Chinese Food Health gives you the basic approaches on how to nourish and preserve health in the perspective of Traditional Chinese Medicine.

In To Comprehend Dark Circles Through TCM’s Eyes, we already have learned the causes of dark eye circles.  Although we may not be able to change the factor of heredity, we can get total control of our diets.  In fact, some foods can just improve the condition amazingly.  In this piece, we will take a closer look at some of them suggested by Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) Practitioner.

What’s more, we will debunk some remedy myths and facts of dark eye circles.

Foods That Work:

• Sesame:  Rich in vitamin E, sesame can nourish eye bulb as well as eye muscle.
• Kelp:  Containing high amount of iron, the main component of hemoglobin, kelp promotes the increase of hemoglobin, which is beneficial to the oxygen and nutrients transportation.
• Black Fungus:  According to TCM practitioner, thanks to the high content of iron, black fungus can replenish “Qi” (essential energy), enrich and activate blood.  It also is very good at inhibiting platelet aggregation and lowering viscosity of blood, therefore can reduce dark eye circles effectively.
• Carrot:   Carrot contains plenty of vitamin A that can maintain a normal function of epithelial tissue.  It also is able to nourish eye bulb and eye muscle as well.
• Water:  Water not only helps to discharge waste from our body, it also diminishes dark eye circles.

Myths That Fail:

• Freeze an after-brewing tea bag, and then use it as an eye mask:  First, the vitamin C contained in tea has long been dissolved after brewing.  Second, the phytic acid and other substances will have a great chance to produce bacteria if handle improperly.  Third, when our skin makes a long contact with the pigment effused in tea, pigment aggregates and does more harm than good.
• Drink coffee in the morning:  Since coffee contains diuretic that causes an increase in the flow of urine, it helps reduce edema in the short term.  With constant heavy coffee intake, however, may lead to an over-acidic body due to coffee’s high acidity.  In fact, coffee (caffeine) breaks down into uric acid, which the body excretes through the kidneys.  An excess of uric acid only lays pressure on the kidneys and worsens dark eye circles in the long run.
• Use apple slices to lay on eyes:   Rich in vitamin A, apple promotes the increase of hemoglobin that can facilitate the transportation of oxygen and nutrients.  Apple indeed is capable of removing dark eye circles, but only applicable to “internal use,” not “external.”

Pandas are cute, yet you never would want to look like them.  “Panda eyes” can be hereditary or inborn; however, diets and lifestyles also play their big part in causing them, or fixing them.

Image by R*18