This reader story come from SB, a regular reader and commenter on GRS. SB writes about personal finance and personal development topics at One Cent at a Time.
Some reader stories contain general advice; others are examples of how a GRS reader achieved financial success or failure. These stories feature folks with all levels of financial maturity and income.
This is my second guest post at this blog. I am grateful to J.D. and his team's humble gesture in allowing me to do it. I hope to provide the same value regular writers of this blog provide to you.
My grandmother was nearly illiterate, born and reared in rural India during the British occupation of the country. At the age of 14, she was abducted by the British army (later released), which ultimately caused her to marry early at the age of 16. She couldn't complete school beyond basic education. Still, she became a very wise woman and mastered many skills.
My aunt happened to write down some of my grandmother's home-remedy techniques from her narration. Recently, my cousin forwarded me a soft copy of that compilation. I'll mention a few common symptoms and their natural cures, all at a fraction of the cost of medicine. But before that, let me tell you why I find home-based cures so beneficial.
The benefits of home remedies
- Drugs contain unnatural substances and chemicals, which are foreign elements to our body. Natural remedies, on the other hand, are not synthetic molecules like drugs; they are made of living organisms which we eat anyway.
- Some drugs act as a manipulator and force the brain to think differently — an example is an anti-depressant. The problem with this is, the moment you stop taking the drug, the symptoms often recur.
- Natural remedies have fewer side effects compared to prescription drugs, as drugs tend to alter the chemical and hormonal balance of our body.
- Natural remedies are available at a fraction of the cost of prescription drugs. Your grocery bill will cover them.
The benefits of prescription drugs
It is important to remember that most drugs are developed by studying the natural cures and identifying ingredients which actually affect the symptoms. Still, prescription drugs are more useful under most circumstances. They work faster. We can't afford to be bedridden for days and hope for natural cures to work someday. Life is tough and we must get well sooner.
We don't have time to be sick. Prescription drugs provide the quickest recovery. They start fighting the bacteria and antibodies as soon as we take them. You may argue that we take chemically altered substances every day, be it the milk or the apple, or even the chicken. They have pesticides, growth hormones and God knows what.
An introduction to home remedies
My grandmother was raised in a 100 percent organic environment. With near zero pollution, she ate healthy, farm-harvested food. Since childhood, I took medicines almost for any illness; rarely was I given a natural cure, except honey and basil leaves for a cold. Our bodies are used to chemicals anyway; therefore, natural remedies may not work the way they worked for our grandparents. Still, there is no harm in detoxifying our bodies to the extent we can, over time. My grandmother's advice may help to accomplish that goal.
Here are some excerpts from the treasure I was handed recently.
Acidity: Acidity is caused by excess acid secretion from the gastric gland, the acid which is used for digestion.
- Chew a piece of clove, and take some time to swallow. It provides instant relief.
- Another immediate relief is to eat a small cup of yogurt.
- For more sustainable relief, drink warm water every day early in the morning.
- Drink coconut water regularly.
- Mix a few drops of honey in water to drink.
- If you know what a jaggery is, suck a small cube of it after lunch/dinner.
- A glass of water with a teaspoon of soda can also provide immediate cure.
- A couple of pieces of dates can also give you instant relief.
Backache: If you happen to work in a chair, you may have this symptom already. As a software professional, I have had backaches for the last few years. The natural cure is garlic. Eat a couple of cloves of garlic every day.
- Prepare an ointment by frying a few cloves of garlic in olive oil, strain and let it cool. Apply to your back every day.
- Indian masala tea can be a cure too — the one with cloves or ginger. Take it daily. (Two cups of masala tea can boost your energy as well, which is a low-cost replacement of Red Bull or 5-Hour Energy drinks.)
- Eating oranges, lemons and berries can reduce the pain over time.
- Drinking water with a tablespoon of honey can make your day pain-free as well.
Cough and cold: When allergens or viral infections cause an inflammation in the upper respiratory tract, we get cough and cold. Here is a less-costly alternative to Tylenol or Excedrin. (This is a remedy I learned in childhood: My mother used to give me a teaspoon of honey and a few basil leaves –Indian Tulsi — to chew. To get instant relief from congestion of nasal passages, she used to heat water with some cloves, cardamoms and cinnamon sticks and peppercorns.)
