In Ayurveda, one of the primary investigative tools of practitioners for determining the state of one’s health is tongue diagnosis or evaluation of the tongue.
The tongue is the very beginning of the digestive tract, which lumbers on for another 30 feet or so. Since we cannot see much beyond the mouth without some invasive diagnostics, a quick look at the tongue can tell much about the health of your inner digestive lining and its function.
In fact, Ayurveda suggested that the surface of the tongue reflects an entire map of the body reflecting its overall health.
Tongue Analysis
While looking in the mirror, examine each area on the tongue, look for differences in:
- Color
- Texture
- Coating
- Taste buds
According to Ayurveda, the inner lining of the digestive tract is the most important determining factor for your overall health. The inner skin, the epithelium governs the delivery of nutrients, the removal of digested toxins, and the beginning of the lymphatic and immune systems. Examining the tongue can offer useful insight into these functions.
Let’s take a look at what healthy inner digestive skin is responsible for:
- Hosting of trillions of beneficial microbes (1)
- Where 95% of the serotonin for mood health is derived (2)
- Where 80% of the immune system is found (3,4)
- The protective barrier to ward off environmental toxins (5)
- The delivery of all vitamins, minerals, and nutrients (6)
- Regulates genetic and epigenetic changes to the human genome (7-9)
- The source of 70% of the body’s immune system (18)
- The beginning of the body’s lymphatic circulation (18)
- The main driver of detoxification (18)
- Creates the environment for the manufacturing of vitamins, hormones, and neurotransmitters
This is, of course, the extremely short list of why the health of the inner digestive skin is so important. The problem with diagnosing the inner skin is that we cannot see it—or can we?
Your tongue can give you quick and useful incites about the status of your digestion.
The Perfect Tongue
Before we discuss the “perfect” tongue constitutionally, note that we will all have a tongue that closely reflects our main constitution. For example:
Vata Constitution
- The tongue will tend to be thinner, smaller, and a bit rough and dry.
Pitta Constitution
- The tongue will be a bit redder in color, medium in size, and slightly dry.
Kapha Constitution
- The tongue will be larger, full, possibly light pink, and a bit wet.
Based on the normal variations between body types, a perfect tongue will be:
- Pink – not pale, scarlet, or red.
- The pinkish color would be consistent across the entire tongue.
- You would be able to see small cylindrical taste buds on the entire top surface of the tongue.
- It would be not too wet and not too dry, it would be just right—moist!
- You would not see any cracks on the tongue.
- There would be a very thin white coating of mucus on the tongue.
- There would be no teeth marks or glassiness on the sides of the tongue.
Tongue Diagnosis: Looking For Imbalances
Inside of your stomach and intestines, you have intestinal villi and delicate epithelium with a thin layer of mucus lining the upper digestion. This coating helps with the assimilation of nutrients and the breakdown of toxins. The health of the digestive skin was classically evaluated by examining one’s tongue. We all grew up with every doctor’s visit starting with a tongue depressor saying ahhh!
When the intestines become inflamed or imbalanced, they produce excess mucus, which bogs down the villa, negatively affecting their ability to detox waste and absorb nutrients. In this case, the tongue would turn red or become overly wet and mucousy.
On the other hand, if the intestines are too dry as a result of excess stress or dehydration, the villi dry out and lose function, turning the tongue dry, parched, and even pale or cracked. Examine your own tongue and see if you can find one that matches your tongue’s appearance.
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- Learn dietary strategies to restore healthy digestion and inner digestive skin.
- Learn lifestyle strategies to restore healthy digestion and inner digestive skin.
- Learn more about herbs to restore healthy digestion and inner digestive skin.
Classic Tongue Imbalances
Movie Star Tongue
When the tongue becomes red, smooth, and moist or wet, I call this a “movie star tongue.” While it might be pretty, it is not a functional tongue, and here is why. When there is excess acid in the stomach, the tongue will often reflect that by becoming more red. Due to the hypersensitivity of the stomach lining and perhaps the upper part of the small intestine, the taste buds will contract as if trying to hide and protect themselves. The result is a very smooth tongue that looks like it was sanded down and buffed. Such a tongue will often be moist, which is a reflection of the excess mucus produced in the stomach and small intestine to protect the lining.
