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Plant Healer Magazine.....

Plant Healer Magazine-Preview to this amazing and thoughtful new magazine: http://ping.fm/wqi7Q

Reaching for Success and Balance with Ericka Blount Danois....

Reaching for Success and Balance with Ericka Blount Danois on Wise Woman Radio with Susun Weed. http://ping.fm/c5E2F

Aspire Magazine........

Aspire Magazine and the Happiness Movement 2011...Aspire Magazine is full of Inspiration for Women. Join us- http://ping.fm/QoBDt

Integrative Wellness with Cindi DeWet..........

Integrative Wellness with Cindi DeWet. Susun interviews Cindi DeWet on Wise Woman Radio: http://ping.fm/fi8HC

Here Comes the Flu Season........

Here Comes the Flu Season-Protect Yourself the Wise Woman Way: http://ping.fm/w69oD

Mercury Retrograde, End Times and How to Carry On through the Holiday Season......

By Vicki Noble: Mercury Retrograde, End Times, and How to Carry On through the Holiday Season. http://ping.fm/ZIEoR

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Natural Approaches to Bladder Infections...the Wise Woman Way........

Step 1: Collect Information
Bladder infections are also known as cystitis, urethritis, and UTIs (urinary tract infections). When bacteria grow in the bladder, the resulting infection usually causes symptoms such as: a burning sensation during voiding, overwhelming urgency, frequent but minuscule urinations, incontinence, bloody urine, and pelvic pain. Up to 25 percent of bladder infections in post- menopausal women are silent or symptomless.

Bacteria enter the bladder in three primary ways: when feces are spread to the bladder opening (such as wiping from back to front after toileting), when the tube leading to the bladder is irritated or bruised (as from use of a diaphragm, pelvic surgery, or prolonged/vigorous vaginal penetration), or when there is an in-dwelling catheter.

The thinning and shrinking of reproductive and bladder tissues that may occur in the post- menopausal years contributes to bladder infections in older women, as does lessening of vaginal acidity.

Sometimes tiny ulcerations appear in the wall of the bladder; this is called interstitial cystitis (IC). Some of the remedies in this section are contraindicated for women with interstitial cystitis.

These remedies are substantially the same ones that delighted and aided the readers of my first book: Wise Woman Herbal for the Childbearing Year.

Step 2: Engage the Energy
• Flow, flow, flow. Head off that bladder infection by drinking a glass of water hourly as soon as you feel the first urgency or burning. It is tempting to stint on drinking if you find yourself unexpectedly incontinent, but don’t. Bladder infections only make incontinence worse.
• Urine is ideally neutral to slightly acidic (pH 5.8–pH 7). Very acidic urine (below pH 5.5) encourages infections. An established infection gives rise to alkaline urine (pH 7.5 or higher), which causes stinging and burning. Test your urine with pH paper at any time except first thing in the morning. Cranberry juice lowers pH; vitamin C raises it.
• Cantharis is a homeopathic remedy for scalding urine.

Step 3: Nourish and Tonify
• Cranberries (Vaccinium macrocarpon) contain substances that kill bacteria and make your bladder wall so slippery that any escaping bacteria can’t latch on and thrive there. Unsweetened cranberry juice (or concentrate) is the most effective form. (The sugar or corn syrup in cranberry cocktail-type juices and cran-apple juices can feed the infection.) Drink freely, at least a glass a day, up to a quart/liter a day for acute infections unless your urine’s pH is already low.
• Pelvic floor exercises help prevent and relieve bladder infections, too! Try this one: After urinating, close your eyes, relax, breathe out, and see if you can squeeze out an extra dribble.
• An overgrowth of vaginal yeast may be irritating your bladder or urethra. Eat one cup of plain yogurt 4-5 times a week.

Sorting Nutmegs ©Lisa Herrera

Step 4: Stimulate/Sedate
• Uva Ursi (Arctostaphylos uva ursi) is an old favorite for strengthening the bladder and ending chronic silent bladder infections. I prefer a hot water infusion of the dried leaves, but know women who have successfully used cold water infusions, tinctures, even vinegars. A dose is 1 cup/125 ml of infusion; 10-30 drops of tincture; 1 tablespoonful/15 ml of vinegar; 3–6 times a day initially, then 1–3 times a day for 7–10 days. In very chronic cases, eliminate all forms of sugar (even fresh fruit, fruit juice, and honey) for a month as well.
• Yarrow is a urinary disinfectant with a powerful antibacterial action and an astringent effect. A small cup of the infusion, once or twice a day for 7–10 days, tones up weak, lax bladder tissues. Combines well with uva ursi. Results may be felt within hours.
• In my experience, Echinacea purpurea and E. augustifolia are as effective as antibiotics in clearing bladder infections and do not contribute to vaginal yeast. (See Step 5b.) A dose is 1 drop echinacea tincture per 2 pounds/1 kilo body weight. (For 150 pound/70 kilo person, use 75 drops or three dropperfuls.) In acute cases, I give the dose every 2 hours. As the infection clears, I lengthen the amount of time between doses until I’m down to 1–2 doses a day, which I continue for another 2–10 weeks.
• Women who wash their vulva with soap and water are four times more likely to get vaginal and bladder infections. Douches, bubblebaths, tampons, nylon underwear, and pantyhose may also irritate the urethra and contribute to bladder infections.
• Known bladder irritants include: alcohol, black tea, coffee, sodas, citrus juices, chocolate, cayenne, and hot peppers. (An herbal tincture in an alcohol base won’t irritate the bladder if you take it diluted in a glass of water or a cup of herb tea.)
• Urinating after love play flushes out bacteria and cuts down on UTIs. Urinating before love play increases your risk of a bladder infection.

Step 5a: Use Supplements
• Ascorbic acid wrings the kidneys, flushes the bladder, and raises urinary pH. Try 500 mg hourly for 6–8 hours. CAUTION: IC sufferers — avoid!
• Be careful about taking calcium supplements if you are prone to bladder infections. Calcium supplements increase bacterial adherence to the bladder wall, increasing bladder infections.

Step 5b: Use Drugs
Antibiotics are the standard medical treatment for women with bladder infections. But taking antibiotics frequently causes vaginal yeast overgrowth (which can lead to bladder infection). One — nitrofurantoin (Macrodantin) — seems to cause microscopic scarring and ulceration of the bladder wall, precipitating IC.

Step 6: Break and Enter
Dilation of the urethra is expensive, painful, and causes tiny scars on the urethra, which may lead to interstitial cystitis. I have seen it referred to as “the rape of the female urethra”. No controlled study has shown this procedure to be effective at limiting chronic bladder infections. Do pelvic floor exercises instead.

