Category: Health

How Comfrey Was Used To Heal Bones

The Miracle Herb:   Comfrey, Knitbone, or Boneset: Silica and  Allantoin are the magic ingredients. Symphytum officinale, or Comfrey, is known by the common names:  knitbone, boneset, consolida, nipbone, bruisewort, church bells, and suckers, and allheal.  One of its more uncommon names is Abraham Isaac and Jacob:  This refers to the changing colours of Comfrey’s flowers, which resemble  ‘Church bells’.

Comfrey is a wonderful healer of wounds, and burns. I have used it with great success on burns.  For the healing of bones, I have no experience,  but Comfrey was used as a bone-healer in times long gone, and there is much to support this in the writings of the old herbalists such as Culpepper.

Comfrey Nutrients:  Apart from its healing components, Silica and Allantoin, Comfrey supplies potassium, iron, B12 and Calcium, which make it a wonderful tonic tea.

Comfrey Fertilizer: Comfrey is not just a great soothing tonic for people, it also a tonic for the garden, as it is rich in nitrogen and phosphates:  By soaking the leaves in water for several weeks, a nutrient-rich liquid fertilizer is obtained which you can dilute and spray over your vegetable and flower garden.  It is good to see Comfrey, which is banned,  included in Brenda Little’s list of important garden herbs in her book “Companion Planting in New Zealand”.  This fine little book is  illustrated by Ken Gilroy and published by New Holland, Auckland, New Zealand, 2000.

When Brenda’s book was published in 2000, Comfrey was already banned.  It was banned so that the drug companies could benefit through our being deprived of Comfrey.  I believe we should all campaign to defy this ruling, and get Comfrey back into our gardens.  It is too valuable as a home remedy, and as a garden nutrient, to be manipulated by the drug companies decision, banned and forgotten.

Comfrey’s common names  ‘Knitbone’ and ‘Boneset’ give an indication of Comfrey’s merits as a bone healer. The Way To Use Comfrey For Bone Breakage is to be found in the book ‘The Illustrated Plant Lore:  A unique pot-pourri of history, folklore and practical advice’, Guild Publishing, London, 1985.

The author is Josephine Addison, and it is illustrated by Rosemary Wise with a forward by David Bellamy, the famous naturalist  and wild-life campaigner.

Was  Comfrey  Used To Heal Bones and Breakages? :  Here is what Josephine has to say about the way Comfrey was used  for bone breakages, strains, swellings and bruises:

The method was to pound up a good amount of comfrey root to a pulp.  The macerated pulp was then squeezed of its juice, and this juice was applied directly to the affected skin or bone area.  For a breakage, the mashed pulp was put into a piece of linen cloth which was wrapped about the breakage.  The limb was then put into a splint to stop movement of the limb so that the bone could heal.

The mucilage in Comfrey,  is rich in Silica and Allantoin.  Both these compounds are great healers:  Allantoin is a powerful  cell proliferant, and Silica helps in the healing of tissues by hardening and helping to draw all the other necessary elements in for the healing.

Impotency Best Herbs and Homeopathy

Impotency Treatment with Natural Remedies

Russell Setright recommends the herbs sarsaparilla, ginseng, and serenoa for treating impotency.  He claims, in his book “Get Well”, published in 1990 by Atrand PTY Ltd, Crow’s Nest Australia, that these three herbs are useful for increasing vitality in men over the age of 40, and that they have also been effective in treating non-malignant prostrate enlargement.

Ginseng Aids Reproduction: This herbal medicine is reputed to promote the growth of the testes, as well as increase sexual vitality.   Rabbits have shown an increase in sperm count after having been given ginseng -at a guess,  probably over a period of three months.

Apparently, studies by Professor Lakhovsky on the herb ginseng have shown that ginseng emits a type of ultra-violet radiation which is similar to one emitted by humans.  In combination with other treatments, I would think that this might make Ginseng a useful herb for treating prostate cancer.  This ultra-violet light could  even substitute, or enhance,  the treatment usually given with X-rays.   Of course, if you have prostate cancer, then you will need to do some serious  research into the best methods of treatment.  But keep Ginseng on your list.