Irritated Tongue
The irritated tongue reflects intestinal irritation from stress on the tongue. It can be smooth, wet and pale. The smoothness is because the taste buds are reacting to the stress by contracting or hiding. It is wet because of the reactive mucus production generated as a result of the stress, and its paleness is the result of the stomach’s low production of stomach acid as a way to protect the intestinal wall from further irritation.
Acid Tongue
The “acid tongue” reflects symptoms like occasional heartburn. When stomach acid builds up in the stomach and begins to move upwards, it can upset the lining of the stomach, esophagus, mouth, and tongue. The result is a very red, dry, and often smooth tongue.
Boggy Tongue
A “boggy tongue” reflects a digestive fire that has been turned off. This typically results in a pale, wet, coated, and even swollen tongue depending on what the body type is.
Teeth-Marked Tongue
This tongue generally has scalloping teeth marks along the sides of the tongue. It can also be discolored, where it might be reddish in one area, pale in another, and pink somewhere else. Teeth marks or a scalloped tongue may suggest imbalanced assimilation of nutrients.
Stress Tongue
This tongue, which generally afflicts vata and pitta types, will have many small cracks on the tongue. This is not to be confused with a “geographic tongue,” which normally exhibits many cracks. A “stress tongue” is also typically dry and often unsteady.
Cracked Tongue
Sometimes you will see a deep crack running down the center of the tongue. This may reflect vata strain in the nervous system or spinal stress.
Ama Tongue
Ama, in Ayurveda, is the accumulation of improperly digested food that can congest the intestinal tract. An “ama tongue” is when the tongue builds up a thick coating on the entire tongue. If the accumulation of ama is on the back of the tongue, it is generally a build-up of toxins in the large intestine, small intestine, and colon. A thick coating on the front and back of the tongue suggests ama build-up in the stomach and small intestine.
Pale Tongue
A pale tongue suggests that there is a lack of good stomach acid and digestive enzymes needed to properly digest food and deliver the minerals, vitamins, and nutrients needed for optimal health. Sometimes this can also be a sign of anemia.
Dry Tongue
For the stomach to produce the acid needed to digest hard-to-digest foods, the stomach requires proper hydration. Proper hydration supports a bicarbonate layer of cells that is 80% water and buffers the acids in the stomach. Without adequate hydration, the stomach will not produce acid and the tongue often becomes very dry and slightly pale.
Wet Tongue
A “wet tongue” can be due to excess kapha (mucus) from a severely irritated stomach lining, intestinal wall, undigested proteins like casein or gluten, or from excessive stress.
Swollen Tongue
A “swollen tongue” may suggest a congested lymphatic system backing up into tonsils, adenoids, and tongue. Look for other signs of lymph congestion to confirm this.
Balance Digestion and Change Your Tongue
Each of these tongue imbalances reflects a certain type of digestive imbalance. Please read the articles in my digestive health article and video archives to address your particular issue, or schedule a personalized Ayurvedic consult so we can dig in deeper.
Caring For Your Tongue
Tongue scraping is the simple practice of scraping the tongue before brushing the teeth. Studies have shown that this simple technique:
- Reduces undesirable bacteria in the mouth that compromise gum, teeth, and oral health. (10)
- Reduces volatile sulfur compounds (VSC) that are by-products of mouth bacteria linked to bad breath. (11)
- Increases the function of taste buds to better taste and digest food. (12)
- Changes the environment of the mouth to reduce putrefaction and decrease bacterial load. (13)
Toxins, or ama (as we discussed earlier), collect on the back of the tongue that can cause obstructions in respiration and foul smell. (14)
Copper may be the best metal to use for tongue scraping because the mouth is loaded with both good and not-so-good bacteria. Copper not only seems to be toxic to the bad bacteria, it also provides important enzymes that are needed for the healthy microbes of the mouth to survive. (15,16)
In one study, the antiseptic benefits of copper were so great that, when copper was put in hospital rooms as furnishings, the surface bacteria count on all the surfaces in the hospital room was significantly reduced. (17) Some hospitals are now incorporating copper furnishings as part of their anti-bacterial strategies.