Green blessings, Susun Weed

Susun Weed's forthcoming book: Down There:  Sexual and Reproductive Health the Wise Woman Way is coming soon!!


Wise Woman Herbal for the Childbearing Year

Now in its 24th printing. A confirmed favorite with pregnant women, midwives, childbirth educators, and new parents. Packed with clear, comforting, and superbly helpful information.

Beginning with the two months before pregnancy, herbs are enlisted to provide safe, effective birth control, or to help ensure pregnancy, even in the most difficult of situations. A special list of teratogens, including herbs to avoid before pregnancy, is included, as is a section on herbs to improve the father's fertility and reduce the risk of birth defects.

Once pregnancy has occurred, herbs are safe and beneficial allies in reducing the distress of pregnancy, including hemorrhoids, high blood pressure, morning sickness, emotional changes, anemia, muscle cramps, bladder infections, and preclampsia. Tasty recipes and clear directions make use easy and fun.

Herbs take a starring role in labor and delivery -- whether initiating labor, increasing energy, diminishing pain, or staunching postpartum bleeding -- and in postpartum care of the mother's perineum, breasts, and emotions, and the infants umbilicus, skin, scalp, digestive system, and immune system.

Humorous, tender, and detailed, this classic text is supported by illustrations, references, resource lists, glossary, and index.  Includes herbs for fertility and birth control.   Foreword by Jeannine Parvati Baker.

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Learning about Earth's Wisdom with Maria Yraceburu on Wise Woman Radio: http://ping.fm/qdJu9

The Healing Medicine of Trees....Part Five Focuses on Oak......

OAK is the ogam Duir or Dair, the door. It holds the center place in the ogam of the thirteen moons. The words Druid and dairy are derived from the same root as Duir.

Oaks (Quercus) are one of the most common trees of the temperature regions. I’ve been told that North America was so densely covered with oak forest five hundred years ago that a squirrel could travel from the Atlantic Ocean to the Mississippi River without ever setting foot on the ground. Oak forests also covered Europe several thousand years ago.

One might say civilization was possible due to oak. It provides heat, tans hides, heals wounds and infections, and can easily be fashioned into bows, spears, oars, boats, and houses. When green it bends well. Once dry, it becomes as hard as steel, and is exceptionally durable. (If the second little piggy had built his house of oak, no wolf would have been able to blow it down.)

Oak is not the hardest wood. (That’s ebony.) Nor is it the toughest. (That would be ash.) But it is the hardest tough wood. Oak logs submerged for more than a thousand years have been used in modern buildings. Oak was once valued due to its ability to be worked into rot resistant ships, barrels, and wagon wheels. We rarely use those things today, but oak is still prized: for furniture, musical instruments, firewood, and floors. It burns for a long time, puts out a lot of heat ,and leaves a bed of coals that lingers.

To the botanist, oak is Quercus, which means, literally, “a fine tree.” Oaks are roughly divided into red oaks and white oaks. The leaves of the red oaks are pointed; the leaves of white oaks are rounded. The acorns of the white oaks are the best to eat.

Acorn meal was a staple food of the Native Americans of the west coast of North America. I prepared it once; once. Not only is the labor of picking up acorns literally back-breaking, the process of leaching them, drying them, and grinding them – before they can be cooked, which is a tricky business itself – is more than my modern self wants to endure. Acorns are still important food for livestock. My goats love to (over) eat them. In Spain, I was introduced to “black leg ham” from pigs fed only on acorns. Delicious.

Magically, the oak wand is used to maintain a strong center under adverse conditions. Or, in beneficial circumstances, oak wands are used for help in creating openings to new realms of understanding. Acorns are magical, of course, and are featured in many European fairy tales.

Oak bark is used medicinally as an antiseptic, astringent, and tonic. The tea – four tablespoons of bark per half-gallon of water simmered for ten minutes, and taken half a cup at a time – is said to shrink goiter, reduce glandular inflammation, stop diarrhea, restore loss of voice and ease coughs, dry up mouth sores, and bring down fever.

The Iroquois considered oak an aid for “when your woman goes off and won’t come back.” To cure sinus problems and infections, they smoked the leaves and exhaled the healing smoke through the nose. A strong infusion of the bark or leaves is used as a sitz bath to ease hemorrhoids, fistulas, vaginal discharges, and chronic pelvic pain. Poultices of the leaves are applied to heal stings, bruises, ulcers, broken bones, swellings, and painful joints. Oak is also of value as a wash to remove dandruff and encourage hair growth, and to heal varicose veins, sore eyes, umbilical stumps, burns, and oozing sores.

Oak trees are sacred to Taranis, Indra, Jupiter, Yahweh, Ukho, Rhea, Cybele, Thor, Artemis, Brigid, Balder, the Erinyes, and the Kikonian Maenads.

“My roots touch the Earth’s heart.
My leaves touch the Bear’s heart.
I am the Queen, I am the oracle,
I am the center of the whirling Universe,
I am the door of the year.
I am the mill shaft; I am the axle.
Around my stillness all is motion.
I am fullness and promises fulfilled.
I am love’s memory; I am love’s grandchild.”

Building Better Bones the Wise Woman Way http://ping.fm/pqHsh

Susun Weed will be in Ashland, Oregon Feb 24-26, 2011. Booksigning, workshop, lecture: http://ping.fm/95tip

The Healing Medicine of Trees.....Part Four Focuses on Linden.........

LINDEN is one of my favorite trees. It goes by many names: basswood, lime blossom, and tille. To the botanist it is Tillia; and this is the name most of the world knows it by. It thrives in many places and is harvested from China to France for commercial sale.

            Euell Gibbons said linden is the tree you find by listening. When linden blooms, its fragrance is so sweet that the bees flock to it. Their buzzing is the sound one must tune in to if identifying linden by sound. (I usually find them by smell!) When I harvest linden blossoms, I am careful to wait until after the bee has left the flower, so I don’t get stung.  

“I smell fairies at my feet, I’m sitting under a linden tree;

Bees abuzz and birds atweet, linden blossoms sure smell sweet.

Linden, linden heal my heart,

You can bring me a brand new start.”

Linden blossoms hang from a green strap-like structure that looks a little like a leaf, but isn’t. The green structure is part of the remedy and needs to be harvested along with the cluster of flowers dangling under it.                       