- A soup with a lot of garlic in it can also bring relief.
- Cut okra into small pieces and boil it, inhale the steam to get relief as well.
- Take a hot-water bath when you catch a cold.
Migraine: This is caused by a contraction of blood vessels in the head. It can be caused by stress, lack of sleep, anxiety, nicotine and alcohol consumption.
- Concentrated grape juice can bring relief.
- For a more sustainable remedy, put tomatoes and cabbage into your daily salad.
- A daily dose of garlic can treat this symptom as well.
- Grind cabbage leaves and apply to the affected area for relief.
- When migraines occur, excuse yourself from work. Find a dark room and lie down. Exposure to sunlight may cause the migraine to intensify.
- Per my grandmother, even if the migraine is in the back of your head, applying sandalwood powder on the forehead can cause blood vessels to function properly. You may have seen Indian religious workers applying a patch of sandalwood powder on the forehead throughout the day. It's an age-old practice.
Snoring: I am afflicted with this disease for sure. My wife says I am the worst offender and she can't sleep because of my snoring, so I have started following these tactics already.
- Stop smoking. Smoking causes more mucus formation around the throat.
- Go to the gym. Weight loss can even end snoring.
- Alcohol increases snoring. (When you drink, you'd better sleep in a separate room!)
- Sleep side-wise rather than on your back.
- Avoid heavy meals before going to bed.
- Stop eating oily/spicy foods at dinner.
- Maintain a regular sleep schedule, and don't sleep during the day.
- Wash the bed sheets and pillow covers frequently, and even change your pillow after a few months. The dust and allergens can accumulate on them, causing nasal passage blocks.
Stress: It's amazing that stress was a concern even 60 years ago in a rural village. Here is her wisdom, which may reduce stress because you're saving money. But more than the money saved, the main point here is reducing the dependence on synthetic drugs.
- Chewing Indian basil (Tulsi) leaves every day is the best natural cure.
- Yoga and Dhyana (meditation) can also cure this.
- Milk and almonds in the morning keep you fresh and energetic.
- Bad eating, oily foods, eating meals quickly, and drinking alcohol may cause depression over time. One of her tips to cure stress is to “love everybody and everything”!
- Applying betel leaves on your forehead can ease your tension.
A few ingredients which are repeated here (and in the rest of the natural cures my grandmother used but which I don't mention here) are mint, honey, water and garlic. Have sufficient supply of these items at your home, if you plan to follow the tips.
Also, another synergy I can see here is the morning drinking and eating habits. If you start your day the right way, the rest of your day should follow that lead and keep you upbeat.
Readers, even if you rely on these natural remedies, when the situation warrants it, there's no alternative to a doctor and the prescription medicine. You need to know when to rely on home remedies and when to go to a doctor. Don't ignore your doctor for a bit.
Thank you for sharing these tips. Just a small suggestion, based on the symptoms you described regarding snoring, you might want to look into sleep apnea. Timely diagnosis of apnea and treatment can be life saving.
Not sure people should take health advice from a personal finance blog, but I’ve found some natural remedies to be totally useless and some changes to my diet and lifestyle habits to be really helpful.
I think it’s important to keep an open mind but not to “do it yourself” when it comes to health (SB’s recommendation to see your doctor is a sound advice!) It’s easy to misunderstand your symptoms (such as not knowing the difference between a bad tension headache and a migraine) or treat the wrong underlying cause (such as using pain remedies for a hip ache when all you need is better arch support in your shoes.) The internet makes it easy to find a lot of advice, good and bad.
I wish integrated medicine — a body of practice where “traditional” and alternative medicine practitioners work together — would hurry up and catch on. IMHO, there’s a lot we can learn from both.
Beth, thanks for your thought comment and taking the health advice on GRS with open mind. I was skeptical about the acceptance while submitting the article.
I’ve had very few health problems, but with the most serious ones, I’ve always self-misdiagnosed.
I suffered through two weeks of what I thought were bug bites on my ankles (they looked exactly like pictures of bug bites that you find online), but it turned out to have been an escalating allergic reaction. A doctor took one good look and came up with the correct diagnosis (and then asked me a barrage of questions to ensure his hunch was correct). One week of steroids and I was 100% healed.
If you can’t diagnose yourself correctly, you can’t treat yourself correctly. I hope a lot of you are better at it than I am.
