"What Are the Effects of Consuming Cold Beverages During Menstruation, and How Can I Address Them?"
Precautions During Menstruation: Avoiding Cold Foods
During menstruation, women must be mindful of avoiding excessively cold foods, including cold drinks and raw, chilled items. Consuming a large amount of cold or chilled foods during this period can lead to menstrual disorders, such as menstrual pain or reduced menstrual flow. If you have inadvertently consumed cold beverages, it is recommended to balance it with warming foods that dispel coldness, such as ginger soup, mutton soup, or American ginseng and black-bone chicken soup.
Effects of Consuming Cold Drinks During Menstruation
Eating cold foods during menstruation can cause menstrual cramps. Women should avoid icy foods during this time as menstrual blood flows smoothly when the body is warm. Cold foods can stimulate a change in blood temperature, leading to poor circulation, blood clots, and subsequently, menstrual pain. Foods like ice cream, cold drinks, iced water, and popsicles should be avoided as they can exacerbate menstrual discomfort.
Certain foods generally beneficial to women's health, like pears, bananas, watermelons, mung beans, and water chestnuts, can also cause menstrual pain when consumed during menstruation. Additionally, spicy foods like chili, mala tang, and spicy strips can delay or advance menstruation, so women should refrain from them during this period and prioritize rest, avoiding sexual activity.
Delay in Menstruation from Cold Foods
Menstruation can be influenced by various factors such as emotions, environment, mental state, pregnancy, and age. In summer, when the environment is hot, the body adjusts to regulate menstruation. However, consuming icy, stimulating foods like ice cream during menstruation can disrupt hormonal balance, leading to a delayed menstrual cycle, which is a normal phenomenon.
Reduced Menstrual Flow from Cold Foods
Menstrual pain is a common experience, especially for those with a cold constitution. Eating ice cream before menstruation can increase internal coldness, causing uterine coldness, menstrual pain, reduced and darker menstrual flow, and sometimes even delayed menstruation or amenorrhea.
Remedies for Consuming Cold Drinks During Menstruation
Consume Warming Foods: If you accidentally consume cold foods during menstruation or usually suffer from cold extremities and sweating, try warming foods like mutton, lychees, and ginger. Drinking ginger soup is particularly recommended, not only during menstruation but also whenever feeling chilled. Note: Avoid using an iron pot to cook ginger soup; a clay pot is preferred to preserve its medicinal properties. Slice ginger, add a few red dates for those with poor complexion, boil with water for about an hour, sweeten with brown sugar, and enjoy both the soup and dates.
Eat Blood-Activating and Qi-Regulating Foods: These foods, such as leeks, ginger, kumquats, rose tea, black soybeans, and yellow rice wine, can improve blood circulation, relieve menstrual pain, and promote menstrual flow. For rose tea, steep 5 rose buds and red dates in hot water for 15 minutes. This tea is potent in promoting blood circulation, soothing the liver, regulating menstruation, alleviating pain, nourishing the skin, and enhancing blood flow. However, it's not suitable for women with normal or heavy menstrual flow.
Consume Nourishing Foods: Women with uterine coldness who inadvertently consume cold foods during menstruation should eat nourishing foods like animal liver, blood, eggs, milk, red dates, black-bone chicken, peanuts, chicken soup, and longans. These not only facilitate smooth menstruation but also effectively regulate uterine coldness. A recommended dish is American ginseng and black-bone chicken soup, which nourishes Qi and blood, promotes blood circulation, nourishes the skin, and strengthens the kidneys, making it an excellent choice for those with a weak or cold constitution to enhance immunity.