I reach for linden when I want to quell inflammation. A student lowered her C-reactive protein (C-rP) levels, and her risk of suffering a heart attack, by drinking linden infusion for three weeks. C-reactive protein is a measure of the amount of inflammation in the blood vessels specifically and the overall body in general. With the licensing of a drug (Crestor, rosuvastatin calcium) to lower C-rP levels, we are going to be hearing lots more about this substance in the near future. (Find out why you don’t want to take this drug at www.worstpill.org)

Lowering inflammation is key to achieving a happy, healthy old age. Toward that end, I drink at least two quarts of linden infusion a week. I believe that most chronic diseases are the end result of inflammation. Joint pain is inflammation. Dementia is inflammation. Blood vessel disease is inflammation. And adult-onset diabetes is inflammation. It seems to me that many cancers are a response to inflammation too. A recent study found women who taken NSAIDs regularly are less likely to be diagnosed with breast cancer.

Linden is the world’s leading anti-cold and anti-flu herb. It prevents and heals all respiratory distresses (but is not an anti-infective). It is a cooling and strengthening herb. Linden is considered safe for children and elders.

Linden is primarily used as a tea, though I prefer the curative powers of a strong infusion.  I use one-half ounce of linden blossoms to a quart of water and steep for four hours. I strain off the first brew and refrigerate it, then rebrew the wet linden flowers by adding two cups of cold water to them in a saucepan. I bring this rebrew to a boil, cover, and let sit for four hours to extract the healing mucilage that is triggered by the cold water. 

            Linden flowers are the usual medicine, but the leaves are medicinal as well. They are heart-shaped and even more mucilaginous and anti-inflammatory than the blossoms.. A student who had been kicked by a horse found relief from a nasty wound (already more than a week old) by applying chewed up linden leaf. If I didn’t have so much plantain at hand, I am sure I would use more linden leaf poultices.

            Linden grows well in cities; I have rarely been in a city in North America or Europe that does not a Linden Avenue. A highlight of my love affair with linden come with a visit to Linderhof in Bavaria. The day I got there, the three-hundred-year-old linden tree was blooming and buzzing and throwing off a scent that made me swoon with delight. My local lindens are tall at fifty feet. This giant was over a hundred feet.

Catch the YouTube of me harvesting linden with my apprentices in the parking lot of the local mall. We attracted many interested people, including one adventurous man who sawed off an entire branch of the tree we were harvesting from, so he could try it out!



Hot on the Trail of Wild Foods with Sunny Savage-Susun interviews Sunny Savage on Wise Woman Radio http://ping.fm/9iEhy

Vaginal Health the Wise Woman Way........

The vagina is a muscular, mucus-lined passage that connects a woman’s outer genitals with her uterus. When we speak of sexual penetration, it is the vagina—not the cervix, the part of the uterus which projects into the vagina, or the uterus itself—that is penetrated. During sexual arousal, the vagina lengthens, opens, and raises a sensitive bump called the G spot.

For thousands of years, men have perpetuated the belief that the vagina is an inert, hollow receptacle which can be penetrated and filled at their will and whim. But tens of thousands of years ago, when women told the stories, the vagina was honored. (And a universe of thanks to Eve Ensler for The Vagina Monologues which has, at least, made it acceptable to say the word “vagina.”)

This vagina, it goes without need of saying one would wish, is alive and sensitive. It is responsive and inherently capable of letting its wishes and desires be known. The vagina, and its health or lack thereof, is deeply connected to a woman’s sense of safety.

Modern women are trained to view their vaginas as dirty and smelly. That’s another misconception. A healthy vagina has a pleasant odor, a slightly sour taste, and is naturally “self-cleaning.” A healthy vagina secretes clear or milky fluids which protect the delicate vaginal tissues. These fluids are heavier and more slippery during ovulation.

The vagina contains health-promoting micro-organisms, as well as microbes that can overgrow and cause symptoms. In the healthy vagina, glucose exuded from the blood serum is eaten by vaginal flora and metabolized into lactic acid. This acidifies the vagina, promoting healthy flora and depressing the disrupters. If there is too much glucose or too few flora, the acidity of the vagina is compromised and infection—from inherent organisms or transmitted organisms—is likely. For health, wash your vaginal area only with plain water, or very dilute vinegar, not soap, which is alkaline.

Antibiotics and antibacterial agents including antibacterial soaps and essential oils kill protective vaginal micro-organisms. Taking antibiotics doubles the risk of developing a vaginal infection.

Celibacy, lesbianism, and double monogamy are life-style choices that cut down on the number of infectious organisms introduced into the vagina. But nuns, lesbians, and monogamous women can still get vaginal infections.

Vaginal Problems

There are at least thirty different bacteria, fungi, and parasites that can cause infections in the vagina. Some live naturally in the vagina, some are introduced through intimate contact, some can be acquired without sexual contact, as well. Many vaginal infections cause discharges, itching, and inflammation. But several are virtually symptomless and can progress to pelvic inflammatory disease (PID), which leaves half of infected women sterile.

The vaginal tissues are sensitive to estrogen and stress hormones. When the estrogen mix changes at puberty, menopause, during pregnancy, and throughout the menstrual cycle, the vagina responds, sometimes with pain, dryness, and eventually, infections.

If the vaginal environment becomes alkaline, or if the tissues receive too much sugar, or if antibiotics kill beneficial flora, then a variety of micro-organisms which live in the vagina, such candida and gardnerella, overgrow and cause an infection. These innate infections make it much easier for other sexually transmitted diseases (STDs)—including gonorrhea, syphilis, trich, and herpes—to take hold. Frequently, several organisms overgrow together, causing multiple concurrent infections. In a European study, thirty percent of the women diagnosed with trich also had a gonorrhea infection.

Things that alkalinize the vagina are listed below, along with remedies to help re-acidify. Vaginal infections generally cause irritation and burning of the vulva as well as the vagina—in some cases, the thighs too. The severe alkalinity and highly increased volume of the vaginal fluids produced during an infection can burn the tissues, like when your nose runs during a cold and leaves the area under it raw and red.

Less common, but more dangerous, is vaginal cancer, of special concern to DES daughters. And a few women will have vaginal ulcers or Bartholin gland cysts, painful blockages at the entrance to the vagina.

