese medicine.
(10:11):
Mm hmm.
And you're one of what, six kids?
Five.
Five.
And you're the youngest.
You're the youngest.
So then yours is sort ofan older when you Yeah.
So she's seven years older.
So she Was one of the main reasons whyI wanted to go into healthcare because
of that exposure into the complementaryhealth or the alternative health.
(10:35):
So seeing, learning about that ata young age through her studies
and becoming a chiropractor andwe all played a lot of sports.
So we were very active that way.
So it just made sense for meto follow that path for myself.
Do you make the soups for your kids?
(10:58):
I, I cheat and I do a lotof herb herbal tincture.
The problem with thesoups is that it stinks.
It's true.
The raw, the cooked shouldn't stink.
I do make them, but Iwouldn't say I do them often.
They also take a lot oftime, which I don't have.
Fortunately, pediatric tinctures areglycerin based, so they're very safe.
(11:20):
It's not super customized,but it's better than nothing.
So, both of our husbands are white.
Will your husband drinkit if you make soup?
Mine is not a big fan.
And the soups, maybe not somuch, but the formulas, yes.
So they come in like a patentformula as comes in the capsule.
(11:42):
So those are the easiest.
I do have granules.
Those ones taste the worst.
People do it.
They're also, I find, thestrongest, if you're not decocting.
And then there are tinctures, whichare the easiest to administer.
I don't find them as strong as thegranules, but I think when you, we've
(12:06):
been introducing it for so long thatnow it's no, it's part of the norm.
Yeah, and I also find in Vancouver, a lotof the herbal stores have shut down, so
it's really hard to find the raw herbs.
Yeah, I don't have a herbal pharmacy inmy clinic yet due to space, but I'm just
(12:29):
starting my research on how to make thathappen and how I can build one in the
current space that I have, if possible.
And I, and so that would meanoutsourcing raw herbs, and how
does that look like in my practice?
I like the option of being able towhip up a formula right then and there,
(12:51):
because the hard part of outsourcingis you don't get it right away.
Yeah, and I am excited for you to dothat, to be able to have a dispensary
in your space, because there's notmany in Nashville who are doing it.
No, and I think COVID really slammed alot of those Chinese herbal pharmacies,
like in Chinatown, or, bet you alot of them would be in Richmond,
(13:14):
but I don't go out that way at all.
The one, the main one in Richmond that Iused to go to for years, they also shut.
I think there's a couple onVictoria Drive that I've heard.
Yeah.
But yeah, I don't, I rarely do raw,like only for myself, if that, but
like I said, it takes forever todetox and it's, my kids have sharp
(13:42):
senses of smell, so I hear about it.
My, my husband, if I makeanything like funny, he'll come
up, he goes, what's that smell?
Then I'll tell him.
Then he goes, Oh, okay.
Then he's fine with it.
Yeah.
My husband, he does it.
He, if I do make something, he'llpalate it, but I don't think his
(14:07):
taste factor is as refined in termsof Chinese medicine as ours probably.
Well, I mean, traditionally growingup in Singapore, when my mom used
to force us to drink these things.
You get the plum afterwards.
Oh, yeah, yeah.
Sour plum, and then it'ssour and sweet, right?
Yeah, we would just eat that for fun.
(14:28):
I remember those.
We did too, but for a while there,when we were younger, we didn't get it
unless she made us drink the cautions.
Oh, yeah, we, I remember my momused to make ginseng once a year
(14:53):
and it would be really expensive.
So there's five of us.
So she would spend a lot of moneyon probably Siberian ginseng once.
It'd make it once a year for usto drink and it was so bitter.
And I just wrote, I probablywas like six or seven.
(15:14):
And I remember pulling a chair upto the sink and just dumping it.
And so, no, you didn't.
I got in so much trouble becauseit's like a hundred bucks a cup.
But we, and my sisters, oh man, we,I got in big trouble for that one,
but we would have an art to it.
(15:35):
So my, I have three sisters anda brother, my old, my brother, my
oldest sister off to university.
So it was just the twosisters and I often times.
So we would have.
Ginseng, a cup of ginseng,a bowl of cereal, and the
other person to hold the nose.
And we, it would be the art.
You plug your nose, someone wouldplug your nose, you drink the cereal,
(15:56):
someone has the bowl of cereal rightthere, you grab your hand in it and
shove it in your mouth to get the tasteout, and we would do that every year.
So when I was savvy enough to know thatI could move the chair to the sink and
just dump that and not have to do that,I did do that, and I got in big trouble.
Did you only do it once?
