Dr.AcuMassage

11/20/2025

TURKEY DAY WITHOUT THE BURNOUT: How to Keep Your Cool (and Your Energy!) This Thanksgiving!

How do you feel about Thanksgiving?
Do you love the warmth and connection — or does the travel, planning, and endless to-do list leave you tired, tense, or overheated?

For many women, it’s a mix of both: joy, connection… and a whole lot of stress. The prep, the gatherings, the expectations — they can leave you drained, overheated, and more reactive than usual. Here are a few tips from Chinese Medicine to help you stay calm, cool, and grounded — even if the holiday gets a little chaotic.

1. Give Yourself Short Breaks

In Chinese medicine, health comes from balancing yin (rest) and yang (activity). The holidays often drive us into too much yang, and that extra heat can worsen hot flashes, aches, and irritability.

You don’t need long pauses to reset. Even five minutes helps.
Try:
- A few deep belly breaths alone in the bathroom
- A quiet moment in your car before going inside
- A short walk outside for fresh air
- A mini-meditation while washing dishes

These tiny yin breaks cool the body, settle the mind, and help you navigate the day with more ease.

2. Know Your Friendly Foods

Some foods naturally cool the body, while others can warm you up.
Here are a few food tips to help keep your temperature down during Thanksgiving meals:

- Eat plenty of veggies — most vegetables are naturally cooling and help balance the heavier, richer Thanksgiving dishes.
- Include a touch of sour (like tart cranberry sauce or a squeeze of lime). Sour flavours gently soothe the system and help regulate the body’s energy.
-Alcohol, spicy foods, and sugary dishes can warm the body, but everyone reacts a little differently — they may or may not trigger heat or irritability for you. If you’d like to enjoy a drink and still stay on the cooler side, white wines or cider are usually gentler than red wine or hard liquor, so those options can be helpful.

3. Stay Committed to Gentle Movement

It’s completely natural to get off your exercise routine during the holidays — but even a shorter, softer version of your movement practice can make a huge difference.

Exercise:
Clears stress
Loosens stiffness
Supports digestion
Lifts mood
Reduces aches and pains

Stick with movements that help you feel good in your body: stretching, walking, simple yoga flows, or anything that eases tension. It doesn’t have to be long or intense — just consistent enough to keep your qi flowing.

May your Thanksgiving be filled with gratitude, steadiness, and small moments of joy.
Here’s to staying cool, grounded, and connected to yourself — no matter what kind of chaos may come your way.

11/14/2025

If the early darkness has been making you feel uncomfortable, you’re not alone.
Many women feel this shift after setting back the clock .

In TCM, darker evenings bring a rise in Yin energy — heavier, quieter energy.
When it shows up too quickly, our bodies sometimes struggle to adjust.

Here’s a gentle after-work breath ritual you can do in under two minutes, right when you step in the door or even before you leave the office.

Follow for more yoga + TCM tips for women’s midlife wellness.

11/10/2025

EASE INTO EARLY SUNSETS- 3 TCM TIPS TO NURTURE RADIANT HEALTH!

Our clocks changed back last week — and with darker evenings and city lights flickering earlier, it’s easier to feel a bit out of sync.

In midlife, the amount of light we see and feel can deeply affect our rhythm and mood. Here are 3 gentle ways from Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) to help your body stay balanced and your spirit bright:

🌿 1. Embrace More Rest

Winter is known for shorter days and longer nights. In TCM, balance comes from mirroring nature — so as the nights lengthen, our bodies naturally want deeper rest.

Enjoy an extra 30 minutes of sleep if you can. Cozy up under a warm blanket with your favourite tea and a good book. Let those slower, introspective evenings recharge you from within. When you rest in rhythm with the season, your hormones and energy both benefit.

🌸 2. Keep Movement Gentle and Warming

Cold weather and busy routines can make us slow down more than we mean to. Yet keeping your energy flowing with exercise is one of the best ways to stay radiant and energized.

If you don’t have a regular form of exercise you love, try gentle Tai Chi, Qi gong, or mindful stretching. Move enough to release tension, not to exhaust yourself. This kind of movement reduces stiffness and nourishes your inner warmth.

🍐 3. Eat Warming, Moist Foods

Cold weather can dry your skin, nose, and throat — leading to dry coughs and fatigue. Nourish yourself with foods that warm and moisten your body. Here are a few: Chinese pears simmered with cinnamon, hearty soups, stews, and teas with a touch of honey.

These foods replenish fluids while gently stoking your body’s internal fire.

💗 Final Thought

The key is to find joy in the darker days — not to fight them. Rest, nourish, and move with the season.

Early sunsets can feel cozy or draining depending on the day — what’s one small thing that helps you feel brighter in the longer nights?

Yoga and TCM offers holistic wellness through yoga and Traditional Chinese Medicine to support vibrant living over 40.

11/03/2025

DIMMER DAYS, BRIGHTER YOU — 3 TCM Tips to Lift Energy After the Time Change

Life gets busy — and after 40, our energy changes.
That one-hour shift from Daylight Saving Time can throw our system off more than we realize. When our circadian rhythm gets disrupted, we can feel groggy, irritable, or just not quite ourselves.

Here are a few tips from Traditional Chinese Medicine to lift your spirit, energize your body, and help you re-sync naturally this week:

✨ Stick to your schedule.
In TCM, balance is everything.
When we eat, move, and rest in regular patterns, our qi (energy) flows smoothly and our hormones stabilize. Try keeping steady anchors: a morning breath or stretch at 6:30 a.m., breakfast by 8 a.m. and dinner around 7 p.m for example. This simple structure helps your circadian rhythm re-align, reducing stress and restoring energy more quickly.

☕ Is your morning brew really that good for you?
Coffee adds heat to the body — which can aggravate hot flashes and night sweats. Try a green tea ginger blend or a chai latte with almond milk instead. From a TCM perspective, these teas gently warm the body, keeping you energized without overstimulating internal heat.

🌬️ Try a 5-Minute Breath Reset.
In TCM, balance creates vitality. To lift our energy, we must also truly rest. That extra hour of sleep might sound refreshing, but many of us may feel sluggish by late afternoon. That’s when a brief nap or this 5-minute breath routine can work wonders:
Sit comfortably with your spine tall, shoulders relaxed, and hands on your belly.
Inhale slowly, feeling your belly expand.
Exhale gently, letting your belly draw back toward your spine.
With each breath, imagine inhaling new vitality and exhaling fatigue or irritability.
Five quiet minutes can reset your nervous system and bring your Qi — and mood — back into harmony.

💗 Be gentle with yourself this week.
Your body is simply finding a new rhythm — and with a little structure and care, it will.

If you’re experiencing hot flashes or night sweats, my Hot Flash Relief Mini-Guide (you’ll find it at the bottom of the page, link below) offers simple yoga and acupressure routines to help cool the body, calm the mind, and restore your balance naturally.
👉 [ https://yogaandtcm.com/hotflashreset ]

11/02/2025

Wondering how Daylight Saving Time might be affecting your energy and sleep? Here’s a quick TCM read. 💛

3 TCM Tips To Bounce Back After Daylight Saving Time

09/07/2025

https://wix.to/PFK0qno Sharing something from my practice, NW Vibrational. This newsletter has a few gentle TCM tips for natural energy — hope you enjoy!

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