Kitchen / Garden / Sanctuary - Urban Homesteading to Nourish Body + Spirit

Month: October 2009 (Page 2 of 2)

Healing From Surgery, Part 1: Homeopathy

Homeopathy for Bone Healing

Before the recent bunion surgery on my foot (bunionectomy with osteotomy where the 1st metatarsal bone was broken, a wedge of fake bone was inserted, and a plate and 4 screws were inserted to secure the area), I thought about what I could do beforehand to prepare my body to heal well afterward. I prepared in many different ways, and there are also plenty of things I’ve done since the surgery to support my body in healing. In this “Healing From Surgery” series, I’ll be sharing everything I did, including:

  • extra-nourishing foods I’ve prepared
  • herbal remedies I’ve made
  • supplements, creams, and alternative therapies I’ve been using

I’ll be focusing especially on bone health & healing, since the surgery involved cutting one part of a bone, breaking another part, and installing 4 metal screws into it. So this series would certainly apply to healing from a broken bone, too.

Part 1: Homeopathy

I used to think it was total hogwash, but I’ve had a few surprising successes with homeopathic remedies, and I find myself turning to it for minor first aid issues. Any suggestions for good online resources? So far, www.abchomeopathy.com is the best from what I’ve seen.

Homeopathy is a form of vibrational medicine (it’s not “of the physical realm”), and therefore will not interfere with any other drug or treatment, so combining homeopathy with western medicine is not a problem.

Here are a couple good explanations of what homeopathy is:

Hyland’s website

Society of Homeopaths website

Before my surgery, I consulted a few different homeopathy books and put together a remedy regimen for myself:

Beginning one week before surgery, I took:

Arnica 30c – twice a day (to prepare for bruising, swelling, trauma of surgery, soft tissue damage, etc.)

Phosphorus 6c – twice a day (to prevent hemorrhage during and after surgery)

Homeopathic Calm Drops – as needed, for fear and anxiety

Then, after surgery I took:

Arnica 30c – each hour for the first day, then multiple times a day for the next couple days, easing off to twice a day for the next 2-3 weeks (for bruising, swelling, post-surgical trauma & soft tissue damage)

Nux Vomica 30c – twice a day for one week (to help rid the body of the anesthesia drugs)

Symphytum Officinale 6c – twice a day for about 4 weeks (for healing of bone fractures)

Calcarea Phosphorica 6x – twice a day for about 4 weeks (For the Hyland’s brand that I got, it was 4 times a day. Just follow dosage instructions on the bottle.) (supports bone health & healing)

King Bio Bone Strengthener – One dose (3 sprays) into mouth or on affected area up to 6 times a day. I’m still taking this remedy until the bone has healed more and I’m walking comfortably.

Of course, I’m not sure if all these remedies have worked. I don’t know what my foot would have looked like or felt like without the remedies. But I will say that my hubby and I were genuinely surprised at how little swelling and bruising we saw when the bandage was removed after two weeks. Even my neighbor, a nurse, was impressed.

As for the bones, of course, who can say? Who knows if the homeopathy helped. However, so far my x-rays look good, and I’m right on schedule for healing; in the next few days I’ll be weaning off crutches (yessss!). At the next visit, the doctor may even let me put my foot into a regular shoe…which would mean that my healing is ahead of schedule. And also, I’ve been doing lots of other things to support my healing process, which I’ll write about in the other parts of this series. Perhaps each little thing plays its own part. I know that I’d do this homeopathy regimen again, though. Since it probably helps, and certainly doesn’t hurt, why not?

Warm Cookies for a Chilly Autumn Afternoon

Chocolate Zucchini Cookies

It sure has been cold here lately. We’ve had temperatures down into the teens, with our first snow storm a few days ago. This is highly unusual, and most of the leaves haven’t had a chance to turn colors yet, and are now hanging limply from their branches, frozen! Kinda sad!

It’s the perfect time, therefore, to bake some Chocolate Zucchini Cookies and have a glass of milk.

(Click below to continue reading…)

Continue reading

Philosophy Friday: Recipe Paralysis

Philosophy Friday: Recipe Paralysis

Geez, where has the week gone? Friday already! I hope you’ve had a nice week!

I opened the fridge today and noticed that one of my yellow zucchinis had just hours of life left, and needed to be used then and there. I thought about the dozens and dozens of zucchini recipes I’ve collected over the years. I thought about opening my overflowing recipe binder and looking through all those recipes…assessing each one, deciding if it sounds appealing…determining if I have all the ingredients…etc.

I can easily spend an hour looking through multiple recipe books, comparing ingredients and methods, trying to decide what I should do with the food in my fridge. Does this sound familiar to you? Maybe it’s only me. Sometimes, I get totally paralyzed by my recipes.

(Click below to continue reading…)

Continue reading

How to Save Your Own Tomato Seed

How to Save Your Own Tomato Seed

If you grow tomatoes in your garden (or if you plan to in the future), you might be curious about saving your own seed. I really love seeds for some reason, and I used to trade seeds on gardenweb.com about 10 years ago. The lovely gardening community at gardenweb (wonder if it even still exists?) was the source for many of the heirloom tomatoes I still grow in my garden. Tomatoes that are called “heirloom” or “open pollinated” are genetically stable, and will produce offspring consistently like themselves (unless they’ve been cross pollinated with something else in your garden, which does happen occasionally!). Hybrid tomatoes are much less stable genetically, and if you save seed from them, you never know what their offspring will be like (which can also be great fun!).

(Click below to continue reading…)

Continue reading

Philosophy Friday: I Just Ate Cake for Dinner

Lindsey's Zucchini Cake with Spiced Frosting

Dinner: Lindsey's Zucchini Cake with Spiced Frosting

Well, I was trying to ‘get it together’ all week and post something, but it just didn’t happen. Not that I really did anything this week, because I didn’t. My visions of recovering from my surgery included getting a whole bunch of reading done, writing lots of posts for my blog here, writing letters, organizing my photos on the computer, and re-doing my recipe binder. And I have done precisely none of that! (Click below to continue reading…)

Continue reading

Newer posts »

© 2024 The Herbangardener

Theme by Anders NorenUp ↑