Ha, I had an opposite experience. I once had shingles, and the doctor diagnosed me as having a poison ivy rash. (…on my forehead)
The nurse, OTOH, took one look at me and said, “it’s shingles, of course.”
Moral of the story is, always trust nurses.
Like Beth said, home remedies are highly variable. They can be a life saving for some and totally useless for others. But prescription drugs can be the same way.
The things that work for me:
Skin rashes: if it’s yeast (like your baby’s bum rash), diluted tea tree oil or grapefruit seed extract oil are by far the best treatments I’ve seen.
Before getting a myriad of creams for any rash, I would also recommend to at least try rubbing coconut oil on the affected area. More often than not, it will relieve symptoms, especially for eczema.
For yeast infections of the feminine variety, I have never found any pharmaceutical drugs to work. It’s all about your diet and topical, natural remedies.
Sinus pain: Often to relieve congestion, I take a hot shower with the drain closed. I put several drops of eucalyptus oil in the water and breathe in the steam. And don’t forget your neti pot. Sometimes I still have to pull out the Sudafed or if I get wholly infected, the Z-pak from the doctor. But it doesn’t hurt to try the other things first. In the winter, most sinus infections can be headed off by saline spray and the use of a humidifier while sleeping.
Cough: Rub eucalyptus or Vick’s vapor rub on your feet and put socks on. No, really. I thought this was an old wives tale, but it recently worked like a charm for me. It must be something about pressure points.
While I am a firm believer in trying home remedies, for my morning sickness during pregnancies, nothing worked. I unabashedly took Zofran (best drug ever!) to stop being sick all day. I just stopped taking it a few weeks ago for my third pregnancy. Basically, it all boils down to your own sense of your body and what you want to put in it. I try to avoid taking daily pills, but I live in a place with severe allergies in the fall and spring, so sometimes I have to take Claritin (even though I hate it). I also don’t hesitate to take Zofran and Advil for a migraine. After you’ve had to go to the ER more than once for a migraine, you learn that it’s best to treat them immediately.
This is all very individual.
Well, I’ll be nice to my fellow reader, but I won’t be nice to the editors. Seriously? You think this is an appropriate topic? You are literally promoting quack medicine. Goodbye.
Quack? Seriously? I guess you missed this paragraph-
“Readers, even if you rely on these natural remedies, when the situation warrants it, there’s no alternative to a doctor and the prescription medicine. You need to know when to rely on home remedies and when to go to a doctor. Don’t ignore your doctor for a bit”
I will take the words of a wise woman over the “approval” of the FDA and Big Pharma any day.
Therein lies part of the problem. “Big pharma” demonizes alternative medicine, alternative medicine demonizes Big Pharma. Both parties are selling you services and products, so who do you really trust?
My family has been pretty lucky to find doctors who are open to alternative therapies, and alternative medicine practitioners who advocate working with our doctors. It’s much easier to find treatments that work for you when you can see past the inflammatory labels, finger pointing and media hype.
As for the wisdom of grandmothers… mine used to think gin-soaked raisins were a cure for arthritis ;)
I’m with you, Beth! It is just as destructive to demonize “Big Pharma” as it is to wholly discount the benefits of natural remedies or alternative medicine.
The recent outbreaks of measles, pertussis, etc. can be linked to the former, and the overprescribing of a nation dictates that we engage with the latter.
I found this post to be very balanced. It wasn’t like the poster was saying that if you have heart palpitations or extreme pain in your lower right abdomen (possibly an appendicitis) to just eat a few cloves of garlic and hope for the best. Or if you are suffering from a serious systemic infection that will kill you (like Staph or sepsis), no one is saying to rub a little essential oil on it or drink a green smoothie. But most ailments we encounter on a daily basis might be treated without going to the doctor. And you know what the best part of that is (aside from the cost)? You are not exposed to the germs of others in the waiting room of the urgent care or doctor’s office!
Believing in the efficacy of pharmaceutical drugs and recognizing the power of natural substances are not mutually exclusive. My rule of thumb: if a more simple and cheaper alternative will do the job – WHY NOT? If it doesn’t, I have no qualms about going to my local pharmacy or to my doctor for a prescription.