Oh yeah, you kidding me?
I don't dare do that again.
(16:18):
You guys are so good to eachother, I just, I would just,
just hold my nose and go down it.
No, you needed three, you neededmore than two hands, because you had
the cup, you can't plug your nose.
And then grab the cereal bowl.
So you had to have the cereal bowl, likethe cereal in your hand whilst drinking
it, and then you, and it wasn't evena lot, it was like maybe half a cup or
(16:39):
three quarters of a cup, just shoot itdown and drop the cereal in your mouth.
Yeah.
But you'll explain deficiency.
So you, you're like.
The bitterness made it worse.
Now that I know what I know about herbalmedicine, I do, I did challenge my mom
once about the decoction that she made me.
(17:01):
And growing up, I don't, yoursprobably grew up very similarly.
You don't challenge any authority.
And so I had to do it in a very Ina non challenging way, so I came
home after moving out to Vancouver,I'd come home every year and
she always made me these tonics.
And this was when I was probablyin school and or finished school,
(17:26):
so I knew a lot more about herbalmedicine than I had before going in.
And she made me this soupand it was all tonics.
And I knew I had some stagnationsand heat in my system.
And so I told her, Mom, I can't drinkthat because it's going to flare my heat.
And she, No, you gotta drink it.
(17:47):
It's good for you.
And so you don't argue with mom.
And she, I flew five hours tosee her and she put so much
effort into making the soup.
So I drank it and then I was there fora week and over the next couple days,
few days, I start breaking out in zits.
Oh.
Asian moms, why do you, whatdoes your face look like A lot.
(18:08):
Yeah.
So too much heat.
You know?
Too much heat.
Why do you have so many pimples?
And so I was like, mom, Itold you I had, I have a heat.
And then I drank the soup and nowit's manifesting the heat to come up.
. My mom used to make those herbaldecoctions in those big hots,
like a cauldron with a lid.
(18:31):
And my mom was a midwife.
So she would do either themorning shift that starts at 6:00
AM or she would do, starts at.
Noon ish to eight, and she would make apot of like, herbal decoction that big.
Wow.
And then she would, she was,okay, I'm going to work now, I
(18:53):
expect the three of you to finishthis by the time I come home.
You had to drink it all?
Drink it all.
And like you say, when you'reChinese and you're brought up by
strict parents, you don't argue.
For a while there, I wasquite afraid of my mother.
So I would like, every time Iwalk by it, I would do a cup.
Walk by it, I would do a cup.
And then I look at mysiblings, they're not doing it.
(19:13):
I'm the youngest too.
And like, you guys never drink thiswithout mom's going to be really upset.
Nobody's drinking it.
But as you get older, you learn that.
Maybe we can just pourthis down the drain.
Oh, you did the same, andyou didn't get caught.
And it like, black in color, and it waslike, things got quick sticking out.
(19:37):
And when you're like 9, 10, 11 yearslooking at it going, what is this thing,
and then it's better, and then it smells.
Okay, now you and I have the education,we like, we appreciate it now, but
at that time you're like, Yeah.
And they don't tell you what it is.
They just say drink it, right?
There's no explanation.
It's do this and you have to do it.
(19:57):
You follow orders.
I mean, there's a, I was talking toanother Chinese medicine practitioner
friend the other day and I wastelling her I used to go to these
herbal shops with my mom and Iwould see the herbalists packing it.
You know, they use a packet in thispaper and sometimes I will see what he
(20:18):
put in there, like insects and stuff.
And as a child, you don't know, like,some of these, like, insects have.
Good properties.
Now, a lot of these are all banned,but I'm standing there looking at
the package going, Oh no, you justgot to make the cautions out of this.
And she's going to makeus drink it and stuff.
(20:48):
I wanted you to talk about how to withChinese medicine to prepare for the
upcoming spring season, especiallyallergies from an acupuncture standpoint.
And if you're susceptible toallergies and you know, the month
of when Something would bloom thatyou're sensitive to like for me.
It's I'm very sensitiveto cherry blossoms.
(21:10):
We're Typically who knows now withglobal warming would bloom around April.
So I normally tell people To prepare forthe allergy season a month in advance
and that's just to improve circulationDecrease inflammation as best as we
(21:31):
can When you do that, then your immunesystem works a lot smoother, and so not
necessarily am I boosting it particularly,but those are the methodologies
that I think about in boosting it.
There are lifestyle and dietary stuffthat you can do, so in Chinese medicine,
the spring season belongs to the liver,qi, so in Chinese medicine, We use
(21:59):
the names of organs to describe the qiof the meridians and how we go about
diagnosing according to Chinese medicine.
