Saturday, December 13, 2014

epazote for symptoms indicative of h. pylori overgrowth

A week ago I told you about my "discovery" (centuries after it was FIRST discovered...) of the latin-American herb called epazote.  After using it some more, i'm absolutely SOLD.  :-D

Half an hour ago, I took the third dose of the "booster" round of this anti-parasitic.  True, it tastes less than savory -- if you want a good-tasting stomach-support you're better off sticking with licorice, peppermint or ginger -- but it did what the three more pleasant herbs could not:  it took away the low-grade nausea, inflammation (with the associated ache) and gas which had been increasing with me.  That it smells like "skunk sweat" I believe to be something of a hyperbole ... but then I've never smelled skunk sweat....

Something over half of people in this country are supposed to carry this heliobacter around with them, and in most it's asymptomatic.  There are confounders, though, which can encourage its proliferation and it can get out of control ... and one of these conditions is STRESS.

With this construction project of ours dragging out (and my husband stressing about details of it) MY stress has been over the top!  I self-medicate with intensive reading which takes me out of the mental atmosphere, and I've run off to Texas a couple of times, as well.  ;-)  I keep myself from using alcohol for the same purpose most of the time -- not a healthy way to "escape" -- but when a glass of wine makes you feel better there's a big temptation to see what a bottle might do!  A cup of tea is a significantly better choice, but tea does cry out for a biscuit as company!  I've exerted myself to resist THAT, too.

Epazote to the rescue!  The unpleasant, empty-stomach belching which had become VERY common with me stopped with the very first dose.  At the end of the first three days, I felt normal except for the residual inflammation which took another couple of days to be soothed away.  Heeding the traditional-use-protocol, after those first three days I took extra magnesium, because it seems that the herb CAN stop one up a bit.

A week after that first dose, I began feeling a little gassy again (though the loose bowels didn't return) -- sure enough, the first dose of the second course made it go away.  It will be interesting to observe if it comes back NEXT week....

Googling doesn't provide much evidence that epazote is documentably effective against h. pylori, just that somebody heard somebody else say it worked....  One search-result pulled up a study which was done (abstract only), saying that epazote's reputation didn't pan out in the lab -- where have we heard that before?  OH -- when conventional-medicine wants to "prove" that their pharmaceuticals are effective where herbs are not!  Since I couldn't see the study, I couldn't determine how they reached their conclusion, so i'll relegate their opinion to the midden-heap where I store my hearthealthywholegrains.  ;-)

The proof of the pudding will reveal itself in time -- meanwhile i'm happy to be your guinea-pig, and give you any updates if and when they seem significant.

4 comments:

  1. The basic knowledge of herbal remedies used to be the standard part of life skills. You are right to share your experience.

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    1. thank you! :-) almost every antique cookbook i own (mostly reproductions) have sections on first-aid and invalid cookery -- their recommendations are very interesting.

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  2. So how much epazote did u drank I heard it can be toxic I have h pylori and want to get rid of it took the antibiotics and didn't work..

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    1. I bought a packet of the herb with its stems from my local grocer. I then in the evening crumbled half of it in a teapot -- maybe a couple of tablespoons? -- and i added a cup of boiling water. In the morning i strained out a third of it and shot it back before my coffee. The following two mornings i did the same thing. Then, two weeks later i repeated the process.

      I would say that this "controls" the problem but doesn't eradicate it. I have to do it again a couple of times a year.

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