Who do I really trust? The free marketplace of ideas. Let ideas and experiences and experiments be discussed and debated. Truth is an ongoing pursuit, not an absolute destination. So I won’t trust people who refuse to talk things over. Am I right?
As for traditional remedies– there are some great ones, some not so great ones, and some really terrible ones. Same thing with “Big Pharma” potions– some are great, some are so-so, and some will kill you outright (and the class action settlement will pay your heirs $15 decades later).
I’d really like to post some experiences I’ve had with both kinds of meds, but there’s breakfast, so maybe later.
@El Nerdo – well said about the exchange of ideas. I’ve had good and not-so-good experiences on both sides. IMHO, it’s important to be informed and to think through any advice we’re given.
@Jane – a few months ago I read a study that suggested honey was as effective for treating dry coughs as cough syrup. Since honey is safe for me and cough syrup gives me nasty side effects, I figure why not try it?
Sometimes natural remedies can have side effects though. For instance, some herbal remedies (like ginger) can thin the blood when taken long-term. That can be dangerous for people about to have surgery or can interact with some medications. Herbal remedies aren’t inert. We take them for the same reason we take medication: because they have an effect on the body.
How did you all miss the most important part of Beth’s reply? The use of gin-soaked raisins…..I love it. Probably helped with the arthritis, toothache, headache, financial ills, recalcitrant children. The list is endless.
Now THERE’S a wise woman.
You will take the words of a wise woman over Big Pharma until you get something serious like cancer, and then you will be first in line for chemo begging for all the drugs you can get.
@TB
Your comment reminds me of: http://nicoleandmaggie.wordpress.com/2010/07/27/blue-children-or-why-i-am-no-longer-on-any-natural-parenting-forums/
Since I am not stupid nor math phobic and never mentioned blue children or ranted about anything-let alone to an extreme where I have emailed you in anger, I do not see any correlation to your blog post.
I would certainly bestow less trust in someone(s) with a bottom line and a huge advertising budget than I would someone who has figured out how to heal their own ailments and has the wisdom of experience on their side.
There are significant factual errors in this article that were missed in the editorial process. That is enough for me to not give the editors a pass.
I did miss that paragraph. But I admit I quit reading before the end.
But that was inevitable, when right up front was “Drugs contain unnatural substances and chemicals, which are foreign elements to our body. Natural remedies, on the other hand, are not synthetic molecules like drugs; they are made of living organisms which we eat anyway.”
That is just hopelessly naive. Molecules are molecules. There’s nothing special about “natural” molecules. Arsenic is a naturally occurring mineral, but it makes a poor diet supplement. Castor oil is a food, but Ricin is a nasty poison and they come from the same plant.
A note on terminology:
Chemicals are not “foreign elements to our body.” Our bodies, like everything else in the world, are made of chemicals. The fact that a chemical does not naturally occur in plants or animals does not make it harmful, just as the fact that a chemical does occur does not make it helpful.
Here is a recent chart displaying which “natural remedies” have actual scientific support for various conditions: http://www.informationisbeautiful.net/visualizations/snake-oil-supplements/
You silly goose, why would you ever expect even basic scientific literacy from people like this? Big ol’ mean science puts a damper on their natural homeopathy garbage.
I’m with everyone who says a balance is necessary. For example, I have noticed a definite decrease in my headaches since I started eating a lot more garlic. I also get sick less. Garlic is a known natural anti-biotic. If I feel a cold, I drink garlicky soup. If I wake up dizzy and not able to walk from some infection, I go to a doctor!
Another example: I cut the roof of my mouth when I first got to China. It swelled (I didn’t know that the roof of my mouth COULD swell) a bit, so I swished salt-water and it got better. If it wouldn’t have, I would have seen a doctor!
By using what I consider natural “first aid,” I’ve saved money and been more in control of what goes into and onto my body. Nothing wrong with that.
Am I going to
Okay, here some impressions on the actual subject, not the merits of the subject.
THE FLU
I really really feel the mainstream way of dealing with the flu is COMPLETELY WRONG. Playing through the pain with 3 weeks of potions and medications and diminished capacity and the risk of secondary bacterial infections is NOT a time-saver over taking a day or two off to stay in bed and sleeping it off. Decongestants, fever reducers, painkillers, etc. only blunt the natural immune response to infection and prolong it.