Impotency is occurring more often these days because of toxic chemicals which get into the body tissues.  Plastic is one of the worst foreign materials which plays havoc with our hormones, causing many problems such as  infertility, impotency, and cancer.  So get onto a cleansing diet.

Easy Cleanse Diet: Several days eating only fresh fruits and vegetables is a great and easy way to cleanse out those toxins.

Lemon And Honey Detox: Use lots of hot lemon drinks and honey while you are doing this easy cleansing diet. If you are working hard physically and feel that you need more protein, then a couple of raw egg yolks will provide you with the protein, but aid the cleansing process at the same time.

Builders and Impotency: If you, say, work on a building site, then you should make up a gallon of lemon drink before work, with half a dozen good sized lemons, and a cupful of honey.  If you keep sipping at this throughout the day, you will not flag and lose energy.  Three days of this, with raw fruit and two egg yolks per day, should suffice as a cleanse for most healthy people.  If you work on a building site, then you should do this cleanse at least one day a week, because building materials these days are quite toxic, unless you are using untreated timbers.  Handling these toxic timbers means that you will absorb many of these toxins through the skin.  They get deposited all around the body, mainly in the liver, and in the sperm.  So, you see, your sperm gets affected very easily by these chemicals.

Agricultural Chemicals Can Cause Cancer and Impotency. Toxic chemicals such as those found in  herbicides and pesticides  find their way into the sperm very easily, as well as the liver. Having these toxic chemicals around your vital organs is just no good at all.    So if you work in agriculture and have been using these toxic chemicals, you also need to do regular cleansing.  And try to talk your farmer, or manager, into using bio-dynamic methods, which include homeopathic treatments for the soil, instead of those very toxic and dangerous herbicides and pesticides.

Mechanics and Impotency: Mechanics are quite likely to have sperm ruined by chemicals from engine oil, brake fluid, and petrol.  As said earlier, all these harmful poisons get deposited in the liver, and, in men, in the sperm.  This puts YOU at greater risk of getting cancer of the testicles, and of the prostate, and probably the bowel.  It also means that your partner, if you work in any of these industries which use harmful chemicals, will have a high risk of getting diseases such as cancer of the cervix.  This is because the affected sperm is passed on to the female.

Other Industries With High Use Of Toxic Material: Painters of houses, of boats, and painters of pictures.  Boatbuilders are at risk of absorbing many chemicals and succumbing to cancer, if not impotency.  Boat building paints and glues are incredibly toxic.  To give an example of how toxic these chemicals are, here is a true story:  The wife of a boat-building friend came to me once in the night to get a homeopathic remedy for her husband who was in a bad state.  I went with her up the road to visit him.  I could smell and taste the apoxy resin right away.  He was foaming at the mouth.  She wanted to try a homeopathic remedy before taking him to the hospital.

Before I left the house, I used my pendulum over my remedies. One came up very strongly, Hammamelis, which I knew was good for liver collapse.  I gave this man the remedy:  One dose stopped the foaming at the mouth, and reduced the delirium.  I left the remedy with the wife, but I don’t think that there was a need for another dose that night.

This man would have needed serious cleansing, though. His was a case of toxic poisoning from  apoxy resin, which was exuding from every fibre of his being.   I advised  him, again,  to leave his boat-building job where he was spraying apoxy resin paints about all day.  He had looked yellow and jaundiced for quite some time, and I had mentioned to him earlier that this job was undermining his health severely.  They left the street soon after, and so I do not know whether he did change his job or not.

Some Homeopathic Remedies which may be of assistance in cases of Impotency:  Agnus Castus, Calcarea carb., Cinchona, Conium, Digitalis, Dioscorea, Gelsemium, Graphites,  Lycopodium, Nux. vom., Phosphoric acid, Sarsaparilla, Selenium, Staphisagria, Sulphur and Zincum.Of course, you only use one remedy at a time, and unless you know your remedies, and have a knowledge of Homeopathy, then this list will be meaningless.  The list is designed to give an indication of the homeopathic remedies which could very well cure you of your condition.   

The cleansing remedies such as Sulphur could be good if you have been working in a toxic environment. These would help to cleanse your body of poisons, and the sperm too.  Of course, to get the best results, you should go to see a Classical Homeopath, or an Ayurvedic Practitioner.

