I've always trusted in folk remedies & holistic healing methods. My experiences with modern medicine has not been good and I've been lucky enough to avoid it for most of my adult life.

One person that understands how truly important this is to me, is my mother in law, who happens to have just spent the week with us.

She is a pharmacist by trade but is very open to alternative medicine and supports my passion with gifts of holistic books from flea markets and also one of my most treasured items: This mortar and pestle, which she's had since graduating from university.

Her gentle nature and innate curiosity has made this a delightful week, sharing our knowledge of natural healing, exploring the medicinal and edible wild plants and swapping stories. The simple experience of sampling the famous sour explosion that sheep sorrel produces in the mouth and the lovely spicy kick of dandelion greens can completely shift sometimes perspective and awaken that innate connection with wild foods.

There is so much abundance in my wild flower garden all of it within a few feet of the house: chickweed, burdock, nettle, Shepard's purse, lambs quarter, wild strawberries and so much more!

Oxeye Daisy

A lot of the wild edibles we have growing in the Maritimes were introduced by early settlers. They brought these vital seeds with them when they courageously journeyed over to Canada for a chance of a new life. A lot of these plants and the centuries old knowledge in how to use them are the reason many of these settlers survived. Isn't is CRAZY that people have adopted a practice of spraying chemicals on these powerful healing plants to kill them?

Sheep Sorrel

She shared a story with me that really got me excited and I just had to share it with you: The Ukrainian Wax Pouring Ritual

In the 60's my husbands grandmother took one of her daughters to the local babka to treat her chronic fears. When the family was out foraging for berries she had run into a wheat field and unbeknown to her it was grasshopper season. Hundreds of grasshoppers started jumping up around her terrifying her. A few other incidents followed causing her to be quite an unsettled and fearful little girl.

The ritual that was performed was called: “Strakh Vylyvaty”or Wax Pouring. This is a traditional Ukranian folk ritual that means “pouring out the fear”. This is considered a magico-religious healing ceremony: combining both elements of religion and magical practices.

Many Ukrainian/Slavic old world rituals & remedies were brought over to Canada in the early 1900's. Communities of early settlers relied on this knowledge for health, not many could afford to seek a doctor so they made natural remedies, collected herbs and in some cases sought out the local healer. My husbands great grandparents were among these settlers.

The ritual is simple. The patient is placed in a chair facing East. A bowl of blessed cold water is held over their head and hot bee’s wax is poured into the water. At the same time the healer "babka" chants special prayers, blessings and incantations asking for the fear to be released from the patient into the wax and cleansed by the water. The wax cools in the water and is then turned over so any shapes formed in the wax can be divined by the healer. This process is often repeated two more times but in our families case it was done only once. At the end of the ceremony, the healer would wash patients feet and hands with the water to pull away all traces of what ailed them and then the water was discarded outside in a special location where no other person can walk and mistakenly pick this fear up.

my wax blob. To me it looks like a person carrying something very heavy.

It was believed that issues such as fear often had a spiritual source and by performing this sacred healing ceremony would rid the patient of those ailments. It was thought that once these fears are poured out of the person, they are gone for good, so the person can go on living without them.

The ritual worked. She lost her fears, and her life returned to the normal state of balance for a little girl. She became happy and joyful again.

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