9 things to LOVE about herbal medicine

Courtesy www.simplekids.net

Herbal medicine is local and accessible.  Every region and culture of the world has its own unique materia medica and medicinal practices.  Wherever we are, there is always medicine available to support our basic health care needs and overall wellness. These medicines don’t have to come in capsules at Whole Foods or be written up in Natural Health magazine either.  Tannin-rich tree barks can be used in case of severe burns (oak galls are best).  Dandelion  grows nearly everywhere and is a great diuretic, digestive bitter, and liver-supportive herb.

Herbal medicine is sustainable.  Although there are some slow-growing medicines (like root bark medicine or Asian and American ginseng), most herbs grow quickly enough that we do not need to worry about decimating the supply.  This is in contrast to their pharmaceutical counterparts, which can lead to practices as extreme as the clearcutting of rainforests, for example, in order to get enough of a single constituent.  Also, most herbal medicines can be grown by individuals—and not necessarily farmers.  You can grow a valerian plant or even a Jamaican dogwood tree, but you can’t grow an ibuprofen or an ambien.

Herbal medicine is whole.  You know how TV commercials for pharmaceuticals warn you of a hundred side effects?  The reason is that when chemical constituents of plants are isolated in order to make drugs, a complex system of balance within the plant is thrown off.  An herb can contain hundreds, even thousands of constituents—while some of those chemicals could cause headache or nausea, others block those effects.  With pharmaceuticals, a single chemical is extracted from a plant and then synthesized into a tablet or capsule, and because it’s not whole, it is missing that checks-and-balances… which is one reason why there is such a long list of possible side effects with most drugs.  

Courtesy www.herbalremediesinfo.com

Herbal medicine is versatile.  It can be eaten fresh or in dried powder form, or taken as a tea, tincture, glycerite, suppository, or enema.  You can apply it externally as a poultice, compress steam bath, or wash.  You can add it to smoothies, oatmeal, salad dressings, or seltzer water.  Teething babies can chew on chamomile ice chips or frozen tea bags.  It can be folk medicine or based in clinical evidence.  It can be simple leaf, or a complex formulation.

Herbal medicine is personal.  No one herb is perfect for everyone, and the same symptoms may be treated in quite different ways.  Two women may both be experiencing cramps, but an herbalist might make very different recommendations to these two women based on their individual constitution, their stages in life, and their lifestyles.  Or, many herbs--including valerian, hops, California poppy, skullcap, and Jamaican dogwood—can be effective for insomnia, depending on the person and their experience of insomnia. 

Herbal medicine is safe.  While it’s not without its risks and side effects (and of course, there are some herbs that are very strong and need to be taken with caution), herbal medicine is remarkably safe.  In the past ten years, 490,000 people in the US alone have died from complications related to prescription drugs—not counting the Vioxx scandal.  (Which, incidentally, makes them at least 16,400 percent deadlier than terrorism). No deaths from herbal remedies have been reported in the last ten years.

Courtesy www.therapists.com

Herbal medicine helps your body to help itself.  There are relatively few herbs that work by eliminating symptoms directly.  Instead, the vast majority of herbs work by enhancing the body’s natural ability to carry out the processes that keep us well.  For example, milk thistle.   A lot of the time, it’s thought of as a liver-purifier, blood cleanser or “detoxifying” herb—but it’s not as if the herb is moving through the circulatory system, scrubbing blood cells or scavenging for toxins.  Milk thistle works because its primary constituents block the entrance of toxins into the body’s cells by altering liver cells’ outer membranes.  Milk thistle works by protecting the liver and allowing it to function strongly. 

Herbal medicine is cost-effective.  Herbal medicine costs far less than drugs—we don’t always notice this because if we are insured, our $10 co-pay masks the fact that medical insurance companies often pay these inflated costs.  Whenever I complain about paying $15 for a bottle of triphala capsules, one of my grandmother’s own favorite phrases comes to mind: “Well, it’s a lot cheaper than the doctor.”  Another reason it’s cost-effective is because of my first point—it’s locally accessible and can be grown, harvested, and prepared at home.

Courtesy www.health.howstuffworks.com

Herbal medicine is empowering.  Herbal medicine is empowering to individuals, families and communities.  You don’t have to go to medical school (or any school) to learn it.  We can be self-taught or learn from others in the community.  We can learn to identify and grow our own herbs, to prepare our own medicines, and develop a good understanding of everyday herbal medicine, including first aid. We can use herbs as a powerful tool for taking responsibility for our health and wellness.

elderberry: a cold-season friend

I wanted to write a nice long post today about root medicine and, honestly, I don't feel up to it.  I think the long traveling wore me out and I've come down with the sniffles...  so instead of being online, I'm making some elderberry syrup.  This post is all  cut-and-pasted from Wiki (for the science wonks) and YouTube (for the DIY elderberry syrup instructions, courtesy LearningHerbs.com).  

Click here for video directions

Elderberry (Sambucus L.) is an easy, sustainable, and effective old-school recipe for health during the cold and flu season.  It grows all over the US, Europe, and in South America and South Africa too. It's honored wherever it grows as powerful medicine.  


And elder makes delicious remedies.  This recipe---> contains ginger, cinnamon and cloves--I'm also throwing in some astragalus.  For prevention, I'll be taking 1 tablespoon an hour or so, as I feel I need it.  Once I feel better, I think I'll still take 1 tablespoon a day as a preventative (and give it to my son as well, who loves it, as do the elders in my life.  Elder's hard not to love).  


