What's Goin' On: naughty, naughty pharmies

This isn't surprising to me, but outrageous nonetheless. If you don't find this outrageous-- then, as the saying goes, you aren't paying attention: click here

It is amazing to me the amount of shady 'behind the curtains' dealings that continue to go on in the healthcare industry(not to mention food and psychology as well). Dealings that lead to gross misrepresentations and misconceptions about what is healthy or not, and what is necessary or not. And it is disconcerting to me the number of people who simply don't know.

Before I start to sound like I'm lecturing, I want to make clear that I was one of these people. I grew up in a very typical suburban, middle class 80's household. I feasted on McDonald's, Snickers, and Stouffer's frozen macaroni and cheese; I soaked my skin in paraben-laced body care and am still surrounded by plastic as far as the eye can see; I dutifully took all the countless antibiotics that Dr's gave me since I was little; and heaven knows what other ills I exposed myself to in the Generation of Excess (too many to list here, for certain-- I smoked for much of my childhood and adult life as well. I've been smoke free now for 5 years now, thank you!). But enough about my colorful background...

This has become one of my pet peeves as of late, the issue around diet and heart disease, cholesterol, etc. The reasons are twofold: I myself have been borderline anemic, and hypoglycemic much of my life, and my husband has a history of heart disease and diabetes in his family. So I have been educating myself more and more around these issues, not only to serve us as we age gracefully (of course!) but to begin preventative health care for my children. Prevention and knowledge are, in my humble opinion, some of the best medicine.

There is a lot of information coming out in the past year especially that highlight all the lies we have been fed about what is best for us. Most of the time, these 'rules' for health are merely hypothesis (to repeat on a previous post), theories, ideas and experiments. We, and our children, are the guinea pigs.

Outrageous.

Daily Dose: motherwort

Ah, Motherwort (also known more formally as Leonurus cardiaca). Her latin name invokes images of the calmly regal -- and protective -- lioness, she with a strong and capable heart. Motherwort helps us with these qualities, being a potent nervine that will take you down a good notch or two when you are feeling jittery, anguished and rattled. (Like when you are getting caught up in the craziness of the holiday season, maybe?) I have benefited from it greatly when I was bordering on a stress attack, or was depressed and hot-tempered as we Aries can sometimes be. A full dropperful (or two, I admit it!) and almost instantly I felt a soothing calm flow through my body.

This herb carries a lot of heart energy for me and for others, as it so efficiently calms the heart and the nerves overall. It is the perfect herb for the holidays, and if I wasn't crazy busy I would have shared this with you sooner (er, sorry). I trust the holidays were wonderful even if you didn't have this trusty herb by your side. But once you know of it, you will be sure to carry it close next Christmas. Or for any other time you need to center and calm yourself, for that matter.

Motherwort is a diaphoretic, emmenagogue, has nervine and tonic properties and is antispasmodic. It is wonderful for those with PMS, menstural cramps and such. IT is great for a good many other things, but I'll save all that for the detailed post on it.

It has a very potent, pungent and bitter taste-- certainly not a flavor one associates with tea. My preference is to take it in tincture form; mind, this does not make it more palpable, just sends it down the throat a bit faster. And of course the medicine takes effect rapidly as well, being absorbed readily through the tissues of the mouth.

Wrap-up: if you are full of tension, anguish, feeling close to a panic attack, can't focus from the stress of it all, Motherwort is for you. She will rapidly bring you to your center, and soothe the beast within. There are cautions from some old time herbalists that it can be psychologically addicting (see Susun Weed), however I have not seen this so far. One dropperful, up to 4x a day is recommended as needed.
Contra-indications: not to be used while pregnant (save for under the care of an experienced herbalist at the final stages of pregnancy), as it can promote bleeding; do not use if you have regular spotting or heavy bleeding monthly. If you have hyperthyroid, consider using a different herb.

What's Goin' on: sad and silly

Being that I am a WAHM, I hope the non-parents who may come here don't mind that I will be posting often about noteworthy/provocative, etc items for parents.