These can make the vagina more alkaline and more susceptible to infections:

■Birth control pills

■Menopausal and postmenopausal hormone therapy

■Hormonal changes preceding menstruation

■Menstrual fluids

■Pregnancy

■Locia (the flow that follows childbirth)

■Male ejaculate, including sperm and seminal fluids

■Diabetes, high blood sugar

■Antibiotics

■Unusual stress, even positive stress

■Bubblebath

■Washing your vagina with soap

■Anything that allows feces into the vagina

■Douching regularly

■Feminine hygiene sprays

■Artificial sweeteners, diet sodas

■Raw fruit, fruit juices

These restore healthy acidity to the vagina:

■Yogurt orally and vaginally

■Acidophilus inserted in the vagina

■Ascorbic acid inserted in the vagina

■Meditation

■Sitz bath, finger bath, or douche with:

2 tblspns/30 ml of white vinegar in one qt/ltr of water, or 1 cup hydrogen peroxide in 3 cups/750 ml water, or

2 tblspns/30 ml of Betadine solution in one qt/ltr water

Note: Betadine is iodine; it dries out vaginal tissues.

■Sitz bath, finger bath, or douche with astringent herbs



Susun Weed's forthcoming book Down There: Sexual and Reproductive Health the Wise Woman Way is coming soon!!

To learn more about Susun Weed please visit http://www.susunweed.com/.

Please visit our bookstore: http://www.wisewomanbookshop.com/ for the entire Wise Woman Herbal series as well as a collection of other wonderful books, cd's, videos and much more.

Susun will be at the 19th Annual Women of Wisdom Conference.......

Susun will be at the 19th Annual Women of Wisdom Conference Feb 17-21, 2011. Please visit: http://ping.fm/4WpAt

Susun will be a guest speaker at The Institute of Holistic Midwifery.......

Susun will be a guest speaker at The Institute of Holistic Midwifery 12/7, for students only. For more info on IHM: http://ping.fm/18QW7

Did you miss Susun Weed on the Menopause Teleseminar last night.......

Did you miss Susun Weed on the Menopause Teleseminar last night? Susun's answers to your questions. Replay link here: http://ping.fm/gKbeq

Ovation for the Ovary CD from Susun Weed.....

Ovation for the Ovary CD from Susun Weed-cope with ovarian pain, cysts, PCOS, prevent ovarian cancer, keep our ovaries http://ping.fm/iUYZ5

Aspire Magazine-Inspiration for Women............

Aspire Magazine-Inspiration for Women. Dec/Jan issue now available. Filled with over 100 pages of inspiration! http://ping.fm/rkkRo

Tonight! 12/1 Susun answers your menopause questions......

Tonight! 12/1 Susun answers your Menopause questions via Teleseminar with Lela Bryan and Rosalyn Adams! 6:30pm Pacific http://ping.fm/agH2S

Wildcraft! An Herbal Adventure Game nearly 50% off......

Wildcraft! An Herbal Adventure Game nearly 50% off. Comes with Kids & Herbs course as well as other cool stuff. http://tinyurl.com/2bowcek

Susun Weed's Green Ally 3 CD Set........

Susun's Green Ally 3 CD set:a guide and a translator for you as you explore the magic of herbal medicine from the heart http://ping.fm/QVofD

On 12/1, Susun Will Answer Your Menopause Questions........

On 12/1- Susun will be available to answer your Menopause questions via Teleseminar with Lela Bryan and Rosalyn Adams!http://ping.fm/wHUj1

A Joyous Audio Love Letter Shared with Susun Weed.......

Here is a Joyous Audio Love Letter Shared With Susun Weed.http://ping.fm/5uBpg

Wildcraft! An Herbal Adventure Game nearly 50% off.......

Wildcraft! An Herbal Adventure Game nearly 50% off. Comes with Kids & Herbs course as well as other cool stuff. http://tinyurl.com/2bowcek

On 12/1- Susun will be available to answer your Menopause questions via Teleseminar with Lela Bryan and Rosalyn Adams.http://ping.fm/gjX7j

Wise Woman Ways to Help Ease Digestive Distress During Menopause........

Susun Weed shares from her book:  New Menopausal Years the Wise Woman Way.

copyright:Jeannine Chappell

Step 1: Collect Information

As the mix of hormones in your blood changes during your premenopausal years, you may notice the effects on your gastrointestinal tract both directly – estrogen is a gastrointestinal stimulant and varying levels may swing you from loose stools to dry ones – and indirectly, as the hormonal load places ever heavier demands on the liver.

Hormones have a strong effect on the motility of the intestinal tract. When your levels of estrogen and progesterone change (as they do throughout menopause, during pregnancy, and before menstruation and birth), your bowel patterns change, too.

Your liver is, among other things, a recycling center. It breaks down hormones circulating in the blood when they are no longer needed and makes their “parts” available for the production of more hormones. During the menopausal years some hormones (such as LH and FSH) are produced in such enormous quantities that your liver may struggle to keep up with its recycling work, and have little energy left over for digestive duties. Help yourself with these Wise Woman Ways.

Step 2: Engage the Energy

• Bless your food out loud before you eat; say grace; thank the plants and animals who nourish you; breathe in and feel grateful.

• My mother’s favorite way of preventing digestive distress and ensuring regularity is to eat at regular times and go to the toilet at regular times. You’d be surprised how effective this is.

• First thing in the morning, get yourself a cup of hot water (or herbal tea) and bring it back to bed. Sip it slowly, and gnaw gently on your bottom lip. Then lie on your back and bring your knees up, feet flat on the bed; place your palms on your belly and breathe deeply. Gently begin to rub your belly (in spirals): up on the right, across the middle, and down on the left. Soon you will feel the movement gathering momentum. Sit up slowly and head for the toilet.

Step 3: Nourish and Tonify

• Yellow dock root vinegar or tincture is a wonderful ally for menopausal women with digestive distress. Daily doses of 1 teaspoon/5 ml vinegar or 5-10 drops of tincture eliminate constipation, indigestion, and gas. Yellow dock is especially recommended for the woman whose menopausal menses are getting heavier.

• Dandelion is everyone’s favorite ally for a happy digestive system and a strong liver. It relieves indigestion, constipation, gas, even gallstone pain. How to use it? Have a glass of dandelion blossom wine. Eat the omega-3-rich leaves in salads. Enjoy the phytoestrogenic roots as a vinegar or tincture (a dose is 1-2 teaspoons/5-10 ml vinegar or 10-20 drops tincture taken with meals) or as a coffee substitute.

• Any rhythmical exercise, especially walking, relieves digestive gas and improves intestinal peristalsis (the movement of feces). Oriental wisdom says the liver loves movement.

• Motherwort, fenugreek, vitex, or black cohosh tinctures, taken daily, strengthen digestion and ease menopausal digestive woes. Or try a cup of garden sage tea.

