The Herbal Writer

Ayahuasca – Does it do Harm?

elizabethbattle — Wed, 09 Nov 2011 03:16:30 +0000

Image via Wikipedia

This story is quite brief, but it does make me wonder about the use of herbs and the regulations that invariably come into play when such remedies are applied. In this case, Dr. Dr. Gabor Maté – who looks disturbingly like a wood carving in the story’s picture – was using a hallucinogenic Amazonian herb called ayahuasca to treat his patients for drug addiction, and apparently, once his practices were reported, health officials in Canada forbade him to continue using the herb, claiming “active ingredients” in it are “restricted.”

I wonder why those “active ingredients” are restricted, and what are they? The story does not elaborate, nor does it answer a more important (in my estimation) question: does ayahuasca do any harm?

Serious drug addiction does do harm; few will doubt that conviction. According to CBC’s report, cure rates using ayahuasca at a clinic in Peru were “many times the average in North America and Europe.” Ayahuasca essentially saved addicts from harm by facilitating the end of their addictions, and Dr. Maté, apparently observing this, wanted to treat addicts with similar success in his Canadian practice.

Again, the stories are brief; but it seems that Dr. Maté had nothing material to gain by using this herb with his patients; in other words, his motives appear pure. But what about the motives of the Canadian health authorities? It is tempting to question their interest in people’s welfare, although they may operate under this guise. There was no evidence mentioned in the stories to indicate that ayahuasca caused any harm to patients using it, and there was significant evidence pointing to its positive effects. Why would the use of ayahuasca be forbidden?

Perhaps the authorities acted on the possibility that the herb could cause harm, or maybe they simply were following the letter of the law regarding those “active ingredients.” Whatever the reason or reasons, this incident does incite me to consider carefully and clarify my views on herb legality.

My Experience with Truvia

elizabethbattle — Tue, 06 Sep 2011 18:35:11 +0000

Image by programwitch via Flickr

It’s amazing how long it can take me to make connections between what I have ingested and unpleasant physical affects; but unpleasant symptoms are precisely what I have experienced since using Truvia.

As a hardened and shameless tea drinker, I am always looking for ways to sweeten my favorite beverage in ways that will not involve sugar in all its caloric sweetness. Truvia seemed like the perfect solution to the problem I had with my favorite sweetener, Sweet Leaf stevia: its expense. Besides, I had a coupon. Then, as if fate approved of my sweetener ventures, I found a small zip top bag full of Truvia packets at a yard sale for $1 – the seller said she didn’t like it, and preferred organic sugar. I let the incomparable nature of the two sweeteners go and bought the stuff.

Using it in tea has worked fine, hot and iced, drinking it basically all day.

Because of the bargains, I had lots of Truvia without a big investment. So I thought I’d try baking cookies with it (recipe at the Truvia website). That’s when the trouble started. (The cookies were lousy, by the way.)

I indulged in the raw cookie batter and subsequent cookies, their lousiness notwithstanding. (Oooo, there’s so little sugar in this recipe! Let’s eat lots, even if the cookies are dry, cake-like, and crumbly!) My son also indulged, but being the grownup in the house, I did a lot more sneaking of extra batter and cookies than he did.

About 12 hours following this Truvia ingestion spree (and following my sneaking of the last two cookies before breakfast – no, they didn’t improve overnight), I developed nasty stomach symptoms. It felt like very bad gas, but there was also stomach pain and a general feeling of what my dad would call a “sour stomach.” It was quite unpleasant, and the pain was significant. Loose bowel movements also resulted in both my son and I. My son (who is 7) also said he had odd stomach symptoms, though they were not as severe as mine (there’s no grownup to curb my ingestion of Truvia-sweetened baked goods). I experienced extreme rumblies all day – good thing I was working from home as the noises emanating from my midriff were most disturbing – and found myself making multiple bathroom trips.

I was still sneaking frozen cookie dough, not connecting these symptoms with the Truvia. I ate quite a bit of the dough just last night, about 28 hours after making the cookies and about 18 hours after the first symptoms.

