Natural Herbal Beauty

Symptoms

Physical symptoms may include headache, fatigue, insomnia, digestive changes, neck pain or backache, loss of appetite, or overeating.

Psychological symptoms may include tension or anxiety, anger, reclusiveness, pessimism, resentment, increased irritability, feelings of cynicism, and inability to concentrate or perform at usual levels.

Call Your Doctor If

You have prolonged or acute symptoms. Excessive stress puts you at risk of other serious disorders, including immune problems, digestive disorders, diabetes, asthma, high blood pressure, migraine headaches, and possibly cancer.

You have symptoms of stress and any of the following: unusual patterns of sleep, appetite, and moods; physical movement that is unusually agitated or abnormally slow. You may have clinical depression. (more…)

Backache, or back pain, is, with headache, one of the commonest and also one of the most serious types of pain experienced. More working days are lost in the western world through back problems than from any other illness except flu. There is little surprise in this, given that the back (and neck), consisting of the spine and a broad swathe of interconnecting muscles and tissues, is almost exclusively responsible for holding us upright and keeping most organs in their correct position. This puts the back (and neck) under constant strain and is the factor that makes back problems difficult to treat. (more…)

Spine

The spine has four natural curves— but they should be gentle and upright curves. A good spine should have the right balance of curves for best performance and to avoid strain on muscles and joints. When they are neither gentle nor upright, a variety of problems can occur. The most common abnormalities are kyphosis, lordosis, flat back, sway back, and scoliosis.

Figuring out whether you have a postural problem and deciding on treatment is best done with help. Consult a specialist, such as a qualified osteopath, chiropractor, physiotherapist, or a teacher of yoga or the Alexander technique. (more…)

Pleurisy

Pleurisy is inflammation of the pleura, the delicate membrane between the lungs and the walls of the chest. The most usual cause is viral infection, but it can also result from pneumonia and injury of adjoining organs. Breathing produces sharp, stabbing pains in the chest and shoulders from the fluid buildup in the membranes, and there is usually also a high fever. (more…)

Headaches (and to a lesser extent, migraines) are a widely experienced form of pain and the most common type of “referred pain.” This means that although a pain in the head can obviously result from a bang on the skull, the more usual cause of a headache is a problem elsewhere in the body. Muscle tension in the neck and shoulders, for example, or in the case of migraine, an (illogic response to food are frequently to blame. (more…)

Classic migraine is much more than just a bad headache. It is a severe and often disabling pain in the head—usually on one side only—accompanied by sometimes alarming symptoms such as altered perception, a feeling that the skull is in the grip of a tightening vise, pins and needles or numbness, nausea and vomiting, and an inability to do anything. Symptoms can come and go and last for hours— sometimes even days. No two people usually experience the same symptoms, and one person can experience different symptoms on different occasions. (more…)

Backache is one of our most common ailments: causes can range from pulled muscles and damaged discs (the spongy plugs that separate the vertebrae and act as shock absorbers) to poor posture, kidney disease, gynaecological problems or simply sitting in an awkward position for long periods.

Some sorts of backache are dignified by rather grander names: “lumbago” simply means pain in the lower back (the lumbar region) from whatever cause, whereas “sciatica” is a pain felt along the back and outer side of the thigh, leg and foot, with accompanying back pain and stiffness, often caused by a damaged disc putting pressure on the sciatic nerve. “Fibrositis” is an inflammation of fibrous tissue, especially muscle sheaths, which often affects the back muscles. It leads to pain and stiffness and can be treated with anti-inflammatories and those remedies recommended for rheumatic disorders. (more…)

The herb garden can be anything from a yard-square patch near the kitchen door to a formal and decorative garden 200 feet square. One great aspect that needs to be stressed is that a herb garden can be both fascinating and decorative as well as purely useful.

Secondly, it may be formal or informal in plan. The herb border outside Dunster Church in Somerset is a pleasing instance of an informal border, planted with a varied collection of scented plants, reminiscent of the way in which the herbs would have been grown in the old monastery gardens. (more…)