Mad as a wet hen

Mass production of remedies is antithetical to natural medicine just like mass production of food is antithetical to, well, food.

Do I even have to write the rest of this post? Have I not made my point?

Is it not the height of irony - or perhaps the term is lipservice, or even hypocrisy - that those in the throes of all natural this or organic that or "Paleo" (hahaha) still take nutritional supplements in capsules? While I agree wholeheartedly that it is, in fact, difficult to attain all the nutrients one needs from today's depleted foodstuffs, it's not impossible. Maybe these people could just fucking try harder.

And what of their medicines?



Let's face it, it is the so-called "educated" who turn to "natural medicine", yet do they educate themselves as to what is actually in those extracts and capsules? Do they know the source? Do they know, really, whether, say, berberine is appropriate in the dosage they're taking? Or even appropriate for their symptoms?

No, they don't. (And berberine is rarely the answer anyway, fer fuck's sake.) Whether it be through intellectual laziness or an implicit trust in Big Herb (oh, the irony), the supposedly educated consumer of natural medicine knows less about what they're putting in their bodies with these shot-in-the-dark choices than they do about the apps on their latest smartphone.

It's maddening to me. So much so that I'm more inclined to warn people off herbal medicine than encourage its use. So much so that I've been contemplating changing the name of this blog to "the angry herbalist".

If you can cook, you can make your own safe (far safer than commercially sourced), effective (far more effective than commercially sourced) remedies for just about anything that ails you. If it's serious, see a doctor! Yes, a doctor, not a freaking "Naturopath" who is only going to give you some tinkered with version of an herb that's so far removed from the time tested traditional form as to make it downright dangerous. Not to mention that diagnosis isn't the strong point of your average freaking Naturopath.

If you can't cook, learn. Healthy food will do you far more good than crap food plus crappy supplements.

If the herbal remedy you're taking is making you feel worse, stop taking it. It's either the wrong remedy for you or mislabeled or you're reacting to the filler - did you know wheat is a common adulterant in herbal capsules?

Yeah. It's a mess out there.

Or, you know, go ahead, trust the profit driven big herbal companies to supply you with safe, effective products. After all, you can trust the industrial farming industry, the industrial pharmaceutical industry and Big Oil, too, right?

Right.

At some point, I'll get back to writing about those safe, effective remedies you can make at home. But for now, and perhaps the next few posts, I have some vitriol that's been building up thanks to having "checked in" to see what's going on in the world of commercial herbalism. In some ways, I know I shouldn't and don't even need to keep my finger on that particularly repulsive pulse. But lots of my readers come to me from that world. In order to have a conversation about this I sort of have to know what kind of poison is coursing through their veins, disrupting their organ systems and the mindset that sent them to that particularly bad neighbourhood in the first place.

And I'm so goddamned tired of the blind, sheep like attitude that so often seems to be behind such bad, bad choices so many people make that I just need to get it out of my system.

And make it very clear where I'm coming from.

Because if learning to use medicinal plants - safely, effectively - is anything, it's an act of courage and responsibility. It's life and health enhancing at every level; physical, psychological and intellectual. Take this path only if you're prepared to work. And learn. And have fun, too. You have to learn a bit of botany. You have to go outside. You have to learn to use your senses. And you have to learn to listen to your body. If that's you, then great. If not, then, well .. you're reading the wrong damn blog.