Today, we’ve moved on to diarrhea. I won’t tell you where I am sitting while typing this, but let’s just say I am grateful for a lightweight laptop with a strong battery.

The rumbling, churning, gas-y feeling tends to come on after/during eating, whether what I am eating has Truvia in it or not. I used Truvia in my hot tea this morning and in my iced tea which I am drinking now. During lunch, here came the rumblies, so I Googled “Truvia stomach gas.”

It seems I am not alone.

http://healthpersonal.blogspot.com/2008/11/anyone-else-tried-truvia.html

http://freedomandlinux.wordpress.com/2010/03/31/the-truvia-deception/

http://www.fitsugar.com/Sweeteners-PureVia-Truvia-Safe-2866994?page=0%2C1

Hm…maybe I’d better cough up the dough (and stop sneaking the dough) and buy stevia again.

Precious Goldenseal

elizabethbattle — Wed, 11 May 2011 13:32:45 +0000

It’s hard to write this post and not be reminded that I have, in fact, been asked to write a story for Goldenseal magazine and have yet to write it. This is the problem with having “no deadlines.”

Image via Wikipedia

At any rate, my goldenseal plant has returned from its winter’s dormancy and put out its brief but interesting bloom for only one week in April. I was hoping to add another plant each year until I had a whole grove of the stuff, but the nursery where I bought the goldenseal last year did not have any this year. I am appreciating afresh how precious this plant is – not only is it endangered in the wild, but it’s hard to come by in nurseries, too. Last year, it was amazing that I even got the plant; it was the last one, and had been picked up, inspected, and rejected by various shoppers because it had 3 leaves rather than the customary 2, and it was identified only by its Latin name. Most of us, including the nursery worker who had been asked several times throughout the day to clarify the plant’s identity, don’t know that goldenseal’s Latin name is Hydrastis canadensis – one of its active constituents is Hydrastine, so that helps me to remember the herb’s proper name. I have to be honest, though – I didn’t know its Latin name for sure last year, and took a chance when I bought it!

I also took pictures of its white, fringed little bloom and will post those soon.

I don’t know how goldenseal makes more of itself, but I certainly hope it increases to produce more of these plants. I look forward to harvesting the roots someday in herbal preparations.

Screech Owl

elizabethbattle — Tue, 26 Apr 2011 12:26:04 +0000

Image via Wikipedia

It’s the season for open windows, and I love the breezes, smells, and sounds that are invited into my home between now and September. Last night, sitting near an open window (which you pretty much have to do in my window-intensive house), I heard a screech owl, just one tremulous call. It was surprisingly quiet – the name “screech owl” would seem to indicate a more fearsome utterance. Thanks to this excellent site, though, I am assured that what I heard was a screech owl, and the bone-chilling, nocturnal shrieks I have heard in the past were probably barn owls. The owl call we hear the most often around here, though, is that of the barred owl. According to enature.com, these owls have been known to call in the daytime, to which my son and I can both attest. We also found out that barred owl calls are relatively easy to imitate, and that these forest-dwellers will carry on a “conversation” with humans!

Image via Wikipedia

What’s the color of hyperactivity?

elizabethbattle — Tue, 29 Mar 2011 12:22:44 +0000

Image via Wikipedia

This is another one of those articles that elicits the following response from me: “Well yeah. Didn’t everyone know that?”

I know I am not the only one in the natural health community who is reacting this way to these latest studies, sponsored by the British government. The studies showed a possible link between hyperactivity in children and the ingestion of food dyes and sodium benzoate (a preservative). Since the 1990s I have known parents of hyperactive kids who were advised by some wise health expert to remove artificial colors and preservatives from their kids’ diets. Nonetheless, studies like this one can validate and affirm what may have been pooh-poohed in the past – such knowledge, if tentative, lends some credence to what was once easily brushed aside as the inchoate notion of deluded natural health enthusiasts.