I’d rather deal with one day of ber rest and one evening of (monitored, controlled) fever than with a week of pill-popping malaise. But that’s just me.
Additionally, I’ve used some Chinese concoction called Yin Chiao (I get it at the food co-op) to stop the flu in its tracks (but it has to be taken at first symptoms). Chinese medicine makes zero sense to me, but empirically, over the years, the drops seem to have worked for me.
DEPRESSION
While St Johns Wort is the most popular alternative medicine for it, and it’s supposedly prescribed mainstream in Germany, it didn’t do a lot for me except give me headaches and make my eyes burn (due to light sensitivity). And maybe it works by increasing light sensitivity (as in the case of seasonal depression), but I don’t know really.
“Big Pharma” antidepressants have done a lot better by me– Zoloft, Paxil, Wellbutrin, etc., were excellent crutches when my mind was broken. HOWEVER: no pill, herb, vitamin, diet or exercise regime cures toxic shame, self hate, and other psychological problems that in my experience are the root of the depression in the first place– at least the depression I suffered.
My depression, contrary to what TV ads say, was not a “chemical imbalance”– instead, I experienced that the chemical imbalance was the result of self-destructive thought patterns I acquired throughout life (social pressure, PTSD, etc). Once those patterns were corrected, the pills became 100% unnecessary.
I’ve also observed that I naturally slow down in winter, which used to be diagnosed as seasonal depression. But these days I just sleep more when my body asks for it (late-October through early February, more or less). Winter only turns into discomfort and anxiety if I don’t let my body fatten up a bit, sleep a bit more, and stop all mental work after dark. Going with the natural rhythm keeps me happy year-round. Is that “traditional wisdom”?
Alright, then.
Great article. Home remedies are fantastic if used correctly.
I haven’t taken antibiotics for more than fifteen years, I’m now 30, and still refuse to when a doctor wants to prescribe them. Antibiotics don’t work for viral infections, they only work for bacterial ones, so half the time it seems like they’re prescribing them just so they can make money and we can spend it. Thanks but not thanks. It’s always good to double check with the doctor – is this a viral infection, and do I really need to take this? You don’t want to be spending unnecessary cash or poisoning your body. The more antibiotics you take the more immune your body becomes to them and eventually, when you really need something to work, it just might not. But always check with the doctor.
Garlic, ginger, honey and lemon are staples in my kitchen. They always help with cold and flu symptoms. Gargling with throat is great for sore throats. Soaking your feet in very hot water works also for a runny nose.
Modern medicine has it’s place and it has achieved a lot for society. However, society has also grown to abuse it and instead of just being a way to heal people, it’s become big business making a lot of people rich. There’s nothing wrong with getting rich, except when it’s done at the expense of someone else’s health.
So it’s always good to have some home remedies on hand for the simple colds and flus. But always check with your doctor just in case.
How does prescribing antibiotics make doctors rich?
I do agree with you that doctors overprescribe them but the reasons for this are very complex. Many doctors succumb to the pressure of their patients, and despite what you might believe, patients often WANT some sort of quick pill or fix. If your kid has an ear infection, parents many times come in demanding antibiotics, even if it has yet to be determined if the infection is viral or not. Now pediatricians recommend the “wait and see” approach for ear infections, precisely because they do recognize that it is prudent to minimize the use of antibiotics for minor infections.
Plus viral infections that linger for a long time very often become bacterial. If you get the flu (a virus) and still have a severe sinus infection weeks later, it is very likely that this is a secondary bacterial infection that can be treated with antibiotics.
You’ll get no disagreement from me that they are overused, but the situation wasn’t as simple as you made it out to be, nor is their some sort of medical cabal that is pushing antibiotics (which aren’t very profitable anyway) to make lots of money. If you had brought up another type of daily drug (like cholesterol pills) your argument would have been more convincing.
Prescribing any type of medicine makes pharmaceutical companies rich to some extent. The article above was about home remedies for simple ailments that most of the time don’t need prescribed medicine. My response was based on that.
I was commenting from my own experience and from what I have seen prescribed to family and friends. Only a few weeks ago I went to the doctor with a cold and he prescribed me antibiotics knowing that I was pregnant and should not take them. I asked him if they were necessary and he said it was a 50/50 chance. I threw the script in the bin used the natural remedies and was back to normal two days later.