How To Scrape Your Tongue
- In the morning, right after you wake up, scrape your tongue. Make it the first thing you do. Even if you wake up in the middle of the night, scraping the tongue followed by a glass of water can reduce accumulating digestive ama (toxins).
- With a relaxed tongue, using your U-shaped tongue scraper, gently reach to the back of the tongue and scrape the tongue from back to front. Repeat this 5-10 times, reaching as far back as comfortable, rinsing the scraper after each pass. A slight gag can help bring up some mucus and ama from the back of the throat.
- Follow tongue scraping with brushing (with non-fluoride toothpaste), flossing, and a large glass of water.
- To complete an Ayurvedic oral hygiene routine, this can be followed by oil pulling – of course, this would require another round of tooth brushing.
- Get into the habit of scraping your tongue prior to each brushing.
How’s the health of your tongue? Take a peek!
What to do in condition where you have “Teeth-Marked” tongue ?
If your tougne is scallapped it indicates that you are low on Iodine-possible thyroid problem.
Speaking and writing of Tongues, I know someone who used to have these attacks: first the joint would start to ache, then the feeling in the arm would diminish because of less blood flow to the arm, and the blood would go upward and the tongue would swell up to more than 2 times its size… of course following many of the advice in this site lessened the frequency of the attacks but what nailed it was the homeopath! When he would feel the attack starting, he would take 5 small pieces of the prescribed medicine and the joint would seize to hurt!
Not a mention of toothpaste! there is neem toothpaste which is awesome for gums, there is also the one with black pepper which makes the tongue feel spicy and cleansed. there is also miswak from the uae, very tasty and cleansing 🙂
My entire mouth has sores. It has been biopsied. Results were inflamed mouth. My tongue is coated white and burns. I haven’t been able to eat. Just liquids. I’ve lost 20 pounds
Very painful. Any suggestions?
Hi Andy. I am trained in Ayurveda and hold a degree in it and practice it in my area. I strongly suggest you set up an appointment with an avyurvedic practitioner in your area. Through changes in diet and lifestyle, along with a process called panchakarma and maybe some herbal formulas, your practitioner would be able to help you with this. Western medicine is not so good at working with these things. My best to you. Lola
I have stress tongue…how can this be treated..it’s awful
Sir,
My tongue has cracked a lot by naturally and no pain of the toungue and when I eat any food no pain but my toungue has breadth ,it is problem ,tell me
black tongue especially in back?
I suffer from a very sticky mouth. It seems I have plaque oozing from the gum line around a couple of my upper left teeth. I’ve read that this can be an imbalance in the calcium/phosph. levels but I’m not certain. Maybe my body doesn’t absorb calcium too well. I am now suffering from gum disease and have recently started developing pockets next to two teeth either side of my mouth (upper). I don’t take calcium supplements. Does anyone have an idea how I can improve these levels or improve my sticky mouth/teeth? Any advice gratefully received. Thanks.
Hi Brenda thanks for reaching out. Try to incorporate the following: tongue scraping, oil pulling https://lifespa.com/the-truth-about-oil-pulling/, and oral respiratory defense (at least 4 a day for about a month) http://store.lifespa.com/oral_plus_respiratory_defense.html
Be well.
What is your opinion about surgery to remove the adenoids in young children? My understanding is that the adenoids are lymphatic tissue and act as gatekeepers to the respiratory tract. Do you have any alternatives to the surgery for very inflamed adenoids in a child with frequent colds? Do you have any examples of long-term success or other results either with surgery or alternatives? The parents are overwhelmed as it is, so the simpler (and less expensive) the better.
I have a burning sensation on my tongue for the last month or maybe longer. The burning sensation is on the tip and top of my tongue which is cracked towards the tip and red, the back of the tongue have small rash and a little more build up. The burning sensation is also inside my mouth. I have a filling that I have rush round my throat area. What I can do ?