To indulge the nerd in me--and to provide backup into for the skeptics--here's some "scientific proof" about Elderberry's efficacy, courtesy of Wiki:

In a placebo-controlled, double-blind study, Elderberry was shown to be effective for treating Influenza B. People using the Elderberry extract recovered much faster than those only on a placebo. This is partially due to the fact that Elderberry inhibits neuraminidase, the enzyme used by the virus to spread infection to host cells.^[3]

A small study published five years ago showed that 93% of flu patients given extract were completely symptom-free within two days; those taking a placebo recovered in about six days. This current study shows that, indeed, it works for type A flu, reports lead researcher Erling Thom, with the University of Oslo in Norway.^[4] Thom’s findings were presented at the 15th Annual Conference on Antiviral Research.

It’s likely that antioxidants called flavonoids—which are contained in the extract—stimulate the immune system, writes Thom. Also, other compounds in elderberry, called anthocyanins, have an anti-inflammatory effect; this could explain the effect on aches, pains, and fever. 

Elderberry extract could be an “efficient and safe treatment” for flu symptoms in otherwise healthy people and for those with compromised immune systems, such as the elderly, Thom adds.

the wildcrafted garden

Backyard, late winter

I originally planned to spend last spring and summer growing vegetables and flowers.  Started preparing the plots nice and early, then we were hit with more snow than I've ever seen in my life. I spent the next month making ambitious, drawn-to-scale maps and plans for the different plots I would put in when the snow thawed...

yeah, right...

coldframe

...and building a coldframe, thinking it might be good to start some cold-weather plants while we waited for spring.  I didn't start them. We still haven't used it much.

So the snow thawed, and life happened.  My seed money went to textbooks, and the  idea of planting an über-special, organic specialty garden (in sodden, clay-heavy soil on a shady northeast-facing lot) went out the window.

Backyard, late spring

I had made elaborate and, in hindsight, thoroughly embarrassing plans that I think now could never have happened without a greenhouse and an assistant.  I was off-track.  Fortunately, the blizzard made me pump the breaks and stop to reflect. I re-read some of what I'd journaled at the start of the year:

"I would like to become proficient enough to teach workshops on cultivation, harvesting, and simple wildcrafting for home use.  This yearlong project will support my work toward this goal... I do not know yet what and how much I will plant or what will be yielded.  I plan to wildcraft tinctures, ointments, oils and creams for experimentation purposes (and home use) as my harvest permits."

Enter our wonderful, native wild species.

Once the soil warmed and tiny seedlings started emerging, I saw that there were already many medicinal plants literally right in my backyard.  First came the honeysuckle, ground ivy, dandelion, mint (cultivated years ago, and still rambling through the yard), mugwort, red clover...

Paul teaching the herbies.
(c) urbnvision photography

Then came "The Ohio Trip"--an amazing experience of botanical discovery and wildcrafting on the land herbalist Paul Strauss (of Equinox Botanicals) stewards and speaks for in Rutland, OH. (Shannon has blogged it better than I ever could.)  While we were there I harvested and made preparations of at least a dozen herbs...

Ohio medicine

Back at home, I found myself newly inspired and more proficient at recognizing what was growing not just in my yard, but around the neighborhood.  Which was a lot.  In June, on a 15-minute walk from the Metro station home, herbs abounded: chicory, mugwort, dandelion, yellow dock, cleavers, jewelweed, mullein, goldenrod, yarrow...    

poke!

By mid-summer, there was a ton of plantain (P. medicago and P. lanceolata), purslane, wild strawberry, poke, red clover, wild lettuce and chickweed growing in the yard.  I'd also brought back some comfrey, stoneroot, and valerian from Ohio, but only the comfrey was really thriving.  

Once the exuberant energy of summer arrived, I couldn't help but splurge on seedlings, which I cultivated in a few small beds around the house and in many, many containers.  We planted nettles, lemon balm, chamomile, catnip, garden sage, rosemary, a few types of basil, and some beautiful Cuban oregano.

Cuban oregano feels 

like lambs' ear

This was my first time doing any serious container gardening. We drilled holes in 5-gallon buckets for the larger plants, and used smaller pots for the miniature peppers and okra.  Now that it's cooler at night, I've moved them all indoors.  I'm wondering whether the eggplant and pepper blossoms are going to make it long enough to fruit.

This year I focused on growing medicine, but couldn't help planting tomatoes (zebra-striped greens, romas, cherries, and a big one whose name I don't recall), peppers, eggplant, and okra.  My cukes and squash were total failures (was it me with not enough rainwater to get them through the "watering moratorium" we had during the hottest weeks of the year?).  But one lovely little cantaloupe managed to make it for a while... until the critters got to it.  A benefit to growing medicinal herbs: they seem to be pretty bug- and animal-resistant.

herbs and veggies make
great houseplants

I harvested a little of everything growing around the yard this summer--leaves, seeds, and flowers.  So we have a nice store of dried herbs, culinary spices, and tea blends for the winter, plus some seeds to plant next year and to share with others.  Now, as we are moving into colder weather and the leaves are changing color, I'm beginning to harvest roots--dandelion, comfrey, burdock, chicory, poke.

I've also been making remedies and kitchen medicine from this season's harvest.  So far, our little yard (and surrounding blocks) has provided herbs to make:

• poke berry tincture
• mint glycerite
• catnip/lemon balm glycerite
• horsetail tincture
• sage- and white truffle-infused olive oil (no, i didn't gather the truffles)
• rosemary/nettles/sage hair oil
• fire cider (peppers, green tomatoes, onion and garlic pickled in apple cider vinegar)
• nettles tincture
• burdock root in mesquite honey
• kofi's "kid tea" (red clover, lemon balm, mint, nettles and chamomile)



the medicine harvest

• and lots of dried herbs for tea or tincturing...

I'm glad I didn't force the cultivated garden this year, and chose instead to notice the humble and beautiful local plants that are already here.