Question about empty heat

Hi - I’ll try to get a photo of the tongue - generally, it is red-pink with a slightly redder tip. A thin white/yellow coat further back.

The heat in the palms/soles came about in the beginning of February, right when I became sick. I’d never experienced anything like this before, so it was noticeable and worrying. The sickness came from a virus that hit the school I work at, one of those where one would feel bad for a few days, recover, then get hit again after 2-3 days. This lasted roughly 7 weeks. I was working the whole time, compounding the stress. I had blood tests done to determine a potential cause for the hot palms/soles, but nothing came up, other than a slightly high thyroid (still in the “old” range), but I have no overt symptoms of hypothyroidism. Anyway, I was very stressed during this period and started to feel serious intestinal pains around the mid of March. After I would eat it would come on 20-30 minutes and last for hours. I lost around 25 pounds between March-June. I took a number of supplements, including high power probiotics. Not sure if these worked, but it began to ease off around the middle of June and had virtually ceased by the beginning of August (I can eat anything and not suffer discomfort now). It was strange – sometimes it would be intestinal, sometimes it would be higher, in the stomach.

I went to an acupuncture school in May. From my pulse and tongue and general anxiety (the latter, I suspect, based on the battering my body had received in the past few months) – they diagnosed me with liver qi stagnation with underlying phlegm. (The coating on my tongue was thicker during this time). They gave me Shu Gan Wan but it seemed to make the ‘heat’ worse, so I discontinued. After doing some research on the internet, I found the formulas that are specific to the hot palms/soles (Yin Deficiency was the usual diagnosis). I also spoke to a professional acupuncturist and another fellow online, and both stated that it sounded like some form of underlying Yin Def.

I started the formula around the beginning of July - Rehmannia 6 and Cork Bark, then switched to Zhi Bai Di Huang Wan at the beginning of August. The symptoms used to persist for hours and could become rather intense, to the point that I was continually distracted by it. After July it mellowed some, but continued until around the mid of August, when I noticed that it only comes for small periods and is less intense – just sort of “there,” but not actively “burning”.

I’m not taking the pills, but the granules which I mix into tea. Initially (July-beginning of August) I was taking only 6 grams, but now I tend to take 9-12 grams a day; I noticed in August that if I increased the dosage, the sensations were reduced.

Other symptoms: I did have some dizziness this summer, but no more. I felt anxiety and fatigue, both are reduced. I tend to urinate rather frequently. Bowel movements were erratic during the stomach condition but are fairly regular now.

Other health info: 40 years old. I exercised a lot up to the birth of my daughter & still walk an average of 5-7 miles a day (from work and in the evening). I was a “mild” smoker for about 12 years, and quit right around the time all this started – mild as in less than 5 cigarettes a day. I believe the symptom probably came from the amount of stress at my work and my unfortunate tendency to keep myself going through lots of caffeine (mostly green tea, but coffee as well; I’ve eliminated the latter) in the daytime and a couple cigs at night, with poor sleep for 5-7+ years.

I was told here by the professionals that I’d probably need to take the herbs for at least 6 months, advice repeated to me by the professional I visited where I live. As I cannot afford both regular acupuncture and the herbs, I’ve chosen the latter for the time being. My life is still pretty stressful (just had a second baby), but I can say the condition has overall improved… When I do get the sensations at various locations I visit (store, pool, etc), it reminds me of how intense it used to be.

Here is the tongue. Ignore the bulge on the right side, it’s been there for many years and was the result of biting the side of my tongue during a stressful period.

I’ve been rather busy lately so please excuse me for the time in taking to reply to you. Your tongue says an awful lot to me and what you have going on is something I treat with clients on a weekly basis (it’s something I’m quite familiar with).

Also, what did you mean by ‘treatment regimes?’

Treatment regimes are basically holistic plans designed to work together in treatment (i.e. dietary choices, lifestyle changes, and administering herbal formulas that can often change frequently as the body adjusts towards healing and equilibrium).

What else would you recommend to help clear heat?

First of all, the reason that poor sleep exacerbates the heat signs in particular is because your kidney channel is extremely deficient and you have heart fire. This is clear as day on your tongue. When the heart and kidney channels lose their symbiotic connection, then the spirit looses its grounding (read: anxiety may build, insomnia goes full-on, and sleep disturbance is pronounced–especially wherein either hot or cold and/or alternating periods of the two extremes is present immediately before and/or after sleeping). I wouldn’t be surprised if you frequently urinate around bedtime as well, or are a light sleeper who wakes up frequently at night. This is just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the manifestations of deficient kidneys.