But this is a personal finance site. The point is that a lot of the minor ailments mentioned in the article can be cured naturally without resorting to spending unnecessary cash on modern medicine. In the end it’s all down to personal choice whether we choose a natural remedy or a prescription drug.
As another poster noted, home or herbal remedies do have effects so you should tell your doctor about any remedies taken which may interfere or increase the effect of other medications taken.
My Greek grandmother often gave us mint tea to help us sleep, honey for sore throats and lemon and chicken soup for colds, and garlic, well for everything!
Some home remedies seem more superstition than anything but it is interesting that the chicken soup remedy comes up in more than one culture.
http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2007/10/12/the-science-of-chicken-soup/?_r=0
A big THANK YOU to everyone who dares to look beyond what mainstream medicine would have us believe. Yes, there have been some awesome advances in western medicine — public hygiene and antibiotics are two important areas — but wasn’t it Hippocrates who said “Let food be thy medicine and medicine be thy food”?
Yes the proverb is about prevention, which is always better than cure.
This is not what i subscribed for, i subscribed to a finance blog.
I personally don’t buy into any of these “remedies” and i dont like being forcefully subjected to it by way of my personal email inbox.
I signed up for advice on getting financially stable, please dont run off topic like this again or you will lose a subscriber. There are plenty of other finance blogs out there that provide the value i am after if you continue in this direction which i personally see as nothing more than “filler” content (maybe you are running out of things to write about?), i believe this topic has no place here.
Thank you.
Hi Shaun, We are getting very few usable Reader Stories. Please feel free to share your own. Over the years, GRS has covered lots of topics that aren’t necessarily about “finance,” but about lifestyle, which ultimately affects your finances. So this was just a change of pace to promote discussion and see what other natural remedies readers might have tried.
Ellen,
Your receiving few usable Reader Stories is not an excuse to put out Reader Stories with blatantly wrong information. Again, I don’t know how this got past editors. If you can’t identify the errors in the story, you SHOULD NOT PUBLISH IT.
I was told by a Korean university student that the best Korean mother’s remedy for the flu was dog soup. How that matches up with chicken soup I am not sure.
My flu cure is still chicken stew, bed rest and night/day pills.
My “nip the coming cold/flu in the bud” approach is to cook some Korean junk food soup – Shin Ramen – and at the very end drop in one or two small cubes of frozen minced garlic. The garlic thaws and only partially cooks. I enjoy eating soup that tastes great but is otherwise bad for me, but the spiciness and added garlic help fight viruses, IMO. I also take my daily vitamins with a glass of Airborne.
Of course, this is what works for *me*. And I recognize there could be a placebo effect. However, I have noticed over the years that if I regularly take a multi-vitamin I am usually one of the last people in the office to catch whatever bug is going around, and when I do get sick it’s not as intense for me as it was for others.
Thank you all for reading and commenting on this post. I submitted this post more than a year back. I had to re read the entire article before replying to the comments.
To those who think there’s no or little connection this article has with personal finance – perhaps there’s some connection.
When I hear someone undergoing full body checkup along with ECG and CAT scan just because he consumed some weed (Ganja, if you know what it is) unknowingly, I feel it’s not only big pharma but, a near trillion dollar health care industry, who may try to disturb your personal finance every now and then. Hence, home remedies may save a few dollars here and there.
When we exercised honey option instead of refilling cough syrup and that produced same (or better) result, it occurred to me that there’s some connection with home remedy and personal finance. Of course it’s my personal opinion.
Now the broader issue, the issue with big pharma vs. home remedy.
Home remedy is only for your own good. Medicines are, on the other hand, is good for you, for your doctor, for your pharmacy and for the drug maker.
I just took stock of my medicine chest, we have outdated pain killers, cough syrup, lotions, ointments, sleep pills, blue pills, red ills, orange pills, maroon pills, green syrup, yellow tubes, etc etc.
Half of those are past their use-by dates, half of them were not consumed.
The biggest argument in favor of buying medicines should be the risk. What would have happened had we not swallowed those 8 red pills or quarter of that green syrup, we consumed? Forget what we hadn’t consumed.
And when there’s life or death risk, there shouldn’t be any argument. You get sick, you go to doctor, doctor doesn’t take any chances, prescribes medicines you need, you may not need.