Can Homeopathy Help Pre-Menstrual Tension?

Homeopathy:  Alternative to Prescription Medicine and Other Drugs.

Homeopathy does not work for everybody: Your Pre-Menstrual Tension might not be helped by Homeopathy if you have had a life-time of taking prescription medicines such as vaccinations, anti-biotics, paracetamol and other analgesics.  The use of such medications and other drugs, such as tobacco, alcohol and marijuana, might have caused  your system to  have become de-sensitized to Homeopathic Remedies.  But for many people, Homeopathy provides a safe, natural,  and non-addictive substitute for many prescription medicines.  And the beauty of homeopathy is that once you get improvement, you generally stop taking the remedy, which means that there is not an on-going dependence on Homeopathy, which there often is on prescription medicines.

The other marvellous thing about Homeopathy is that if you strike on the right remedy to help your complaint, all your other associated, and perhaps unassociated, health complaints generally get fixed up at the same time. (I like this old spelling of marvellous – it is only recently that dictionaries dictated that it should be spelled with only one ‘l’)

So – Here are some Homeopathic Remedies to help prevent Pre-Menstrual Tension. These are just a few of the possible natural homeopathic remedies which might help PMT.  There are literally hundreds, if not thousands of Homeopathic Remedies.  I will list just several of the more well-known remedies which you might like to experiment with.

It is recommended that you see a Homeopathic practitioner, or an Ayurvedic practitioner, if your condition is serious.  However, for the people whose symptoms are uncomfortable more than terribly distressing, experimenting with one or two Homeopathic Remedies   might be very helpful in reducing your  symptoms of Pre-Menstrual Tension –  PMT.

Aconite: This remedy is famous for the SUDDEN onset of symptoms.  If your headache has come on quickly, and feels worse for moving, then Aconite might be good.  It can be useful for people whose periods are scanty or late.  It often goes with a distended stomach and fluid retention.  If you get stomach troubles before the period, or any kind of gastro-intestinal disturbance, then Aconite could help.  With Aconite, there is often restlessness, especially at night, and pain which is worse in the evening or at night.  The person does not like the painful part, usually the stomach, or back, to be touched.  Often sneezing goes with the Aconite patient.

There is a remedy called ABC, which is a mixture of Aconite, Belladonna, and Chamomilla which you could try.  These remedies are known to complement each other, and are useful for treating many common conditions, including some cases of  Pre-Menstrual Tension.  Homeopathic Remedies which complement Aconite are Coffea and Sulphur.  Sulphur is often used as a folllow-up remedy to Aconite, to finish off the process of healing.

Other common remedies which are sometimes used for PMT are: Coffea, Chamomilla, Bryonia,  Nat. Mur,  Pulsatilla and Sepia…

to be continued…….

Natural Remedies To Help Pre Menstrual Tension

Herbs, Homeopathy and Vitamins  For PMT

Pre-Menstrual Tension: Many women suffer from pre-menstrual tension.  According to Russell Setright, who wrote the “Get Well” book in 1990, 70% of women experience the symptoms which are related to pre-menstrual tension.

What Are The Symptoms of Pre Menstrual Tension? The typical symptoms are headache or migraine, mood swings,  anxiety, depression and fatigue.  Other  symptoms which you might experience before the period are: painful and swollen breasts, pain in the stomach, water retention, and cystitis.

Rule Number One: To prevent PMT, or pre-menstrual tension,  make your diet more alkaline.  This means eating more fresh vegetables and fruit, brown rice instead of bread, and eating less of wheat products, sugar and dairy foods.  Celery and alalfa and mung bean sprouts should form part of your daily diet, as these things are very alkaline.   Often, a gluten-free diet helps people with PMT.  Many people are sensitive to gluten in wheat flour and other products, and they do not realize it.  So experiment – do without bread, cake and pastries for a week, and avoid all products which may contain gluten and preservatives or chemicals of any kind.  This just could do the trick.

