Mama's Home Remedies: Discover Time-Tested Secrets of Good Health and the Pleasures of Natural Living

by Svetlana Konnikova

  palace, where they were greeted with great joy. Ruslan and Ludmila were married amid great festivities and lived

  together happily for many years.

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  Ailment: Insomnia

  Experts define sleeplessness or insomnia as sleep disturbance, when one has difficulty falling asleep and/or staying asleep. Some believe, erroneously, that this happens only to elderly people who seem to sleep shorter periods of time than the young. In fact, the luxury of a sound sleep is greatly influenced by the type of lifestyle we lead. No matter what age we are, we might experience several interruptions in our sleep during the night. And then it might take us an hour or more to fall asleep again.

  In some cases sleep can be prolonged but still be insufficient. It can be annoying when we would like to sleep, but we cannot in spite of being exhausted. We may complain about lying awake for hours without being able to fall asleep. We may awaken and recount and dwell on the problems in our lives, which often grow in magnitude at the daunting hour of 3:00 a.m. Tensions and pressures accrued during our everyday routines, including demands at the workplace and the negative impact they have on us, can interrupt our sleep and cause depression.

  Experts usually classify various modes of sleep into three categories: 1) superficial, when a person can be easily awaked by even a small noise; 2) a deep sleep, bringing satisfaction and rest; and 3) a sleep accompanied by good and bad dreams. When people suffer insomnia, the duration of deep sleep decreases at the expense of a superficial sleep. These changes lead to some problems in the morning. When a person feels tired and jaded, his memory, concentration, and efficiency suffer. In addition, even at the beginning of a new day he may experience headaches and weakness.

  Causes of insomnia vary

  Even a healthy person can suffer from sleeplessness. Fatigue and irritation inhibit reflexes in the brain’s cortex. Any stress can attack the sensitive nervous system and disrupt a good night’s sleep. Some people also experience insomnia when they are sick with colds and fever or have poor blood circulation or respiratory problems.

  All these conditions prompt the sleepless to get fast treatment, and many reach right for a sleeping pill, which is counterproductive and dangerous. Fastacting tranquilizers are enemies to the body. Too many people think the sleep154 ^ Mama’s Home Remedies ing pill is the answer to their problems. On the contrary, they can promote a dependency on them and the consumer may find that he cannot function normally without them—or with them. At this stage the consumer is addicted. Chemical addiction destroys the body’s ability to react in a natural way and, left untreated, can eventually lead to death.

  The treatment for insomnia depends on the causes that provoke it. Try to discover your triggers and eliminate them. Perhaps you habitually drink alcohol at lunch or at dinnertime or you try to boost your energy, drinking strong black coffee several times a day. Try the following instead. Healthy people are usually able to restore their sleep in 10–14 days without the use of sleeping pills.

  r1. Replace alcohol or coffee with a glass of carrot, tomato, orange, apple, or grape juice. Become accustomed to a new taste. You’ll be happy to see that this simple change in your habits can help you to sleep soundly throughout the night.

  r 2. People with sensitive nervous systems should take a walk in the fresh air before bedtime and/or take a warm, calming bath. If not a bath, try a cold shower.

  A woman in Kazakhstan created a method of treatment with cold water to cure herself when she got very sick. Then she offered her water treatment technique to her husband, two daughters, and grandchildren. When she was sure that it helped those who tried it, she opened several schools for adults and children, training them in a cold water self-cure technique. You can do it yourself following these simple steps.

  r 3. Take a cold shower or swim in a pool with cold water each morning.

  r 4. Apply a cold pack (kept in the freezer) to the back of the head or neck before bedtime.

  Sleeping Beauty @ 155

  r 5. Massage your body in a circular motion with a natural bristle brush to help induce a good night’s sleep.

  Massage will stimulate blood circulation and drive blood to the external areas of the body. Sleeplessness is often caused by an accumulation of too much blood in the brain. The brain is always at work, 24 hours a day. The mind is always busy, and very often we are under stress, so we need a fair balance between day and night, which requires a deep, sound sleep to preserve our health and energy.