When there’s health concern, you shouldn’t think about those $20 saves you can score.Or, should you be thinking? Yeah a balance is needed, but who’ll decide? Your doctor will unlikely go for home medicine. You’ll end up buying expensive pills.
Saying that, I feel good that I haven’t taken cold medicine since when I started having one table spoon of honey in the morning, every day.
Also, even while I wrote about migration remedies, I never use it myself. when I get a bad migraine I jump on Excedrin for a quick relief.
Perhaps, home remedies be left as preventative measure, rather than cure. Perhaps they cna be used as cure, if you’re absolutely sure.
IMO home remedies point the way to inexpensive fixes for minor problems such as indigestion and headaches, and preventive medicine for more serious conditions. For example, instead of popping a Tums or Rolaids every time I get gas I mix some baking soda and water. It’s cheap, easy, and I’m not spending money on antacids that do the same thing baking soda does.
And, at the risk of oversharing, I am somewhat prone to bladder infections. Some women are able to cure themselves using home remedies. I’m jealous of them – those home remedies don’t help me and I HAVE to go see my doctor and get antibiotics. And, since a bladder infection can turn into a very serious kidney infection I don’t mess around!! However, I do take cranberry pills and extra viatmin C as a preventive measure to reduce the number of bladder infections I get.
I agree that if this sort of off topic misinformation continues I will stop reading. As an actual healthcare professional, I dont come to a finance blog to read quack medical advice that at best does nothing and at worst potenially harms people. And more importantly to a finance blog, the advice doesnt even save a dang bit of money over conventional treatment. By the time I finish paying for all those “natural” cures that likely dont help much I could’ve just bought the sudafed which will actually decongest me. Not to mention I would’ve bought the sudafed on sale with a coupon and paid nearly nothing for it. Not many coupons for garlic or neti pots (and the distilled water needed to go with the neti pot because using tap water or well water with a neti pot has actually killed people).
As a health professional, if you’re really that offended by someone suggesting that people eat more foods like yogurt, cabbage, sleep more, stop smoking and on occasion wash their sheets more often, I hope that I never encounter you or someone like you in my doctor’s office or hospital.
So people can die from pouring pig water into their nostrils. Or get sick from drinking West Virginia tap water. So the obvious thing is to avoid that, no?
However, Sudafed’s 201 drug interactions aren’t that obvious, even for the educated. 201 interactions!
And this is the list of side effects without interactions. I’ve experienced some of them and I didn’t enjoy them. Plus, there’s the whole stupid meth business.
I buy sterile saline sprays at the drugstore to deal with occasional allergies or congestion. They cost more than a neti pot in the long run, but they are precisely dosed, portable, extremely convenient, long-lasting, non-addictive, and have no side effects (of course one could jam the thing too hard while drunk and cause nosebleeds, or poke one’s eye, I suppose). Plus, you can’t make meth from salt water.
Now, I wonder where the labs got the saline spray idea… hmmm…
I love this! Any doctor worth his or her salt (ha!) would definitely encourage a patient to use saline spray over Sudafed, if it works for them. And the fact is that saline nose irrigation does oftentimes work! It’s not foolproof, but in many instances, it will do the trick.
The amazing healing and cleansing properties of salt have been known for….well, forever. It might not always work, but it should always been the first mode of attack. I’m truly flummoxed by labeling tried and true methods of treatment “quackery.”
Like you, I’m not against Sudafed or most other lab created drugs. I have many of them in my medicine cabinet. But most do have side effects. Longer used “natural” treatments also have side effects, but their list usually doesn’t run into multiple pages.
This either/or approach people seem to have regarding drugs/natural remedies is maddening. But I guess it is indicative of so much polarization that exists today in peoples’ thinking.
I don’t know that I can speak about healing properties as such — for me it’s just a wash that thins mucus, removes allergens, and prevents post-nasal drip, all without infusing every organ and tissue of the body with pseudoephedrine.
The thing with the saline is that its concentration prevents the creation of an osmotic gradient when in contact with the delicate tissue of the nose lining, so it’s a lot less harsh that it would be if washing with something like, say, pure distilled water, bottled water, tap water, etc. In a way it works the same way as saline solution to hydrate post-op patients.