Supplements To Help Pre Menstrual Tension: For the emotional and mental symptoms, Vitamin B is helpful, especially B6 and B12. Another very helpful supplement is Evening Primrose Oil, which is  useful in calming the nerves, giving a good night’s sleep,  and in counteracting depression.  Evening Primrose Oil has been scientifically proven to alleviate the symptoms of Pre-Menstrual Tension.

Dandelion:  Blood Purifier and  Diuretic Herb: Most herbs  which encourage urine flow are useful in counteracting pre menstrual tension.  This is because toxins are expelled from the body through the urine.  Dandelion helps to remove  toxins, as well as excess water from your system:  If you get swollen legs, or swollen fingers, or a distended stomach before your period, then dandelion can help to reduce this fluid.  Dandelion is a great blood-purifier, which also has a beneficial effect on the liver:  It helps the liver to de-toxify, and  can help prevent gall-stones.  It is rich in many vitamins and minerals.   Dandelion is the herb which is most used in PMT.  Drink dandelion root coffee instead of that real coffee to help PMT.

Alfalfa Tea:  Alfalfa is a great detoxifier of the blood.  It is also highly alkaline which is healthful for the body.  A body which is too acidic can result in pre-menstrual tension.  You can drink up to five or six cups per day.  To make alfalfa tea, simply put a teaspoon of alfalfa seeds into a large cup, and pour on boiling water.  Let cool, to warm, then drink.  You can use the ‘grounds’ for a top-up before taking fresh seeds for another cup.  Again – drink less coffee, and more of the herbal teas such  alfalfa and dandelion root coffee to help pre menstrual tension.

Liquorice, or Licorice, is recommended by Russell Setright:  His dosage is 500mg per day, taken 5 days before the period. Liquorice can help soothe the nerves and detoxify the liver and intestines. However, in my experience,, while I just love liquorice, it has a tendency to lower the blood pressure.  If you are like me, and you have LOW blood pressure anyway, then too much liquorice will further lower your blood pressure, and this can make you feel terrible, and your depression worse.  So go easy on the Liquorice.

It is best to begin taking your supplements seven days prior to the period:  These will help stabilize your system, and aid it in its  natural production of  hormones.  Aldosterone is a hormone which is is linked to the menstrual cycle, and this is secreted seven days prior to the period.

It is best to avoid drinking coffee for AT LEAST  three days prior to the period.  Coffee depletes Vitamin B and other nutrients from the body, so it is good to limit your coffee drinking while you are suffering PMT.

Toxins in the body and the blood are usually the reasons that people get PMT.  Some chemicals which are used as preservatives, and herbicides and pesticides – even plastics – get into our blood-streams and cause havoc with our hormones. It is helpful to many sufferers  of PMT to fast on just fruit and vegetables for three days prior to the period.  This helps to reduce toxins in the body:  Being free of these toxins can have a remarkable effect in the curing of  pre menstrual tension.

Homeopathic Remedies which might be useful for pre-mensrual tension are:  Aconite, Bryonia, Chamomilla, Coffea, Nat. mur, Pulsatilla,  Sepia.  Of course, unless you know your remedies well, you should seek some advice from a health professional who understands Homeopathy.

I would recommend Homeopathic Remedy Coffea if you are especially irritable and cannot sleep, or if  you drink too much coffee.  In Homeopathy, the remedy Coffea comes from Coffee, but it actually has the opposite effect to coffee, in that it is a mild sedative.  Homeopathic Coffea can be helpful in reducing the desire to drink coffee.

One Homeopathic remedy which I have found to be useful in helping to dry up excess fluid in the body is Homeopathic Bryonia.  This can help depression and morbid thoughts too.  It is a useful remedy to have in the house for chest infections and phlegmatic illnesses, as it dries up fluid.   Worth a try if you think this might be suitable for you:  I would take the Bryonia a week before the period is due, and take it for only three days, three doses per day of just a few drops.  If you should feel worse, then stop taking the Bryonia.

Pulsatilla is a good one for PMT if you are excessively weepy and sad.  Again, I would take this about a week before the period, but you could try taking it as soon as you have the pre-menstrual symptoms.

Different remedies work for different people:  The professional Homeopath will take all your symptoms, and consider all sorts of things about you, your day, and your life before deciding on a remedy.  But there are some fairly standard remedies for some conditions which will generally work for most people.