  To begin, get familiar with simple folk remedies, which are preventive measures for healthy people with a sensitive nervous system, who are prone to developing insomnia.

  r 6. Try going to sleep and waking at the same hour each day. You wil benefit from a routine biological rhythm. It is important to reach a balance.

  Since prevention is better than cure, take good care of your nervous system and heart, which works very hard, constantly pumping blood to your brain and all other internal organs. Many centuries ago King Solomon wisely advised people to take care of their hearts more than anything else. He made a good point by saying that “out of the heart shall flow springs of living water,”

  referring to the Holy Spirit (John 7:38).

  In Russia and northern European countries, such as Norway, Sweden, the Netherlands, Finland, and Denmark, sauna baths are very popular. These beneficial treatments are now practiced in many other countries around the world. You’ll read more about them in the chapter, “Dialogue with the Trees of Strength and Everlasting Life.”

  r 7. People have enjoyed sauna baths for centuries. After these baths ( banya), some people, especial y in Russia, plunge into icy water or walk barefoot or rol in the freshly fal en snow.

  These simple procedures are proven to build the body’s resistance to il ness and drive the blood from the brain to be distributed 156 ^ Mama’s Home Remedies

  equal y throughout internal organs and the skin. This procedure promotes a healthy, restful sleep. You’l read more about calming bath remedies later in this chapter. The following are simple folk remedies that have proven successful for many years. Try them and enjoy the sleep of the just.

  r 8. Drink a cup of warm water or milk sweetened with a little honey or sugar before bedtime.

  r 9. Drink a cup of “Tranquility” tea. Place one tablespoon minced valerian root in a cup and add boiling water. Steep for 20 minutes. Filter and drink. r 10. Add one tablespoon valerian root to eight ounces boiling water. Continue to boil for 15 minutes. Steep for 10 minutes. Filter and take one tablespoon twice daily.

  r 11. Cold valerian drink. Dice one tablespoon valerian root. Add one cup cold boiled water. Steep for 24 hours. Take five to six teaspoons a day.

  r 12. Take a 30-minute walk outside before bedtime.

  r 13. Cal your local health-food store to locate a source for black elder or common elder. Use elder root or leaves and brew the tea for a good night’s sleep. In a pot, add dried elder flowers to eight ounces boiling water. Steep for 30 minutes. Filter and take one tablespoon before bedtime.

  In the chapter “Stop Sneezes and Sniffles and Stifle a Cold” I wrote about the black elder plant as a “treasure chest” of the green pharmacy. If you are awake right now and cannot sleep, perhaps you would like to read the funny superstitions about this great plant.

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  ^ In the seventeenth century there was a belief that if a small boy got scratched by an elder branch, he stopped growing.

  ^ Lightning never hits the elder, so some people plant it near their houses for protection.

  ^ If you want to get rid of a wart, rub it with a green branch of elder. Then bury the branch in the ground to rot—the wart

  will disappear.

  ^ If a horseman carries two small branches of elder in his pocket, he will never rub a sore on his horse’s back, no matter how fast he gallops. Even today some horsemen carry the twigs of elder in their pockets during horse races.

  ^ Cut a piec
e of elder branch between two “joints,” where the sunlight has never fallen and hang around the neck of an epileptic to treat his condition. This treatment was popular in Europe in the seventeenth century.

  ^ Elder was considered an effective healer in many European countries. Various beliefs surrounding this plant created legends, such as that the cross on which Jesus Christ was crucified was made of elder, and traitor Judas hanged himself on the elder tree too. Contrary to British beliefs, Russian legends tell that the cross on which Jesus was crucified was made from the cypress, but Judas hanged himself on the asp.

  ^ Slavic people bent young shoots of elder from the tree to the ground and held them there with stones. A sick person with fever was to crawl three times under the arch of the elder’s branches and say, “I cut out my sickness with these three shoots.” The same ceremony was performed in England as well, but instead of the elder, they used the sprouts of an oak or an asp.

  ^ According to Russian folk beliefs, the elder possessed a magic. The elder’s cane saved and defended a traveler from wicked people and dangerous animals.

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  Here’s what the little elder tree mother had to

  say in the following interpretation of a Hans

  Christian Andersen fairy tale written in 1845.

