That's the title of my new page. Old-Home-Remedies-Guide.com will now have pages of herbal remedies used by Native American tribes.
Since I'm from the Northeast, I started with native Northeastern tribes like the Algonquian, who populated New England and the maritime Canadian provinces. Tribes like the Penobscot, Montagnais and Mohegan, used single herbs to cure illnesses rather than herbal recipes.
Their understanding of herbs came from folklore. The use of muskrat root as a general health restorative was recommended to an Indian in a dream in which a muskrat appeared to him.
The early Native Americans also used the doctrine of similarities: if a plant resembled the condition you sought relief for, then you used that plant. For example, the ginseng root resembled the shape of a child, so it was used by women with fertility problems.
If you want to read more just visit my Native American Herbal Remedies page at
http://www.old-home-remedies-guide.com. This research is fascinating! I'll be posting more soon.
Sunday, March 1, 2009
Saturday, January 10, 2009
Feel A Cold Coming On? Roast A Lemon!
It's January and it's cold and damp outside! Perfect recipe for a cold. But I found a cool little home remedy for colds that people used to use years ago, and it's so easy.
Just get a lemon, set your oven on "bake," and bake the lemon for about 20 minutes or until the skin starts to crack. I don't know what degree to set the oven to because in the old days there were no ovens with temperature settings. So I'd try 350 degrees which sounds safe enough.
Then squeeze out all the lemon juice -- be careful handling the hot lemon -- and drink it. That's what they took to remedy the onset of a cold.
You could also squeeze some garlic and add the juice to the drink for a real strong anti-cold remedy. Your breath won't smell great but you'll have stopped a cold dead in its tracks.
Be back soon with more old home remedies. In the meantime I will be adding pages about folk medicine for colds and coughs to my website Old-Home-Remedies-Guide.com so please stop by for a visit!
Barb
Just get a lemon, set your oven on "bake," and bake the lemon for about 20 minutes or until the skin starts to crack. I don't know what degree to set the oven to because in the old days there were no ovens with temperature settings. So I'd try 350 degrees which sounds safe enough.
Then squeeze out all the lemon juice -- be careful handling the hot lemon -- and drink it. That's what they took to remedy the onset of a cold.
You could also squeeze some garlic and add the juice to the drink for a real strong anti-cold remedy. Your breath won't smell great but you'll have stopped a cold dead in its tracks.
Be back soon with more old home remedies. In the meantime I will be adding pages about folk medicine for colds and coughs to my website Old-Home-Remedies-Guide.com so please stop by for a visit!
Barb
Tuesday, November 11, 2008
Welcome to the Old Home Remedies Guide
I decided to create the Old Home Remedies Guide a few months ago after reading some old medical texts written by country doctors of the 1800s. I was impressed by their extensive knowledge of diet, foods, herbal remedies, healing plants, and simple natural folk cures.
My motivation for the Guide was provided by today's insipid and stupid TV commercials that praise the wonders of pharmaceuticals, while warning you how they may also cause nausea, tremors, blindness, diarrhea, fetal damage, double vision, depression, stomach pain, weakness, respiratory difficulty, rapid heartbeat, dry mouth, indigestion, and alas, thoughts of suicide! And these medicines are being prescribed by our doctors to help us?
As the old saying goes, with friends like that who needs enemies? I had to wonder just how did people manage years ago without such dubious and questionable gifts from our big drug companies?
Anyway, the point of the Old Home Remedies Guide is mainly to show people that natural alternatives existed before these poisonous drugs came along, and still exist. That is not to say that I recommend these specific remedies. Many herbs and natural preparations can be poisonous too and must be used with caution.
But I do feel it is worth searching for a natural herbal or folk remedy before we run out and invest hundreds of dollars on drugs that we will likely always need, because they do not remedy anything, they just mask it. And if that's all they do then we will just keep needing that mask, ensuring the drug companies' profits while we just linger on in the same way.
The Old Home Remedies Guide is also to honor nature and all the wonderful gifts of healing remedies that nature affords us -- if we just take the time and effort to investigate them.
