January 23, 2025 • 30 mins
When you think of UTI and herbs, you probably think of cranberry and uva ursi first. You’re not wrong to do so! They’re reliable and effective remedies. But if you stop there, though, you’ll be missing out on some herbs who can also do the job, and do it well. In this episode we outline two herbal UTI formulae we work with ourselves, and explain why and how they’re helpful.
We also take this opportunity to demonstrate our method of formulation, and show how the same actions and qualities can be achieved from different sets of plants.
Formula 1:
primary – yarrow (Achillea millefolium) flower, goldenrod (Solidago spp.) flower;
support – linden (Tilia spp.), marshmallow (Althaea off.) leaf, chamomile (Matricaria recutita)
catalyst – juniper (Juniperus spp.)
Formula 2:
primary – heather (Calluna vulgaris), calendula (Calendula off.)
support – marshmallow (Althaea off.) root, catnip (Nepeta cataria), fennel (Foeniculum vulgare)
catalyst – cedar (Thuja plicata) leaf
If you’d like to learn more about supporting your urinary system, our Urinary Health course is for you! It’s too common to neglect this system of the body – until something goes wrong. Take proactive steps to prevent UTIs and kidney stones, and learn methods to manage issues such as interstitial cystitis or incontinence. You’ll be glad you did!
And if you’d like to dig deeper into formulation, well, then our Fundamentals of Formulation course is where to go next! Learn our strategies for combining herbal actions and balancing the qualities of herbs to produce more effective remedies.
Like all our offerings, these are self-paced online video courses, which come with free access to twice-weekly live Q&A sessions with us, lifetime access to current & future course material, open discussion threads integrated in each lesson, an active student community, study guides, quizzes & capstone assignments, and more!
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Our theme music is “Wings” by Nicolai Heidlas.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Speaker 2 (00:13):
Hi, I'm Katya.
Speaker 3 (00:14):
And I'm Rinn . And
Speaker 2 (00:15):
We're here at Commonwealth Holistic
Journalism in Boston,Massachusetts,
Speaker 3 (00:19):
And on the internet everywhere. Thanks to the power
of
Speaker 2 (00:21):
The podcast , um, I just came in from taking Elsie
out to pee before we gotstarted, and my lips are still
numb. a little blue .
. Yeah. I feellike, oh , I need to very
clearly enunciate, and it'shard because my lips are numb.
, it's cold out there.
You're doing great ,
Speaker 3 (00:36):
. It is, it
is cold out there lately. Yeah.
It's , uh, it's wintertime forreal , uh, where we live and,
you know, with winter comeinfections, and we tend to
think about respiratoryinfections first and foremost.
Mm-hmm . Cold,flu covid, that's all one word
now, right?
Speaker 2 (00:52):
It's all one word.
Yeah . Yeah .
Speaker 3 (00:54):
Oh, it's cold flu covid. Yeah, we're dealing with
that. Um, but hey, guess what?
We can get infected in allkinds of places , uh, on these
human bodies. Yeah . And , uh,that includes the urinary
tracts.
Speaker 2 (01:04):
Yeah. So I'm really excited to talk about UTIs
today and specifically to talkabout, you know, like if you've
been studying herbalism, you'veprobably learned that like, oh,
if you have a UTI then likecranberry, unsweetened
cranberry juice, and Uber ursi. Listen, there's so much more
than unsweetened cranberryjuice and uber ursi , and I
(01:26):
really wanna branch out. So Iwanna talk about more herbs,
and I wanna talk aboutformulating them , um, for the
people that you're workingwith. Because listen, there are
times that you really maybedon't wanna work with Uber or c
maybe it's not appropriate fora particular situation. So ,
uh, we gotta learn more.
Speaker 3 (01:45):
Yeah. So that's what we're doing today. But first,
let's remind you that we're notdoctors. We're herbalists and
holistic health educators.
Speaker 2 (01:52):
The ideas discussed in this podcast do not
constitute medical advice. Nostate or federal authority
licenses herbalists in the us .
So these discussions are foreducational purposes only.
Speaker 3 (02:02):
We want to remind you that good health doesn't
mean the same thing foreveryone. Good health doesn't
exist as an objective standard.
It's influenced by yourindividual needs, experiences,
and goals. So keep in mindwe're not trying to present a
single dogmatic right way thatyou should adhere to.
Speaker 2 (02:19):
Everyone's body is different. So the things that
we're talking about may or maynot apply directly to you, but
we hope that they'll give yousome new information to think
about and some ideas toresearch and experiment with.
Further
Speaker 3 (02:31):
Finding your way to better health is both your
right and your own personalresponsibility. This doesn't
mean that you're alone on thejourney, and it doesn't mean
that you're to blame for yourcurrent state of health, but it
does mean that the finaldecision, when you're
considering any course ofaction, whether it was
discussed on the internet orprescribed by a physician,
that's always your choice tomake. Mm-hmm .
Yeah. Uh, and listen, if youdid choose to work with UI and
(02:54):
unsweetened cranberry juice foryour UTI, you wouldn't be
wrong.
Speaker 2 (02:58):
. Oh, no.
There's nothing wrong withthat. There's totally nothing
wrong with that. And yeah. Butit's just that , um, you know,
your knowledge doesn't have tostop there, right? You could
know more. Yeah.
Speaker 3 (03:08):
Yeah. Because there's days when you don't
have that herb, or like yousaid earlier, there's days when
that's not actually the rightchoice,
Speaker 2 (03:14):
Right? Mm-hmm . Like for
example, let's say we'reworking with someone who has a
really dry constitution, justlike super bone dry, it's gonna
be very hard for them to workwith Uber ursi , and you're
gonna be constantly trying tobalance the, the like, super
drying aspects of Uber ursiwith the fact that their
(03:37):
constitution is already superdry. Yeah . And now let's
imagine that that person has aUTI as they're just coming off
of a covid , a round of Covid.
