About once a year I get a surge of enquiries about weight loss, after a TV program this week about acupuncture and weight loss it’s happening again.

Acupuncture can help you lose unwanted body fat BUT you must still diet sensibly, drink enough water and exercise regularly, acupuncture is no magic substitute for self discipline.

Acupuncture helps people improve their body mass index in a variety of ways, firstly if you want to exercise but are too tired to, acupuncture can help you sleep better (see insomnia blog). If you sleep enough but still have low energy, there are acupuncture points that can help raise your physical energy, this type of acupuncture is used by athletes and on race horses for better performance and can work surprisingly well. 

If you sleep well and your physical energy is up to scratch but find it hard to limit your food intake you may need to remove temptation from your path, just like drinkers drink more when they hang around with other drinkers you may need to spend less time in the company of people who eat too much, eating like drinking is a social activity and there may be peer group pressures that need to be recognised, I have had numerous clients over the years who have lamented losing their thinning-resolve when in the company of certain friends and acquaintances.

Your excessive food intake may be related to comfort eating, if so it may be stress related, some people lose their appetite completely when they are stressed- out, others eat more, kind of like alot of smokers smoke more when they are stressed-out. Acupuncture can help you if this applies to you, whether your stress is related to worry, fear, anxiety or anger there are acupuncture points that if properly matched to your particular needs can help you achieve your goals.

I do stress the point about the acupuncture points matching your needs because there are numerous acupuncture points that are associated with weight loss, your attempts at utilizing this form of therapy will usually be more successful if administered by a traditionally trained acupuncturist rather than by some one who doesn’t really specialize in it.

Some people have slow metabolisms, I have known people who think it’s normal to defecate only once a week (or even longer), if you never eat breakfast it won’t help you either. Laxatives are a poor second best to good dieting but are better than being constipated.

If you are chronically constipated perhaps you need more water, fruit and vegetables, a recently released Australian study showed that 70% of Australian adults do not eat enough vegetables. Exercise can help keep you regular too, when you are moving about our internal organs gently rub up against and massage one another. Like wise having massage applied to your abdomen and lower back can help you go to the toilet more regularly, you can learn to do this for yourself from the Self Massage book.

Weight loss is a big subject, not all methods work equally for all people but if any of the above helps you that’s great.