So the spring season is also a goodtime to maybe do a liver cleanse or
think about cleaning out the liver.
A lot of bitter foods go to the liver.
(22:19):
There is a lot of liver cleanses outthere that are mainly supplements.
So a lot of I find a lot of liverherbs that Western supplement
companies use are dandelion, bootplura, um, what else is there?
Yeah, so basically a lot of those,if you were to go to like Finlandia
(22:42):
or Whole Foods, a lot of those liverherbs are those kinds of Western
herbs that also are Chinese herbs,but they're named in their Latin name.
So.
They basically all havebitter qualities to it.
Any food to avoid?
Sweets.
What's sugar?
(23:02):
Sugar is a real sticky product.
And so if you're tryingto clean things out.
Imagine trying to clean out somethingthat's sticky and has goo on it.
It's really difficult to clean out.
Now, when you say sugar, are youtalking, for the listeners, are
you talking about processed sugar?
(23:25):
White sugar?
Are you also talking about like fruits?
Like, sweet vegetables.
It depends on the constitution.
So everyone has a personalconstitution that, uh, is very unique.
So some people might be okay with fruits,and then even with fruits, there's Some
(23:46):
fruits that kind of are more sticky forme than others, like tropical banana,
yes, or bananas are very sticky as well.
We call that dampness.
Um, and so there are a lot of foods thatcreate more dampness than other fruits.
Berries are typically, I find prettygood, like the more, less sweet the
(24:08):
fruit, like granny smith apples, theless damp it will form, in my opinion.
Refined sugars, no one shouldbe eating in my opinion.
It does nothing helpful for the system.
And then some people are evensensitive to like honey and maple
syrup or even natural sugars.
(24:28):
So it really depends on the constitution.
For myself, I have the TCM constitutionthat's very sensitive to all sugars.
And so my system createsdampness really quickly.
So I have to really be mindful of thesweets that I eat, even including natural.
naturally producing sweets.
Yeah, I'm similar with you todeafness and my allergy season
(24:51):
starts March and goes to June.
The other thing you can do, yeah,I'm like April to June as well.
There's something in June that kicked up.
Cottonwood.
Yeah, I don't, I, yeah, it was, Idon't know, it was the last five
years that something kicked up.
The other thing you can do is youcan also strengthen your lung chi,
which is usually a lot of white foods.
(25:13):
In Chinese food options, thisis where TNT is really helpful.
You have the lily bulbs,which you can buy dried.
You have water chestnuts, whichyou can buy fresh or in the can.
You've got the white fungus thatlooks like a pink flower with
a little bit of orange in themiddle, and it's usually dried.
(25:34):
There is, like, a lot of those, like, in,at TNT, they have those, like, soup mix
that has a lot of the white things in it.
Yeah.
There's huangchi, which is a stragglers.
Shanyao, which is Chinese yam,usually has those little apricot
seeds, xingren, which is, they'relike heart shaped little tiny ones.
Those are all really good for the lungs.
(25:56):
And so you can prep yourselfby cleaning out the liver as
well as strengthening the lung.
And I would also say that itis important to remember this
is not like a one time thing.
You got to build up to.
It's true.
And so I like acupuncture whenyou're using, um, the food approach
(26:17):
because acupuncture can help.
My analogy of the system is like a car.
And you've got your gas tank, whichneeds to be full all the time, and
that's where if it's low, then we havethese deficiencies or these weaknesses.
So, the lungs are often low, sothen we don't have that, that
(26:40):
defense system to stave off.
an allergy attack or an allergy invasion.
Then you have the pipes in thecar, which are usually blocked.
And so no matter how full the gas tankis, it will be difficult to go where it
needs to go if the pipes are clogged.
So that's where I findAcupuncture really helpful.
It's a really great way to unclogthe pipes and get circulation moving
(27:04):
to where it needs to go and evenit out so that the immune system.
Is working properly, there's lessinflammation, and so hopefully that
builds onto that immune defenseof allergy or pathogen invasion.
I don't know if this works foreverybody, but for me, when you
(27:24):
talk about the blockages and thecirculation, sometimes I find if I'm
having a really bad allergy day, ifit's not too horrible, I go for a run.
It helps to move things.
And not like a super long run, but evenjust 20 minutes, half an hour, then I
(27:45):
feel better for the rest of the day, andI don't have to take any antihistamine.
Yeah, so that's, as we get older,we're bound to have pipes clogged.
That's just how we age.
