Dietary Guidelines for People Prone to Weight Gain: Scientific Food-Based Weight Loss Plan

My advice is that unless you have an extreme case of Qi deficiency, you don't need to deliberately restrict your water intake. This is especially true for women who have just finished strenuous exercise, as they already need more water. Don't deliberately reduce your water intake to avoid damaging your Yang Qi; insufficient water intake can lead to other health problems.

However, if you have an extreme case of Qi deficiency and are advised by a doctor to reduce your water intake, or if you experience significant stomach discomfort after drinking large amounts of water, then you should be mindful of reducing your water intake appropriately. However, you must drink water when you are thirsty; this is essential.

Patients with Qi deficiency should also avoid eating overly greasy, cold, or hard foods. This is because most people with Qi deficiency also have spleen deficiency, which makes it difficult for them to digest greasy, cold, or hard foods. Therefore, the foods listed above should be mainly stewed or boiled, not fried or stir-fried. When cooking, pay attention to fine preparation; try to cut the food into small pieces or cook it until it is very soft.

Based on the above characteristics, we have removed high-calorie, unfavorable for weight loss, and greasy foods from the list above, and have prepared a more reasonable Qi-tonifying diet plan for you. If you feel you are overweight due to water retention, have a large body size but lack strength, are prone to sweating, and are easily short of breath, then you can use this plan to supplement your diet while actively exercising. Qi-tonifying dietary principles:

1. Eat more legumes.

Many legumes are suitable for tonifying Qi. Legumes are low in calories and rich in various nutrients, making them very suitable for daily consumption. Therefore, in your daily diet, you should replace some staple foods with legumes. For example, add some legumes when cooking rice and rice porridge. Or, when steaming buns or rolls, add bean flour to the flour to reduce the intake of refined grains and increase the Qi-tonifying effect.

2. Eat more vegetables and mushrooms.

To lose weight, you should include a considerable proportion of vegetables in each meal. Furthermore, many vegetables and mushrooms are precisely the foods needed to replenish Qi. Therefore, you should refer to the list of vegetables and mushrooms above and plan your meals accordingly, making sure to eat a sufficient amount of vegetables at each meal.

3. Eat more stewed meats.

Many foods that replenish Qi are meats, such as beef, lamb, and fish. Since replenishing Qi requires foods that are not too greasy or difficult to digest, you should choose lean meats. For cooking methods, stewing is the primary method, and it should be stewed thoroughly; a pressure cooker can be used.

This is slightly different from a weight-loss diet. In a weight-loss diet, it's okay to eat less lean meat. However, for patients with Qi deficiency, meat supplementation is more important. It's not that eating meat is optional, but rather that they should eat more stewed lean meat to nourish their energy.

4. Eat fruit appropriately.

If you feel hungry between meals, eat more of the fruits listed above. This will replenish your nutrition without causing weight gain.

Additionally, some common medicinal herbs can be added to qi-tonifying recipes, such as astragalus. Astragalus is one of the most commonly used qi-tonifying herbs in Traditional Chinese Medicine, with a mild effect suitable for most people.

Because astragalus is mild, it is often used in qi-tonifying dietary therapy, such as astragalus-infused chicken or duck. You can also choose lighter recipes, such as astragalus porridge. Decoction the astragalus using the traditional Chinese medicine method of "three decoctions and three boilings" to extract its medicinal essence, then use this essence to cook rice porridge. Note that rice is a staple food and contains calories, so the amount of other staple foods should be reduced accordingly when eating this porridge.

Patients with qi deficiency should also pay attention to exercise. Appropriate exercise can help replenish qi. Since weight loss inherently requires consistent exercise, this point doesn't need further explanation; simply maintain sufficient exercise regularly.

Balanced nutrition: A healthy spleen and stomach prevent the body from accumulating fat.