Secrets for the Natural Removal of Head Lice
To Juice or Not to Juice
Quote of the Week
A Sustainable Source of Omega 3
Do Medications Help or Harm
Why Not Artificial Flavours
Last week, we covered the homoeopathic way of treating someone with worms, so this week it seems appropriate to talk about treating someone with head lice, another common parasite, especially in school children.
Staphysagria is made from the delphinium staphysagria or stavesacre. This is a member of the ranunculaceae family. Aconite also belongs to this family.
This is a huge remedy for treating chronic conditions, as well as the acute conditions that these eletters cover. So please don’t be offended if you have been prescribed this remedy and feel a bit indignant about the reference to your head’s hygiene.
Not only is this a great remedy for making conditions for head lice unfavourable, it’s also a great remedy for those who get a strong reaction to mozzy bites, or who seem to be quite a fan of mozzies - you may get bitten more often or in more places than those around you.
It can also be a great remedy for styes or lumps on your eyelids.
As with all plant based remedies, you tend to be highly sensitive - sensitive to mozzy bites, sensitive to the criticism of others, sensitive to all sorts of physical and emotional upsets. But those needing Staphysagria are probably the most sensitive.
If you’ve had a catheter while being in hospital, you may find that the sphincter doesn’t return back to normal and you may have problems from that - leaking urine, stool, etc. This is a wonderful remedy for fixing this. It’s been an invasion and your body tells you it doesn’t like being invaded, having its sphincters stretched.
It’s another great remedy for wounds where there had been lacerations (mangled, torn). This could be where Arnica doesn’t finish off the healing. There are others, too.
Women frequently get cystitis after their first sexual encounter and this remedy is great for sorting this out.
Its just such a wonderfully diverse remedy.
There can be a craving for tobacco, so this remedy is often used when someone wants to give up smoking.
An oddity about this remedy is, if you have an itch, scratching it will change its location.
The keynotes of Staphysagria are:
- head lice
- mossy bites
- styes, lumps on eyelids
- ailments after catheterisation
- lacerated wounds
- cystitis after first sexual encounter
- craves tobacco
- scratching changes location of itch
Definitely a remedy to take on holiday with you.
What I always find so fascinating about the homoeopathic approach to things is that the aim is not to kill, to poison, to fight, to eradicate.
The medical approach to head lice is to kill them, to do battle with them and everything else.
The homoeopathic approach is to make the conditions unfavourable. This means that the host isn’t harmed in the process, or the environment. The lice have a place in nature, just preferably not on your head, please.
The rhythm of homoeopathy is so gentle, yet so powerful.
Life isn’t a battle. Life is an evolutionary process and each “unfavourable” condition or illness (dis-ease) gives you the opportunity to grow, to expand, to move forward, to find ease.
Whether you choose to take that offered opportunity or not is up to you.
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To Juice or Not to Juice
Juicing fresh fruit and veggies has become very popular, but is it as good as it’s made out to be?
Well, in my opinion, it depends on your starting point.
The thing about eating is that saliva is the first part in the digestion process, so if you chew on something it will be better digested than if you drink it. Especially if you chew it well, so producing lots of saliva.
Another thing about chewing is that it puts pressure on your teeth and gums. Without this constant pressure, your teeth tend to become loose in your gums. So chewing is good for keeping your teeth secure and the harder the food the better, such as crispy apples or raw carrots.
When you bite into something hard, you’re massaging your gums - another bonus of food over drink.
And the final thing about eating whole fruit or veggies is that you’ll getting all the pulp that is normally strained out. Pulp may not only contain nutrients the juice may not, but also provides addition fibre - great for your bowel movements.
So if you naturally eat lots of fresh, raw fruit and veggies and juicing is an extra, then that’s a positive step. You’re just adding more.
If juicing is the only way you will consume your fresh, raw fruit and veggies, then that’s also a positive move. At least you’re getting it.
If however, by juicing you cut down your natural consumption of the whole food, that’s a backward step.
Forget bottled juice, unless it’s super fresh and will only last a day. As soon as food is juiced it starts to lose nutrients. It’s much better to do it yourself as and when required and takes so little time. Bottled juice has been heat treated to preserve it and heat destroys valuable nutrients.
I don’t think I need to mention cordial or soft drinks here - they’re off my radar screen, being firmly rooted in my list of ‘unhealthy foods’, being full of artificial flavours, colours, sweeteners, preservatives and god knows what else.
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Quote of the Week
People are beginning to see that the first requisite to success in life is to be a good animal.
--Herbert Spencer
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Omega 3 is an essential fatty acid that you need but can’t manufacture. Common supplements for this is fish oil, but with our oceans being overfished and stocks depleting, maybe its time to look around for a sustainable source.
Rosehip seed oil is the best vegetable source of omega 3 and a good source of omega 6.
The breakdown is:
13 – 19 % Oleic Acid (Omega 9)
48% Linoleic Acid (Omega 6)
25 - 35% Alpha Linoleic Acid (Omega 3)
Rosehip Seed Oil which is used commercially is produced in Chile. It is extracted from seeds of a rosebush which grows wild in the southern Andes. It is the only vegetable oil which contains natural Retinol acid (A-Vitamin acid) - 125mcg per every 100g.
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The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) in the US, reported that drug overdoses killed 33,000 people in 2005, second only to car accidents in the category of accidental deaths. In 1999, the number was 20,000, and in 1990, 10,000 died.
As this excellent commentary in Better Body Journal points out, the huge increase in people dying is not because of a heroin or crack epidemic. These deaths are largely due to prescription drugs.
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Why not Artificial Flavors
from http://www.thepeopleschemist.com
Two professors at Purdue University have discovered that when you're eating, artificial sweeteners block the feeling that you're getting full. In other words, they disarm your body's first defence against obesity.
Their results, published in the International Journal of Obesity, showed that "mouth feel" plays a crucial role in the body's ability to sense the number of calories that are being consumed - and that artificial sweeteners disrupt the natural calorie "count" based on sweetness.
