I will start off with saying we are not doctors or medical professionals in any way! Every person’s issues are different and we do use modern medicine from time to time! Natural Remedies is our starting point. Many people have questions and we hope others can gain perspective from some of our personal experience.
The pillars of healthy living usually are narrowed down to diet and exercise. What if you are in shape, don’t eat all that bad, and are still having issues?
I was a cross country runner in highschool, have never been overweight and always active. In highschool I was diagnosed with high cholesterol and placed on medicine. I am extremely bad at remembering to take medication though, maybe that was a good thing. Diet wise I was told to avoid the high cholesterol things like dairy, meat, and eggs.
My wife started having issues with most food while in her early 20s. She saw many specialists and nutritionists with little progress. Elimination diets were attempted to narrow down what was causing her stomach discomfort and constipation. This did work in some ways, as it identified that she had developed a dairy intolerance. It did not help with her bowel regulation and she was eventually placed on medication for IBS (Irritable Bowel Syndrome).
So here we are, a young couple already on two prescription drugs with no real solution but continue to take the medications to stay “healthy”.
Food
My wife saw the most improvement while doing the Paleo diet with a friend. (Our jobs do not normally allow for much choice in food.) That sparked my curiosity and I started to read more about IBS. Turns out there were certain foods that can trigger different side effects and one of the biggest culprits was processed food.
We started our journey by cutting out processed foods and immediately started to see her improve. Working more with higher quality whole foods led to homesteading options for reducing cost.
With the addition of chickens, ducks, rabbits, and a decently large garden in our backyard we saw even more health improvements. Not only had my wife been off medicine for a few years, but I too was able to stop taking my prescription medication.
2 different symptoms, 2 different medications to manage the symptoms and 1 single solution to fix the root cause! The food we eat. This brought about a natural transition to other questions. What do we use in our everyday lives because it is what we always have used? Think: Household cleaner, pain killers, makeup, soaps, toiletries! What actually is in them and who approves their use?
*This is just our experience, though we have many family members and friends who have had similar experiences solving completely different symptoms.*
We started to look into apothecary type herbal remedy options about the time my wife became pregnant with our first son. With the addition of morning sickness, many hospital scares, and headaches we really started digging into options.
We were concerned because we knew that whatever medicine she took also could be exposed to the baby. So we started small, various teas and ginger since they are safe and do not come with a warning about contacting your medical provider if pregnant!
Essential Oils
We had already seen so many effects from changing our diet so compact plant juices in a bottle seemed like a logical transition. That opened up a whole super long research process of what company to buy from. Is it surprising to find out that just like all food is not made the same, not all oils are made the same? (Why our family picked Young Living Essential Oils link, coming soon)
Essential oils sparked a much larger transition. If we had an issue that we used medicine for we would first research if an essential oil could be used first. Methods of use vary and this is where quality and labels really make a difference!
You can experience the effects of essential oils through diffusing the oil in a diffuser, topically applying it (generally with a carrier oil), and even ingestion. The regulations are different, not all oils are pure, not all oils are tested and approved for topical or ingestion use! This scared us in the initial approach to using essential oils (because we had a newborn baby) until we chose to buy from Young Living based on their stringent quality control policies.
Things we now use oils for: Pain relief, any GI related issues, hormones, teething, congestion, bleeding, anxiety, stress, skin, infection, sleep… you get the idea!
Chiropractic care
Sometimes even the OBGYN doesn’t have a great solution (besides more pain meds) to sciatica or frequent headaches while pregnant. Turns out that your body has natural positions it should be in, and when you are off from that alignment there is tension and headaches can occur.
My initial scepticism with going to a chiropractor revolved around the concept that once you go, you have to keep going. Our frequency of going was high at first. Especially with my wife pregnant and requiring adjustments to get the baby off a nerve! The frequency of visits did reduce, our bodies are staying in better alignment and we felt so much better!
Improvements: An adjustment of the neck often removed a headache caused by a poor sleep position. A constipated baby no longer constipated, restricted movement fixed, back pain removed, joint pain from working out fixed, better sleep, overall improved health!
Household products and cleaners
How many chemicals are you exposed to on a daily basis? We already worked to remove chemicals from our food, and reduce medicine intake of other chemicals. How about what you clean with, wash clothes, makeup, face wash?
If we saw effects from placing essential oils on our skin doesn’t that mean the chemicals could also have effects on our bodies as well? So further lifestyle changes occurred in our house.
My wife loved cleaning wipes, shower sprays, and all things that helped make the house germ free! So the idea of losing those products in an effort to make our house more chemical and toxic free was scary. Normal cleaners now make our skin red and irritated and cause headaches! Who would have guessed!
There are loads of options now and I will not pretend to know the ins and outs of each brand or what they are made of. We had the simplicity of already switching to Young Living which offers way more than just oils. Their Thieves Household Cleaner quickly replaced every single one of our cleaners.
This saved me lots of research time and greatly reduced what was under our sink. Using their super concentrated base we made glass cleaner, general surface cleaner, and cleaned everything in our home for about 11 months with just one bottle! Laundry soap and dish soap was also replaced in short order!
*We have a toddler now who loves to open cabinets. And there is nothing toxic with a warning label in our kitchen for him to get to!*
Conclusion
There are many items we are still working on replacing (like dandruff shampoo). We have tried various castile soaps and even use a deodorant stone vice antiperspirants!
None of this occurred overnight. We have been making adjustments for the past 6 years and always continuing to learn and change things. Pick something that you are interested in and jump on making those changes. You will be amazed by some of the results you will see!