  T hat was no fairy tale,” said the little elder tree mother, “but now it comes!” Real life furnishes us with subjects for the most wonderful fairy tales; for otherwise my beautiful elder bush could not have grown forth from a teapot.

  She took the little boy from his bed and placed him on her bosom; the elder branches, full of blossoms, closed over them. It was as if they sat in a thick, leafy bower which flew with them through the air; it was beautiful beyond all description. Suddenly the elder tree mother became a charming young girl with a green dress covered with white blossoms, just as the elder tree mother had worn; she wore an elder blossom on her bosom, and a wreath of the same flowers was wound round her curly golden hair. Her eyes were large and sky blue. Those who gazed into them were mesmerized. She and the boy kissed each other, and then they became the same age and felt the same joys.

  They walked about hand-in-hand and then the little girl seized the boy round the waist, and they flew far into the country. It was spring and it became summer, it was autumn and it became winter, and thousands of pictures reflected themselves in the boy’s eyes and heart and the little girl always sang, “You will never forget that!” During their flight the elder tree smelled so sweet for the flowers fixed on the little girl’s bosom lay against the little boy’s face as he rested his head against her and slept soundly throughout the flight.

  Sleeping Beauty @ 159

  Try the benefits of herbs for sleep, using the following remedies: r 14. Combine one teaspoon of minced elecampane root and one cup cold water. Steep for 10 hours. Filter and drink two ounces four times daily 30 minutes before eating.

  r 15. Combine 1½ ounces dried dil or dil seeds with one pint of Port wine or grape juice. Cook seeds in wine over a low heat for 10

  minutes. Drink one wine glass before bedtime.

  Two ancient Russian remedies

  r 16. Place a birch broom under your pilow. This plant wil induce sleep.

  r 17. Place under your pilow a handful of hops. You’l have a sound sleep in a state of natural “intoxication.”

  r 18. Drink ⅓ glass Cabernet Sauvignon or Chardonnay, which act as natural sleeping remedies and stimulate sleep.

  To combat headaches and sleeplessness, my Grandma used the remedies and recipes previously described and also an unusual, but proven environmental alteration, using black sheets. This method has offered excellent results even for those who have suffered for months with sleeplessness and nightmares. Before bedtime she would cover a window in her bedroom with black cotton fabric. When I asked her why, she said that the black fabric reminded her of the night sky and it helped her to get a quiet sleep. As a student at Moscow University, I observed the same ritual in the home of a famous Russian poet. She was widely recognized during the 1970s along with other celebrated poets in Russia, including Andrey Voznesensky and 160 ^ Mama’s Home Remedies

  Eugene Evtushenko. Her poems, rich with strong emotions and philosophies, entertained hundreds of readers.

  During one period in her life, she nearly suffered a nervous breakdown due to sleep deprivation.

  It was in summer when I, then a reporter, set out to interview her for an article for a local newspaper. I visited her in her country home, a dacha set in Peredelkino, a small village near Moscow nestled in a beautiful northern forest where some of the most renowned poets and writers in Russia wrote their most inspiring works. In fact, it was there that Boris Pasternak wrote his classic novel, Doctor Zhivago.

  “Zdravstvuy! ” she said, bidding me hello as she opened the door. In a less enthusiastic tone she told me she was not feeling well, but to please come into her bedroom.

  Once in the room she returned to her bed, and I, surprised by the room’s ominous appearance, asked her why her sheets, pillows, comforter, and even her nightgown were made of black silky satin.

  “The color black soothes my mind and gives me unbelievable, amazing tranquility; rapt attention to my poems; and sound sleep,” she explained, “so I can completely relax from my everyday thoughts, problems and brainwash.”

  We continued our conversation for a couple of hours and at the end I was not overexcited from having just interviewed a great talent in Russian poetry. Instead I began to feel sleepy. The black color around me had become dominant in my mind.

  I later learned that experiments have shown that people who have tried many remedies for sleeplessness to no avail have found rest from the extensive use of the color black or navy in their bedrooms. Try this to get a sound sleep: r 19. Make your bed in thin black or navy fine satin fabric: sheets, pillowcase, comforter, and nightgown or pajamas. If you are real y adventurous, you can even paint your wal s black and add shimmering silver stars. r 20. Rub your temples with lavender oil before you go to sleep. r 21. Pour five drops of pure lavender oil into a cube of sugar. Let it melt in your mouth before bedtime.

