Manuka
Prunes - Are three enough? Are six too many?
Onions boiled in milk. For colds.
Grandma Anderson swore by it. Kinda faded from the family pharmacopeia after she passed.
Stupid list:
Ginger
BenGay
Prunes
Pepto-Bismol
Salt-water gargle
Excedrin
Petroleum jelly
Adhesive bandages
Ice
I had a knee replacement last April. Sometimes the post surgical pain was so much that my pain meds wouldn’t touch it. I found that Aspercreme rubbed on the scar worked better than the narcotics they were giving me at rehab.
Wet tobacco slapped on bee/wasp stings takes the pain out and neutralizes the poison. I keep a can of Skoal in our First Aid kit.
Handed down in our family from our Cherokee Great Grandmother.
I remember my Day telling me they used kerosene on scrapes and cuts when he was a kid.
Gave some to my parents and it worked for them.
MythBusters checked it out and confirmed it works for seasickness.
Pepto Bismol
It’s like a miracle drug for anything stomach related, I was shocked when I got married and my wife and never used it and still resists using it for some unknown reason.
Beer.
My family didn’t do the salt water gargle, but Mom would take 4 or 5 Bayer Aspirins, dissolve them in warm water and make us gargle. When gargling, we would let a little bit of the warm water trickle down our throats. Good temporary relief for sire throats.
These days with the coatings and what not, I don’t know if you can dissolve aspirin in water.
Got a sore throat? I will swear by gargling a cup of warm water mixed with with a 1/4 cup of apple cider vinegar. Two gargle sessions and gone. Much more effective than salt water.
Don’t forget peppermint sticks for an upset stomach.
Pharmacists used to stock them for children as a belly ache and nausea relief. They didn’t get associated with Christmas until someone red striped them and sold them as Christmas candy.
To help with sex,put petroleum jelly on the doorknob leading into your bedroom. Keeps the kids out when you are fooling around
Many Physicians are still “Practicing” medicine.
I avoid doctors at almost all costs.
The flu ? A double shot of Nyquil, lots of water and sweat it out.
Toothache ? A series of warm saltwater rinses.
If you have an “infection” as the result of a cut, you can put the skin of a raw egg on it, it will literally pull the infection out. The skin is between the egg itself and the shell.
Nose Bleed ? Fold a small piece of paper to about the dimensions of the “striking portion” of a book of matches. Place this as far as you can under your upper lip. There is a pressure point there that will stop a nose bleed.
Sinus problems ? Lay flat on your back. Relax. There are a number of pressure points on your face that when pressed will relive your discomfort. You will likely have to experiment here. Place constant pressure to the bridge of your nose to relive nasal congestion.Some people will actually feel their sinuses draining. There are additional pressure points under your eyes and along your eyebrows.
I was hit twice, many years ago, with something called SVT,Supraventricular tachycardia, I drove myself to the emergency room on both occasions. I learned a few techniques that I may have been able to use for future reference. One, is to “crunch down” your muscles like your tying to go number two. The other is to put your face in a bowl of ice water. I also learned that most EMT’s carry an injection of Adenosine, which works in an instant.
I’m sure there are more conditions in which I have a solution for. But I’m only 50 years old.
When I was 21 I had a sore throat that was so painful it hurt to breath and was a pure nightmare when I swallowed. In desperation I gargled with Bacardi 151. Worked like magic.
Back in the 1800s a person could self label himself “doctor” if he had a copy of the book on Thompsonian Medicine.
I have such a great great uncle. Went by the name Dr. Priddy Meeks. During his lifetime, he migrated from Charleston SC, through Kentucky, to southern Indiana, Illinois, westward as a Mormon through Iowa, to Utah. Then to southern Utah.
While in southern Indiana he witness his father killed and brother injured by Indians.
Throughout he treated people using herbs.
His lifetime was described in a journal transcribed late in life to his daughter. The non-Mormon aspects of the book are fascinating, as they describe life during those times, in those places.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samuel_Thomson
Gargling a tall glass of salty, warm water has long been known as one of the best oral and sinus therapies out there.
Likewise, a mix of salt and powdered baking soda as toothpaste, alternatively with tartar control toothpaste, kills off the five kinds of spirochete bacteria common in the mouth. There are suspicions that these spirochetes may use gum disease as a conduit to the brain and may be implicated with Alzheimer’s disease.
“Because they feel similar when applied to human skin, there is a common misconception that petroleum jelly and glycerine are physically similar. While petroleum jelly is a non-polar hydrocarbon hydrophobic (water-repelling) and insoluble in water, glycerol (not a hydrocarbon but an alcohol) is the opposite: it is so strongly hydrophilic (water-attracting) that by continuously absorbing moisture from the air it produces the feeling of wetness on the skin, similar to the greasiness produced by petroleum jelly.”
I mention this because both petroleum jelly and glycerine have lots of traditional uses, and are important parts of a well stocked medicine cabinet.
bfl
Great info