“Clearing heat” has many applications depending on a lot of factors–i.e. what channels are affected? Where does the heat originate? How does it manifest? What other dysfunctions are either directly and/or indirectly causing and/or exacerbating such heat? Etc. The short answer to your question of what to do about clearing heat is that depends on a whole lot. We’d have to set up a consultation to go into those details (my initial consultations average 2 hours with such cases). [quote=“Ian_Vance, post:1, topic:4053”]
I’ve been taking Zhi Bai Di Huang Wan for the past two months.
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If I were the one helping you I would not have made this call. Huang Bai should never be taken longer than a month maximum because it will devastate the good bacteria you need in your intestinal tract–albeit working fantastically by killing off bad critters as well. It needs to be treated as an antibiotic would–yet it’s far stronger and more effective than most antibiotics on the market today. Taking this will definitely help heat signs (especially if they’re prominent in the lower burner), but this ingredient easily damages true Qi and causes the collapse of the kidney meridian–causing way worse conditions that are chronic and stubbornly fixed. Such damage is evident from your tongue (note the small white patch at the very back).

The heat in the palms/soles came about in the beginning of February, right when I became sick.

Your underlying issues have really decimated your liver meridian to the point that the Yang has separated form the Yin and can no longer downbear. This would explain why you have such prevalent dampness accumulation as well, since when Yang and Yin separate they disrupt the normal upbearing of Yin and downbearing of Yang. The liver channel is hollow and empty, creating wind. The heat can easily transfer from the Kidney to Liver channels, fusing with the wind pathogen and creating wind-heat.

By the way, the reason caffeine exacerbates this is two-fold: (1) it further depletes the Spleen and (2) it adds damp heat which ends up exacerbating liver wind-heat.

Ignore the bulge on the right side, it’s been there for many years and was the result of biting the side of my tongue during a stressful period.

That’s a big detail best not left ignored. Biting the tongue or tongue marks on the sides is a fundamental representation of chronic Spleen issues (which I immediately picked up on from hearing about your case for the first time).

To summarize, the reason you haven’t resolved your issues is because no one has yet looked at all that needs to be addressed, nor worked on those things simultaneously. That is the only way these types of issues are resolved. You have chronic Spleen issues at the core, causing Kidney deficiency which both exacerbates and feeds (now) concomitant Liver vacuity with wind-heat presentation. This then leads to blood deficiency. Blood deficiency and Liver wind-heat in the presence of Kidney vacuity can easily produce Heart fire–which you also have. With the dampness accumulation as the result of the chronic separation of Yin and Yang (on top of underlying true Yang deficiency), this eventually leads to Yin deficiency on top of all these things to further complicate matters and firmly lock these patterns in place until you address them all in one go.

Most of the clients I’ve served in the last year have been from all over the US–Pasadena, Chicago, Minneapolis, Rochester, and Boston to name a few. The long distance is not an issue, since I utilize tongue diagnosis effectively and prepare herbal remedies from my own personal apothecary and post to my clients.

Are you referring to an exercise/stress/meditation ball?

I believe it helps you to get to bed only if it’s that early because if you were to try and go to sleep at the same time that Wei Qi naturally sinks into the interior of the body you will have insomnia and increased heat sensations due to wind-heat in the liver channel.

It does little justice to suggest individual herbs for a person because the whole of the patterns must be addressed (the functional health of the body must be observed). We could always go into great detail with suggestions and treatment regimens during an initial consultation. I offer free initial consults–which typically last 1.5-2 hours. Let me know your thoughts.

I wish you the best on your healing journey.

For my long-distance clients the most feasible solution is sending you one or any combination of (1) tinctures; (2) herbal pills; and/or (3) raw herbs for you to decoct at home–I give instructions if this is the case. I prepare the tinctures and pills myself with premium ingredients that I use for myself. Every substance I use is organic, premium quality, and spectrometer tested for contaminants.

We can talk about all else on a consult. My Skype ID is fujiyokocookiecutter. What is your schedule like? Would you have time to talk on Wednesday at 3pm CST?

Ok 4 it is then. See you tomorrow!

I sent a request yesterday and attempted to call @ 3… let me see what is going on.

Yes I did. Have a look at my response now.