This is a blog on parenting I came across, the first post I read speaks volumes about the state of birthing in America today. My experience was so far from this, and I feel lucky. Many families, sadly, are not. Can you imagine birthing here? Read on: Sweet Juniper

And now, to lighten the mood.You need not be a parent to enjoy this:
The.funniest.thing.ever!



Carry on!
MsThistle

Daily Dose: usnea

This is the time of year for calling on a dear herbal ally "Old Man's Beard," or Usnea (usnea wirthii, u.californica).

It's the time of year when we keep cozy inside: a lack of fresh air when we shut tight our windows and turn on the heaters, and keeping kids inside to play in such environments only helps viruses to prosper in abundance.

When I was pregnant, I found all too often there were so many wonderful herbs that help colds and flus, but are not recommended while pregnant or nursing. I started using Usnea--safe for short term use while pregnant-- and now use it regularly. More even than Echinacea. Don't let the idea of being gentle enough for mama's fool you -- Old Man's Beard packs a punch! It has even been shown to fight gram-positive bacteria's, it is so potent. It is also called one of "nature's antibiotics" (see Buhner, 1999, _Herbal Antibiotics_ for a great reference). It is wonderful internally or topically as well for staph infections (I must note here, that one should never mess around with staph infections these days, they can advance to serious systemic proportions quickly. Please make sure you are being careful to have such an infection monitored by a health practitioner or your choice).

Some of this magical herb's qualities include assisting the fight against internal candida issues (because of its anti-fungal properties) -- I've even used this on my babies when they came down with a yeasty-diaper rash (after sweating off the alcohol, to be sure! It will irritate their skin otherwise. I'll post that recipe in the next post). I have also paired this with a tea blend to fight off tenacious UTI's with great success.

Wrap-up: Usnea is a powerful white blood cell stimulant (which in turn helps the body to attack viruses) and antimicrobial: anti-fungal, anti-viral and anti-bacterial. So it really covers your bases. If you are going to be in an environment that exposes you to illnesses, or feel like you are catching something, you can take 3-4 dropperfuls a day of this tincture and within days you will be feeling on top of it. Sometimes I even blend 50/50 tincture of Echinacea and Usnea, if I am feeling rundown already and want to stimulate my immune while fighting the nasties.

Contra-indications: none known, don't overdue while pregnant

Be well,
MsThistle

What's Goin' On: lies we've been fed about food; Part One of a smallish rant

Check it out -- a user-friendly blurb about the latest buzz in regard to food. Or rather, what we eat and why it's bad for you. I haven't followed the food pyramid guidelines for a few years now, and this helps to explain some of the reasons why:

here

Human nature is such that we easily start to believe-- trust, even-- something that we have been told again and again, whether it is true or not. Familiarity breeds comfort. Even when there is mounting evidence for years that something ain't right, we trust what we have grown comfortable with. One of these things is that grains are necessary and good (great!) for us, another is that saturated fat is bad (awful!) for us. Remember before you scoff at this-- we also were told for generations that hydrogenated oils were fine (great!) for us. If you've been keeping up on the latest news in food lately, we now know that this is absolutely not true. Whole foods are best, chemical or processed foods are bad (BAD!).

(Case in point: Have you ever thought about why there is the phenomenal rise in auto-immune disorders? Heart disease? Autism? For brevity I'm slopping these all together, but my point is that we are indeed what we eat. And most of us grew up on processed, chemical based food. Which our bodies treat as foreign and therefore have to try and fight to get rid of it, since it is not designed to process it... and this, coupled with all the environmental toxins we are also exposed to but the body cannot process leads to inflammatory issues and various diseases such as those I just listed... whew...taking a breath, here...but I digress...)

It gets really scary, though, when we assume "experts" are telling us the truth: often, they are either offering their agenda as truth, or they are merely presenting a hypothesis that we want to be truth. In the first case shame on them-- in the second case, shame on us (well, in both cases, really - -buyer beware and all). The food pyramid has been touted for decades as the Golder Rule, although with new information they recently "updated" it. This is because They understand more now than They did before. Be clear here: our science is only as good as the questions we are capable of asking. And if we aren't even bothering to ask more questions, how can we know that our original question was sufficient? In the case of food, more and more people for instance are coming up with Celiac disease. More and more people are having issues with wheat. So now, we are asking more questions. We are finding that maybe grains aren't the next best thing as ...er, sliced bread. Maybe we are wrong about the Greatness of Grains, eh? And maybe it is worth considering that we are wrong about saturated fats as well.