• If constipation occurs due to a lessening of the moistening, lubricating cells in the colon, slippery foods such as slippery elm bark powder, oats, seaweed, flax seed, and seeds from wild Plantago (or cultivated psyllium) are wonderful allies. Adding a teaspoon/5 ml of any, or better yet, all of them to a cup/250 ml of rolled oats and cooking until thick in 3 cups/750 ml of water is a delicious way to prepare this remedy.

• My favorite remedy to relieve digestive and gas pain is plain yogurt. Sometimes even a tiny mouthful will bring instant relief. Acidophilus capsules work, too. I use both when dealing with chronic constipation or severe diarrhea.

Step 4: Stimulate/Sedate

• White flour products slow the digestive tract; so does too much grain-fed meat. Whole grain products, well-cooked beans, wild meats, and cooked greens speed it up.

• Add more liquids and soft foods to your diet – applesauce, yogurt, nourishing soups, herbal infusions – to help relieve constipation. Chew your food slowly and savor it. Drink lavishly between meals.

• Menopausal women will want to avoid the use of bran as a laxative, as it interferes with calcium absorption. Instead try prunes, prune juice, rhubarb with maple syrup, or figs.

• Ginger tea with honey is a warming, easing drink when your tummy is upset. Ahhh. Try the fresh root grated and steeped in boiling water, or put a tablespoon of the powdered stuff from your spice cupboard in a cup of hot water and enjoy.

• Crushed hemp seed (Cannabis sativa) tea – rich in essential fatty acids – is a specific against menopausal constipation.

• Herbal laxatives such as aloes, cascara sagrada, rhubarb root, and senna are addictive and destructive to normal peristalsis. Except in rare cases (such as relief of constipation for a ninety-year-old woman confined to a bed), I do not advise their use.

Step 5a: Use Supplements

• Constipation and digestive distress are common side effects from taking iron supplements. A spoonful of molasses with 10-25 drops of yellow dock root tincture in a glass of warm water is a better way to increase iron, and improve elimination.

Step 6: Break and Enter

• Enemas and colonics are last-resort techniques. They do not promote health and may strip the guts of important flora. Regular use of enemas is highly habit-forming. For the sake of your health, avoid them.



Paperback by Susun S. Weed. 304 pp.  The best book on menopause is now better. Herbal solutions for osteoporosis, hot flashes, mood swings, fatigue, flooding, fibroids, low libido, incontinence, anxiety, depression.

Completely revised with 100 new pages. All the remedies women know and trust plus hundreds of new ones. New sections on thyroid health, fibromyalgia, hairy problems, male menopause, and herbs for women taking hormones.

Recommended by Susan Love MD and Christiane Northrup MD.

The best book on menopause is now better. Completely revised with 100 new pages. All the remedies women know and trust plus hundreds of new ones. New sections on thyroid health, fibromyalgia, hairy problems, male menopause, and herbs for women taking hormones.

One of the world's best selling books on menopause still comes on strong. Called "indispensable," "incredible," and a "treasure trove of information," Menopausal Years is the "bible" for the 87% of American women over the age of fifty who want nothing to do with hormones.

Includes information and remedies for problems with premenopause -- flooding, erratic periods, fibroids, spotting, water retention, muscle soreness -- as well as menopause -- hot flashes, sleeplessness, mood swings, headaches, palpitations, anxiety, depression, fatigue, and much more. Final chapters speak to post-menopausal women's concerns: including ways to maintain heart health, prevent and reverse osteoporosis, deal with dry vaginal tissues and incontinence, ease aching joints, and maintain healthy libido.

The soothing, wise voice of Grandmother Growth guides each woman through the book and through her own menopause metamorphosis. Ritual interludes interweaves a spiritual dimension often lacking in other works.

Includes superb resource lists for menopause information, index, glossary, directions for using (and preparing) herbal medicines, complete descriptions of the most-used menopausal herbs (including nettles, ginseng, dong quai, red clover, oatstraw, and motherwort), recipes for heart- and bone-healthy dishes, and lots of illustrations. Also available: Menopause Metamorphosis Video starring Susun S. Weed.

Susun Weed interviews Lynda Yraceburu on Wise Woman Radio.......

Please join Susun as she interviews Lynda Yraceburu on Wise Woman Radio 11/28/10. http://ping.fm/xP2sO http://ping.fm/VrcrJ

Susun Weed interviews Lynda Yraceburu on Wise Woman Radio-11/28/10....

Please join Susun Weed as she interviews Lynda Yraceburu on Wise Woman Radio today-11/28/10.
http://ping.fm/ARDLb

The Healing Medicine of Trees....Part Three Focuses on Willow.....

WILLOW is also an ogam: Sail or Salle, meaning “the color of death.” (That is, the wood is white, like bones.) The early Americans carved willow trees on gravestones because the willow rises up from the earth, then bends her branches back down to it. Willow, like elder, symbolizes a gateway between the worlds.

 Everyone knows and loves the willow; it is a common tree throughout moist, temperate regions. The weeping willow comes to mind first for many people; pussy willow is rarely far behind.

            Probably every one of the 400 species of willow has been used as medicine. For example, herbalist Ellen Evert Hopman cites Daniel Moerman who recorded Native Americans using S. nigra  (black willow) as an anaphrodisiac; S. caprea  (goat willow) as a specific against whooping cough; S. amygdaloides (peachleaf willow) as a sacred herb in the sun dance ceremony; S. arbusculoides (littletree willow) as an Eskimo/Inuit wound healer and soother of sore eyes; S. fuscescens (Alaskan bog willow) as a cure for mouth sores and an analgesic; S. Babylonica (weeping willow) as we do and as a “wind” tonic; S. candida (silver willow) as a reliever of fainting and trembling; S. discolor (pussy willow) as a stomachic; S. fragilis (crack willow) as a styptic, S. cordata (heartleaf willow) as a way to increase appetite; and S. purpurea (purple osier), S. gooddingii, and  S. caroliniana (coastal willow) as an ally for rapidly cooling off the feverish.

Willow is anodyne, diaphoretic, digestive, sedative, astringent, tonic, and anti-rheumatic.

To the botanist, willow is Salix. The active compound is salicin. When extracted into vinegar (acetic acid), the compound acetisalicylic acid is formed. Thus, willow has long been used as a muscle relaxer, pain killer, inflammation cooler, and fever reducer. It is generally the inner bark of white willow (Salix alba) that is used medicinally, but I have it on good authority that the inner bark, the leaf buds, or even, in an emergency, the mature leaves, can be used successfully.

