Herbal Medicine for Preppers: Centaury

[00:00:00] Hey y'all, welcome to this week's show. Alright, so we're gonna get into a really interesting herb this week. I'm gonna just go ahead and tell you right up front, I cannot pronounce this thing. This is like the one herb that is like the worst tongue twister for me. Alright, so it is spelled C-E-N-T-A-U-R-Y. It's pronounced something like Centauri.

[00:00:31] Okay, I can't, it always comes out like Centauri for me. I mean, you know, if I say the word Centauri, just understand, I mean the plant Centauri. Let's just go with that, okay?

[00:00:52] I mean, I've been doing this for years and I've tried like a thousand times to pronounce the name of this herb. I never, if I get it right one time, I can't repeat it. I mean, it's just ridiculous.

[00:01:06] Yeah, so anyway, the Latin for me is actually a little bit easier. And it's Centaurium Erythriae. C-E-N-T-A-U-R-I-U-M. Centaurium E-R-Y-T-H-A-R. I mean, T-H-A-E-A. Okay, so let's see if I can get that again. Centaurium Erythriae.

[00:01:32] Centaurium Erythriae. Now that, to me, actually is far more easy to pronounce. So this is like the one case where the Latin is easier than the English. So anyway, that's the herb we're talking about. It's been used, gosh, it's been used for thousands of years in European medicine.

[00:01:53] Really, not much used by American herbalists, which is kind of weird. Most American herbal books, websites, videos, wherever you would go. So, I mean, the class I took for my herbalist certification, you know, I've actually taken a lot of them. I have like, I don't even remember it last count. I've got like 27 certifications. But one of the biggest ones, which is why I felt comfortable calling myself a master herbalist.

[00:02:23] I really could have done it before then because I've been a practicing herbalist for many years, having been an apprentice starting at the age of 15. It was 270 hours, okay? 270 hours. That's more time than you spend in college to get a degree.

[00:02:42] Yeah. So, I mean, just remember, when you listen to my show, when you listen to my podcast, you're getting huge amounts of information made practical and simple in small bite-sized bits. That's what I try to do. I want nobody in their right mind spends 270 hours studying herbal medicine, okay, in a classroom setting. And that was just one certification.

[00:03:09] But you realize in that entire time, we never mentioned this plant. Never once was it brought up. It's really, I would say, the second most bitter herb in European herbal medicine. It's second only to gentian. And it was actually once quite popular.

[00:03:37] I mean, if you ever watched, like, on PBS or something, or BBC, if you get BBC, you know, it depends on where you live. You might have watched Poirot. Poirot was, you know, Agatha Christie's detective. Love those mysteries. Yeah, I love a good mystery, and Poirot is one of my favorites. Very, you know, how would I put it? I am not obsessive-compulsive in the least. I'm actually pretty messy.

[00:04:05] But there are certain, you know, detectives that I kind of identify with because they're kind of quirky in the way their brains work. Poirot would be one of those, without a doubt. Yeah. And Poirot was pretty cool. He was a little Belgian guy, and he always would order tisane. Now, tisane is an ancient herbal tea recipe. It probably began just as barley water.

[00:04:30] If you go back and read Hippocrates from ancient Greece, his tisanes were nothing more than barley water. The water in which barley had been soaked. Warmed up, you drink it. By, I don't even know, 1500s, it became to be an herbal tea that usually included linden flowers and centauri, however you pronounce that. Or jinshin or something like that.

[00:04:56] And, you know, eventually it began being called tisane. Sometimes it's spelled with a P in front of it, a silent P. I don't like silent Ps. But that's where we get the word tea from. We actually get the word tea from tisane, not from, you know, black tea that we make iced tea with in the south. Or, you know, you drink as your Earl Grey in the morning or something like that. So, just an aside.

[00:05:25] But this was really once one of the most essential herbs. And it's like now nobody talks about it, which is just weird. The Diaschorides, going again back to ancient Greece, actually compares this herb, Sintuari, to Hypericum, the St. John's wort. We recently talked about that. And Oregonum, which is oregano.

[00:05:51] So, kind of interesting that he compared it to those two herbs. He said that in appearance it was a little like rue. The seed looked like a wheat seed. You know, when we look at herbal medicine, we start looking like what plant kind of resembles, tastes like another. And we start to, we can almost like figure out its uses before, you know, we really even studied them. What does this herb taste like? Is it bitter?

