Tag Archives: medicine

Natural Solutions Instead of Drugs

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I’ve never been a fan of curing all my pains with drugs, but let’s face it, I went through my fair share of Ibuprofen in my ’20’s; I’m not sure how I would have made it through some days without it! As I’ve gotten older and become a parent I’ve learned a bit about moderation – and also a bit about medicine and medicine alternatives. Especially when our little babes get sick we want to find the quickest solution to make them feel better. I’ve learned over the past 20 months or so though that some things can be done without turning to Western medicine solutions. Below are just a few of the little tricks I’ve learned along the way. The big caveat is: I’m not a doctor and sometimes you just need a doctor. Hopefully some of these things help you need a doctor a little less though.

    1. Congestion/Cold:
      1. Elderberry Syrup: This has easily become my favorite natural immunity booster. When I feel a little dryness in my nose or soreness in my throat, I take a little of this. When Ellie gets a little runny nose we give it to her in the morning. I think it’s shortened her colds and prevented a few from coming about.
      2. Eucalyptus Oil: Our midwife told us about this recently. When Ellie gets congested we put a little of this in her humidifier at night. It’s a natural cold fighter. We just did this last night and Ellie woke up a little more dried out.
      3. Home-made “tea”
        • This Korean gal I used to work with told me about a tradition of honey and lemon tea. Here is a “recipe” – it’s pretty dang easy: http://catherineboley.blogspot.com/2009/08/preparing-for-winter.html
        • I made a tea once when Ellie and were sick and I swear it worked wonders. I minced about 4 or 5 cloves of garlic, boiled water and steeped the garlic in it covered for about 30 minutes. After 30 minutes, I strained out the garlic and added a bunch of fresh lemon juice and honey. It surprisingly did not taste like shit and Ellie actually drank some of it.
      4. Elevation: put a pillow under one side of the crib mattress and lay babe down with her head on the high side
      5. Bone Broth: I haven’t tried this yet, but a local naturopath recommends a homemade bone broth. It seemed a little time consuming for me to be honest, but I bet it works great. I also wonder if picking some broth up at your local Pho restaurant would work just as well: http://www.jadeinstitute.com/jade/bone-broth-health-building.php
    2. Fever:
      1. Apple Cider Vinegar: It’s a natural fever reducer. Put a cup in a warm bath or soak a washcloth in it and put in on the forehead or the feet.
      2. Calcium Lactate: This is what your body naturally uses to fight a fever. Using a supplement will make your little one recover quicker and not be as achy during the process.
      3. Egg Whites: Soak a pair of socks in them and put on feet. You can also soak paper towels and put them in the socks
      4. Garlic: Blend fresh garlic cloves and mix with a little olive oil or coconut oil. Smear on the bottom of the feet and put socks on over. Test out a small amount first to see if your little one experiences any burning sensation.
      5. Warm baths: Once when Ellie had a fever we put her in a warm bath and her fever dropped three degrees within 5 minutes. Cold baths are not the way to go, warm baths are.
    3. Ear Pain: Garlic Mullein: I haven’t used this yet because Ellie hasn’t had any ear problems since I discovered it. Basically this stuff is supposed to be put into the ears when babies have ear infections. I would recommend trying this very early on if you are suspicious of an ear infection.
    4. Baby Probiotics: I began taking probiotics myself during this pregnancy and then found out they’re actual great for little ones as well.
      • They’re great immune boosters, which help to fight against colds, flu, strep throat and stomach bugs.
      • They’re good for the belly, so they can either keep the digestive tract balanced or help to fight off things like diarrhea, etc.
      • They also help if your child has a dairy intolerance, which can cause Eczema.
    5. Teething: Hyland’s Teething Tablets: These are a good alternative to fever reducers when children are teething. The trick is really getting the babe to take them.
    6. Colic: With our newborn, our midwife recommended Dr.Ohhira’s Probiotics to address her apparent tummy discomfort. They are gel capsules so she recommends poking a hole in them and either trying to feed to the baby on a finger or rubbing some on the nipple for consumption during feeding. Baby should have some twice a day and a capsule should last about two days or four doses. 

These are just a few of the tricks off the top of my head. I’ll continue to update this as I hear more from friends, midwives and blog posts, as I think it’s super helpful for those desperate sickness times.  Good luck braving the winter with your little ones and remember, sometimes rest is the best cure for our mommy busy bodies.

The Rocky Mountains, and that they Are!

