background information - Irmgard Acupunctuur

The Consequences of Poor Nutrition

irmgard background information, Lifestyle, Nutrition 5 August 20256 August 2025Alzheimer dementia, arthritis, autoimmune diseases, autonomic nervous system, cancer, cardiovascular disease, food, low-grade inflammation, lung diseases, neurological disorders, physical exercise, stress, type 2 diabetes, vascular diseases

I notice that people often panic when they accidentally put the wrong fuel in their car—like diesel instead of petrol—because they know it can damage the engine.
Yet, our supermarkets are full of foods that act like the wrong fuel for our bodies. Although our digestive engine also sputters, unlike a car, the body adapts and the consequences become visible later. How does that work?

The Body as a Garbage Dump

All the indigestible fuel that we consume, looks for a place to go in the body. But where is the rubbish dump?

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Like sludge in a ditch, this “indigestible fuel” thickens our internal fluids, such as blood, lymphatic fluid, and tissue fluids, disrupting their natural flow.
A clear example is seen in children with dairy intolerance: their bodies struggle to process dairy, and the normally clear nasal fluids turn into thick, green mucus. This visible change is just one way the body signals that something isn’t right.

Thickening of Bodily Fluids

The thickening of bodily fluids can occur in many forms, levels, and locations throughout the body. It can, for example, thicken, buildup and, manifest in various ways, including:
• Mucus (nasal congestion)
• Eczema (linked to impaired skin circulation)
• Asthma or blocked sinuses
• Vaginal discharge
• Elevated cholesterol
• Arteriosclerosis (hardening of the arteries)
• Edema (fluid retention in tissues)
• Fat accumulation
• Gallstones
• Kidney stones
• Cancer

Where bodily fluids become so thickened that there is reduced flow and stagnation, low-grade inflammation can occur. You can compare it to the stinking sludge from a stagnant ditch.
You can read more about low-grade inflammation and the role of nutritionhere

When stagnation becomes severe, it can create isolated, energy-consuming systems that no longer communicate with the rest of the body—similar to how a clogged ditch becomes cut off from surrounding water.
This loss of regulation is one way to understand the development of cancerous growths.

The formation of fat can protect your body against toxins. Toxic substances are encapsulated by fat. That is why you gain weight from consuming foods with various added preservatives, colours, and flavours.

What Is Healthy Nutrition?

That’s the big question—and the honest answer is – it depends. What’s healthy for one person may not be ideal for another.
Digestion is a rotting and ripening process during which your digestion is assisted by about a kilo of gut bacteria. You can only digest what the gut bacteria recognize as food.
Many processed foods contain preservatives. Preservatives are substances that specifically prevent decay and ripening and thus hinder digestion as well. In addition to preservatives, colourants and flavourings are indigestible, and sugars are also bad for everyone’s digestion.

So, when you eliminate sugar and eat a varied and unprocessed diet (not from a package), you’ve already made a big step in the right direction!

Good nutrition is food that can be digested well, and we are very different in this as humans: some people digest fats very well, others fare better on proteins or carbohydrates, or combinations of these.

Therefore, it’s always good to check with yourself:
‘How does this settle in my stomach?’
Does it feel like a stone in your stomach, do you then suffer from gas or heartburn, or does the food leave you feeling nourished and energized?
And how long does that energy last? Do you feel satisfied for hours, or are you hungry again soon after?
Sometimes I get clients who eat very healthily and still have digestive problems. In such cases, it’s worth exploring deeper causes, such as food intolerances or allergies.

Body Fluid Flow

“Sludge” in the body can be caused by indigestible food, but the flow of body fluids also plays a role. Compare it to sludge that has less chance of sabotaging a well-draining ditch.

Exercise is, of course, an important factor for fluid flow. The more you exercise, the better the flow of your body fluids.

And don’t underestimate stress! Stress causes the body to contract, which reduces fluid flow and increases the likelihood of sludge buildup.
Furthermore, stress causes you to be constantly “on” and excessively in the fight-or-flight mode of your autonomic nervous system. This is detrimental to the resting state of the autonomic nervous system, which also includes your digestion. Therefore, your digestion can function less effectively under the influence of stress.
Chronic stress is a major stagnating factor that contributes to illness.

The reward of good nutrition:

In one form of acupuncture I practice, the effects of nutrition can be felt directly in the abdomen. I once treated someone who consistently experienced a sharp, stabbing pain deep in the abdominal area during several consultations. Despite treatment, the discomfort persisted. I shared my concern about a possible rumbling appendix. The client returned a few weeks later. The pain had disappeared like snow in the sun, and she had more energy. I asked her if she had changed her diet, and it turned out she no longer ate sugar. It was very motivating for her to notice the significant effect this had had so quickly.

Nutrition is therefore an important factor for your health, and when treatment is combined with an improved diet, the results for your health will be better and longer lasting.

PMT shopping

irmgard background information 6 November 202426 April 2025Hormones, Menstrual complaints

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You are visiting the drugstore in a busy high street and it’s almost that time of the month. Everything is immensely irritating, even a gust of wind. Everyone is getting in your way. You could kick them.
Have you ever realised how different your mood can be just before your period?