[00:06:20] Well, if it's bitter, it's probably going to be good for digestion. It's probably going to be good for the liver. You know, we can go through that. It may help break a fever. Is it yellow? Well, if it's yellow, it's certainly going to be good for the liver. Every yellow herb is good for the liver. That's called the doctrine of signatures. And it's a bigger topic than I want to get into today.

[00:06:41] But when you meet someone who's an herbalist, and they seem to have like an intuitive knowledge of herbs, it's not some magic thing. Okay. It's really just learning the patterns in plants so that we can identify their uses. And when, you know, Europeans and Brits and such came to America, that's what they did. They got here. They started finding plants that kind of resembled the plants at home.

[00:07:10] At some point, they started interacting with Native Americans. The Cherokee especially gave early America a lot of its herbal knowledge. But a lot of it had to do with like, you know, you're coming over from England and you're familiar with feverfew. And you get here and there's a plant. And now, what that? That almost looks like feverfew. Well, it's bone set. Well, it kind of does the same thing. And, you know, sometimes the plants are related.

[00:07:39] I think one of those is an epilobium. The other's not. I mean, sometimes they're related and sometimes they're not. Sometimes it can be like a Joe Pieweed. Joe Pieweed kind of looks like those plants, but the flowers are a very different color. Somehow, when you learn the uses of plants, you start to pick up on these patterns. The best book on that is Botany of the Day by Thomas Elpel. It's all about plant identification.

[00:08:08] The position of leaves, the shapes of leaves, the shape of the stem, etc., etc., right? That visual identification of plants is 99% of the time, and I do have a couple of exceptions, going to give you insight in the use of other plants. Other plants that may not even have documented use in herbal medicine. You know, I've talked about that before.

[00:08:35] I've found a few plants that really don't have documented use in herbal medicine that I find very useful. Very useful. Coleus. Coleus is one. Coleus is one. But the exception would be, I guess I would say, in the umbilifera type plants in the, oh, I can't remember the Latin name for it. Umbilifera or, mmm.

[00:09:02] Anyway, it's the same family as carrots and parsley and all that, right? Right on the tip of my tongue. It's not coming to me. Anyway, the two very, very poisonous plants, the two of the most poisonous plants known to man, poison hemlock and water hemlock, or there's another name for it, water, anyway. They can look very much like other plants in the same family.

[00:09:31] Poison hemlock especially can look exactly like wild carrot or the carrot you grow in your garden. Okay? You can differentiate it. You can learn. You have to learn. One has a hairy stem. One does not. One has a little purple flower in the middle of that umbil. One does not. Okay?

[00:09:52] But nine times out of ten, or I'd even say 99 times out of 100, recognizing the characteristics of a plant will give you a clue to its use. Um, that, like I said, it's called the doctrine of signatures. Herbalists have used it for thousands of years. Some people say it's superstition or folklore. You know, it's really not. Uh, you can actually look at a plant once you've studied herbal medicine enough and know its use.

[00:10:22] Even if you can't identify the plant. Now, I'm saying that with that huge grain of caution. That big old, you know, uh, whatever you want to call it. Uh, every now and then there's something that's really poisonous that can look a lot like another plant. So you can't always go by that. But, yeah, 90% of the time at least you really can. Um, a grape is a grape.

[00:10:48] Um, a cruciferous vegetable, um, like a broccoli or collard greens or mustard is a cruciferous vegetable. Um, a lettuce is a lettuce. A mint is a mint. Now, some mints are stronger than others. That would be another one where I put a little bit of caution. But unless you're making essential oil of a mint, they're usually pretty darn safe. Uh, basil's a mint, believe it or not. You know, um, mints are, mints are so common.

[00:11:19] Um, anyway, let's get back to this one. D.S. Cordy said, the, um, pounded, a plant pounded while green and applied seals wounds, purges old ulcers, and brings them to a scar. Good one to have around. Good plant to have around. Boiled and swallowed down. Love the way they used to say things.

[00:11:44] It expels the bile and the thick fluids through the bowels. So the coction of it, uh, can be used as suppository for sciatica. No, okay. Suppository for sciatica. I have sciatica. Uh, I'm not big on suppositories. Never tried it. Can't tell you one way or the other. Um, don't really like sticking anything up my butt. But if you do, hey, go for it. Uh, good for drawing out old blood and easing pain.