For ease of use, put up some willow in vinegar or one-hundred-proof vodka. A dose (the equivalent of two aspirin) is a tablespoonful of the vinegar or a dropperful of the tincture. If using the dried plant, steep four tablespoons of inner bark in a quart of cold water overnight, then bring the whole thing to a boil. Cool and take a cup at a time.     

Willow is one of the original Bach flower essences. He suggests using it when there is bitterness and resentment. Willow is and was the wood of choice for the Druids’ harps. Willow is said to “speak the truth.”

Willows always grow near water; so the sight of them signals water to the primitive parts of our brains. The wood of the weeping willow is so wet that, even when well dried, it hardly burns at all; rather it seeks up a choking and awful-smelling cloud of thick yellow smoke.

Did you know that willows are unisexual? Male trees have yellow staminate flowers. Female trees have seeds surrounded by light, fluffy, whitish down. The seeds blow about in the wind and collect along the roadsides in great numbers.

Willow is cultivated for use in making baskets and wicker furniture. In previous times, willow withies were used to create wattle walls, wattle fences, and coracle boats. Willow can be coppiced or pollarded to produce long, thin, straight rods that are flexible and easy to work with. An ancient Celtic house found in Ireland required five miles of willow rods in its construction. Willow is also used to make cricket bats and various useful hoops.

Willow produces a rooting hormone that allows it to root when merely stuck into the ground. Willow tea helps other plants form roots as well.

Willow is from the same root (wicce, to bend) as wicker and wicked and wicca. The early Greeks believed that nine wild orgiastic Muses lived in the willow tree. A willow wand is used magically for working moon charms and for casting spells to entice creative visions.

A Japanese folk tale tells of a man who so revered a willow tree that it became a real woman, whom he married and had a child by. When the villagers cut down the willow – ironically, to build a temple to Quan Yin – the wife dies. Trees are our natural places of worship.





Natural Remedies, Prevention and Help for Sore Nipples During Breastfeeding......

Sore nipples heal rapidly, often within a day or two, but it is still easier to prevent them than to heal them. Nipple sprays intended to prevent sore nipples have been shown to be ineffective, but the following Wise Woman remedies are safe and effective. Note: Persistently or suddenly sore nipples may indicate a thrush infection. Further symptoms of thrush include pink, flaky skin and itchy nipples.

PREVENTING SORE NIPPLES

• Continue to nurse. Neither sore nipples nor thrush are helped by discontinuing nursing; in fact, they may be remedied by more frequent nursing.
• Expose the nipples and breasts to the air as much as possible to discourage the growth of thrush. Avoid wearing a bra 24 hours a day. Wear nursing bras with the flaps down whenever possible.
• Expose the nipples and breasts to sunlight for brief periods to strengthen tissues. Increase gradually from thirty seconds in the sun to a maximum of three minutes.
• Olive oil, sweet almond oil, lanolin, or comfrey ointment rubbed into the nipples throughout the latter part of the pregnancy and the beginning weeks of nursing create healthy, flexible tissues very resistant to cracks, tears, and chapping.
• Experiment with different nursing positions until you find those in which you are completely comfortable, with the entire areola (dark area) in the baby’s mouth, nipple centered.
• Offer your breast often. Reducing the number of feedings can make the baby so hungry that it tears at the breast.
• Avoid soap, cologne, deodorant and powder on your nipples or breasts. Do not wash nipples with soap. Soap predisposes the nipples to chapping and cracking.

REMEDIES FOR SORE NIPPLES

• Crushed ice wrapped in a wet cloth, or a frozen gauze pad, applied to the nipples immediately before nursing is a good local pain killer. This cold treatment also helps bring out soft or small nipples and helps baby feed more easily when the breasts are very full.

• Comfrey ointment softens and strengthens nipples at the same time. It is exceptionally soothing to sensitive nipples and rapidly heals any fissures or bruises.

• Yarrow leaf poultices – or yarrow infused oil – provide almost instantaneous pain relief and heal cracked nipples rapidly.

• Any of the [below] poultices described for painful breasts may be used advantageously. Comfrey and marshmallow are especially effective. Many brief poultices work better than one or two lengthy sessions.

• Place a handful of fresh or dried parsley leaves in a clean cotton diaper and tie it closed with a rubber band. Put in a pan of water and simmer for 10 to 15 minutes. Apply the hot (fresh) parsley as a poultice or use the (dried) herb still tied in the diaper as a compress to ease swollen and painful breasts.
• Prepare fresh or dried comfrey leaves the same way as parsley. A hot compress or poultice of comfrey leaves soothes sore nipples, softens engorged tissues, reduces the pain of swollen breasts, and helps unblock tubes and ducts. It is generally considered safe to use comfrey root preparations externally, but nursing mothers may be understandably leery to use them for fear of injuring her infant’s liver.
• A cold poultice of grated raw potato can draw out the heat of inflammation, localize infection and unblock clogged tubes. Grated raw potato is applied directly to the breasts, and covered with a clean cloth. When dry, it is removed and replaced with fresh grated potato.
• Marshmallow roots make wonderful soaks that soothe tender tissues and sore nipples, open clogged ducts and tubes, powerfully draw out infection, and diminish the pain of engorged, inflamed breasts. Steep two ounces of dried marshmallow root overnight in half a gallon of water just off the boil. The texture of the finished brew should be slippery and slimy. Heat as needed, pouring the hot liquid into a sink or basin and soak your sore and aching breasts.
• Infused herbal oils—such as those made from the flowers of calendula, elder, or dandelion, or from the roots of yellow dock—can ease the pain of tender breasts and sore nipples. Buy them ready-made. Or make them yourself: Gently warm a handful of dried or fresh blossoms in just enough olive oil to cover; keep warm for 20 minutes. Strain, cool, and rub into nipples and breasts whenever there is pain or sensitivity.

• The gel from a fresh aloe vera leaf will soothe and heal sore and cracked nipples.
• Calendula ointment is an old favorite to heal and strengthen nipples. CAUTION: Ointments containing antibiotics, steroids and anesthetic (painkilling) drugs are potentially harmful to both mother and infant.

Wise Woman Herbal for the Childbearing Year -By Susun S. Weed

   

Now in its 24th printing. A confirmed favorite with pregnant women, midwives, childbirth educators, and new parents. Packed with clear, comforting, and superbly helpful information.

Beginning with the two months before pregnancy, herbs are enlisted to provide safe, effective birth control, or to help ensure pregnancy, even in the most difficult of situations. A special list of teratogens, including herbs to avoid before pregnancy, is included, as is a section on herbs to improve the father's fertility and reduce the risk of birth defects.

