“How Herbal Healing Became and Interest”

People: “How did you get into herbal medicine?“

Me: “I cut my achilles tendon open.“

Yeah, it was horrible.  I hate that it happened.  But it did.  I should say, actually, “someone’s bicycle cut my achilles tendon open.“…

So I had this cut into the back of my heel, parallel with the bottom of my foot, making a 1″ flap of my heel, cut straight through, that could open up like a mouth.

At the time I’d never really used herbs with any competence for healing.  I was skeptical because I was ignorant.  A willing pair of hands helped me keep the wound clean, flushed, and bandaged once or twice daily.

I refused to look at it, my constitution couldn’t handle it.

After a week of sleeping with my foot elevated, hopping around the barnyard with crutches and bucket handles clenched between my teeth, it was still as raw and bloody as the day it happened.  Thankfully no sign of infection or complication had set in, but clearly it was not healing.

A friend of mine, who is a seasoned herbalist, looked at me one day and said “This is totally ridiculous.  Sit down.”

She brought me a tub of hot water steeped heavily with comfrey leaf and well salted with epsom salt.  I had to put my foot in the hot concoction and grit my teeth for 2 hours.  I asked more than once if I could be done soaking my foot.  “No.” was her answer.

By the end of the soak my toes were curled tightly and my foot was tightly clenched.  Everything felt… stuck in that position, like I couldn’t move anything in my foot.  But it didn’t really hurt.  I didn’t fight the sensation, I just bandaged up and went home.

The next day the wound was sealed shut, no more bleeding.  2 days later I was walking on it with confidence.  I was dumbstruck- after a full week, my body had made 0% progress on healing.  In a single night of comfrey soaking, the wound had healed almost fully.

Thus my interest in learning more about the medicinal properties of herbs was born in earnest.  And a good thing, too!  Because a few months later I put a nail through that same foot and treated it confidently, comfortably, and successfully on my own with herbs.  But that’s another story…

Someone: “Why didn’t you go to a hospital?“

Me: “What would they have done?  I didn’t sever the tendon, nothing needs to be stapled, it’s clean and not infected.  And I don’t want stitches or pain meds.  There’s nothing else a doctor can do for this wound other than charge me money looking at it.“