Natural Remedies For Skin Irritation And Insomnia.

Calendula Cream

Calendula Cream is a great natural remedy for insect bites or stings, and skin irritation. Calendula is made from marigolds and has been a skin itch remedy for hundreds and hundreds of years, helping calm the effects of bee stings, eczema and sunburns. The plants skin relieving properties are due to its combination of essential oils, which have anti-inflammatory and antimicrobial traits.
To use calendula cream, apply an ointment that contains two to five percent calendula up to 4 times per day on the affected area. Calendula may not be good for those who have ragweed allergies as calendula and ragweed are both members of the Aster (compositae) family. It’s suggested to apply a small amount and wait to see if any red or itchy bumps occur, which would indicate an allergy to calendula.
Valerian Capsules or Tincture
Valerian Capsules or Tincture are good for treating insomnia. Valerian goes back to the times of Ancient Greece, where it was commonly used as a sleep aid. Thus, it is one of the best-studied herbs for insomnia. Studies have shown that valerian decreases the time it takes to fall asleep without any of the common side effects of prescription sleep aids.
Valerian is a plant-based remedy suggesting that there are a combination of factors for how it works, but the exact way it works to help insomnia is still unclear. Studies done with animals suggest that valerians volatile oils possess sedative properties. Some other studies indicate that the herb tricks the brain into releasing additional gamma-aminobutyric acid, which is a calming neurotransmitter, before blocking it from being absorbed by nerve cells. Thus, the gamma-aminobutryic acid continues to circulate and promote sleep.
The potency of the valerian varies depending on the form, so it’s important to follow the instructions of the label for how much to use. The common therapeutic dose is 300 mg of standardized valerian extract. One option is to take three 100 mg capsules throughout an evening to gently ease your body into sleep. If you are using a tincture, which is a concentrated liquid form of the herb, dilute a droppers worth of valerian in a cup of water. Drink one dose after you’ve had dinner and another before bed. Some suggest keeping a valerian capsule bedside in case you tend to wake up in the middle of the night and are unable to fall back asleep.
It’s important to note that valerian can create a restlessness and/or anxiety in ten percent of people, so when trying it for the first time, take a small amount to see how its affects you and if you experience any restlessness or anxiety.

Cold And Flu Natural Remedies

When it comes to getting the flu, we tend to reach for over-the-counter drugs to combat the virus. There are homeopathic remedies and herbs out there that can be used as an alternative to over-the-counter drugs. The benefits of these remedies and herbs are plentiful, as they are natural and have few if any side effects.
Consider making over your bathrooms medicine cabinet with new remedies to combat the flu virus. While there are still instances that you’ll want to use conventional medicines, having the option will promote the notion of a natural method of healing as well as provide you with ample way to treat the flu virus.
Check out these items that may be worth incorporating into your medicine cabinet the next time the flu virus rolls around the schoolyard or work place:
Oscillococcinum
Oscillococciunum is good for relieving flu symptoms. It is a homeopathic flu remedy that contains a highly diluted concentration of the flu virus, which triggers the body’s immune system to fight off the virus. Studies have shown that oscillococcinum both reduces the severity of flu symptoms as well as shortens their duration. Recent research published by the British Homeopathic Journal discovered that nearly 63% of people, who took oscillococcinum within 24 hours of the onset of the flu virus, had significant improvement or complete recovery within 48 hours.
The principles behind homeopathy are different than conventional medicine in that the belief is that like treats like. This remedy only contains an imprint of the flu virus, but it’s enough to get the body to get its immune system to work on fighting off the virus.
The earlier taken, the better when it comes to treating the flu virus with oscillococcinum. Taking oscillococcinum within 24 hours of experiencing flu related symptoms such as a fever, runny nose or body ache, will allow the oscillococcinum to work best. Always follow instructions on the label. Certain substances are known to weaken the strength of homeopathic remedies, such as chocolate, menthol, caffeine and mint. It’s important to avoid these substances when using oscillococcinum.
Andrographis Paniculata Tincture
Andrographis Paniculata Tincture is good for fighting off colds. Andrographis paniculata is an immune-enhancing herb common in traditional Chinese medicine that is a potent infection fighter. Studies using placebos alongside the andrographis paniculata showed that the andrographis paniculata repeatedly fought off the cold and flu symptoms. Andrographis paniculata, like every herb, has a lot of active constituents as well as powerful antimicrobial substances, which is why it has the curing effect that it does.
To use Andrographis paniculata, take a 400mg dose 3 times per day. If you feel like you are about to get a cold, use a tincture rather than a tablet or capsule. Tinctures are easily absorbed by the body and are thus able to get to work much faster.

