The edge of my tongue is scalloped all the way around. It has been for years, but sometimes I get to wondering what is up with that? I looked around on the net a little bit, and found that it may be some problem with metabolism or thyroid, although I don’t think I’ve got any of the other symptoms. Am I just some kind of freak? Should I keep my tongue forever hidden from the Normals?
If you don’t know what’s wrong with my tongue, feel free to entertain us with descriptions of whatever physical peculiarities or symptoms you may have.
I’ve spent years studying tongues as part of the diagnostic tools of Traditional Chinese Medicine, and I gotta tell you, very few people have “normal” tongues. Scallops, white or yellow coatings (“greasy” coating are the grossest), bumps, swellings, red spots, pink spots, white spots, black spots - black greasy coating is NASTY! There’s even some people with “hair” on their tongues!
If you have no other symptons of thyroid issues, I wouldn’t worry about it. There are very few tongue conditions that Western Doctors get concerned about.
If you were interested in a TCM diagnosis, I’d need to know a lot more, like the color, coating and shape of the tongue. Scalloped edges alone tell me that there’s likely something kerfluey with your digestion, but not exactly what. And by “kerfluey”, it could simply be as simple as eating a standard American diet, not something that TCM approves of. At a wild guess, I’d guess you’re probably a woman with bowel issues - loose stools or diarrhea being the most common symptoms of illness for you. (For those playing along at home, scalloped edges are a sign of “Spleen qi deficiency” or “Spleen yang deficiency”, depending on whether the tongue is swollen or not.)
So there you go. Now you can be hypochondriac in two medical systems!
I had a friend whose tounge was scalloped so much that it distracted me the first few times I spoke to her. She is/was significantly overweight. Aren’t both of those signs of thyroid problems?
Even more wow. Scalloped tongue can also be caused by jaw clenching and grinding, which I have also been diagnosed with.
So the interesting question is, is my jaw pain and crenellated tongue caused by grinding my teeth, or by fluctuating thyroid levels that caused my tongue to swell and my salivary glands to ache?
What does it mean if your tongue only gets scalloped sometimes? My husband noticed that happening. It seems to swell slightly. I haven’t seen it for awhile, though.
