The first live broadcast of the internet radio show, Holistic Healing with Herbs and Chinese Medicine, will air on Tuesday, January 15th, from 7:00 PM- 8:00 PM EST. Michele Collins, RH (AHG), MPH and Andres Vergara, M.Ac., L.Ac., are the co-hosts for the show which airs on Voice America's Health and Wellness Channel. In the first show, Intro to Chinese Medicine: Chinese Medicine 101, Michele and Andres will be providing a broad overview of the basics of Chinese medicine. In addition to tracing Continue Reading
Using Chinese Medicine with Animals
I was excited to recently read an article about the Singapore Zoo and how they use Chinese medicine for their residents. Click here to see the story. At the zoo, veterinarians integrate conventional veterinary medicine with Chinese medicine, using both acupuncture and herbs to treat a variety of issues, like constipation (for an orangutan), sinus problems (a horse), and swelling around a leg fracture (for a cheetah). They turned to Chinese medicine when western medicine wasn't working. Continue Reading
Celosia – Coxcomb – Yi Guan Hua Herb
This is such an interesting and unusual flower. It's thick velvety fanlike petals look out of place when you see it in a garden, as if it's thick velvet exterior should be upholstering a chair in your living instead. This one is growing in the side garden between me and my neighbor's house, sprinkling the area with it;s luscious richness. I love that she is not simply a pretty face, beautifying a garden space, but that she is a strong medicinal herb in her own right as well. In Chinese she is Continue Reading
My Path to Herbal Medicine
I have always wanted to pursue work that could help people live their lives as healthily and sustainably as possible. Initially, it seemed the best way to do this was to help people transform their external environment, literally their communities and workplaces to support them in their quest for health and balance. I started out with a Master of Public Health (MPH) to test out my theory in a number of different settings. One of those settings was as a health educator in a local health Continue Reading
Poke Root – Phytolacca Americana
Poke root and I have been well acquainted with each other for almost my entire life. We met quite unexpectedly for the first time when I was 2 years old. I was playing outside with my older sister and a couple of family friends who were slightly older than my sister (all older than me). For fun (theirs not mine) they fed me poke berries (widely considered to be poisonous). My mom and parent’s friends rushed me to the emergency room where the doctor had to decide whether or not to Continue Reading
Herbal Baths as a Way to Experience Plants
Herbal baths are used to calm and soothe and even to restore pieces of oneself that may have withdrawn from the conscious mind and thought processes because of trauma, pain, or shock (due to an accident, the death of a loved one, abuse, etc.). I find it is a great way to directly and personally connect with a plant on an emotional and spiritual level. I learned about herbal baths several years ago in a workshop taught by herbalist and naturopathic doctor Rosita Arvigo Continue Reading
Wild Herb Weekend
The North Carolina Herb Association is hosting their annual Wild Herb Weekend on July 27th-29th in Valle Crucis, NC. It is a wonderful opportunity for plant lovers to meet like-minded people and learn about growing, harvesting, cooking with, and using herbs and medicinal plants. Bevin Clare from Tai Sophia will be the keynote speaker. I will be teaching 2 workshops there. One is about using medicinal herbs for common women's health issues. Another is about how to stay healthy in summer with Continue Reading
Qi Gong, the 5 Phases, and Being Present in Your Body
One of the things that I most love about Qi Gong and Taoist philosophy is the underlying belief that my intelligence, any single person’s intelligence is stored in the physical body, in 5 key organs to be precise. This immediately takes me out of my head and forces me to focus on what is going on inside my body. I have a lot of experience, which I come by honestly, of living disconnected from what was happening within my own body. Dissociation has its utility, in that it helped me Continue Reading
Finding Inner Sweetness
I recently decided to stop eating sugar. I had stopped eating refined, processed sugar but my last hold out was gummy worms that were sweetened with organic fruit juices and evaporated cane juice. I have comforted myself with the fact that it isn’t refined sugar, that these were actually healthy treats. In my defense, they did give me 100% of my daily required vitamin C. Plus, I really looked forward to my gummy worm snack. Which is why I decided to stop eating them and to limit my sugar Continue Reading
Learning about the Healing Properties of Individual Plants
In this blog, I have been writing about individual herbs and the ways they help the physical, the emotional, and the spiritual body heal. There are several different ways that I learn about individual plants and their healing properties. One of the first things I do is I read all I can find from as many different sources and as many different perspectives so I can learn more about how a western herbalist, Chinese herbalist, homeopath, a practitioner of flower essences uses it and Continue Reading
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