How to Fight Chapped Lips: Natural Remedies to Stop the Burning and Pain

Chapped lips happen for many reasons including extreme exposure to the wind, sun and cold air, breathing with the mouth open, constant licking of lips, physical dehydration and contact with allergens in cosmetics like lipstick.  The symptoms can affect quality of life especially where eating food is concerned as chapped lips are often very sensitive to the touch.  Fortunately, there are many natural remedies to relieve the symptoms of chapped lips.  Of course, once you relieve the symptoms, you would have won the battle against the pain and the burning associated with very dry lips.
Your lips are chapped because they are dry.  As such, it is imperative to keep them as hydrated as much as possible with the following methods:
- Use cool saltwater compresses daily, preferably before you hit the sack, for about a week.  Just mix one teaspoon of rock salt to a pint of water, soak a washcloth in it and lay over your lips for about 15 minutes.  You should then lock in the moisture by applying a natural lip balm or petroleum jelly.
- Apply either a vegetable oil like tea tree oil or the juice of an aloe vera on your lips.  Remember to dilute the tea tree oil with water.
- Consume more fluids especially water to bring back the moisture in your body, thus, lessening the severity of the chapped lips from the inside.
- Ensure that your home is neither too dry in summer nor too cold in winter.  If possible, use a humidifier during winter.
- Rub a slice of cucumber directly on your lips, which will help in cooling it down and in easing the burning feelings.
The most important thing in treating chapped lips is to counteract what brought it in the first place - lack of moisture.  However, you do not bring back the moisture by constantly licking your lips for obvious reasons.
Protect Your Lips
The next logical step will be to protect your chapped lips from becoming even drier than it already is, of which the following methods can significantly help:
- Use a commercial lip balm with sunscreen in it.  Your lips are easily sunburned, thus, leading to chapped lips so it is only logical to protect it with sunscreen.  However, avoid flavored commercial lip balms because you will lick your lips more often than necessary and, hence, worsen your lip situation.
- Make your own lip balms if you are allergic to the commercial varieties.  Also, it is a good idea to ascertain the reasons for your frequent lip-licking and then avoiding them.  For example, if stress makes you lick your lips more, then manage your stress.
- Avoid lipsticks to which you are allergic to.  Instead, you should opt for hypoallergenic products or avoid them altogether during treatment.
- Use baking soda for brushing your teeth instead of toothpaste since it can dry out your lips.
With these natural remedies on treating your chapped lips, you should be able to pucker up, eat food and say cheese without saying “ouch”.