[00:12:11] The juice is good for eye medicines with honey. Cleaning away things that darken the pupils. Now that is a pretty cool use, okay. That's, they're really talking about, um, cataracts. If there's an herb that could prevent cataracts, so you don't have to have cataract surgery. Uh, you know, the same thing's been said about violet and roses. Uh, that's worth looking into. Um, I don't have cataracts.

[00:12:40] Uh, probably won't for another 30 years. Uh, maybe I'll give it a shot then. But, you know, go for it. If you have good results, if you have bad results, let me know. Um, anyway, uh, a pessary extracts the menstrual flow. That's, hmm, how can I put this and be tasteful? A suppository going in another place. That's, that's what a pessary is. Yeah, that'll work.

[00:13:08] Um, it taken as a drink is equally good for disorders of the strength. The herb juiced first gathered and when full of seed and steeped in water for five days and after boiled until it floats up with the water. Um, oh, good for a lot of stuff, actually. Uh, and he goes on, you can mix it with honey. You can, uh, store it in an unglazed ceramic jar.

[00:13:34] That would be pretty, uh, interesting because, uh, in an unglazed jar, the water's gonna evaporate off so it would actually concentrate it. Uh, that's a, that's actually a really good herbal preparation. I haven't really thought about that before. But, uh, yeah, that's, um, it's like a decoction without having to cook it. Um, anyway, he said, um, wow. Uh, good for inflammations, bruises, helps women troubled with pregnancy, eases the pain

[00:14:03] of slow, painful urination. So, um, it's diuretic and such. Gather, uh, the herb in the spring at sunrise. Interesting. I don't know. Oh, well, more than likely the reason you would gather at sunrise is before the heat of the day, um, the volatile oils could, uh, be evaporated by the sun. So, yeah, I mean, it sounds like, you know, old fashioned, but it kind of makes sense. Right.

[00:14:28] Um, let's see, let's get into, uh, we'll go forward like a thousand years. We'll get to 1080 and St. Hildegard von Bingen. Uh, she wrote of the herb, gives very similar uses, but also you included cornflower or bachelor's button in, in centuar, whatever word is.

[00:14:56] Um, so I'm going to skip it because I can't be sure which plant is which and, uh, cornflower can have a little toxicity. So we'll just go up to about 1850. Father Nape, also in the German tradition, um, gave a German word for the plant, which is even harder to pronounce. It's Tossenguldenkraut. Call it Tossenguldenkraut. Wow.

[00:15:26] Um, he said that means thousand florin herb. I don't even know what a florin is. So anyway, he says how curiously certain herbs have been Christian by our ancestors. I agree. And Father Nape was, he was a pretty cool guy. He had a great sense of humor. Uh, but he said our little flower must have occupied a high social position in the herbal world of those bygone days. He was cool.

[00:15:53] Uh, anyway, he said it tastes bitter and employed as a tea. It resolves the stomach of superfluous winds and gases. In other words, it gets rid of burping and indigestion and flatulence. It restores the digestive saps. In other words, it increases the stomach acids and the bile and acts upon the liver and kidneys. It is the best remedy for heartburn. Suffers from derangement of circulation may seek counsel and help from the herb.

[00:16:21] I've never actually sought counsel from an herb, but I think I know what he means. And his counterpart in Switzerland was Father Kunzel. Um, also hilarious, um, feisty, um, pug, pugnastic, I think is the right word. That man would fight anybody. And, uh, he was a good herbalist. And he's the one that went to court and made herbal medicine legal in, um, what was about

[00:16:47] to become the Nazi state and where they were outlawing a lot of stuff. He went and fought them head to head. And he was, he was, he was, he was something. He really was, um, Father Kunzel. Um, I think it was a Johann Kunzel. Man, um, you know, I, I was very pleased to do the only current English translation of his book,

[00:17:12] Herbs and Weeds, which, uh, I think he called Herbs Kraut, which may be what, you know, Father Nape was talking about, it was like Kraut and Alkraut or something. I don't know. I don't speak German, but I had a, a, a Austrian coauthor who did. And I'm telling you that little dude, he probably wasn't more than five feet tall, bald with a long, uh, gray, white beard. And he gave him hell. I mean, he went up against the medical establishment.

[00:17:41] He accused him of everything from atheism to thievery. I mean, he was, man, he was something. Uh, I would have loved to have a beer with either of those priests. They were both really, uh, solid, funny, intelligent, and good herbalists. But anyway, Father Kunzel said internally one uses the tea for croup, um, sore throat, bladder ailments, light diarrhea, sleepless, sleeplessness.