If you want me to research a particular ailment and list the natural remedies just post to this blog and I will look it up and post what the old timers had to say.
Or, if you have a special home remedy of your own, post it here and I may add it to my website. Readers' contributions are appreciated and welcome!
Be back soon,
Barb
My motivation for the Guide was provided by today's insipid and stupid TV commercials that praise the wonders of pharmaceuticals, while warning you how they may also cause nausea, tremors, blindness, diarrhea, fetal damage, double vision, depression, stomach pain, weakness, respiratory difficulty, rapid heartbeat, dry mouth, indigestion, and alas, thoughts of suicide! And these medicines are being prescribed by our doctors to help us?
As the old saying goes, with friends like that who needs enemies? I had to wonder just how did people manage years ago without such dubious and questionable gifts from our big drug companies?
Anyway, the point of the Old Home Remedies Guide is mainly to show people that natural alternatives existed before these poisonous drugs came along, and still exist. That is not to say that I recommend these specific remedies. Many herbs and natural preparations can be poisonous too and must be used with caution.
But I do feel it is worth searching for a natural herbal or folk remedy before we run out and invest hundreds of dollars on drugs that we will likely always need, because they do not remedy anything, they just mask it. And if that's all they do then we will just keep needing that mask, ensuring the drug companies' profits while we just linger on in the same way.
The Old Home Remedies Guide is also to honor nature and all the wonderful gifts of healing remedies that nature affords us -- if we just take the time and effort to investigate them.
If you want me to research a particular ailment and list the natural remedies just post to this blog and I will look it up and post what the old timers had to say.
Or, if you have a special home remedy of your own, post it here and I may add it to my website. Readers' contributions are appreciated and welcome!
Be back soon,
Barb
Old Home Remedies Guide
Hi all. This is the inaugural blog for Old-Home-Remedies-Guide.com, dedicated to bringing you old home remedies and natural cures that the country doctors of centuries past used to recommend to their patients.
Old texts written by country doctors of the 1800s served as my references. The knowledge that these men had of all the herbs, natural compounds, plants, and folk medicines was impressive! In fact these doctors poo-pooed what were known as "patent" medicines, the foreunners for today's pharmaceuticals. The doctors were aware of the healing power of nature and how to use it on a very basic level. Many of them referred to patent medicines as "poison."
I just started Old-Home-Remedies-Guide.com a couple months ago and I have many many pages to add. Plus, I am adding a directory of all the names of the herbs and natural remedies so that you can see where they come from and what they are about. For example, "aconite" was a medicinal plant, but we rarely hear of it today. "Cubebs" is another natural remedy that was widely sold, but who knows what it is? I think the directory is important to understand more about these natural cures.
I find folk medicine interesting so this website has been a labor of love. If anybody wants me to look up a specific item or add a page on a specific ailment please post to this blog!
My website is http://www.old-home-remedies-guide.com.
Or, if you have a natural recipe to share, let me know!
Back later,
Barb
Old texts written by country doctors of the 1800s served as my references. The knowledge that these men had of all the herbs, natural compounds, plants, and folk medicines was impressive! In fact these doctors poo-pooed what were known as "patent" medicines, the foreunners for today's pharmaceuticals. The doctors were aware of the healing power of nature and how to use it on a very basic level. Many of them referred to patent medicines as "poison."
I just started Old-Home-Remedies-Guide.com a couple months ago and I have many many pages to add. Plus, I am adding a directory of all the names of the herbs and natural remedies so that you can see where they come from and what they are about. For example, "aconite" was a medicinal plant, but we rarely hear of it today. "Cubebs" is another natural remedy that was widely sold, but who knows what it is? I think the directory is important to understand more about these natural cures.
I find folk medicine interesting so this website has been a labor of love. If anybody wants me to look up a specific item or add a page on a specific ailment please post to this blog!
My website is http://www.old-home-remedies-guide.com.
Or, if you have a natural recipe to share, let me know!
Back later,
Barb
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