And we're bound to haveour gas tank half empty.
So we would call that Uh,deficiency with a stagnation.
There are some, what happens is like whensomething gets stuck, there's a backup.
(28:07):
So that does become excess kind oflike when a pipe is clogged, then
this becomes this backup or buildup.
So then that area becomesexcess, an excess we call it.
So moving your chi is.
Always important, in general, evenif everything is smooth running,
(28:27):
and for people who have low energy,like their tank is just empty, but
they still have these pipes clogged,these, this cheese stagnation, usually
what I tell, My clients is to movetheir chi if they can do that five
minutes a day, that way you don'thave to gear up, go outside for a run.
So that's something that's like doingsome jumping jacks or burpees or if you
(28:51):
have stairs in your house, you can justgo up and down a step, even one step.
I had to do that when I had gestationaldiabetes to work off my meals.
I would just go up and downa step for ten minutes.
If you do 10 minutes after everymeal, that's 30 minutes a day.
If that's even hard to wraparound, start with 5 minutes.
That's 15 minutes a day.
(29:13):
I was able to keep good weight fromthat protocol alone while pregnant.
Because I basically worked out 30 minutesa day, I did a 10 minute thing after
every meal just to break, just to workoff the meal, the sugars, that build up.
Which I also think that is brilliantbecause oftentimes we think
(29:34):
working out needs to be intense.
Yeah.
But, and also that I find trickytoo, oftentimes when I was
still practicing the puncture iswhen you talk to clients about.
Don't go and do intense exercise.
If your energy, your chi is already lowbecause then you're texting the body.
So I love that you say that evenif you just do five minutes after
(29:55):
every meal, three meals a day.
It builds up and it helps to movethe qi to circulate the energy
and helps to move the stagnation.
Yeah, and it gets the heartpumping and the heart.
What does the heart do?
It provides, it produces bloodand provides blood to move
everywhere where blood is redblood cells and that's oxygen.
(30:16):
So you're oxygenatingthe whole system too.
And there's the endorphinsthat come with it.
You feel good, your brainfeels a little bit more clear.
So I usually try to get people tobreak a light sweat whenever possible.
And if that's five, 10 minutes atyour home, I, for me, it's difficult
to do things at home as well.
So I get it.
That's why I try to.
(30:38):
Get people to get introducedto the concept of it by really
having it be a light thing.
Five minutes.
Aim for five minutes a day.
I use an app called FitOn, because theygive you workouts according to time.
And then you can tailorwhich one you want.
Do you want cardio?
Do you want stretching?
So, that's a good intro into it.
(30:59):
Now I know the exercises thathelp with providing that cardio
flow, so I just stick with those.
That's good.
Walking is great too, like walkingis better than nothing as well.
Maybe do a little brisk walk fora minute and then walk normal just
to try to get the heart rate up.
I, yeah, and I love thatstretching too, right?
(31:19):
For people if mobility is harder forthem, but even stretching or doing some
gentle weights that can also start tohelp them with some of that circulation.
One thing I might add, so I had two Csections, so I, I was really laid out
after the second one, and my Chi wasso deficient, the cardio workouts or
(31:40):
anything that I did, I would just researchand find how I can do that all while
laying on the ground, and there are,there's lots out there, so I I just had
no energy, but I knew I needed to movemy blood and my chi and my circulation.
So I just tried to find a lot ofthose exercises on how I can get that
(32:03):
while laying on the ground so that Iwouldn't tax any more energy working
out because the whole point of itis for it to do what it needs to do,
but not tax the system even further.
So we're looking at intensity,duration, and positioning.
Mm hmm.
I love that.
Very unique to every person.
(32:23):
Cool.
Yeah.
I forgot you had two c section.
Yeah, that was horrible.
The recovery.
I don't think I'm fully recovered.
, we should be starts into the next talk.
I just went to a pelvic floor physioyesterday because I'm like, I think I
need to start addressing the C-section
(32:44):
And they're great.
I saw a 2019 for a whileand it was really helpful.
Yeah, that's, it's, uh, it's alway.
I always love.
Learning from other practitioners and howthey view the body and how they approach
healing and try to put it all togetherfor my brain to make sense of it all and
(33:07):
with the kinesiology degree is helpful tohave that background so that I understand
the language, I understand the anatomyand the physiology, and I love learning
about pathologies of how the system works.
So it's nice to learn a newway of looking at the body.
And then how do I translatethat into Chinese medicine?
(33:35):
My dad passed away in 2017.
Well, even though we've known eachother for 20 years, it was only
around that time that you and I reallystarted talking about mental health.