Natural Remedies For Burns, Constipation and Anxiety

Aloe Vera

Aloe Vera is good for sunburns and household burns. Aloe Vera gel soothes and cools the surface of the skin by calming the irritation and heat of the burn. Juice from an Aloe Vera plant possesses natural inflammation fighters known as salicylates. Once the pain and swelling of a burn reduce, the other ingredients in Aloe, like polysaccharides, provoke the body into producing antibodies which speed up the healing process. Studies done with Petri dishes show that fibroblasts (regenerating skin cells) reproduce up to 4 times faster when being treated with Aloe Vera.
To use Aloe Vera, rub into the skin on the affected areas, repeating every couple of hours until the heat and pain start to recede. Aloe Vera tends to dry the skin, so consider using a moisturizer after the Aloe Vera has done its job. When treating a burn, avoid Aloe Vera products that also have alcohol in the ingredients because they will further dry out the skin. The bright green Aloe Vera gels use artificial colors to achieve the green hue, so it’s best to avoid those and opt for the clear products.
Consider keeping an Aloe Vera plant in your kitchen. Cut parts of the plant from the oldest leaves on the bottom in order to avoid stunting the plants growth, and rub the juice from the plant on your burn.
Dr. Schulze’s Intestinal Formula #1
Dr. Schulze’s Intestinal Formula #1 is good for occasional constipation. This product contains 2 varieties of Aloe leaf extracts as its main ingredients, as well as two less-known bowel movement aids, senna leaf and cascara sagrada. Aloe has a long history as a laxative. Plant compounds in Aloe help to stimulate the inner lining of the colon, speeding up the process. Be cautious to follow directions when using this product as overdoing any laxative can lead to diarrhea and dehydration.  Also note that this product is not for daily use.
Aloe works, in this case, by causing slight irritation to the gut, which loosens any stuck material and encouraging the lower bowel to move. Thus, if you have an inflammatory bowel disease such as Crohn’s, avoid Aloe products. Also make sure you are near a bathroom when using this product.
Rescue Remedy
The Rescue Remedy is good for anxiety, panic, and emotional upset. This remedy is a blend of five different flower essences, each of which counters a certain type of stress. Flower remedies are made mainly from wildflowers that are infused in water, then filtered and preserved with equal parts brandy. Many integrative physicians attest to the healing properties of flower remedies.
To combat everyday stresses, place four drops of the remedy on the tongue 3 or 4 times a day, or dilute the drops in a glass of water and sip during the day. To treat acute stress or anxiety, take 4 drops every 20 minutes until the anxiety passes. There are no side effects from using the flower essences.

Remedies for High Blood Pressure: Take Control of Your Life

Today there are a variety of different remedies out there to help you lower your high blood pressure.  Sure, there are medications as well, but many times the natural remedies are options that you may prefer since they are less likely to end up causing side effects.  If you are ready to start taking control of your life, here are a few tips that you’ll want to keep in mind.
Start Eating Differently
If you really want to lower your blood pressure, one of the best remedies out there is to change what you are eating.  Just changing your eating habits a bit can help you to effectively lower your blood pressure.  Start eating more fruits and vegetables and reduce the amount of sodium that is in your diet as well.  Drinking more water and decreasing the caffeine and alcohol in your diet can help as well.  While it may sound a bit tough, you will find that it can really help you to get your blood pressure back under control.
Supplement with Vitamins
Another great remedy for high blood pressure is to start taking some vitamin supplements.  Of course, before you start just taking vitamins on your own, it is probably a great idea to speak with your doctor first to find out what supplements may help you out.  In many cases some potassium and calcium can be very helpful when working to keep blood pressure under control.
Start Exercising
Another great remedy to help you take control of your life and lower your blood pressure is to start exercising.  When you exercise on a regular basis you can help to lose some weight, which helps to lower your blood pressure.  Exercise will also help you to get the blood pumping which works to keep the heart rate regulated and improves cardiovascular health.
Work to Reduce Stress
If you have a high level of stress in your life, you may be having a hard time keeping your blood pressure under control.  Just reducing your stress can help you to lower your blood pressure significantly.  However, it’s not easy to reduce the stress in your life.  Some ways to help you out reduce your stress levels can include meditating, doing yoga, and more.
While these remedies for your blood pressure won’t take it down right away, as you make these changes in your life, over time you’ll begin to see your blood pressure come down.  Start using these remedies so you can get back in control of your life and improve your blood pressure for a healthier life.

Take Control Of Your Life With Natural Remedies

Every year reseachers and scientists worldwide conduct studies to prove that natural remedies can be used to treat a host of health problems ranging from minor aches to serious ailments.

