Q. Doctor, my InBody results show a body fat percentage of 26%. What exactly does this mean, and why does it make dieting so difficult?

I completely understand that feeling of disbelief when looking at InBody results; it can be quite a shock. While 26% body fat might not look 'overweight' externally, it signals that your body is undergoing internal physiological shifts. Scientifically, enlarged fat cells release inflammatory substances that interfere with insulin, putting your body into a 'storage-obsessed' mode where it hoards energy instead of burning it. This is why dieting feels much harder for you than for others. In Traditional Korean Medicine (TKM), we attribute this phenomenon to Spleen Deficiency (Biheo). When the Spleen's energy, which governs digestion and transformation, is weakened, the food you consume isn't converted into clean energy. Instead, it turns into a sticky metabolic waste called Phlegm-fluid (Dameum). If this further obstructs blood flow, it creates Blood Stasis (Eohyeol), leading to poor circulation, a cold core, and chronic bloating or swelling. People often say they 'gain weight just by drinking water,' and there is a clinical truth to that—when metabolic pathways are clogged with waste, your metabolism effectively stalls. In this state, simply starving yourself can be counterproductive and even harmful. The priority must be to clear out the Dameum and Eohyeol to reopen the body's 'traffic lanes' for energy. Our treatment focuses on breaking this vicious cycle by tailoring the approach to your specific constitution. Let's work through this step-by-step together.