Happy Health

About "Simples" / Understanding holistic herbs / Be wise: be informed, and go for help when needed (resources, medical herbalists) / My 'simples' recommendations: 1st Aid / Colds & Coughs / Constipation / Aromatic power / Suppliers

NOTE For simples to have on hand for any 'inner' upset – shock, anxiety and fear, grief, tantrums and so on, go to my Flower Remedies and Nature Essences field. Bach Flower Remedies have proved invaluable for the whole family, and help when there are physical symptoms too.

About "Simples": and reclaiming power and responsibility. This is the stuff of what we used to call 'folk medicine'. Its still alive and well in many societies around the world. Particularly in Britain, though understandable, we have come to rely too much and inappropriately on doctors for our health care – physical, emotional and mental. Our family knowledge of how to care for ourselves for day to day health and sanity, without chemical drugs, has all but withered away.

I have witnessed too many people with long-time common ill conditions saying, "The doctor has tried everything". Yet they are sceptical about trying anything to help themselves, even when told that a particular 'home' remedy is safe and has been known for generations. Monty Don, British gardening presenter, visited an unusual garden in South Africa that is cultivated by the children. The organiser of the garden project commented that none of the children get coughs. If a chesty complaint begins, they take some tea of one of the garden herbs, and recover. Is there any town in Britain where we can say that – yet?

For Europeans' health we don't need to import from South Africa, or anywhere else for herbs that help coughs and for many other day to day ailments and regular health care. For hundreds of years we have had plant remedies been known as "simples". I think 'simple' is a telling term for the materials of 'folk medicine'. Now that our society has come to depend on doctors and complicated, expensive drugs for health care, few people remember simples or know how to use the safe remedies that our ancestors lived with. Even more sadly, I've found too many times that when I do tell, for example, serious coughers about horehound tea, that the information is greeted with doubt and dismissal. If its so good, why aren't doctors using it? Why not indeed. With rare exception, the many who did try the horehound tea I recommended experienced quick wonderful relief from long term cough.

The health care uses for many of the simples that used to be taken for granted as remedies are now forgotten. Most people would say Angostura Bitters is for making drinks (e.g. gin and tonic) taste better, ignorant that it was formulated as a 'simple'. Its Gentian is a great health aid. Or, the fluffy white balls of sugar we call marshmallows. They used to be a way of preserving and using the healing herb Marsh Mallow. Spices were not prized originally as fancy flavours for cakes or curries, rahter for their excellent curative properties.

Understanding holistic herbs Its worth remembering these points about herbs:

• They are usually much more holistic than 'this for that', often helping the whole body to recover, rather than acting as a 'bullet' type medicine for one symptom or organ.
• Very often, rather than acting in an 'anti' way (as do so most pharmaceutical preparations, working against a mal symptom) herbs tend to support the body's integrated health systems to renew balance and life flow.
• There is most often more than one herb that helps with a range of imbalances, and sometimes a bit of experimentation is needed to find out which is for you.

Be wise: be informed, and go for help when needed (see re medical herbalists below) If you are in doubt about trying any of the simples I recommend for Happy Health, do check out information from a variety of reliable sources. For general, purposes, you need to know what is very safe, and what to use with caution. Too much of even the safest things isn't helpful – which applies to all foods! Information about how to use, how much and when makes a difference too. There are some excellent books, and lots of information online. My favourite herbal resources are

• "Royal Horticultural Society Encyclopedia of Herbs and Their Uses", Deni Brown
• "The Green Pharmacy", James Duke
• "Rodale's Illustrated Encyclopedia of Herbs"
• "A Modern Herbal", Mrs. M. Grieve. Get as near to the original 1931 edition as possible, because much important information is edited out in later versions. Remember she was writing when people much more commonly used herbs for many daily purposes, so she includes lots of information that's not so easily available these days. I cross reference her work against later resources to balance with modern research info (which is not always reliable or informative). Her only drawback, understandably, is plant identification, so be sure you know which she is referring to.

There is also loads of information online, (see also note re Suppliers below) though I would advise caution because it is not as easy to verify correctness and source reliability as for a book source (unless its one of the internationally renowned sources, e.g. Baldwins. And it can be easy to get swamped with overload, missing what you really need to know. So I use online when I need to find specific info, or do a very wide search as starting point..