Once pregnancy has occurred, herbs are safe and beneficial allies in reducing the distress of pregnancy, including hemorrhoids, high blood pressure, morning sickness, emotional changes, anemia, muscle cramps, bladder infections, and preclampsia. Tasty recipes and clear directions make use easy and fun.

Herbs take a starring role in labor and delivery -- whether initiating labor, increasing energy, diminishing pain, or staunching postpartum bleeding -- and in postpartum care of the mother's perineum, breasts, and emotions, and the infants umbilicus, skin, scalp, digestive system, and immune system.

Humorous, tender, and detailed, this classic text is supported by illustrations, references, resource lists, glossary, and index.

Includes herbs for fertility and birth control. Foreword by Jeannine Parvati Baker.

Please join Susun on Metaphysically Speaking with Ladean. Friday 11/19/10 at 7pm EST.
http://ping.fm/MPOP8

Susun in Ashland OR. 2/24/11-2/26/11 Contact Candace Cave:541-324-6021 cancave@msn.com. Booksigning, Lecture, Workshop. http://ping.fm/pnkRp

On November 22, please join Susun Weed as she discusses the many uses of White Pine @Enchanted Forest.
http://ping.fm/TR3GH

Please join Susun Weed on November 21 for her interview with Mary Elizabeth Hoffman.
http://ping.fm/C4xCw

REFILL that part of yourself that gets POURED out in the DAILY GRIND. www.inspirationalcoffeebreaksforwomen.com
http://ping.fm/kcVhr

Natural Solutions for PMS by Herbalist Susun Weed........

Here are some natural solutions for common PMS symptoms.



Water retention, mood swings, sore breasts, and indigestion are problems experienced by many women in the week preceding menstruation. Here are a few tips from my book, NEW Menopausal Years the Wise Woman Way (Alternatives for Women 30-90) to help ease these discomforts.

To relieve water retention

1) 10-20 drops of dandelion root tincture in a cup of water with meals and before bed.

2) A strong infusion (one ounce of dried herb in a quart of boiling water, brewed overnight) of the common weed, stinging nettle, not only relieves, but also helps prevent further episodes of water retention. I drink a cup or more of this infusion daily whenever I want to nourish my kidneys and adrenals.

To moderate mood swings

3) Tincture of the flowering tops of fresh motherwort is one of my favorite calmatives. I use 5-10 drops in a small amount of water as a dose, which I repeat as needed, sometimes as frequently as 3-4 times an hour, until the desired effect is achieved. I never feel drugged or groggy or out-of-it when I use motherwort to help me calm down.

4) For women who consistently feel premenstrual rage, use 20-30 drops of motherwort tincture twice a day for a month to help stabilize mood swings. Make it a priority to take a moon day — one day right before or at the start of the menstrual flow which is set aside for you and you alone.

5) One or more cups of an infusion of the herb oatstraw (the grass of the plant that gives us oatmeal) helps the nerves calm down and provides a rich source of minerals known to soothe frazzeled emotions.

To relieve congestion and tenderness in the breasts

6) 20-30 drops of the tincture of cleavers, another common weed, works wonders. This plant, also called “goose grass” was used as a black tea substitute by the colonists. The dose may be repeated every hour or up to 6 times a day.

7) Women who get a lot of calcium and magnesium from their diet (leafy greens, yogurt, and many herbs are rich in these minerals) have less breast tenderness. Increase the minerals in your diet with a cup or more of red clover/mint infusion daily.

8) Large cabbage leaves, steamed whole until soft, and applied as warm as tolerable, can be used as a soothing compress on breasts which are sore and swollen.

To relieve digestive distress

9) A daily dose of 1 teaspoonful/5ml yellow dock root vinegar.

10) A cup of yogurt in the morning (buy it plain and add fruit at home) replaces gut flora and insures easy digestion all day long.

Power-by Krista Lynn Brown

Opportunity for Wise Woman Herbalist with Michael McCammon N.D........

Opportunity for Wise Woman Herbalist with Michael McCammon N.D. in Christchurch, NZ.
More info: http://ping.fm/FhId4

The Healing Medicine of Trees....Part Two Focuses on Elder.......

ELDER is the last letter of the ogam alphabet (Ruis). It rarely attains tree status where it grows in North America, but it has taken me by surprise several times in Europe by the height to which it can grow (up to ten meters) and the tough bark it is capable of making.

Around the world, elder is viewed as a tree that is so sacred  and awesome that it is to be feared. In the British Isles, anyone who cut down an elder tree, it was believed, would suffer at the hands of the woman who lives in the elder. She is known by many names, including Elda Mohr, Hylde Moer, Frau Ellhorn, and Frau Holle. And she is found in many stories from many lands.

She is a guardian of children and is willing to help anyone who asks her nicely. But she takes revenge if she is not honored or respected.

One year, when I had a job taking juvenile delinquents on weed walks, I took the girls to an elder bush and had them sit under it while I told them a story about Elda Mohr. The counselor told me that many of them went back, over and over again, to sit with the Elda and talk to her. They found a refuge in her branches and ease in her leaves. Yes, elder is indeed the guardian of all children.

Remedies made from elder flowers and elder berries (Sambucus nigra) are favorites for easing children’s fevers, colds, and flus. Elder flowers may be dried to make a tea, or tinctured fresh to bring down high fevers rapidly. Five to ten drop doses may be repeated every thirty minutes or as needed. Elder berries may be tinctured from fresh or dried berries, or turned into tasty syrups, jams, and jellies. Science confirms their flu-fighting abilities. Elder berries soothe sore throats, quell coughs, relieve asthma, ease bronchitis, and clear chest congestion. Fermented elder berries make a semi-permanent hair dye for those who prefer a their locks dark in color.

Fresh elder flowers may be fermented into champagne. (Recipe at my website; www.susunweed.com ) One book refers to this brew as “Liquid Light.” It relies on the natural yeast present on the flowers, which must be picked on a bright sunny day. Elder berry wine is justifiably famous; the color and taste are unlike anything I have ever drunk.

Ruis means “red in the face,” which some authors connect with shame and embarrassment, while others believe it refers to anger. I don’t agree with either of those views. I think it reminds us that elder is used to treat those who have red faces; in fact, I suspect it may be effective against the skin disease rosacea, which reddens the face and causes outbreaks of pustules.

The “pimples” on the bark are the “signature” to use it against pimples. Elder leaves are steeped into a tea that is used as a wash to clear the complexion of redness and outbreaks.