[00:18:11] But for the internal use, one should always add the same amount of juniper berries. Uh, take a half cup three times a day. So juniper berries mixed with this centuari, um, makes a good, completely harmless drink for sleep. Take about a half an hour for going to bed and works best for reflux, acid reflux, heartburn. Um, getting up to the English tradition, but going back in time a bit, we're at 1500s.

[00:18:39] Um, Gerard said that it was good for them that be bursting. So internal bleeding is what that means. Those that split blood, spit blood, good against the cramp and shrinking of the sinews and the shortness of wind or difficulty breathing, the cough and gripings of the belly. There was not any part of the herb, but it rather worketh miracles. Okay. Uh, he said the entire, okay. So he's saying, I'm going to put this in plain English.

[00:19:09] The entire herb could be poulticed for, uh, any kind of wound or cut. Uh, he said it joineth together the lips of simple wounds of the flesh. Um, and a lot of stuff I can't really understand, but it closed wounds. In other words, it has an astringency. It would pull together its issues. The root of this plant is a rub remedy for ruptures, convulsions, and cramps, um, for fever, uh, taken in wine.

[00:19:37] Uh, he, he mentions Galen and we don't have a lot of Galen's writings. Apparently there were still around in 1500s. He said, Galen saith that the juice of the leaves thereof performeth those things that the root doth, which is also used in a kind of hard juice or sharp paste. Whew. Um, in other words, the whole plant's useful, the leaves as well as the root,

[00:20:06] and it can be dried and turned into a resin, essentially. Uh, getting out now, let's get up to modern use. 1930s, Maude Greaves said, oh boy, she gets into the history like crazy. And there is a lot of history of this herb. It's amazing we stopped using it mostly. Um, wow. She goes back to 1619 and, I mean, old herbals. Uh, also said it was, um, Macer was an herbalist.

[00:20:36] Uh, of the, gosh, I don't even know. Maybe 1100, 1200 AD. He said it was powerful against wicked spirits. No. Um, hopefully none of us encounter wicked spirits. Uh, if we do, hey, keep that herb around. I don't know if it's going to do you any good or not. But, uh, you know, this is ancient England. This is Anglo-Saxon.

[00:21:02] I mean, spirits is, no, wicked is spelled W-Y-K-K-E-D. And spirits is S-P-R-Y-T-I-S. That's how old that is. That's, that's going back to, you know, before like Robin Hood and such, you know. Uh, so, anyway, um, cold peppermint is good for dropsy. And, um, the green sickness, which is apparently, um, oh, what do you call it? Anemia?

[00:21:32] You know how, uh, in anemia, a woman's bleeding too much. She can get a green tint to her skin. Uh, so that's good. Also would kill intestinal worms. So, um, but she said, let's see, um, oh, she mentions that ancient Anglo-Saxons thought it was good for snake bites. Uh, yeah. Um, but she said it was particularly good for, uh, jaundice combined with barberry, Oregon grape, which we have talked about before.

[00:22:01] And of course it would be, uh, very good for the liver and would just, uh, get rid of worms and, and other parasites. Now, modern use, Plants for Future says, since, since, since, since, this herb is one of the most bitter, no, one of the most useful bitter herbs. Centuari strengthens digestive function, especially within the stomach, increasing stomach secretions.

[00:22:30] It hastens the breakdown of food. It also stimulates the appetite and increases bile production. The plant needs to be taken over a number of weeks and an infusion, a tea should be slowly sipped so that the components, the bitterness, uh, can stimulate the reflex activity through the upper digestive tract. The whole herb is an appetizer, aromatic and bitter. I mean, it stimulates appetite. That's all it means. You don't eat it like a snack before a meal.

[00:23:00] It just stimulates appetite. Aromatic, bitter, coliogic, diaphoretic, digestive, anematic, weekly feb refusion, hepatic, and hepatic. Big words. Uh, what do they mean? Um, can get rid of gas. Uh, can help break a fever. Helps digestion. Taking in large amounts can make you throw up. Um, good for the liver, good for the stomach, and good for digestion again.

[00:23:26] It acts on the liver and kidneys, purifies the blood, and is an excellent tonic for the digestive system. Externally, the fresh green herb is said to be a good application of wounds and sores. It is often used in combination with other herbs such as chamomile, meadow sweet, and marshmallow. The whole plant is harvested. That's not the marshmallow. It's the little white things in the store. It's the actual plant that's kind of like okra and has pretty flowers like hibiscus and rose of Sharon and all that.