When help is needed, I also strongly recommend visiting a medical herbalist. This means more than people who have done some herbal study. Medical herbalists are 'proper' doctors, that is they have qualified in all doctors' subjects, and often much more – except the use of pharmaceuticals. For more information and for the UK register to find qualified medical herbalists in your UK area,

• The National Institute of Medical Herbalists (NIMH )
• The College of Practitioners of Professional Phytotherapists (CPP)

(A little note from the voice of experience: Beware of fanatic anti-doctor / pharmaceuticals attitudes – your own and others')

MY 'SIMPLES' RECOMMENDATIONS
I don't intend this as a comprehensive simples guide, just to remind you about effective gifts we have from nature for our daily health, and to pass on my favourites as an introduction – what I would not want to be without. Enough chat, here's my favourites.

1. Grow and use your own herbs when you can.

FIRST AID
Lavender oil. External use, apply neat (undiluted) on burns, and on sores and cuts. If you have cuts / sores that don't heal, this is one to try. I believe its also been found to relieve scar tissue. As with any herbal help, "little and often" is usually best. Remember: all essential oils are very concentrated, so use them with caution, care and respect.

Five Flower Remedy. The is the combination formula that Dr. Bach made of the Flower Remedies he developed. Its also labelled as Trauma or 1st Aid formula. It comes as a liquid, and also as a cream with added cleanser Remedy Crab Apple. Sadly, the one labelled and trademarked as "Rescue Remedy", made by Nelsons and advertised as 'The Original' is no longer made according to Dr. Bach's instructions. I suggest avoiding it as so many people have confirmed that it does not work as well as the proper formula (if at all), and beause it is actually a homoeopathic, and very diluted remedy, rather than vibrational essence 'stock'. There are whole books written about this combination, plus my own pages about using Flower Remedies, so for here, just to remind you that the proper formula is safe and easy, and to urge you to keep a bottle handy wherever you are.

Comfrey ointment, external for bumps & bruises, burns, general healing salve. Lots of people find arnica invaluable, yet I generally find my body responds better to this herb. Such a common plant, and ointments are fairly easy to make so that you could try your own. I use the one from Henry Doubleday's research, available from the Organic Catalogue.

Elderberry for colds. If your cold (and resultant cough) is a result of a viral cold infection, reach for the beloved elderberry. The elder tree is so helpful a plant that its been know for ages as the People's Medicine Chest. Herbal research has shown that the berry (distinct from using flowers) disables the cold virus. When I'm just at the edge of the chorus of symptoms that warns me 'virus cold!', I get out my trusty trio of Echinacea tincture, Vitamin C high dose, and my home made elder syrup (tablespoon in warm water 3 x daily). The bud is duly nipped, and I feel its the chorus of help , and not any one them that's done the job. Certainly I feel 'good' and comforted when I take elderberry.

COUGHS (Caution: If you are using any pharmaceutical / drug preparations for cough or any lung condition, check with your medical herbalist before using even safe herbs, to make sure there will be no harmful chemical interaction. However, Flower Remedies and Nature Essences are safe to use with all pharmaceutical and herbal preparations.)

Bitter. Its worth knowing and accepting that a lot of plant healers are very bitter, because of their alkaloids which are just what our body is needing.

Horehound (white) is one of those. If you've ever had Fisherman's Friend lozenges, that's the weird flavour. Like it or not, by golly it usually works amazingly well, and is listed as one of the safest herbs for promoting lung health. Don't wait until your lungs get very poorly, use it at first signs of lung problem. Take tea – 3 cups (not mugs) a day – . If this one doesn't help within a few days, its a fair sign that there are other factors of health that need looking to, and/or other herbs better for you. Such as:.

Marsh Mallow. Having started to grow it in my garden, I'm excited at finding out how helpful it may be for me. Another age old known helper for lungs and more, I reckon its going to be a tastier option than horehound, though I'll probably carry on keeping both in the cupboard. Its a beautiful plant to grow, easy to harvest, chop and dry roots.

Aromatic herb mix as below.

CONSTIPATION. 1) Check your water consumption. You probably need to drink more water, but not too much either. Not tea, coffee, juice. Water. Give your body your attention to know when and how much to drink. Dry lips are usually a sure sign of 'please drink now'. And please avoid trashing Earth through using 'bought' water from plastic bottles. A wicked con wasting your money and Earth's valuable resources, and polluting with resulting rubbish (even if recycled, masses of plastic bottles are not healthy for life). If you don't like your tap water, try filtering it and adding a pinch of sea / rock salt to taste (not refined table salt).

