What follows is Prof. Baek’s own account, and the original was written in plain declarative Korean rather than his usual register because it is personal rather than instructional. It is the story of a constitutional diet that backfired — his own.
In Summary
- Diagnosed Vesicotonia in his late twenties, with minor recurring illness, poor digestion and trouble falling asleep.
- Constitutional acupuncture worked from the first day — sleep and digestion improved immediately — which is exactly why he threw himself into the diet.
- He ate strictly: warm, cooked, quickly absorbed food. The Vesicotonia description said nothing about also needing slowly absorbed food, so he ate none.
- Result: nutritional balance broke down. A sustained diet of warming, drying food produced heat in the body and a tendency to flush.
- Avoiding fresh and raw food produced constipation; prolonged warming food burdened the stomach and digestion declined.
- As constipation worsened, more heat accumulated — and he responded by eating more of the beneficial foods.
- What fixed it: one or two plates of supermarket salad mix a day for two to three weeks. Constipation and the feverish feeling disappeared.
- The lesson: what is common to all human beings often matters more than constitution.
How It Started
Before applying ECM to patients, he had his own constitution diagnosed. Vesicotonia, in his late twenties.
Before the diagnosis he had particularly liked poultry — chicken, duck. Having grown up somewhere with plenty of seafood and vegetables, he had been eating reasonably well for his type by instinct, without knowing it.
At the time he was healthier than he is now, but had minor recurring illness, digestive trouble and difficulty falling asleep. Constitutional acupuncture changed that from the first day — he slept and digested well immediately.
That is the part worth noticing. The treatment worked, and working is what made the overcorrection possible. Anyone who first learns ECM notices how much clearer and more concrete it is than other Korean medical theory. It invites commitment.
What Strict Adherence Actually Did
He kept to the chart rigorously: warm, cooked food suited to Vesicotonia, and quickly absorbed food that would not burden the stomach.
And here is the specific failure mode, which is worth stating precisely: the Vesicotonia description did not say anything about also needing slowly absorbed food, so he did not eat any. The chart is a list of what suits you. It is not a nutritional plan, and it does not tell you what it has left out.
Insisting only on beneficial food broke the nutritional balance. Specifically:
- A sustained diet weighted toward warming, drying food produced heat in the body, and he began flushing easily.
- Keeping away from fresh and raw food produced constipation.
- Prolonged warming food burdened the stomach, and digestion declined — the exact thing the diet was supposed to protect.
Then the loop closed. As the constipation worsened, more heat accumulated — and he still tried to eat more of the “beneficial” foods.
His own comment on this is the sharpest line in the original: regardless of constitution, a person with constipation needs dietary fibre, and he was eating almost none.
What Actually Fixed It
Embarrassingly simple. One or two plates a day of the bagged salad mix from the supermarket — about 100g — for two to three weeks. The constipation and the feverish feeling went away.
He describes being startled by how easily it resolved.
The conclusion he drew from it is the one this article exists for: the universals common to all human beings are often more important than constitution. Knowing your type helps. It does not follow that a constitutional diet should be insisted upon in every situation.
The Second Problem With Eating Only What Suits You
There is a further drawback, and it is subtler than the nutritional one.
Eating only beneficial food leaves the body no slack — it overstimulates one function, like driving with the accelerator flat. In the short term you can get a great deal done. Over the long term it can damage the vital force (정기 正氣).
And there is a structural point behind that. Even a constitutionally strong organ needs its qi replenished. Vesicotonia mainly needs the qi of the deficient pancreas-spleen — but it also needs an adequate amount of kidney qi in order to express its own nature and for the body to be properly driven.
Feeding only the weak side is not the same as balancing.
Where This Leaves the Chart
The constitutional diet is a valuable reference and an owner’s manual for your own body — and it has to be applied alongside your body’s overall balance and ordinary principles of health.
Overdone, it damages health rather than protecting it. Applying your constitution, your current condition and general health knowledge in balance is, on the evidence of his own experience, the actual shortcut.
Two Questions This Raised
A parent asked about a four-year-old with rhinitis who had been on a constitutional diet since about age four — chicken and warming foods daily — and worried that this narrow a diet might be straining a growing child.
The answer is worth quoting closely. Eating only constitution-appropriate food does help recovery and treatment when a condition such as rhinitis is bad. But when there is no illness, avoiding harmful food completely makes a person frail, like a plant raised in a greenhouse. Without healthy stress, human organs decline in function in much the same way. And a child cannot avoid school meals and social life entirely in any case. So: feed them broadly when they are well, and be careful during flare-ups. Find the balance point.
I would add one thing to that: a restricted diet in a growing child should be overseen by a clinician, so that adequacy is actually being checked rather than assumed.
A second reader said that the food they eat whenever they are unwell — the one that makes them feel completely restored — turned out to be on their forbidden list. Prof. Baek’s reply: having your own recovery routine and food is a sign of health.
Summary
The man who teaches this system made himself unwell by following it too well, and was fixed by a supermarket salad. That is not an argument against constitutional medicine. It is an argument for holding it alongside the ordinary things everyone’s body needs — which the chart, by design, does not mention.
Related: Starting a Constitutional Diet Without Failing · When a Water Type Runs Hot