Yeah, we were young and we didn't havethese big jolts in life that made us.
Look at our mental status and alsogrowing up in a Chinese family.
(33:59):
I don't know about your family,but my family that was exist.
It did.
90 exist.
No, depression was not a thing.
You just swept it under therug and you deal with it.
Just, just say you ignore it.
It's not there.
Right.
I would say starting Chinese medicineCollege, because they do talk about the
(34:21):
whole, you know, mind, body, spirit.
In a, in, in school, that was when Istarted learn, like, really exploring
my mental health status, and in general,not just my own, just how do I view the
body, and how do I maximize results.
(34:42):
With my clients with each treatmentthat they come in for and that
emotional psyche is huge in my practice.
It's, we don't have to talk aboutemotions, but I definitely use that as a
major tool in terms of my treatment plan.
(35:03):
And, but I don't know whether you didthis and I did when I was practicing.
I did what you did.
I would consider the clients.
mental health, where they were and stuffand they connected to the organs, right?
Because each organ houses an emotion.
Houses an emotion.
But I didn't apply it tomyself for many years.
(35:23):
Did you?
I didn't think about it.
I think over the past 20 years,I, I've been in and out with
counseling just for various reasons.
It didn't ramp up untilmy dad passed away.
So he passed away two years ago,and that was the first major loss.
And having two young kids makesit really difficult to grieve.
(35:47):
And process that grief.
And I was having a hard time doingthat because I had no space or time
to myself to be able to grieve.
And so it would hit me in theseweird moments where all of a
sudden there'll be a trigger.
It could be a song.
It could be something that I saw.
It could be something someone said,and then I just would start crying.
(36:10):
And that happened for quite some time.
And it was.
Like, it was okay.
I welcomed it and I know that's whatneeded to be done, but I knew I wasn't
dealing with it as best as I wanted to,um, and I knew that if I were to continue.
With that path in grieving thata lot of inflammation would get
(36:33):
stored in my system and that I am sosensitive in terms of, um, my nervous
system that I feel all of that.
That's when the counseling kind of rampedup just to help put a lot of things.
Just give me some tools and alsojust to talk to somebody about the
grieving, about grieving and the law.
Exactly.
(36:54):
Right.
And also, what you say that just nothaving two kids, you're busy and running
your practice, oftentimes there's no spaceand it's good to have someone to talk to.
But and even as friends, we didn'ttalk about it for many years
for mental health because wedidn't have the language for it.
And I am grateful that youand I can talk about it when
we go for soups and chai tea.
(37:17):
Which is our thing.
Yes, but let's go back.
We're gonna go back.
Oh, and I love that we talk about itas if there's no stigma attached to it.
I think that's the hard part isthere's still a large stigma around it.
And, and in my practice, Ireally try to make it a safe
space, um, with no judgment.
(37:37):
And if there is.
Like an emotional component that'spresent, we can talk about it
or we don't, and that's okay.
All I want, biggest thing for meis to know how that is stuck in
the system and how I can move that.
Mm hmm.
It doesn't create more of thisinflammation that I'm talking about
and I think all of that goes somewhere.
(37:58):
Like you've touched upon every,according to Chinese medicine,
every organ houses an emotion.
So with the lung.
But if we talked about the lung earlier,the lung houses the emotion of sadness,
grief, there's a control aspect to it,guilt is a big one, and if someone is
(38:19):
Grieving for a long period of time, oras often feels guilty about stuff, which
was my pattern and probably why I'msusceptible more to catching colds and
being affected by the allergy season.
I just try to work on all of it.
How do I strengthen my lungson a physiological standpoint?
(38:39):
Exercise, eat foods that support thelungs according to Chinese medicine.
And then on the emotionalfront, maybe take a look at Is
there anything I can't let go?
Is there anything I'mfeeling really guilty about?
What am I grieving oram I sad about anything?
And just look at it as awhole picture kind of a thing.
(38:59):
And also that, which you, you talkedabout it just now, it's also that
seeking out other practitionersto help you to move forward.
Not even move forward, but to movewhatever you're feeling so you're not
having to deal with it on your own.
Totally.
When I was, I still get thisquestion sometimes, but when I was
(39:20):
practicing, people would say tome, do you acupuncture yourself?
Do you put needles in yourself?
And I say, yes, when I'm desperate,but it's not the same as going to
see your own practitioner and havingthat 60 minutes where it's just your
time and you're being looked after.
And so your body can do the healing whileyou're there and in time for yourself.
(39:44):
Agreed, yeah.
