5 Signs You Might Have Spleen Qi Deficiency

So one of the most common clinical patterns that I see clinically with my patients is a pattern called spleen qi deficiency. Now in layman's terms, it's basically just digestive problems, but a very specific manifestation and a very specific presentation of those digestive problems. So in this video today, I thought I would share five signs you may have spleen qi deficiency. Hey guys, Dr. Alex Hein, Chinese medicine doctor, author of the health book Master of the Day on Amazon and Audible. Now before we jump into today's video, two very important links right below this video. The first is if you'd like to become a patron of mine locally or online via telemedicine, the link below the video is a link to my private practice and clinic. And the second link is for a free download, which is four daily rituals that can help you add years to your life potentially with Chinese medicine. You can check those out right below this video. Now, sign number one of spleen qi deficiency, right? This word, the spleen, this organ, we're not very familiar with in the Western world because it's not really paid much attention to, but in Chinese medicine, this translation of what's probably spleen, pancreas, or something in between is very often used. Now I would say the first sign is someone who consistently has very low or poor appetite or picky eating. So for example, a very common spleen qi deficiency pattern is that the person has very low appetite. They may even go eight or 10 hours and they still don't feel hungry, but sometimes then if they eat, either they can eat, but they just had no appetite or they just find themselves getting full quick, getting bloated and getting that food baby pretty quickly. Now in children, it very often manifests as picky eating. So in an American context, this may be the child that is only eating mac and cheese or only eating chicken nuggets or only eating pizza. They will eat nothing else besides those two food groups. This is often a more subtle manifestation of spleen qi deficiency. Sign number two of spleen qi deficiency is bloating or phlegm. So when I say bloating, I mean typically the person is easily prone to getting a food baby after eating. So they eat a meal, doesn't even have to be big, and then right after they feel abnormally full and abnormally bloated. Now one differentiation is that this is often below the belly button. So sometimes people self-report that they feel bloating, but when I ask them to gesture where they feel that bloating, they're pointing to the epigastric area up of the belly button. That's more of a GERD or a reflux pattern, but I'm talking specifically about the below the belly button. So bloating, a lot of gas, a lot of farting and things like that. Now coming up the other way, another sign of spleen qi deficiency or general digestive weakness on the spleen side is that the person is always having a phlegmy throat. So they're coughing or they're clearing their throat. These people are often, yes, I was just, I went to my friend's house, they're always clearing their throat because there's always mucus in their throat. Now that is a very clear spleen qi deficiency sign because the spleen is one of the organs that governs these kinds of fluids. And so when the person's spleen is being run down, typically they have problems with the transformation of food and even liquids because they may get what looks like a GERD or a reflux pattern, but they don't get burning and they don't get really obvious reflux, but they're always having stuff coming up. There's always a water or mucus in their throat, saliva, and they're often clearing their throat. Sign number three of spleen qi deficiency, I would say this one is possibly food allergies or food sensitivities. Now this often goes into other patterns as well. Most likely it's something related to the small intestine in reality, but this often overlaps with people who have spleen qi deficiency where they're prone to bloating, but very often these are the same people that are prone to eating a very specialized diet and they say things like, you know, I don't have any symptoms if I just eat three foods or I just don't really eat anything or if I don't eat food, I feel better. So these are very, very common and very pathological in reality. You know, the sign of a healthy digestive system is not that it can only eat three foods to feel well, right? In reality, the sign of healthy digestion is someone can eat virtually anything and digest it and still have a normal, good bowel movement the next day. Now, Taco Bell aside, there are just general, there's a spectrum here, right? Because some people cannot even eat just a hamburger made of healthy food and good bread and then have normal digestion, while someone else who has a strong digestion that's well built up will eat virtually anything, including Taco Bell, and they'll have a good bowel movement the next day, good appetite, they're not getting much counter flow, we call it in Chinese medicine. So food sensitivities is another one. Sign number four of spleen qi deficiency is loose stools. So a quintessential sign or pattern of spleen qi deficiency is often loose stools, fatigue, somnolence, the person doesn't really want to talk, maybe even low voice. They're always trying to, they have to speak up for you to hear them, in addition to a low appetite. And I don't know if I mentioned it, but again, the loose stools. So loose stools, you know, this is not always an easy concept to translate, but the pathological factor that affects the spleen is what we call dampness. So the spleen is prone to getting damp and wet. How that manifests one side is the primary symptom of dampness is loose stools and bloating. So the loose stools Chinese medicine views is almost like an overflow of that damp, there's not enough of that digestifier to warm the stools, which will then dry them out. And so the person is in an extreme sense, you know, patient with ulcerative colitis, or a person with five to 10 loose stools per day, or even diarrhea, that's a pretty severe version of that, that we see clinically, a more mild version is maybe the person is just prone towards, you know, two or three more frequent stools per day. Whereas in Chinese medicine, the mentors I learned from suggested one form of bowel movement a day is healthy bowels. So loose stools is the next sign. Now the fifth sign of spleen qi deficiency, I would say, based on what I've seen, is a low grade dull headache or brain fog, primarily in the front. So people who very often have all the aforementioned symptoms, their low appetite, or their appetites weird, they're prone to bloating or gas production or loose stools. These same people will very often report getting brain fog, or dull sensations, low grade all over the front of their head, sometimes their whole head, like they're wearing a hat, like there's a bag over their head. Sometimes they say my head is heavy. Sometimes they say my head is foggy. Sometimes they say there's cotton balls in my head. A lot of words people use to describe their subjective sensations. But these kind of low grade brain fog headaches are very, very common as secondary manifestations of spleen qi deficiency. So these ancient Japanese doctors called this counterflow toxic water. And again, remember, pathological aspect of the spleen is dampness, you know, flamminess, this mucus production, the mucus membranes are a little bit too damp. And so that brain fog is almost always associated with a GI pattern in my experience. All right, you guys, that's all I have for today. Again, remember two very important links right below the video. The first is if you'd like to become a patient of mine locally, or online via telemedicine, there's a link to my private practice and clinic below. And there's also a free download for my weekly video newsletter. Four daily rituals that can potentially help you add years to your life with traditional Chinese medicine is a PDF and a little case study I put together there. You can check them out both below this video. And then before you go, I have true related videos right over there.