Tag Archives: herbs in containers

Healthy Herbs: Kelp

Kelp is an herb which is so high in vitamins, nutrients and minerals that it works wonderfully as an all around every day vitamin. It’s particularly useful as a women’s vitamin, because it’s high in iron, calcium and potassium – all of which tend to be essential for women during menstruation, and while pregnant or nursing.

Kelp has a salty taste to it too, and some people even use it in place of salt. It’s also a natural source of iodine and this is where a lot of it’s medicinal, healing and wellness power comes into play.

Iodine is essential to your body, because it helps the thyroid function properly. And the thyroid controls growth, energy and metabolism in your body. Since kelp is a natural source of iodine, it’s absorbed by your body more slowly and safely than chemical iodine is. I’m actually allergic to chemical iodine but I have no problems consuming moderate amounts of Kelp on a daily basis.

Kelp regulates both the thyroid and pituitary glands, plus it activates all glands in your body. It’s wonderful for nail growth and hair loss too, plus it can help regulate your body temperature. It even helps if you have problems with chronic low body temperature.

Kelp is beneficial to the pancreas and the prostrate. In fact it helps with both female and male organs in the body. It also builds cell membranes, helps the digestive system, can help prevent the growth of tumors, can help cleanse the body of radiation, and normalize glands and hormones. That last part makes it an excellent supplement to take while pregnant, particularly because Kelp contains such high mineral content too.

The natural, high iodine content of Kelp actually helps it act as an antibiotic in your body too. When there’s an infection in your body, Kelp will help assist the thyroid to release more iodine into your blood stream, and iodine kills infections.

I’ve personally used kelp tea for years to kill strep throat actually. I add a gel capsule of ground kelp to regular, hot black tea, let it dissolve, and stir it around. Then I drink the tea. The kelp coats the throat as it goes down, and the iodine kills the strep bacteria. It also relieve pain almost immediately. It’s gritty and doesn’t taste too great in tea form, but it works really fast and it’s cheap too.

One other little known fact about Kelp is the weight loss benefits it offers. Since Kelp regulates your thyroid, this can also stimulate your metabolism and give you more energy. It also acts as a diuretic, which means it will help you shed water your body might retain. These two benefits of kelp working together can help you achieve your personal weight loss goals.

NOTE: Statements in this article may not be approved by the FDA, and are not made by a licensed medical practitioner or physician.

Healthy Herbs: Golden Seal

Golden Seal is another natural, extremely strong anti-biotic. This is an herb not many have heard of, but it’s an excellent infection fighter with many other healthy properties.

Golden Seal can be bought in many health food or herbal stores, but sometimes you have to hunt for it at larger stores online. It’s most often sold in a combination herbal solution with other herbs such as Echinacea. Golden Seal by itself can often be purchased though, in both root or leaves pill form.

The root variety is the strongest of course, and most expensive. Buying Golden Seal pills made from the leaves and stem work quite nicely as well. I don’t recommend however, buying hard pill style herbs. Instead buy herbal pills which are in capsule form, with the ground root or leaves inside. This allows the herb to stay as close to a natural state as possible, doesn’t add a bunch of other junk to the pill that may be more harmful than good for your body, and is a form that can be quickly absorbed and utilized by your body too.

Golden Seal is a natural source of insulin, so it can lower your blood sugar when you take it. Because of this, anyone with low blood sugar problems – i.e. hypoglycemia – should not take Golden Seal by itself, particularly in large doses. You can however, take it in conjunction with Licorice Root to help combate the insulin effects, or simply take another herb called Myrrh instead of Golden Seal.

Golden Seal has a wide variety of uses and is in fact considered by many people to be a “cure all” herb. It can be mixed into a salve for instance, and used as a contact healer. I’ve personally used it this way myself for over 15 years and it’s excellent.

You can also take Golden Seal to reduce swelling, and it’s said to actually stop internal bleeding as well. You can make it into a tea to be used for nose drops, or to drink for a sore throat. The tea can also be used as a mouthwash to get rid of canker sores, and you can even mix White Oak Bark into Golden Seal tea to use a rinse after oral surgery. You need to be aware though: Golden Seal is quite bitter to the taste.

I’ve kept Golden Seal on hand for more than 15 years now, because it’s one of the best ways I know to help clear up colds, flu, and infections. I’ve also used it in several other remedies, here are a couple for you:

1. Golden Seal Salve – I’ve used this over the years to deal with major cuts, scrapes and injuries my three boys brought home regularly…

– One capsule of Golden Seal – Root or leaves doesn’t matter, but I do use ground Golden Seal in gelatin capsules.

– Aloe Vera juice or gel (Pure, not the stuff that has perfume and alcohol mixed in and is sold for sunburns), or standard Petroleum Jelly.

I open the capsule of Golden Seal and pour the powder into a plate, then mix in enough of the Juice or Jelly to make the powder mix in fully. Then I simply slather the salve onto the problem area, and if needed I cover it with a clean guaze bandage or bandaid. With larger affected areas I’ll wrap it in a sport bandage.

I should warn you: The salve will look nasty. It’s a dark greenish color that just looks gross and disgusting, and this will discolor your skin slightly too.

Leave the bandage or covering on overnight, then wash well in the morning. In most cases there is already massive healing progress just from the overnight treatment.

2. Hemorrhoid Relief – This can be used both internally and externally.

Open one capsule of Golden Seal, shake the powder onto a plate or dish of some kind. Open one capsul of White Oak Bark and empty it’s powder onto the same dish. Mix in a small amount of pure Aloe Vera gel until combined well. Slather that onto the hemorrhoids at night before you go to bed.

In my experience using this remedy: They hemorrhoids are completely gone by the time you wake up in the morning.

NOTE: Statements in this article may not be approved by the FDA, and are not made by a licensed medical practitioner or physician.