These findings are double checked and proven as effective remedies, yet they are not made pubicly available to allow consumers to make informed and choice based decisions about their healthcare. This guide is not advocating that mainstream medicine is bad or should never be taken. Of course there are times when a health condition is very serious or life-threatening that taking medications become absolutely necessary.
What is being advocated here is that you don’t always have to rely on conventional medicine to solve all health problems. Natural remedies can provide the same solution most of the time, so you should have the choice to opt for a drug-free remedy - where available. It is better to treat any health problem with methods that encourage the body's natural ability to heal and restore its own natural balance.
Suffice to say that it is always wise to find alternative ways of remedying your body without causing adverse effects or adding more health issues from taking certain drugs.
Here you’ll find tons of proven natural remedies that have been compiled for you to use to combat numerous ailments.
Using alternative natural remedies to cure various illnesses is not a fad. In fact more and more people are now turning to safe practical healing methods for all sorts of ailments.
Why? because it’s becoming more evident that prescription drugs are now the No. 4 cause of death in the United States alone.
Aside of the humongous cost of this mainstream medicine, sometimes the side effects of these drugs on the body are downright scary and you should not ignore them.
The shocking truth is that hundreds of thousands of Americans die from conventional medicine side effects every year. More than one million Americans are hospitalized due to bad drug reactions every year, and did you know that at least, 25% of prescriptions for the elderly carry potentially life-threatening errors.
Wow! These statistics are enough to make your head spin and think twice before you pop another pill. I know I did - when I found out these facts.
So my question is: Are you concerned or worried about all the drugs you or your loved ones take daily all year round? You should be! But take heart, there is hope for us all because for almost every health problem, there’s now clinically proven natural remedies that can match or beat a lot of mainstream medicine.
At this site, you will find answers for common ailments such as infections, arthritis, aches and pains, allergies, sleep disorders, anxiety and depression, diabetes, stomach disorders, and even how to lower your cholesterol without taking expensive and potentially dangerous drugs.
You will discover that often, you can treat many health problems with items from your own kitchen that has been used successfully for centuries by our ancestors.
For instance, garlic has been known to prevent and treat everything from the common cold to lowering high cholesterol and blood pressure;
Did you also know that ginger has been found to work wonders in the treatment of flu and migraines to the prevention of certain types of cancer?
What about the good old onions? I bet you hate it in your sandwich because you don't want your breath to smell of onions. Yikes! Well, you might want to reconsider and give it a try to get rid of a host of ailments such as coughs, breathing problems and even asthma.
So why don't you come along with me now? Together we will uncover and embrace alternative ways of how to heal your body and give you the longevity you deserve.

Good Health

Good health is not only about not being ill, it is about being happy and feeling whole from a physical, mental and spiritual point of view.
Being healthy is not anymore just about taking medicines when unwell, it means taking care of ourselves to prevent any illnesses and to change our attitude when we need to heal or get better after the illness. Taking care of our health today means doing a lot of things to feel good, from eating the right way to taking vitamins, from exercising to having a job we enjoy.

Holistic care

A few years ago, healthcare professionals such as doctors and nurses used to treat any illness in a fairly standardised way: symptoms were checked against those of a well known condition and there would most certainly be a tablet that we could take to make it all better.
But sure enough, our bodies have a way of letting us know when something is wrong and when we are pushing ourselves too much, and not only in a physical way. We might have a headache because we are very stressed; we take some paracetamol and it goes away, but what brought the headache on in the first place is still there: sooner or later the headache will come back.
Because of the strict relationship between the way we live and our health, healthcare professionals now assess patients in a ‘holistic’ way. This means that not only they will ask about symptoms, but also about lifestyle, work conditions and family life. So it is not just about tablets anymore, it is also about support and understanding us as patients to improve our general health. This is particularly true in long term and ongoing conditions.

A little can be a lot

Diet, exercise, five-a-day, three-a-day, work-life balance: now more than before we can take charge of our health and feel better. Health promotion is a very powerful tool and it is used constantly to remind us that we have the opportunity to make our bodies and our minds feel better. It is no longer the case of spending a few hours in the gym every week, or eating entire meals of vegetables and fruit, or banishing sugar from the kitchen cupboard. Health professionals realised soon enough that by suggesting the gym at all costs or tormenting us with eating greens was not going to get us anywhere healthy soon, so now the focus is different.
We are told to try a little bit every day, and it will eventually pay off: a little exercise, a few portions of fruit and a little sugar (oh yes, because remember that we have to keep the mind happy as well as the body). This new approach seems to be giving better results than the old fashioned one, so it appears it is the way forward. A lot of problems still remain: obesity and binge drinking, to name just two. But health promotion will continue to be the key to teaching everyone how to take care and feel better, in the hope that, eventually, a few initial attempts will become good habits for life.