There is a gastro virus doing the rounds and what has surprised me is how quickly well meaning parents run too the doctor and then give kids antibiotic. I won’t go into the pros and MASSIVE cons of antibiotic prescribing right now, but Superbug anyone? Candida? Instead I’ll let you in on how we do sickness in our home.
Firstly we need to get comfortable with our children feeling uncomfortable, being sick is crappy and it’s hard to watch those we love looking sick and it doesn’t help being constantly bombed with the ‘evils’ of a fever by product pushing advertisers or quick fix medics.
Symptoms like fever, nausea and lethargy are little bodies healing! And they grow stronger and more resilient when they come out the other side. The changing of the bodies core temperature is a mechanism for fighting off pathogens, let’s trust it. Don’t dampen it with panadol, neurofen and the likes (The crazy over use of these drugs impact our children’s long term health inclideing gut and kidney health, while setting up a pattern of pharmaceital use for all ills)
FEVER
To help my babes feel more comfortable with a fever I use a small hand towel, wet with water straight from tap (room temperature as too cold can shock) I sponge down and then rinse again before applying to forehead, in the throes of fever this cloth will keep heating up so regularly check and rerinse it and return to forehead or where ever is comfortable for your patient. The back of the neck can be good too. . You can use some cooling and realxing essential oils like peppermint, lavender and eucalyptus. Internally I use a blend I make up called Tummy Tamer which has chamomile, rhubarb, ginger and peppermint extracts.
🌿 Chamomile will cool the body and ease the spasms of the tummy and intestinal tract which come with gastro bugs. She also has a lovely sedative effect and is a gentle febrifuge (a herb that brings on sweating naturally to get the show on the road and then off again for good)
🌿 Rubarb is a #purgative which gets whatever shouldn’t be there out of the body, it can have a slight laxative effect but that’s ok. We are cleaning house and working alongside the body not against it.
🌿 Ginger is a #diaphoretic too getting the sweat on an aiding the nausea
🌿 Peppermint dispersed the heat, relaxes the intestines and calms the vomiting to just when needed.
When gastro hits I will dose every half hour to an hour. Then reduce to every two to three hours. My model in the photo was pretty crook Saturday and Sunday but has perked by Monday. I have allowed him to naturally fast but I suspect by tomorrow his interest in food shall have returned.
Tummy Tamer is on website so grab yours or make your own from the ingrediants I have listed
Healing Herbally,