[00:23:54] The whole plant is harvested while in flower and can be dried for later use. There's a bock or botch flower remedy. People say it both ways. Um, that actually is prescribed to people who are weak-willed or too easily influenced. Don't ask me. The bock or botch flower remedies, um, they're unique.

[00:24:18] They tend to be more prescribed for emotional issues than physical ailments, and frankly, I don't give a crap about most people's emotions, you know. Anyway, it's used to treat the liver and gallbladder ailments. And according to several sources, although centuari, I think is how you pronounce that, is not native to North America, it has been naturalized in several areas.

[00:24:46] So, you know, it's kind of growing like a weed in some places now, and a whole lot of people just get all upset. They're like, you know, we gotta have native plants, native only. Well, you know, native to when? When did this plant get here? Did it come over before the Asians crossed the Bering Straits and started becoming Native Americans? I mean, when were they native to here?

[00:25:14] They're not indigenous, nor are people of Irish descent, such as myself. We all got here at some point. And so did plants. So, native to when? Sorry, you know. I don't call one plant a weed and something else an indigenous plant, because nothing's indigenous to anything. It all came here at some point. And plants are going to fight it out the same way as people will, and eventually people and

[00:25:40] plants establish themselves in a spot. And, you know, who the hell are you to say this doesn't belong here? I mean, you're going to say this plant doesn't belong here? You're going to say this person doesn't belong here? You know, you're not God. Get over yourself. But anyway, probably the biggest example of that, of course, was kudzu, the vine that ate the South. And it was introduced originally as an ornamental.

[00:26:11] And then a guy from Georgia, Atlanta area, a little bit outside Atlanta, Channing Cope. I believe he actually went to the University of Georgia. He's a real hero of mine. He was sort of a father of permaculture. Big, you know, heavyset Southern man, drank a lot and told stories and was really funny and had a weekly column in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. He was on the radio for a time, probably WSB out of Atlanta. I mean, you know, this is classic.

[00:26:40] If you're Southern, this stuff matters, right? So Channing Cope found this ornamental vine that someone else had introduced to the United States from Asia, kudzu. And he realized that it was the very best feed for livestock. It is the most nutritious of all plants for livestock. It is a vine that grows big flowers that kind of tastes like spinach and have about half as

[00:27:10] much protein as meat. Yeah, there's actually protein in there. At that point in time, farming in the Southern United States, they hadn't been using crop rotation. Things were really bad. There was erosion. The South was about to become a dust bowl like the Midwest in, you know, like Grapes of Wrath or something.

[00:27:35] Literally, whereas the wind was blowing away all the topsoil in the West, the water, the rain was washing away all the topsoil in the South. Our soil, we were about to starve to death. And Channing Cope said, you know, if you plant kudzu, it's a leguminous plant. It's self-fertile. It will enrich your soils. It helps other crops. And it will hold the soil in place so it doesn't wash away. And cattle can graze on it. And he came up with this book. He called it The Front Porch Farmer.

[00:28:05] And he proposed a system of growing kudzu with grazing animals. That makes total sense. You plant kudzu, it grows. It will grow up to a yard a day in the summer. I mean, it is just ridiculous how productive this plant is. It's incredibly healthful. It's incredibly nutritious. It has great use in herbal medicine. It can actually be used as a fiber in place of cotton or linen, flax for linen, you know. But something has to eat it.

[00:28:35] So he proposed planting kudzu and having cattle. The cattle would eat the kudzu. And he called it The Front Porch Farmer because you could plant some kudzu, get a few calves, put them out on the pasture. And in a few years, you'd probably be a millionaire looking at a huge herd of cattle. And you don't have to buy hay for them. And they're going to grow and get really strong and healthy on that really nutritious kudzu, right? He was freaking brilliant.

[00:29:04] I mean, honestly, Channing Cope was super intelligent in this regard. But then the government comes along. And you remember what Ronald Reagan always said about the government. Scariest words in the English language are we're from the government and we're here to help. They decided to help with soil erosion in the south. And they took Channing Cope's idea of planting kudzu to help prevent erosion and then to grow cattle on it.