I didn't, it takes a village.
And that, after having kids,I definitely own that saying.
And with your health team, I'm fortunate.
I have, I built my health team,including those friends that
are of support too, like you.
And.
That's part of it, too.
That's healing in and of itself.
And exactly like you say, I acupuncturemyself, but it's not the same.
(40:08):
I'll acupuncture, like, my knee if ithurts, but I'm not doing I do try to set
the intention every once in a while, butit's, you're right, it's not the same
as fully letting go and letting someoneelse see you in their own eyes and
treating you in terms of what they see.
Because I have, I have my image of myselfof what I think is stuck, but someone else
(40:29):
might see something totally different.
And that's And they'renot incorrect either.
Yeah, for sure.
Um, so the next thing I dowant to ask you is, um, because
two of us are getting older.
Now, now
(40:51):
that I'm in it, I, and a lot of my clientswho have grown with me are also in it.
I realized that it is.
There is not a lot of talk about it.
There's not a lot of education.
It's not talked about.
There's also a littlebit of a stigma, I think.
And I think it's just not well known tothe general Can I say this in the sense
(41:12):
of, like, working moms who For example,it might be in the corporate structure
and they're, they've got young kids andwhen you're going through perimenopause
and menopause, everyone is different.
Everyone goes through it differently.
For me, my brain doesn't remember thoselittle fine details like it used to be.
(41:36):
And I can just imagine, I'm okay.
I still can remember, but I remember beinga lot sharper when I was non transcripted.
Not in this stage, but I just thinkof those working in high, really high
profile jobs that have to perform, andespecially if they're in a work culture
(41:57):
where it's very male dominant still,
is there education in and aroundwhat females go through during
this period to the co workers orto the workplace or employers?
There isn't many, right?
And even on my own research, I'm like,okay, these symptoms are happening.
(42:21):
Okay.
And I know it's a hormone decline, butthere's, it's, there's so much to it.
There is, and also they, and you'reright, especially for those of you in
the corporate, say, workplace, there'sno support, not forgiveness, but look
at it, not just menopause, period.
(42:41):
Nobody's talked, nobodyreally talks about it.
And I'll, my mother didn't talk about it.
I don't know about yours, but my motherdid not initiate when I got my period.
And my mother never talked about whenshe was alive about menopause, but look
back my sister and I can guess the yearsthat she was, went through it because
(43:06):
she was more moody, she was angry,she had hot fleshes, and even living
in Singapore, you could tell she washaving hot fleshes and stuff like that.
So, our mothers didn't talk aboutit, aunties didn't talk about it.
From a TCM perspective, a Chinesemedicine perspective, any advice for
(43:30):
those entering menopause, perimenopause?
Oh, it's such a unique journey.
Two of my sisters have gone throughmenopause in totally different
fashions, like totally differentbody constitutions, so their
symptoms presented very differently.
Like one got hot flashes andthe other one got migraines.
(43:51):
So yeah, you know, just, andthat's just the physical stuff.
I, I think just recognizingthat you're going through it is
the first thing because thingsjust start getting different.
Like my vision started changing.
I would say a couple of years ago andbecause I had kids late, I couldn't
(44:13):
tell if this was like a postpartumthing or I knew my hormones were
changing, but why were they changing?
Was it because I had kidslate or because I was.
In perimenopause, or all of the above.
So the first thing I noticed wasmy eye, my vision fluctuating.
And sometimes it would beokay, normal, and other times
it would be, like, strained.
(44:35):
And so back and forth of going tomy sister, who's an optometrist, so,
just, do I need new glasses, do I not?
And she was like, I thinkyou're just, like, fluctuating
out, just Let's just see.
So I think I ended up getting newglasses and it was helpful, but then
(44:56):
comes that vision fluctuation came a lotof headaches, which I don't ever get.
Headaches is not a thing at all.
So now that I am in, I would say I'mactively in perimenopause and the
symptoms are now pretty consistent.
So the vision, that'sbetter now that I have it.
Upgraded my prescription, but I doget more headaches than I used to.
(45:20):
And that is, like I said, a new thing.
I don't get any hot flashes.
So not every womangoing through menopause.
So it is, it's definitely personal.
I started getting like these,the snippets are the beginning
stages of frozen shoulder.
And that's very common.
If you look at the research,it's like women like age.
(45:43):
45 to 54 or something like that, which ismenopausal years or perimenopausal years.
So is that a coincidence?
I don't think so.
I'm able to acupuncture my shouldersand have it within bay, but that was a
weird thing that doesn't, and especiallylike my left shoulder, which is my.