Elder leaf poultices are also used to ease sprains, bruises, and headaches. Fresh leaves are the best; I admit to never using elder this way as there as so many common poultice plants and elder, at least where I live, is rather uncommon – certainly not as near at hand as plantain or burdock leaf! An ointment of the bark is used to help heal ulcers, burns and abrasions.

Elder trees are said to be the home of fairies. If you sleep under an elder at the full moon, you may see the fairies. If the full moon is near the summer solstice, the fairies may invite you home to play with them. An elder wand is the best one to use if you must exorcise something or someone. An elder wand wards off evil so well, the drivers of the hearses used to carry whips fashioned of elder wood.

Elder is hollow, so it has been used to make functional pipes for transferring liquids as well as musical pipes for transferring emotions. An elder stake is said to outlast iron when put into the ground. Elder grows easily in the temperate regions; it likes cold winters. Plant one and you will enjoy her fragrant flowers, delicious berries, stately grace, and – who knows – you may even become a friend of the fairies.

Susun Weed Course being offered when you become a Pay It Forward Angel...

Join the @DrPatShow community and become a Pay It Forward Angel. Free Susun Weed Course at Wise Woman University for members who join.
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Susun will be in Ashland, Oregon February 24-26, 2011. Contact Candace Cave 541-324-6021 cancave@msn.com.

19th Annual Women of Wisdom Conference......

http://ping.fm/1HXaw



February 17 - 21, 2011
Held at North Seattle Community College

Susun Weed
Presents Baba Yaga's Bag, Friday, Feb. 18th, 7:00pm - 10pm

Saturday, Feb. 19th, 2011 10:00am - 4:30pm

Susun Weed Workshop for women
Sexual and Reproductive Health the Wise Woman Way

We all have a down there – sometimes it’s a pleasure; sometimes it’s a pain. Susun Weed has spent the past three years listening to those down there parts that please and pester us. In this intensive she will share the fruits of her research, with a special emphasis on the parts YOU are most interested in.

For more information go to

http://ping.fm/L4Ix3

http://ow.ly/i/5jF8

Join me in New York City this November 13 - 12-5pm



Susun Weed in NYC November 13, 2010 – day long workshop 12-5 pm

This event takes place at the Edgar Cayce Center NYC – learn more here



This fascinating and informative afternoon will provide you with the simple, safe tools you need to regain and maintain health with the least harm. The Seven Medicines -- Serenity Medicine, Story Medicine, Energy Medicine, Lifestyle Medicine, Herbal Medicine, Pharmaceutical Medicine, and Hi-Tech Medicine -- will show us the benefits of doing nothing, the best ways to collect information, how to dance in the shaman's playground, simple lifestyle choices that extend life, ways to discern the differences between nourishing, tonifying, and stimulating herbs, and the uses and problems of drugs, including supplements, and high-tech diagnosis. Your health, and your life, will never be the same.



This event takes place at the Edgar Cayce Center NYC – register here: http://ping.fm/67pY7

The Healing Medicine Of Trees....Part One Focuses On Birch Trees......

From Susun Weed-Herbalist



Trees are some of the most fascinating of all plants and of all herbal medicines. The lore surrounding any one type of tree – even some individual trees – is vast.

Consider doing a brief meditation with each tree, breathing with it, listening to it, and being open to the messages that it has to share with us. Every breath is a give away dance of joy.

BIRCH is the tree of beginnings. Birch (Beth) begins the ogam alphabet. Birch was the first tree to take hold in Europe as the glaciers retreated after the last ice age. Birch is one of the first trees to grow in disturbed soils. A birch tree in your dream is a strong indication that you are beginning a new aspect of your life, and that new spiritual understandings await you.

Birch is Betula to the botanist. In Sanskrit, it is burgha, meaning “that which is good to write upon.” The use of birch bark as a material to write upon is thought to predate paper, and even to be the model for papermaking. Magic spells are often written on a piece of birch bark.

Birch is the “way shower.”  Birch is safety and warmth in the cold. Birch is the sky ladder of the Siberian shaman. Birch is the cradle for the newborn. Birch twigs are used to whip the skin in Scandinavian saunas; a kind of rebirth. Birch twigs are used to light the sacred fires in Wales. Birch torches were used to “purify” the land, to expel “evil spirits” and maleficent fairies, and to “beat the boundaries” at winter solstice throughout old Europe.

Birch bark will burn whether wet or dry. This knowledge has saved my life at least once in high mountains when hypothermia threatened. Birch bark is antiseptic. Because it is pliable when fresh, it may be fashioned into containers which preserve food. Strangely enough, a simple birch bark cup can be use over an open fire to boil water without bursting into flames.

There are many Native American stories in which birch saves the. The European fairy tale we know as Cinderella is based on an older Russian story in which a woman becomes a birch tree in order to take care of her orphaned daughter. (Some versions say it was a beech tree. Walt But the original tale centered on the caring love of the birch. Disney left out the tree, alas.)

Notice that the wood of birch rots away quickly while the bark remains intact, often in one piece, for many years. Birch bark canoes are justly famous.

Birch leaves – collected in the spring only – can be used to make a tea which eases sore throats, bleeding gums, sores in the mouth, constipation, gout, rheumatism, kidney stones, and bladder problems. The tea has a slightly sedative effect and eases sore muscles, too.

Older birch leaves can be added to a hot bath or made into a strong brew and poured into the tub to heal moist, oozing skin conditions.

Recent studies have found an anticancer compound in birch sap: betulinic acid. Older herbals contain recipes for birch beer made by fermenting the sap; and for birch vinegar, also made by fermentation. I have never tapped a birch tree as they don’t heal easily and can bleed to death. The sweet birch that I use to demonstrate on in the spring often drips sap for several days after I break a small limb.

Sweet birch is my favorite of the birches. It smells of wintergreen and is used commercially to produce essential oil of wintergreen. A hot water infusion of the twigs gathered before they leaf out is all I use as a household cleanser. A handful of twigs in a quart jar may be rebrewed up to thirty times before they need to be replaced. This cleanser is safe for children to drink, but effectively loosens and removes grease and grime.

Birch wood is primarily used as a veneer. It is light in weight and light in color. It is favored in the manufacture of electric guitars.

Who can fail to be moved by the mystery of a white-barked birch shining under the light of the full moon on a snowy winter night?

Resources:

Celtic Tree Mysteries, Steve Blamires, Llewellyn, 1997.

Myths of the Sacred Tree, Moyra Caldecott, Destiny, 1993.

Sacred Tree Medicine, Ellen Evert Hopman, Destiny, 2008.

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