Comfrey The ‘Miracle’ Healing Herb/Why Was It Banned?

Comfrey The Forgotten Herb

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Just why has Comfrey, Symphytum officinale, become a forgotten herb?  Its value as a healing medicine has been recorded over a long period of time.  It has a long arm of proven efficacy as a healer of burns, a soother of the digestive tract, a strengthener of the teeth,  a healer of broken bones, and is a great tonic for falling hair and brittle nails.  And this is why Comfrey was known as The ‘Miracle’ herb.

Comfrey is high in Silica, which is a healing component.  Another aid to healing in Comfrey is the component Allantoin, which is a cell-proliferant. A cell-proliferant encourages the cells of the body to grow again:  bone growth, skin repair, and hair and nail growth are all affected beneficially by the Allantoin in  Comfrey, as well as its abundant silica.   And Comfrey has Mucilage, a slimy material which helps healing.   This means that Comfrey, with its Allantoin and Silica, and Mucilage, and Vitamins, is truly a ‘Miracle Herb’.   Comfrey can heal just about anything.

Well – I will explain why Comfrey has become a forgotten herb:  The reason is because  Comfrey was such a valuable household remedy, it often took away the need to visit the doctor and get a prescription medicine.  Which meant that both doctor and drug company were deprived of quite a lot of money, if you consider how many people were using home remedies, such as comfrey, during the 1980’s and 1990’s.

‘Research’ into Comfrey was, I think, manipulated by the drug companies to achieve a specific result, one which would convince the public that Comfrey should indeed be banned.

The article which I read in New Zealand, which was published just before comfrey was banned pretty much all over the western world,  said that ‘Studies had shown that there was a relationship between Comfrey and Cancer”, because PIGS which had been fed Comfrey for three months had developed cancer.  The article did not say just how many pigs had developed cancer, and nor did it tell us what other food, if any, the pigs were fed.  I suspect that the pigs were given naught else to eat except Comfrey.

And the result of this mind-boggling manipulation of facts and figures has resulted in the drug companies gaining complete control over the healing substances in Comfrey, the main one being Allantoin.

It is illegal in New Zealand to grow Comfrey in your garden.  You cannot buy fresh Comfrey anywhere, and I think that even the herbal comfrey pills have been taken off the market.

Making it illegal to have Comfrey in your garden, because ‘research’ has shown Comfrey may cause cancer, is just ridiculous.  The only people to benefit from this ruling is the drug companies who use comfrey components in medicines and cosmetics, and who will now have increased sales of other prescription medicines because we, the public, do not have access to Comfrey.

Comfrey can be used internally and externally. It can be taken internally as a tea.  Comfrey can be used externally on skin and bones. Comfrey aids the healing of burns.  Comfrey poultices would have been useful for people who had suffered radiation burns at Fukushima.  Comfrey was often known as ‘Knit-bone’, because of its ability to mend broken bones very quickly.  It is good for all kinds of skin troubles such as eczema and psoriasis, and ulcers on the legs.   Comfrey is good for the digestion and intestines, and has been used in cases of  Ulcers, Colitis, and Irritable bowel syndrome.  Comfrey has been used to treat people with cancer, in combination with other remedies.

Comfrey needs to be brought back into household herbal medicine.  This will benefit people, rather than harm them.  Of course Comfrey could be problematic if you were to have too much of it.  But you can die if you eat too many carrots, too, and whoever would want to do that?

Comfrey never caused cancer in people, because we never had a steady diet of it for three months, as the pigs did.  Comfrey has been banned for well over a decade now, but cancer is on the increase.  Cancer statistics really have nothing to do with Comfrey.

Postscript 2 April 2013 – Well, someone commented a few months ago that they had seen comfrey for sale in NZ this season.  Then, just a couple of weeks ago, I spotted two lone little comfrey plants in our local plant store.  I bought one, and a friend bought the other. I don’t know what is happening here – have our laws prohibiting the growing of comfrey been relaxed?  Or have people simply forgotten that it was put on the ‘banned’ list?  Either way, it is a good thing that comfrey is about again.

Shop-Bought Comfrey Is Ruined Medicinally, And Is Inedible