Additionally, the spray uses a lot less liquid to irrigate the same surface, so it’s an improvement on the traditional neti pot which uses more water/liquid/mess (but, let’s admit it, it creates more trash).
Now, I’m sure there’s a place and time to use pseudoephedrine, just like there’s a place and time for burning kerosene, but there’s a reason why we don’t use kerosene that much these days– it’s dirty and we have better options. Of course not many “better options” ever arose from close-mindedness and just taking orders from the authorities. (And speaking of personal finance, whoever patented the saline spray must be sitting on a pile of money right now.)
I buy saline sprays too.
I also like to deal with basic colds and congestion by eating lots of spicy food to clear out my sinuses. I really only take cold medicine to help me sleep when I’m sick.
I enjoyed the article. Though I enjoy healthy living and if I am ever not feeling well I re-examine my diet and exercise routine before reaching for pills.
One of our favorite games is to crank up the volume during big pharma tv commercials and try to predict the worst of the potential side effects of whatever they’re pushing: impotence, diarrhea, suicidal tendencies, etc. No thanks!
I remember an old stand-up bit, I think by Janeane Garofalo, about a drug for social anxiety that had “uncontrollable diarrhea” as a side effect. She pointed out that if you were already very anxious, that wouldn’t make you more likely to leave the house!
If you find herbal remedies take longer to be effective, this may be your body naturally healing itself, and your brain ascribing that success to whatever you took/did. There’s a reason drugs get double blind studies, and you’ve pointed it out in part (no offense).
I’m kind’ve surprised to see so much anger in your comments. Its crazy how people can get at the mere mention of alternative options to traditional medicine. Many of them work, and work well. Many have research from esteemed institutions backing their use, but no one cares about any of that, apparently. Very sad.
What I love about this comment is that it’s true regardless of if you think “traditional medicine” is “Grandma’s home remedies” or “MD-directed Western medicine.”
The fact is, there is no promise that these home remdies stuff will cure your problem, but hey, these are the things lying in your home, kitchen or right after your hand.
So, you can definitely try some of them for minor symptoms. Even Dr. OZ often recommends them.
As someone who enjoys playing with and using herbs in her life, has researched many folk remedies and who has experienced a modern trend of doctors putting people through a course of home remedies before being willing to use antibiotics, I don’t diss home remedies. But this statement just jarred my sensibilities:
“Drugs contain unnatural substances and chemicals, which are foreign elements to our body. Natural remedies, on the other hand, are not synthetic molecules like drugs; they are made of living organisms which we eat anyway.”
Please be aware that there are many ‘natural remedies’ which we wouldn’t eat anyway, and and some things we do eat that we wouldn’t want to take in therapeutic doses. Nor are all ‘drugs’ synthetic and all ‘home remedies’ ‘natural.’ (Consider oxalic acid, which can cause harm in large amounts. As a backyard forager, I’m pretty aware of what greens give large amounts of oxalic acid.)
Traditional home remedies should be treated the same way as home remedies you buy off the drugstore shelf: if the condition doesn’t resolve in a few days, get thee to a competent medical professional (and don’t waste time or money on one that isn’t) to check for signs of something really out of whack. Read up on any new treatments, home remedy or otherwise, using several reliable sources.
One more thing: be aware that some home remedies can work out to be a lot more expensive to you, if you have health insurance, than the equivalent from your doctor, and if they don’t work, you’ve thrown that money away. Excedrin (or aspirin and a caffeine beverage) is per dose cheaper than good quality sandalwood powder!
Hi Linda, you shared a great post with nice tips of home remedies. Actually from past 4 years I am suffering from migrane headache. I used to take tablets prescribed by the doctor. But instead of taking tablets, I can reduce my pain with small tips, which your grandmother’s advice. Thanks a lot, i will be following these tips right now.
Herbal remedies are good and work better if you already have a healthy lifestyle where you eat properly and exercise regularly. They certainly aren’t a quick fix to a health problem. It can take a long time to see relief if you’re using just herbal remedies to fix a problem. Organic food, clean water, exercise, and meditation are things to do in conjunction with herbal remedies.
Home remedies are, in most cases, one of the best solutions.
Thank your for the article!
Some home remedies can allow us to not rely on pharmaceuticals for pain relief and other symptoms. I always recommend an alternative before getting on a drug. Great article and a couple of them I will definitely take with me!