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We planned our trip to Colorado back at the end of 2012 and we took into consideration many of the things we learned with our first traveling experience with Ellie. Yes, she can walk, so we figured a quick two hour flight wouldn’t be too bad and the fact that we were going in the opposite time zone direction would be good so she would fall asleep later and wake up later. We booked the trip with my mom and her boyfriend (Grandy) and thought we were smart to stay in Denver for a day so we could visit with our aunts and get Ellie acclimated to the altitude before going up to the mountains.

All good intentions, but unfortunately good intentions do not equal good outcomes. Tutu (my mom) and Grandy had to cancel the trip due to their impending living situation and new job. Long story, but nonetheless, we were coming to visit family, so not the end of the world. The flight was fine, Ellie was happy. We spent the next day at the aquarium with Aunt Jackie, which was a blast. Then we headed up to the mountain with Ellie. While only 3000 feet above Denver, Ellie did not acclimate to the altitude very well. 

The day after we got up there she seemed okay and the next morning we went for a snowshoe. It seemed to be all down hill from there – no pun intended. Ellie became really fussy and she developed a bit of a fever. Being the adequate parents we are, we had our baby Tylenol on us and gave Ellie a bit of that. She seemed to wax and wane, but at around 5 am she woke up with a temp above 103 and she vomited. With that, we were off to the nearest ER.

After a plethora of tests – a nasal swab, a chest x-ray – it was determined that she had altitude sickness and acute bronchitis. They put her on some oxygen and advised we keep her on it and get down to lower altitude as soon as possible. This was incredibly disappointing, since we were really looking forward to spending a lot more time with family up in Minturn. 

We got Ellie down to lower altitude yesterday and spent the entire day today in our hotel room. She seems to be doing better now, but oh my goodness, what a roller coaster ride. It is so incredibly difficult to see our baby have a difficult time getting air and not knowing when enough is enough. We were so grateful to talk through the situation with our nurses through the hotline at Ballard Pediatric. We felt so much better after that conversation. It’s just insanely unnerving to hear that our baby could start to turn blue and that’s a sign to go back to the hospital. I just want to be like “oh really, no shit!” Being a parent is so tough sometimes. But it’s so rewarding at other times and it’s always worth every minute. I’m so grateful to have such a great partner to work through these tough situations and such a trooper of a daughter. She could only be slightly more of a trooper if she didn’t try to spit out every drop of Tylenol we try to put in her body and freak out every time we put saline in her nose and suck out her boogers. We’ll take what we can get though! 

Baby Orajel = No Bueno

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Ellie’s been having some trouble sleeping lately and since it seems like she’s potentially teething, we thought we’d try Baby Orajel off a few people’s recommendations.  When we say we think she’s potentially teething, she’s been drooling like nobody’s business and gnawing on everything she can get her hands on. We had some Orajel, but it said not to use it on babies under 2 years old. When we were at Fred Meyer, we saw Baby Orajel and that it was okay for babies over four months.

Like I usually do with products like this, I started googling the ingredients. It just seems like it might not be a good idea to me to put things I can’t pronounce into my Ellie Belly’s mouth – call me crazy.  I googled all the inactive ingredients and nothing really seemed to scare me too much, some sweeteners, bonding agents, etc.  We were all clear.  One thing about the active ingredient, benzocaine, that sounded concerning to me on Wikipedia was this:

“Over-application of oral anesthetics such as benzocaine can increase the risk of pulmonary aspiration by relaxing the gag-reflex and allowing regurgitated stomach contents or oral secretions to enter the airway. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration notified healthcare professionals and patients that FDA continues to receive reports ofmethemoglobinemia, a serious and potentially fatal adverse effect, associated with benzocaine products.[8]Because it may be used in topical creams with a concentration as much as 20%, it is not difficult to administer a dose sufficient to cause this problem.”

Hmm, that sounds not so great, but when I looked on the package, there was only 7.5% benzocaine. Brian and I talked about it and only because Ellie seemed like she was in so much pain and we felt like we had tried everything else, we thought we’d give it a shot…bad idea! Brian put the ointment on her gums and she went ape. She was screaming and crying like nobody’s business. I was really concerned at this point because theoretically this product should be making my daughter feel better.

Brian was tending to Ellie and I went and googled “baby orajel crying” and came across more concerning stories from other parents. One, which sounded legitimate was found here: http://www.snopes.com/medical/drugs/orajel.asp

I went into the room to spell Brian and had him come out and read the article. After that, he thought it would be best for us to keep her up for an hour and make sure everything was fine. Everything was fine.  We automatically through the bottle away and wanted to share the information, so it’s hopefully helpful to others.