The use of potentially dangerous dyes in foods is not just a possible health risk for children. FD&C Yellow #5, tartrazine, converts to hydrazine in the body. Hydrazine is a vitamin B6 antagonist, and vitamin B6 is an important vitamin for normal female hormone regulation.

Ginkgo for Allergies

elizabethbattle — Tue, 04 Jan 2011 21:56:24 +0000

I spent most of my childhood and young adulthood medicated for allergies. In my time – the late 1970s and 80s – childhood allergies were somewhat freakish. I think I knew maybe one kid who had an allergy to chocolate. But I never knew any child who would break out in hives and violent sneezing fits when she went to visit her friend with a dog (even if the dog was out of the room). I never knew another child whose parents had to pick her up from overnights because of the severe allergy attack that seemed to be an inevitable component of children romping around together. From the age of 6 or 7 until my late 20s, I was on some sort of daily allergy medication. I was allergic to all sorts of things, but pet dander was the biggest culprit.

I went off of all allergy medications when I was 28, when my then-husband and I planned to have a child. I suffered terribly, as I was living with 2 very hairy dogs and 2 cats at the time. And once the mucous membrane inflammation that is a part of all pregnancies set in, I was miserable perpetually – at home, outside, and in the office where I worked. I had to stuff a tissue up my nose just to have two hands free to type; my nose ran and tickled constantly. But then, around month 4 of my pregnancy, the allergies disappeared completely. Totally. Utterly. I could pick up the cats and sniff their fur. The dogs could drool on me and not produce hives. It was amazing.

The allergies stayed at bay for 4 years following my son’s birth, so I considered myself finally free of these loathsome disorders. I joyfully acquired 3 cats and a dog, and continued in my anti-allergy lifestyle: no carpets, daily vacuuming, regular grooming and bathing of the dog, and no pets in my bedroom. But then the remission (or whatever you want to call it) gradually ended over the last 2 years, and I was once again plagued with allergy symptoms, despite continuing the anti-allergy lifestyle.

At first, I blamed it on pollen. But when winter set in and my allergies worsened when I was shut inside with all the pets, I knew that my old, allergic self had returned. The symptoms were so severe that I could hardly function. And so I turned to herbs, something I wish I had done 30 years ago. And here’s what I discovered.

Ginkgo, the living fossil that is a testament to a species’ resilience and adaptability, turned out to be the answer. Ginkgo’s little fan-shaped leaves, fluttering long before human history, contain a component that inhibits Platelet Activating Factor, or PAF. I can not help but be awed by this amazing fact that shows so beautifully the Mastermind of the Creator. PAF, it seems, is a vital link in the chemical chain that is an allergic attack. Inhibiting PAF weakens the link and effectively disrupts the chain, preventing an attack from completing its cycle and taking hold.

This summer, I acquired a bottle of Ginkgo supplements for less than $2 – they were on sale at my local grocery store. I picked them up thinking I would give them to my mother, who has arteriosclerosis. But she claimed Ginkgo made her nose bleed, so I had this supplement on hand when I read James A. Duke, PhD’s account of Ginkgo as a treatment for allergies. I now take 1 or 2 capsules a day, and my allergies are once more at bay.

It’s enough to make me pick up one of my cats and sniff its fur.

Another Reason Not to Use Teflon

elizabethbattle — Tue, 07 Sep 2010 11:52:51 +0000

Frankly, I thought there were already enough unknown factors associated with Teflon and non-stick cookware in general to keep me from using it. But now it is not just the unknowns that repel me – it’s the knowns, or at least the “we thinks.” A recent study at West Virginia University (I confess that the location of the study caught my attention) indicates a correlation between high blood levels of C8, a chemical commonly used in the manufacture of non-stick cookware, and high cholesterol. The study points to children in particular as being susceptible to the cholesterol-increasing effects of this substance.

I wonder how C8 affects this cholesterol increase? Perhaps it affects the liver, the body’s cholesterol processing center. The liver is also the organ that processes toxins and any foreign substances. If anyone came to me with concerns about ingesting C8, I would suggest using non-stick cookware only with a barrier present, such as parchment paper or paper muffin cups. A course of milk thistle herb to cleanse the liver would not be a bad idea, either.