This is because the liver energy is out of balance.

I look at it from the perspective of Chinese medicine:
Liver energy ensures that the blood reaches the right place at the right time. For example: when you exercise, more blood flows to the muscles. When you eat, more blood flows to your digestion system.
Strangely enough, you can compare liver energy with bamboo. Bamboo only wants one thing, and that is to grow! Bamboo has deep roots. If there is an obstacle that hinders its growth, such as a gust of wind, it will gather strength from its deep roots, stabilise itself and straighten up again. Bamboo is hollow and, after the gust of wind, it does not focus on the wind, but only on its own growth.

Just like bamboo, liver energy gives you the drive to overcome obstacles while maintaining focus on your goal.
When your liver energy is in balance, you can weave your way through the crowds on a busy Saturday and get to the drugstore without getting annoyed by the people in your way.

But if you are premenstrual while shopping in that same busy high street, your liver energy could be out of balance because it has to work harder due to menstruation cycle.
If the liver energy is too strong, then every person who gets in your way on the high street is a huge obstacle.
However, if the liver energy is too weak: the very thought of all that hustle and bustle means that you would rather stay home and sit on the couch.

I can bring the liver energy into balance using acupuncture.
Make an appointment.

I’ve cancelled half of my appointments

irmgard background information, client experiences 20 August 202420 August 2024autonomic nervous system, menopause, stress

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A woman comes to me with menopausal symptoms. She has a full schedule and has put a lot of pressure on herself. But after a number of treatments, she feels better about herself and is more in touch with her needs.
She says: “I looked at my busy schedule and thought, this is ridiculous. So, I’ve cancelled half of my appointments.” A while later, she realises that she doesn’t like her job anymore either: “The contact with my customers drains me completely.”
A short time later, she has a new job with contacts that give her energy.

When you are in stress mode, you are often no longer in contact with your real needs. The nervous system is in fight-or-flight mode and every action becomes a ‘must’. When you relax into the resting position, you can feel where the need lies; not from a feeling of ‘must’, but from a sense of ‘being’.

Headache

irmgard background information 20 August 20247 August 2025food, headache, posture, stress

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Headaches can stem from a wide range of causes, all of which are represented in the image above.

Headaches can be caused by:
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foods containing refined sugars, E-numbers or foods that you are intolerant to. The liver is then too busy detoxifying the body which can cause headaches.

medication can cause headaches as a side effect.

bad posture, whether done subconsciously or because of the nature of your work, can cause tension in your neck muscles, resulting in headaches.

vision problems: if you don’t see well, you will squint which may cause a headache.

stress often causes you to pull your shoulders up slightly and tense your neck and shoulder muscles. This can cause poor bloodflow in your neck and result in headaches.

Because headaches can arise from a variety of causes, there’s no one-size-fits-all solution.
That’s why I begin with in-depth questions—in order to tailor the treatment to align with both the root cause and the person behind the symptoms.
Headaches can be effectively treated by acupuncture.

I’d like you to come for treatment six times a week

irmgard background information, client experiences 20 August 202428 August 2024frequency, pain, scar

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This is the first and, to date, the only time in my acupuncture practice that I have ever made such a proposal.

Normally, I treat clients with pain complaints once or twice a week in the beginning. In this way, the treatment can build on the effects of the previous treatment and you will ultimately need fewer treatments.

But this case is exceptional: this young student cut her index finger on a broken glass and the scar fused with the nerve. Although the scar and nerve were separated, two years down the line the nerve pain still shoots from the finger to the shoulder. It’s impossible for her to sleep for more than an hour at a time becauseof the pain. She has difficulty planning activities, because the pain might resurge and then she is unable to do anything.

So, I begin treatment on the healthy finger. The pain immediately subsides for a few hours and then returns. When I treat her again later in the week, the pain has returned in full force. This calls for drastic measures. I tell her that treating her twice a week will not bring any lasting results and that it will be a waste of time and money if I keep having to go back to the starting blocks after each treatment.
When I propose treating her six times a week, she decides to go for it!

So, she comes for treatment six times a week for two weeks, then the following week she comes three times, followed by two treatments the week after that.
The treatment stops and except for a very slight stinging sensation in her index finger, which she can live with, the nerve pain has completely disappeared. She can sleep again and is pain-free for a year.

But after a year, she comes back to the practice because the pain has returned in full force. We immediately start treatments six times a week, but this time the pain does not significantly lessen with each treatment. So, my conclusion is that there must be something that structurally continues to irritate that nerve. I tell her that I think that there might still be glass in that finger.
Her surgeon checks it out and discovers that there are still two pieces of glass in her finger.They are removed and at Christmas I get a card from her saying that she is doing well now.

This anecdote illustrates the importance of a well-coordinated frequency of treatment. It also proves how effective acupuncture is without directly pricking the painful area. And it shows that acupuncture can’t eliminate mechanical blockages.

