Herbal Asthma Tea

And I’m not talking about the herbal tea you generally find from Celestial Seasoning. I’m talking healing herbs. There were many comments and a few emails about my herbal asthma tea. I’m always hesitant to give out too much info here. To those that aren’t familiar with herbal therapies or don’t have a Naturopath, a little herbal info can be worse than no info. So what I’m saying is that if you are one of those and even if you are familiar – please don’t stop your meds and check to see if the herbs are a dangerous combination with the meds you take. Herbals are medicinal and can make other meds ineffective or dangerous. Just know what you put into your body. ok?

With all that, I’m going to give you a few recipes. If you are new I suggest you check out your local health food store. There are many medicinal teas out there that are just as good as stocking up on a bunch of herbs to make your own. That is if you’re new at this and don’t really want to play with herbs. I’ve only taken the respiratory ones when I’ve been out of herbs and waiting for a new order to come in. Yogi Tea makes “Breathe Easy” and Traditional Medicinals makes “Respiratory Health”. Both taste a bit better than the tea that I make and work just as well.

Asthma Tea
1 part of each in dried herb form – Chamomile flowers, Passionflower, and Echinacea Root
1/2 part each in dried herb form – Licorice root, Elecampane root, and lemon verbena leaves

If the herb is too big I crush it up a bit. I mix it all up in a jar and I make it fresh by the cup. Steep 1 large teaspoon of the mix in 1 cup of boiling water for 10 minutes.

Sometimes making a tea from one ingredient is helpful as well. Lemon Verbena is known for stopping wheezing. Making an infusion of equal parts of nettle and thyme work for some. Skull cap is another one that is good for respiratory health. And then some people find that just chamomile is enough to help.

Chamomile really is a wonderful herb. It’s a relaxant, anti-allergenic, antispasmodic and anti-inflammatory. Many people find that their asthma is triggered by stress as well as the usual triggers. As in, if you are stressed then your asthma will be worse than it normally is.

When I started down the path of treating my own asthma (I still have my rescue inhaler, I would be stupid to give that up) I started to read lots and lots. I wasn’t online then but I read all the articles I could find in magazines and in books. It’s the reason I first became a vegetarian. I was a strict ovo-vegetarian 12 years ago and it helped. It helped immensely. It really was the first step to becoming healthier. Since that time I’ve had times of eating meat and then back to being vegetarian. If I had to describe my diet these days I’d say it was Macrobiotic. No sugar, No dairy or eggs. The only meat I occasionally eat is fish.

I had sugar over the holidays. On slip and then one more and another….. Until I made myself sick. My digestive system is still feeling it. My poor stomach hates me these days but I’m treating it right. I suppose we need those times of eating bad to remind ourselves of why we eat the way we do. I’ll talk about other ailments and other reasons for dietary changes in another post. Really this could get very long but there has been interest in knowing about non western meds so I’m happy to share.

If you are really interested in learning more then I suggest you go out and get a GOOD book on herbs and healing. There are many good ones out there. I suggest you start with an encyclopedia – like “Encyclopedia of Herbal Medicine” by Andrew Chevalier.

Edit: I forgot to also add that Caffeine has an effect on asthma. In this case it’s a good effect. Though you have to take into consideration the rest of your body. If the rest of you is effected negatively by caffeine it’s probably not a good idea to start to ingest it for it’s effect on the asthma.  I also want to add thta eating Gralic is a good thing.  You might already like it, if  not you can take garlic tablets.  Garlic helps reduce chest infections but it’s also good for colds, flu, ear infections and reducing mucus. So eat more garlic.  I know I didn’t put everything down. Asthma really is a personal illness. What triggers my attacks may not trigger yours.  Once you really know what your triggers are, you can work towards lessening the effects or removign the triggers.

KNITTING:
I spent half the weekend daydreaming about new designs. Which isn’t all bad. I wrote out the skeleton design for 3 shawls and a vest. I need to make my way to the shop to card the fiber for one of the shawls. It’s the one I want to do the most even though I have the yarn on the wheel for one already. Since all of this is at the shop, I really have nothing to show you.

I did do one sock and am workign down the heel of the other. I can’t show you those either because they’re for a game that’s being put on by The Knitting Experience. I’m not playing the game so I volunteered to test out a pattern. If any of you that are playing the game are reading this, it’s a good one. I can see this is going to be a good game. I can’t wait to sit back and watch it happen.

And so I’m going to leave this post without photos. I hate to do that. No photos is always so boring. I promise to have some good spin ones next post.