And Western, becausewhen I was practicing.
(46:04):
A lot of my practice was hormones, right?
And fertility, and for a few years,it was women going through menopause,
frozen shoulder, and then I makethe link because Western medicine
doesn't really talk about it.
But nobody talks about it.
The one great thing that is happening,especially in the digital age, is There's
(46:26):
a lot more awareness around perimenopauseand menopause, so that's very helpful
in terms of support and even education.
Like one of my friend's sisterin law started her own online
presence called Alter Ego, andit's all about perimenopause
(46:48):
and menopause education support.
She has naturopaths.
She has dietitians.
And that's, that's what.
We don't talk about.
And all of that can help with the journey.
One of my clients picked up a bookcalled The Menopause Reset and I think
there's, I haven't read it, but shejust told me about it this week and
(47:08):
there's information in there about foodsto eat and around hormone regulation.
Again, I don't know what it says inthere, but the point of it is that
there's a lifestyle and diet thatmight be conducive and helping with
the symptoms that people may have.
Um, a lot of acupuncture.
Actually, it was one of the clientsthat when you shut down your practice,
(47:29):
Um, uh, talks about how great yourtreatments helped her along menopause.
I actually take that information andthink about acupuncture in a different
light now that I'm going throughperimenopause and I need to increase my
treatments just to help this journey now.
(47:51):
And I, if I don't want to go on hormonereplacement therapy or inundate my
system with a whack load of supplements.
Acupuncture is a really great wayto approach hormone regulation.
So that was very helpfulinformation that I already know
but needed to be reminded of.
(48:12):
Yeah, another good book isthe Manipulse Manifesto.
Have you read it?
I'm halfway through it and to be fair,a lot of the information on that you and
I already know because of our Chinesemedicine education, for example, some
of the advice like reduce stress, don'ttake on too much, don't over exercise.
(48:39):
And you and I, when we look at itfrom our Chinese medicine training,
that makes sense because whether it'sexercise or it's working too much,
being on social media, being on screentoo much, all that depletes your qi.
And Uh, some of the advice in the book,when I read it, I was like, okay, that
(48:59):
makes sense because what you want todo is you want to manage your nervous
system, your body, and give your bodya chance to be able to deal with what's
coming up, what's going to happen.
And like you say, everyoneis different, right?
(49:19):
You get more headaches.
Mine, I noticed about twoyears ago was my skin.
I've never had issues with skin.
That's not my thing.
Yeah, I've never had issues with skin,but this book she does talk about skin
is one of the things that start changingbecause your hormones are different.
Yeah, and you talk about the deficienciesand the first thing that came to mind
(49:43):
in terms of Chinese medicine is, Aswe're entering menopause, we become yin
deficient, and yin is responsible for allfluids in the body, and blood is a fluid.
And so that's exactly whatmenopause is, the drying up of yin.
So our menses stop, we might start gettingdry eyes, like you say the skin dries
(50:05):
out, and then we have some skin problems.
So when we have a deficiency,that's exactly that gas tank.
The gas tank is empty, so wheredo you have the fuel to be able
to do this intense Exercise orthe to do list is 20 feet high.
We don't have the stamina to plowthrough that, and that will just
(50:27):
keep adding to that deficiency.
So during this hormonal shift, it's thisfine line of moving the chi as well as
restoring it, picking what has to be doneon that to do list, which is the overload.
So the overload will always bethere, and it does keep piling high.
And that's what I consider stress.
(50:49):
So when people talk about stressor if I ask someone in the
clinic, what are your stressors?
Immediately we go to this, Oh, I'mnot stressed or I'm not anxious.
We go to this frazzledfeeling that comes with it.
But to me, what I mean bystress is that overload.
How's your to do list?
Yeah.
You have it 10 feet high, that weighsyou down and stresses the system, right?
(51:09):
Like putting a hundredbricks onto your shoulders.
You're going to stress the bodyand therefore what comes out of it.
Fatigue, chronic pain, especiallyof the neck and shoulders.
insomnia, then you start gettingmaybe some gut disturbances.
Those that are going throughmenopause might have more
heat flashes or night sweats.
(51:29):
The brain fog is real.
So what we don't want to do is havethose stressors on our shoulders.
That to do list, that overload compilesso much that you're, you know, sinking.
So that's what that deficiencyis, a sinking feeling.
It's a downward energetic flow.
So with menopause We're trying to keepit at baseline because there's so many
(51:54):
shifts that are happening, that arewaning in the body as is, and then
once the body stabilizes with its newconstitution, then we will have a bit
more wiggle room to be able to buildand restore, or move, or have longer
exercises, or there's more stamina.