I use only cast iron, stainless steel, or enamel cookware. And I don’t have to worry about scratching the surface of my pots and pans!

Growing Weeds

elizabethbattle — Tue, 22 Jun 2010 18:35:41 +0000

I think I have found a way to deal with the poison ivy problem I encounter every year. Normally, I suit up in the homemade equivalent of a bio-hazard suit and yank it out of the ground. But I think that, from now on, I should just try to grow it.

I have been utterly unsuccessful at growing Shepherd’s Purse. This supposedly rampant, prolific, obnoxious weed that is so tough it sometimes blooms even in winter is not sprouting. And the bit I yanked out with the root attached (and subsequently planted) has withered and died.

But I am not defeated yet! I still have a great many seeds, still attached to the stalks in their bitty purses, with which I can experiment. And perhaps I should read up a bit on growing it first.

Planting the Shepherd’s Purse

elizabethbattle — Sun, 06 Jun 2010 02:46:16 +0000

I sowed Shepherd’s Purse seeds today. I cut a cardboard egg carton into sections, filled them with dirt, and used the lid of the carton for a tray. I wet the dirt, then sprinkled a pinch of seeds onto each dirt-filled section. The seeds are exceptionally wee, but still heavier than the tiny, hollow, heart-shaped purse they came from.

I then sprinkled more soil over the seeds and watered again.

I have no idea if this is the right time of year or the right method for sowing these seeds. This is sort of the “generic” way to sow seed. Judging by the tenacious tendencies of Shepherd’s Purse, this will probably work fine.

Shepherd’s Purse

elizabethbattle — Fri, 04 Jun 2010 02:18:46 +0000

Having read about Shepherd’s purse (Capsella bursa-pastoris) in various places, I noted that it was generally described as a common weed found throughout the area. But I could never find it. Often missing the phenomena of the heavens due to my downward-looking gaze, I kept a continuous vigil for Shepherd’s purse during all my outdoor ventures. But, as so often happens, it was when I was not looking for it that I found it.

My son had just finished his first chiropractic appointment, and being in the middle of town, we decided to go for a walk to “look for parts.” Josiah loves to glean the ground for random machine or engine parts – or parts that look like machine or engine parts – and bring them home in order to cover the house with dirt while simultaneously inventing and building interesting machines. He is as vigilant in his downward gazing as I am, but with utterly different intentions. His dream is to find a hubcap.

We came upon some “waste” ground amid the buildings, a square meadow fully exposed to the sun. In the middle there was a disorderly, massive swirl of recently dumped concrete that was clearly not intended for any useful structure. Grasses and plants – and machine and engine parts – had somehow found their way here, like fish in puddles. And lo, there was Shepherd’s purse, looking quite different from the various illustrations I had pored over, but similar enough that I recognized it by its clever little seedpods. It startled me with its presence, so dry and brown and homely.

I suppose I had expected something more showy from an herb so powerful. But that shows how little I have learned. Of course it is often the most subtle of herbs that are those with the greatest powers. Goldenseal comes to mind. In the case of Shepherd’s purse and its ability to cease uterine hemorrhage, the humble is truly a life-saver.

The seeds were falling easily from the “purses,” so I pulled some up and brought it home with the intention of planting the seeds. One of the plants graced me with an intact root system, however, so I thrust it into a pot with my basil to see how it does. That was a bad choice – basil likes moist soil and, judging from its “native” location, Shepherd’s purse likes it dry. But I was in a bit of a rush and needed to stick it in some sort of pot.

The bunch without the roots is sealed in a plastic bag, as the little seeds fairly jump from their heart-shaped purses. My plan is to sow them indoors and transplant them. Or I could play nature and scatter the seeds randomly. But that plan could prove fatal – not knowing what the seedlings look like, I could easily yank them out by mistake before they were given the chance to prove their identity.