Therefore both Chinese and western medicine care are essential.

The blind acupuncturist and pinning the tail on the donkey

irmgard background information 20 August 202420 August 2024toyohari methode

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When I tell her that I have followed an acupuncture course for blind acupuncturists, my client looks at me in bewilderment and says: “It must be like pinning a tail on the donkey”.

Fortunately, it is not like that at all. It’s a very subtle and powerful way of treatment that was developed by blind acupuncturists in Japan. The needle techniques are painless because the skin is not punctured. This style of acupuncture is called Toyohari and is very suitable for sensitive people and for people with a fear of needles.

Irritability MOT

irmgard background information, client experiences 20 August 202420 August 2024short temper, yin yang

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Someone comes in for an ‘MOT’ because she has a very short fuse and is extremely restless. She comes to the practice regularly because she really struggles with this. One day she comes in and she is boiling over.
She has just retired and I ask her what she is doing differently than usual because the inner turmoil is now at the max. She says that she exercises intensively every day and then goes to the sauna.

Now I understand what’s going on and I can explain it to her step by step using the meaning of Yin and Yang:

Yin is the dark side of the mountain
and Yang Is the sunny side of the mountain.

Yin is cold
and Yang is warm.

Yin – cold becomes a more physical, solid presence (just like water turns into ice under the influence of cold)
Yang – heat becomes increasingly rarefied (like water turns into steam under the influence of heat)

The bodily fluids are Yin (matter).
The moving energy and the mind are Yang (rarefied).

Yin and Yang balance each other in the body.
If there is a lack of Yin, there is a lack of bodily fluids.
Then Yin can no longer control the Yang in the body.

If Yang is not under control, the tenuous moving energy flies out of control. This manifests itself in great restlessness or in rising heat in the form of hot flashes or short tempers.

If you exercise fanatically every day and go to the sauna, you lose a lot of bodily fluids and therefore a lot of Yin. And that, in this case, causes Yang to boil over.

Can acupuncture cure everything?

irmgard background information 20 August 202420 August 2024

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You can treat many more complaints than most people know.
These are complaints in which the balance in the body needs to be restored.
When an imbalance is left untreated, it can become more and more entrenched. However, if the imbalance has become too fixed in the body, such as with calcific tendinitis (shoulder complaint) or gallstones, acupuncture is no longer the right tool.
Sometimes relief is still possible in the event of a stuck process, for example treatment for nausea during chemotherapy.
I might not always be the best person to treat you. I think that, depending on the nature of your complaint, you might be better off with a bones/muscle specialist, a natural dietician, a trauma specialist, a pilates class or the doctor.

In that case, I will always consult with you about alternatives because I don’t like to string people along.

Should I believe in acupuncture?

irmgard background information 20 August 202428 August 2024

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One day, while giving a lecture on ‘women of today’, a woman asks me if we need to believe in acupuncture for it to work. I tell her that it’s not necessary at all.
After the lecture, we talk for a while and she tells me that she had been treated by someone for a year and that it didn’t help. She wonders if she hadn’t ‘believed in it hard enough’. I tell her that animals are also treated with acupuncture successfully and they don’t understand what’s happening to them. If a treatment doesn’t work and plan B doesn’t work either, I will stop the treatment. I would never blame that on a lack of faith in acupuncture.

I think it’s wonderful if you can be open to new experiences with acupuncture and I would really appreciate it if you’d like to share them with me.

Off to a flying start at the ultimate cross-country ice skating race (Elfstedentocht)

irmgard background information, client experiences 20 August 202420 August 2024body awareness, stress

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In the winter of 1997 I witnessed a special spectacle at the start of the Eleven Cities Tour – the ultimate cross-country ice skating race through eleven northern cities. A man, in his forties, sportily dressed, is eager to start this two-hundred-kilometre skating race.
He steps onto the ice and with quick, powerful strokes he sprints towards the finish line that he mentally can already see in front of him. However, he doesn’t move an inch, but he doesn’t realize that, focused as he is. People shout at him: ‘Hey dude, you still have your skate protectors on’. After a one-minute sprint, the penny drops. With heavy legs and freed from skate protectors, he continues his race.

I am reminded of this event when I treat a man who returns to work after a burn out. He is very reluctant to open his laptop for the first time and, well prepared as he is, has resolved to only do things that have priority.When he opens his laptop, in no time he’s doing tasks that don’t take priority and that he hadn’t set out to do. His brain is focused on ‘the finish’ and the connection with his body is lost.

I ask him to open my laptop as an experiment and feel where the tension is in his body. He can clearly feel it around his diaphragm. I ask him where he experiences peace in his body. He feels it in his feet. I then ask him if he can feel a connection between the diaphragm and the feet. He succeeds and now feels a lot calmer behind the laptop.

By connecting with his body in this way, he can avoid starting the marathon called work with a sprint that puts his whole body in stress mode. Landing in his body prevents him from sprinting like an unguided missile towards the endless horizon. And so he can set the right pace for the work marathon without getting heavy legs.

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