Dr. Vasant Lad’s book “Ayurveda: A Practical Guide: The Science of Self Healing”, Lotus Press; 1985 ISBN 0-914955-00-4 has excellent illustrations of the tongue for tongue diagnosis. However, the explanation in this article is more detailed than the one I found in Dr. Lad’s book. Thank you Dr. Douillard.
Ama Tongue
Ama, in Ayurveda, is the accumulation of improperly digested food that can congest the intestinal tract. An “ama tongue” is when the tongue builds up a thick coating on the entire tongue. If the accumulation of ama is on the back of the tongue, it is generally a build-up of toxins in the large intestine. If it is in the middle of the tongue, it points to a build-up of toxins ‘in the middle of the tongue’.
The last part of this sentence does not make sense – it should likely say – it points to a build-up of toxins in the small intestine?
You mention a “Geographic Tongue” but then you don’t go into detail on it. What is a “Geographic Tongue”?
I would love to know what the geographic tongue means in terms of digestion, because I have one. Areas of the taste buds seem to come and go, and it looks like a map,hence the term “geographic”. It is often painful and acidic or salty foods can hurt my tongue when it’s in this state.
I practice Chinese Medicine not Ayurveda, but since John never answered, I’ll give you my perspective. The classic description of a geographic tongue is that the coating is uneven; it may be thick in some places, thin in others, and usually there are “peeled” spots, where there is no coating and the surface looks glassy instead of having the normal roughness with a thin white coat. Diagnostically, it means inflammation or sometimes infection, usually in some part of the digestive tract, but it can also be a general fluid imbalance or deficiency, which means too much fluid in some areas and not enough in others. The farther back on the tongue you go, the lower in the digestive tract, or other organs, e.g. Colon or Kidneys are represented on the back of the tongue.
The tongue diagnosis is very fascinating. Do you have a picture of each kind of tongue, so that we might have a visual to go along with your description of each condition?
Hi Barry,
I have found it very interesting as well. We are working on pictures – we couldn’t find ideal one’s in time to print with the article.
Thanks!
John
I agree I am waiting for the pictures too. It is hard to understand what a healthy pink tongue looks like with thin white coating without seeing it.
Im definitely showing malabsorption problems…what steps can I take to recover? I have chronic epstein barr, hypothyroid but with weight loss.
You need to rebuild your digestive strength, Drink celery juice first thing in the morning. Slowly incorporate antiviral herbs, Cat’s Claw, Lemon Balm, and take L-Lysine daily,
a good probiotic would help as well.
You missed two points: If your tougne is scallapped it indicates that you are low on Iodine-possible thyroid problem and if it is too white you may have an excessive Candida population.
Thanks, Randy!
One more thought I would like your opinion on…..I have heard that a vata type person with a kapha tongue can have scallops just due to the size of the large tongue nesting next to the teeth in a small mouth. Having nothing to do with malabsorption. Do you agree with this?
Hi Jackie,
Yes, this is possible but kapha types also tend towards boggy digestion.
The tongue is only one piece of the digestive puzzle.
Be well,
John
Thanx for some nice and intresting input on the tounge health.
Here is some more on the Copper thing very intresting.
Ayurveda – Copper Drinking Water
Ayurveda – Copper Drinking Water : According to Ayurvedic Medicine, a holistically simple, practical, and effective way to consume water would be via a copper drinking vessel (like a cup).
What’s the Deal with Ayurveda – Copper Drinking Water ?
So it follows, according to Ancient Ayurveda that Copper is said to be less habitable, and far more resistant to certain (if not all) types of bacteria that may get into your cup or the water than say stainless steel or aluminum (like cans). Thus the idea would be that storing water for about three hours in a copper vessel would kill harmful bacteria.
But there’s more :
Regular consumption of water (at room temperature) is said to cleanse the gastrointestinal tract, flush the kidneys, and even stimulates peristalsis. When copper is used it is said to become a decent tonic for the liver, spleen, lymphatic system and is even reported to help with anemia. Copper is also thought be good for hair, eyes, normal aging, and energy production., and even helping melt away fat!
//Djani