Can you tell I'm a bit of a rebel? Or maybe I'm smart -- you decide, research all of this for yourself, don't take my word for it.This is the so-called Age of Information, but is it the Age of Knowledge? Can it be? I believe so. More than ever, it is essential that we educate ourselves in order to have the knowledge to make the best choices for ourselves, for our families. With the onslaught of cloning animals on the horizon and on your dinner menu-- and GMO's already found at your local market-- we need to wake up and pay more attention. And it's not about more regulation to protect us from ourselves (which is insulting at best) it's about simply not buying into it. Literally.

I didn't mean for this to sound like a rant, but there you go. I'm feeling a bit saucy today!

What do you think?

Eat well,
MsThistle

Daily Dose: spilanthes

One of the reasons for this blog endeavor is that I wanted to show how easy it is to use herbs in your daily life. Whenever I meet people who are not familiar with herbal benefits I find they tend to shy away from using them at all, thinking it's just too "difficult," or "confusing."

In truth, it can be if you are dealing with a more complex situation or specific pharmaceuticals, for instance. But it certainly doesn't have to be. In the posts titled "Daily Dose" I'll be offering up examples of how I use herbs in day to day life. I won't get much into the details about an herb (although I will include any specific contra-indications, or warnings), but I will try and come back and do so in a later post that will focus on that specific herb's qualities. Daily Dose is meant to be a quick reference, an herbal inspiration for the herbally impaired.

Today, it's Spilanthes (acmella oleracea).

My tooth has been hurting for a few days now, and it occurred to me that I may have a cavity. Since I can't get to a dentist right away, I pulled down my tincture of Spilanthes and placed a teaspoon in a shot glass with a bit of warm water. I swished this around my mouth for a good 30 seconds or more (just like when you use mouthwash), and then spit it out. (Yes, you could swallow it if you like; t has other benefits as well, I'll get to that in another post). My mouth quickly had that trademark tingly sensation that Spilanthes gives, like hundreds of miniature little firecrackers exploding in there. Then a gentle, soothing light numbness.

Within about 5 minutes, my tooth no longer hurt. Now I can get back to fixing Thanksgiving dinner. Sure, I will need to go to a dentist next week --if I have a cavity there's no way around needing a filling-- but until then, I will gargle probably about three times a day using the same method.

If the pain gets really bad, I will also put a little drop of clove essential oil in my palm, add 5 drops of olive oil, and then take a cotton swab and put that right on the gum (no open wound of any kind, please! clove oil is a potent irritant) above the hurting tooth. This works fantastic (!) for pain, and the relief is immediate.

The Wrap Up: Spilanthes, the "toothache plant" is a potent anti-bacterial and immune stimulant (known to even fight E. coli and staph). This plant is specific for issues of the gums and helps to numb them when you gargle with it, while offering relief for inflammation and infection of the gum tissues. It raises blood flow in the tissues, thereby helping to carry away the waste created by infection/inflammation -- all around, it's helping to keep any nasties I might have going on in my mouth at bay until I can get it taken care of. And that's just some of what this plant brings to the table. Good stuff!
Contraindications: none I've come across, however I've heard it can with high or regular use stimulate auto-immune issues (because it stimulates the immune system), so use with discernment if that's you.

Be Well,
MsThistle

What's Goin on: Vaccines

Wow. This is fascinating. I'm wondering if this will hit the media, and if this is a well-done study. The numbers are startling, however I'm not surprised. I am wondering if the areas that the surveys were done in were chosen to best reflect one another (meaning, to keep the results from being skewed due to environment, etc. If you survey children on say toxic levels in the city compared to in the country, I'd expect different responses).

http://www.generationrescue.org/survey.html

Blessings,
MsThistle
(thanks, Janine, for sharing this!)