Natural or Chemical? That is NOT the Question

Nature is a wonderful thing!

I have an immense love and respect for nature. I could just go out and sit under the trees in the forest all day, listening to the birds chirping, the wind rustling through the trees, and the squirrels playing, and I would be perfectly happy! You see, I started my life in Newfoundland. I practically lived with my grandparents, who lived in the woods with no one around, when my siblings and I were kids. (After moving to the city, though, I was mainly with my parents, who weren't as holistic minded, so I was then taught to "go with the flow" and follow the doctors orders, even though I often didn't, because the core of me always knew there was a better way). My grandparents use to get up early to chop wood for the stove every day. They grew and trapped most of their food, and they relied on natural remedies that they concocted themselves. I still remember being made to eat dandelion stew and cod-liver oil when we were sick...blaaagh...it was so bitter, but it worked every time! We were in good health, and so were my grandparents. My grandmother once told me about her childhood, when TB was spreading though the community, killing so many people around her...except for her household. Eventually, a doctor in the area found out that TB can be prevented with a healthy diet and good hygiene/clean water. That's why her family didn't get sick with TB, even though people who had it came in contact with them. They grew their own food and lived on their well water, so they were healthy enough to keep it at bay. Fast forward a few decades, and if any doctor says that about TB, they might risk losing their medical license because nothing that has a vaccine can be prevented by any other means than it's vaccine. Those thoughts are considered quackery. ...sigh...

So I'm sure you can understand where I'm coming from, when I say that looking at the world today, I can't help but shake my head and sigh. Everyone is on drugs for something, and oftentimes, more drugs to counter the damage that the first drugs have done. Don't get me wrong, there are times when drugs are definitely needed and life-saving...but the vast majority of drugs we take were never needed in the first place. A change in diet and/or lifestyle goes a looong way, and homeopathy usually takes care of the rest.

Every drug was made from nature, so every drug has natural counterpart that doesn't have the nasty side effects. But that's not the general consensus, at least not in the western world.

There's drugs for mental states, drugs for "just in case", drugs for minor pain, drugs to help you sleep, drugs to help you stay awake, drugs to manage symptoms...I could go on and on. You name it, and there's a drug for it. A quick fix. A cover-up. Drugs are like, a mask that you're sensitive to; Except, you don't know you're sensitive yet, so you wear it one day to cover up some ghastly pimples. The next day, the pimples are still there under the mask, but they're a little smaller, so you decide to keep wearing it, because it's working-and bonus; no one can see them! You continue to wear the mask for a while to cover those pimples, until it's been long enough that the pimples should have been gone by now, so you remove the mask...Only to reveal a horrible rash all over your face from the mask irritating your skin. You didn't even notice until you took off the mask. But now you need to keep wearing the mask because exposing the rash to the air makes it painful and risks infection. Plus, now you need some sort of cream or oil to heal the damage from the mask. Meanwhile, If the mask was never worn in the first place, the pimples would have healed on their own in a few days with good hygiene. That's how I see it; an endless cycle of side effects that could have been avoided if the mask was never worn.

I was lucky to have been with such a natural minded family at such an influential age...It later made me realize the true insanity of the normality and trust placed on drugs.

I don't see this as normal. This list shouldn't be normal, or acceptable to do. Unfortunately, many, many people do:

• Give babies children's Tylenol for teething

• Give babies 40+ doses of mix n' match meds, before they're 6, "just in case" (half of which are given by 6 months old) (In Canada)

• Give children drugs to calm them down

• Give babies medicated diaper cream for simple rashes

• Take pain meds for headaches

• Take meds when you're feeling perpetually sad

• Take meds and interventions for normal, healthy baby deliveries just to speed things up

• Take meds to sleep

• Take meds to stay awake

• Take meds to lose weight

Everything has a drug, and there's a drug for everything...even though they're constantly coming out with new ones, and none of those drugs are actually needed, or do any good. In fact, if you step out of the drug zone and really take a third party style look at it all, you'll see how sickening and borderline insane it really is.

Natural healing should be a given. It should be the go-to treatment. There's always a natural alternative:

• Teething babies can chew on cold items, use amber necklaces, or homeopathic tablets or gels if it's really bad

• Healthy babies and small toddlers are not going to be healthy after injecting 40+ doses of any drug into them. The acceptance of that being true is astronomically crazy...even without taking other ingredients and severe reactions into account.

• Children are naturally hyper. That's always been a fact of life. In my opinion, they should never be drugged to sedation...It's simply not necessary. If they are over-hyper and uncontrollable, their diet needs a major overhaul-that's the core of the problem. There's a lot of food that's portrayed as healthy, so most people agree that it's healthy, but it really isn't healthy, especially for kids...and that's a major part of the issue. It's not at all their fault, and it's our job as parents to help them heal, not mask them and make it worse over time, ignoring and continuing the cause. (This comes from experience, I had trouble like this with my first baby, more on this in a later post!)

• Coconut oil is almost always enough for diaper rashes. If not, a few drops of lavender essential oil mixed with half a cup of coconut oil takes care of the stubborn rashes. That's all I've ever used and needed with my youngest two. My oldest had medicated, over-the-counter diaper cream, which always gave him chemical rashes, but I crazily kept using the cream thinking it was all that would work.

• Pain medication for headaches? Does this work for anyone? I know when I did, it only made me cloudy, and never actually got rid of the headache. Which makes sense, because headaches aren't caused by a lack of ibuprofen or acetaminophen. Plus, I'm sure I've seen the side effect "headaches" listed on some OTC pain meds...Check out a package!

• Antidepressants have a side-effect of "suicidal thoughts". Need I say more? Exercise, or make sure you have proper vitamins. There are also homeopathic treatments that won't make you want to kill yourself...I only beat my depression after I stopped taking the meds.

• Pitocin makes labour pains a whole lot worse, making you "need" pain meds. Pain meds cause stress to your baby, and stress slows down labour. Stress also causes complications and increases the risk of needing a c-section. All of that also causes less oxygen to reach the baby, which slows the heart rate and triggers doctors to do an emergency CS because of the complications it causes. So instead of speeding up labour, it makes it longer, harder and much more traumatizing...not to mention more dangerous...when labour could have been quick and flawless if momma was left alone.

• If you want to sleep better or stay awake during the day, adjust your diet and physical activity. It's the only way to get quality sleep, which means more than more sleep. Quality over quantity, right?

• Taking any magic pill to lose weight is ridiculous. Trust me, I've been down that long, expensive, disappointing road. It's a trap, RUN! (That'll work better, anyway! He he...) If it works, once you stop taking it, (which is inevitable), you will gain it all back, and then some. The only way to lose weight is slow and steady, through diet and exercise. Actually, if you do it right, just a change in diet is all you need. Your weight is 80% diet and 20% exercise.

Image source: Flickr

All of that is based on my experiences, and I'll still be writing about most of it in detail as the inspiration hits me! The bottom line, though, is that we are too drugged up. Coming from the woods, living naturally off the land, and then coming to the city to see how "civilization" lives, actually believing that it's healthy and working, I'm appalled. To top it all off, I'm called the crazy person for saying we don't need to be on drugs all the time....it really cracks me up, though, when someone says "don't do drugs, they're bad!" and then proceeds to pop their Advil and antidepressants as per usual. I guess living in the woods as a child, I missed out on the rose-coloured glasses they were handing out to children in the cities? Good! I wouldn't have it any other way.

Don't do drugs, folks! (Or give them to your kids...)