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A natural remedy for asthma

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Contributed by: Kate Jones on 7/29/2008

Well, it's been an interesting beginning to summer around here -- I got a kitten, added a whole raft of new products, survived a minor medical emergency with the kitten, did a four-day camping show...with the kitten...

That latter was possibly insane, but he was a very good and well-behaved kitten so it went pretty well. And camping kept me outside long enough to make a few useful discoveries:

My new Ease the Burn Sunburn Spray works really well (which I discovered because I forgot my sunscreen).

Kittens like to play in the mornings (and when you can't just pitch them out of the bedroom because you're sharing a small tent, it gets exciting).

Plants grow outside.

And from that last, rather pedestrian observation comes a tale.

--

See, I have asthma. In fact I have relatively exciting asthma, which requires me to take expensive medication morning and night. Those of you who work for yourselves will realize that expensive is best avoided.

Last week I got the advice that mullein (you might know it as lamb's ear) makes a lovely asthma remedy. As I was camping in the center of mullein country I thought I'd give it a try.

The first step was picking a whole lot of mullein. As advised I kept away from the stuff growing too near the road, so this involved a bit of walking. I chose healthy plants and only took a few leaves from each -- only one if it was small. And likewise I only chose whole leaves without evidence of bug or other damage.

I still wound up with a whole bunch in short order. And then, I packed up my kitten and drove home.

There are many ways to prepare fresh leaves gathered in this manner. I could have dried them for tea. I could have eaten them fresh though they're, alas, not tasty. I could have put them into a light oil, brought it barely to a simmer, and let the oil cool in preparation to make a chest rub. The recommended method and the one I settled on, however, was to soak them in apple cider vinegar for at least six weeks, producing what's called a tincture.

I've made tinctures before, usually in alcohol. Alas, they've all tasted so bad that I wound up pitching the results. I hope that the apple cider vinegar will produce better results.

In any case, having driven home with my ill-gotten gains, I washed them all carefully, tossing a few that had damage I'd missed the first time. I let most of the water drain off of them, packed them into a jar, and covered them in about half a gallon of apple cider vinegar. And there they sit, safely in a closet. for the next six weeks until it's done.

In the meantime, I do have some dried mullein around -- so I've been drinking a tea of it, morning and night. After two weeks of this my inhaler use is halved -- success! I anticipate that the tincture, once it's finished, will be even more effective.

As always, be careful with using any herb in this manner. Check for allergies for you start using a lot of it, and check to make sure it won't interact badly with any illnesses you have or any medications you're on.

But if you've got asthma, you might just want to give this one a try.

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Kate Jones

Longmont , CO

Kate Jones has posted 3 stories and 0 comments since joining on 7/24/2008. Kate Jones 's average story rating is 0.

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