[00:29:34] To, you know, range cattle, whatever everyone put it. And they said, well, we're just going to go plant kudzu along every roadside and stream. And kudzu became the weed that ate the south, the vine that ate the south. When I was a kid, you would, you don't see it as much anymore, you know, round up. Now people get rid of it. But literally, like around Rockingham, North Carolina, Morganton, Lenore, I could go down the list.

[00:30:01] You would see towns where kudzu was growing on either side of the road for acres. You know, thick, choking out, killing trees. Growing along the telephone and power lines across the street. So you would be driving under an arbor of kudzu. Covering houses and gas stations. I mean, consuming everything in its wake.

[00:30:27] I mean, like, it pushes out every other species because it covers it and the other species can't get sunlight. But I mean, covering bridges, covering railroad trestles, covering stores and gas stations and homes. I mean, it grows up to a yard a day in the summer. So, kudzu was a horrible idea as proposed by the government and the way it was used.

[00:30:57] Unfortunately, instead of blaming the government for their, as usual, really bad decisions, people blamed Channing Cope. People would actually drive. Well, he died. His wife left him. His kids wouldn't talk to him. His home was covered with kudzu. And he died basically covered in kudzu. The driveway grown over. The house grown over.

[00:31:27] He became a hopeless alcoholic and hated by everyone. When he was buried, people would actually drive from other states to urinate on his grave. And, you know, this is just a long aside. But I consider Channing Cope to be a great American, a great southerner, a father of permaculture. If people had listened to him, everything would have been fine.

[00:31:57] Everything would have been fine. But for what the government did, they blamed him. And I'm telling you, that's one guy that deserved a whole lot better than he got. I kind of identify with him in a lot of ways. You know, I'm just the same talkative storytelling southerner or real cracker. But that guy had a great idea.

[00:32:22] And to this very day, if you institute his plan, as outlined in the Front Porch Farmer, that was his book, you're going to be a very successful cattle rancher. Just make sure that you own the land and your children are going to follow after you. Because that kudzu is always going to have to be grazed. You cannot go a single season without having cattle on that property. You can have goats. Goats are fine. It doesn't have to be cows.

[00:32:53] But chickens love kudzu. I mean, it doesn't matter. Something's going to have to eat that plant. Humans can eat kudzu. It's actually a really good vegetable for foraging. But something's going to have to eat that plant. And, you know, eventually kudzu will work itself out in its environment. It's going to fight it out with the other plants. And, you know, somebody will eventually look at kudzu as a native. Yeah. Yeah.

[00:33:20] In a thousand years, people say kudzu's a native to North America. Well, why not? Every other plant they say was a native to North America was not here a thousand years ago. It all came in from somewhere. And in a thousand years, kudzu will be considered a native to North America. So, learn to use those plants. Don't consider them weeds. Don't spray them with Roundup.

[00:33:50] Just figure out where they fit and how to use them properly. People spend thousands of dollars on herbicides trying to get rid of kudzu when they could make thousands of dollars just raising some goats or cows and feeding them kudzu. Or supplementing their own diet with kudzu. Or making fly lines or shirts out of the fiber.

[00:34:15] Or, it's literally a nicer fiber than the flax they use for linen or any kind of cotton. The most expensive kimonos in Japan are made from kudzu fiber. And, you know, what are you going to do? So, that's a subject we talked about many times, isn't it? But, anyway, y'all. I still can't pronounce the name of the plant for this week. Look it up.

[00:34:43] You might find a lot of good uses for it. It's one I use. And very, very beneficial. So, have a great week and I'll talk to you next time. The information in this podcast is not intended to diagnose or treat any disease or condition. Nothing I say or write has been evaluated or approved by the FDA. I'm not a doctor. The U.S. government does not recognize the practice of herbal medicine and there is no governing body regulating herbalists.

[00:35:13] Therefore, I'm really just a guy who studies herbs. I'm not offering any advice. I won't even claim that anything I write or say is accurate or true. I can tell you what herbs have been traditionally used for. I can tell you my own experience and if I believe in herbs help me. I cannot nor would I tell you to do the same. If you use an herb anyone recommends, you are treating yourself. You take full responsibility for your health. Humans are individuals and no two are identical. What works for me may not work for you.

[00:35:41] You may have an allergy, a sensitivity, an underlying condition that no one else even shares and you don't even know about. Be careful with your health. By continuing to listen to my podcast or read my blog, you agree to be responsible for yourself, do your own research, make your own choices, and not to blame me for anything ever. Thank you.