2) Psillium husk (not seed). This (or senna which I don't know personally about) is the main constituent of most over the counter constipation remedies. You can pay through the nose for branded products, which also give your body other stuff its probably better off without. Or you can find a source of the plain, unadulterated stuff. I buy bulk from a whole food wholesaler. A small spoonful in a small cup of liquid daily. In water, juice... I mix mine with warm soy milk and a bit of malted milk powder.

3) All hail the glorious prune! Prune porridge (USA: 'oatmeal') is my favourite breakfast. Oats are good gut food for most Western people (different cultural blood types digest and use different grains best).

GENERAL DAILY HEALTH CARE
Aromatic herbs for teas and cooking: sage, thyme, rosemary, oregano, lavender. If you can't grow your own, use the freshest dried you can find, and the least processed. Whole leaves is better than powder or tea bags for most any herb. These herbs help the whole system, not the least because they care for the digestion system so well. Using them is about a way of life, regular use rather than as a medicine cabinet 'pill'. I reckon a helpful 'rule of thumb' is to eat the ones you like. If your pallet doesn't find it attractive, then likely its not the one that will help your body.

Sage: I'm told its more helpful for A Blood types than O. I'm A, and find it always helps keep my temperature even (after ten years of hot flushes), when I have it once daily as tea.

Aromatic Mix: I love to harvest my own Safe, Rosemary and Thyme (pick Thyme when in flower – more mellow!). As well as using separately, I keep a mix of the three and use as herb tea, in dumplings and stews. Try mixing into butter for a fab spread for potatoes, oat cakes, on rice etc.

Lavender makes me feel happy. My larger bush smells so good I thought one year, "That's good enough to eat!" Which led me to figuring out how to make lavender jam. There are some tricks to its excellence. I may put my recipe up on this site later on.

See also my information on Tissue Salts and Bach Flower Remedies (running through several of my Flower Essence pages). Both are inexpensive, safe, easy – and SIMPLE!

SUPPLIERS 1. Beware! Information and shopping online for herbs can be a quagmire. You need to be sure you will get what you have asked for. Do you know, for instance, what Horehound smells like, and the difference between white and other horehounds? Between psillium husk and seed? We need to be able to trust not only that the supplier knows their stuff, and that what they send you will be correct, also that it will be fresh. Even the best dried materials cannot keep forever. Having worked for a herb wholesaler importing from around the world, I became aware of the many issues involved. And who are trustworthy companies.

Here I am offering details of three UK based suppliers (this page is already long enough! And I want to keep this as simple as possible...), who I have had excellent service from for several years. Each offers different service and products.

• Baldwins, based in London, is a very large and long established firm, offering a mind boggling array of excellent products, including online. Not always the cheapest, yet always reliable. They have a large organic stock, as well as seeds so you can grow your own.
• Tree Harvest Products is a UK small family business, great for those who prefer dealing with individual people who will remember you year after year. All their stock, and many things not available from Baldwins ('tree' is key to their stock choices), is beautiful and of highest quality. A good catalogue, and also one for practitioners. People who are a joy to do business with. They have no reason to start up online sales, so its good old-fashioned contact details:
  The Granary, Lintridge Farm, Bromsberrow Heath, Herefordshire HR8 1PB England Phone: 01531 650764 (International: 0044 - 1531 650 764) They do use e-mail.
• Herbs Hands Healing A nearly 30 year old herbal medicine house, "our focus on ethical, sustainable organic and biodynamic herbal preparation is paramount." They have a relatively small but highest quality stock, including of the finest, most wonderful herbal cleaning products for body and home. (See my Clean For Life articles!) Jill Davies and colleagues' herbal formulas are first class. They also run home study courses, Their catalogue is available hard copy and online, listing herbal preparations by symptom, and other products.

BOTTOM LINE FOR SUPPLY Grow you own simples!

All recommendations and instructions are given intending to support and not replace medical care. Please use "Happy Health" and all other Lifepower teaching responsibly, and seek medical help as appropriate.

With thanks to Sally Horrobin, Naturopath, for checking my details

Cynthia Alves, copyright 2008

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