Mm hmm, and Also, as most of us, bythe time we go, we are going through
(52:19):
menopause, it's also some take on thecaregiver role because of aging parents.
Yeah.
Like you say, it might not seem Stressfulfor some because they think it's my duty
to look after my parents, but it doesadd on to that weight in the shoulders.
And last thing I'll say before wrap up isto, I always remind my younger clients is,
(52:43):
if you're able to, when you're younger,in your twenties and thirties, starts
to build, start to build the reserve.
Don't wait until it's too late.
If you keep depleting your body as youget older, it's going to take more work
to go to what you call the baseline.
(53:05):
When things start shifting, so takecare of yourself when you're younger,
if possible, with dietary, withlifestyle, with trying, don't do
too much, don't take on too much, beaware of light pollution, be aware
of sound pollution, stuff like that.
(53:33):
Last question for you, as aChinese auntie, any advice?
I wish I had done this when I was youngeror I wish I, someone helped me along
with this or brought it to my awareness.
And the concept of yin, I always tellpeople to pick a one yin activity.
So a yin activity is a very slow,calming kind of activity like yoga.
(54:00):
There's yin yoga and there's power yoga.
It's like the slow yoga.
And I wish I had harnessed somethinglike that more or maybe more of yin
activities when I was younger andto care to follow me through life.
I say this because I was really activeas a kid, played a lot of sports.
And I tore my ACL whenI was what, 17, maybe.
(54:24):
And that was how I let off steam andmanaged stress and I couldn't walk.
And I think I was like really down andI got depressed cause I was, I couldn't
place, I didn't have a release and thoseYIT activities can help move the chi in
a different way that can still help withventing like how sports or exercise does.
(54:50):
So would you call this advice to people isfind, build your toolbox of inactivities
because if you're an active person or youuse exercise as a stress relief and you
hurt yourself, it's really difficult toattain that release by not exercising.
So then you need other tools tohelp with moving your chi the same
(55:14):
way that physical exercise does.
So would you say forsomeone who's really active.
The yin activity wouldbe like slow walking.
In terms of physical exercise, it couldbe like I said, the yin yoga, it could
be tai chi, it could be qigong, it couldbe swimming, if joints or injury permit.
(55:36):
Walking would be yin as well, um, if,like I said, injury allows for it.
Other yin activities that I oftenrecommend to people are, like, if you play
a musical instrument that's really yin innature, journaling, meditating, drawing,
painting, those sandboxes with a rake.
(56:00):
Yeah.
Just something to calmthe nervous system down.
Guided meditations I find the easiestbecause you can do that anywhere.
You can as long as Youcould do it in the car.
You could listen to it.
Breathing exercises are the best.
You could do that anywhere.
And no one even knows you're doing it.
That's what I do.
(56:20):
What about napping?
I'm not a great napper, but you like naps.
Yeah, I'm an excellent napper.
I wouldn't say that's a yin activity.
Stop teasing.
I am so teensy.
Oh, I'm just teasing you becauseyou're a great napper and I'm
not, so I'm slightly jealous.
Oh, yeah.
I unfortunately, fortunatelygot born with that gene.
(56:42):
Thank you Debbie.
Thank you.
I hope you enjoy this episode.
I had a lot of funcatching up with Debbie.
This week's advice from me, yourChinese auntie, is to be proactive
about your health if you can.
I remember my dad used to say to me,I think he was in his late 60s or 70s.
(57:07):
One of his regrets was that he didn'tlook after his health when he was younger.
By then, he was suffering fromsome health issues, heart disease,
and his digestion wasn't the same.
So, if possible, be proactive aboutyour health, get sufficient sleep, turn
off your devices at night, move yourbody if possible, and take care of your
(57:30):
mental, spiritual, and physical health.
Have a great week.
Wishing you lots of love.
And peas this week.
Thanks so much for listening tothis episode of the Conversations
With Your Chinese Auntie podcast.
If you're enjoying the show, pleasefeel free to rate, subscribe,
and leave a review whereveryou listen to your podcasts.
(57:52):
That helps others find the show,and we greatly appreciate it.
Also, remember to sign upfor our newsletter to receive
free materials and updates.
Links in the website, patriciapeterson.
ca.
That's patriciapeterson.
ca.
P A T R I C I A P E T E R S E N dot C A.
Again, thanks for listening.
(58:13):
We hope you have a great week, andwe'll see you in the next episode.
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