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  r 22. Place ½ ounce celery stalk (Apium graveolens) in a glass jar. Add one quart of cold boiled water for eight hours, then filter. Take one teaspoon three times a day to help prolong your sleep. r 23. Crush two tablespoons dried red hawthorn berries and place in a glass jar. Add 1½ cups of boiling water. Steep for 30 minutes. Take the mixture three times daily 30 minutes before a meal. It is a helpful treatment for insomnia for those with heart disease. r 24. Place one tablespoon oats in a large jar. Add two cups of cold boiled or spring water and cover overnight. Next morning cook for five minutes. Drink it as a tea any time for a better sleep. r 25. Cook eight ounces oats and five cups cold boiled or spring water in an enamel pot until volume is reduced by half. Filter, add four teaspoons of honey, and cook for an additional 30 minutes. Drink two to three times daily. The tea is a good natural calmative/sedative. r 26. Place two tablespoons crushed turnip roots in an enamel pot. Add one cup water and cook 15 minutes. Drink ¼ cup four times daily or one glass before bedtime.

  r 27. Wild lettuce usualy is referred to as the bitter cousin of common garden lettuce. It has been known for its mild sedative and painkil ing effects since Greek and Roman times. Place two teaspoons of crushed, dried leaves of wild lettuce in a mug and add one cup of boiling water. Steep for 10 minutes, filter and drink ½ cup before bed. It induces sound sleep, relieves pain and can ease nervousness and muscle spasms. Do not drive or operate machinery when taking this infusion.

  r 28. Put two teaspoons honey and one teaspoon apple vinegar in a mug. Mix and take at bedtime. This usual y induces sleep within 30 minutes. If you are overtired and feel weak and you wake up in the middle of the night, repeat the same. Honey itself stimulates sleep. It becomes more effective in combination with apple cider. 162 ^ Mama’s Home Remedies

  Remedies treatin
g insomnia of nervous origin, including headache, neurasthenia, or neurosis

  r 29. Boil one tablespoon red elderberries in one cup water for 15

  minutes. Steep for 20 minutes. Filter and take twice a day. r 30. Make a nastoyka (infusion) from the passionflower (Passiflora incarnata). Place one tablespoon of crushed, dried leaves of Passionflower in a mug and add one cup of boiling water. Steep for 10 minutes, strain and drink ½ mug before going to bed. Do not drive or operate machinery, because the nastoyka acts as a sedative. The fresh or dried whole plant is used effectively as an herbal medicine to treat anxiety and insomnia.

  r 31. Dice two teaspoons motherwort herb ( Leonurus cardiaca) and add one cup boiled or spring water. Steep for eight hours. Use it al within one day.

  r 32. Dice two tablespoons motherwort herb and add 2½ cups boiling water. Steep for two hours. Drink ½ cup four times a day before meals. It is a good calming and sedative natural medicine. r 33. Blend one teaspoon peppermint, one teaspoon motherwort, one teaspoon valerian root, and two teaspoons hops. Place one tablespoon of herbal mixture in an enamel cup. Add one cup of boiling water. Place this cup in a pot with boiling water for 15 minutes for a steaming water bath. Cool and filter. Take ½ cup two times a day for insomnia, irritation, and nervous excitement.

  r 34. Place two tablespoons lemon balm in two cups boiling water. Steep until cooled. Take al during the day in equal portions. It acts as a calming sedative.

  r 35. Mix one teaspoon strobiles (dried female flowers in leafy cone-like catkins) of hops and one teaspoon chopped valerian root. Add one tablespoon of the mixture to one cup boiling water. Let it steep for 15 minutes. Take ½ cup only before bedtime for insomnia.

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  r 36. Mix five teaspoons thyme, four teaspoons wild marjoram, five teaspoons motherwort, four teaspoons valerian root, and one teaspoon yel ow sweet clover/sweet Lucerne (Melilotus officinalis). Add two tablespoons of the mixture to one pint boiling water. Steep for two hours. Drink ½ cup three times daily before a meal as a calming remedy.