So covid typically is likesuper dry. There's other things
that could be super dry too. Itdoesn't have to be covid. You
could have like a super drybronchitis or a su you know,
like whatever kind ofrespiratory infection that like
(03:58):
really dried you out and youhad that like super dry hacking
cough and whatever. Okay,great. But, and it's common to
get a UTI , like it's common toget other infections when you
have an infection, right? Um,so like, if you already have
the flu or something, a bunchof other pathogens are gonna
have a much easier timeknocking you down than they
(04:22):
would if you weren't alreadylike, weakened because of the
flu, right? So, so it's commonto see this kind of a pattern
where somebody gets something.
Let's say it's covid becausethat's notoriously drying, and
then like on the tail end ofit, a UTI and you're like, this
person has just spent 10 daysbeing the driest they've ever
been in their life. I can'tgive them a ton of over because
(04:44):
it's gonna like, like yeah,it'll help the UTI , but it's
not going to help their lungsat all right now. Mm-hmm .
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (04:52):
Yeah. And if you were to at that point, you
would really need to formulate,you'd be like, all right , my
formula has four partsmarshmallow, two parts
licorice, which is a lot.
Speaker 2 (05:02):
It's a lot
Speaker 3 (05:02):
Actually. Yeah .
and then, and then onepart UVA sy and that should be
tolerable, but , uh, flavor'sgonna be an issue for some
folks, and it gonna be prettyweird, you know, there's,
there's limitations.
Speaker 2 (05:13):
So also, also to just be clear here, you don't
have to put, like, you couldhave the u earthy separate from
the moistening stuff. Sure,yeah. And like marshmallow and
Uber cy together get a littleweird because we get like super
AST stringency and super ul,and then there's like just some
weirdness there, so Okay, fine.
Okay. You could do, if we werein that situation, we were
(05:33):
gonna work with Uber , I would probably
do something like a whole quartof marshmallow. Hmm . And like
maybe some cinnamon orsomething just to give it a
little nice flavor. Yeah. Andthen like uva by
the shot glass . So like every30 minutes a shot glass of uva
, earth ursi all by itself, andthen the whole rest of the half
hour a quart of marshmallow.
(05:55):
Mm-hmm .
Speaker 3 (05:55):
Yeah. This is like an adoption of the Ella
campaign strategy. Yes.for the Yeah. Yeah, yeah. I see
it. I see it. That's cool.
Yeah. Nice. But listen, again,sometimes we can solve these
problems, the , the urinarytract infection, and we don't
even need to call on Uber orsee Mm . You know, it's, we
can, we can work with otherplants. So we , we've put
together , uh, a couple offormulae here , uh, which
(06:18):
neither include cranberryjuice, nor nor uva ursi leaf .
Mm . Um, but are still going togonna make a, a really solid
dent in that UTI chase it awayand help you feeling more
comfortable . Yeah .
Speaker 2 (06:32):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (06:32):
Yeah. So the first one , uh, we'll say all the
herbs in it and then we'll kindof dissect what's going on
here. Right. We've got yaro andespecially if, if you can yaro
flour preferentially.
Speaker 2 (06:45):
Yeah, it does really, I feel it does really
make a difference to have theyaro flour , because you're
gonna get much more of thearomatic profile. And as we
talk about this whole formula,we're gonna talk about those
aromatics. So if you don't, the, but the thing is that you
can't buy yaro flour. You can,or , or I don't know anyone who
(07:06):
sells it. You can buy yaro ,but it'll be mostly leaf and a
little bit of mm-hmm . Um, and so this
means that you need to grow itin order to have yaro flour in
quantity. The flip side of thatis yaro is pretty easy to grow.
So if you don't already growyaro , even if you don't have a
garden, but if you have a yard,if you have, neither of those
(07:27):
buckets will work. Um, go aheadright now. 'cause it's like tis
the season for buying seeds.
Buy yourself some yaro seeds ,um, and plan to plant that this
year. Yeah.
Speaker 3 (07:38):
It's so nice to be able to harvest your own. Hmm .
Um, and honestly, when it comesto golden rod as well, that's
another one where we reallylove to harvest our own,
because we can preferentiallygather the flowers just at the
right moment. Like, they're notfully open yet. They're
beautiful, they're super gold,but they're about to open. You
grab 'em in that moment, youget 'em right into the
dehydrator, and they dehydrate.
(07:59):
Beautiful. Yeah. Beautiful. Soeffective. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (08:03):
And also you can buy golden rod and commerce, but
it'll be mostly leaf. Right? Inthis case, we really want the
flour because it is higher inthe volatile oil content. The
leaves are not bad. They'regreat, but they're higher in
the bitter constituents. Mm-hmm.
Speaker 3 (08:17):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (08:18):
Um, yeah . Yeah.
Okay. So yarrow flour , goldenrod . Mm-hmm.
Speaker 3 (08:23):
And then linden and marshmallow and chamomile , and
then juniper. And so you canlook at this formula. One of
the ways that we structureformulas is we've got, like our
primary, they're doing the, theheavy lifting, the major work,
the primary job. Uh, so yaroand golden rot are doing that
here. And then we've gotsupport herbs, and they're
(08:45):
often softening the formula,making it more palatable,
making it a little gentler onsome potentially irritable
mucus membranes, for instance.
Mm-hmm . Andthat's a big part of what our
demulcent herbs in thisparticular blend are doing. And
then in the third position, youhave the catalyst, and that's
often strong and active andmoving and , um, and has a lot
(09:06):
of, lot of oomph to it. Andjuniper's playing that role
here.
Speaker 2 (09:09):
Just a reminder, sometimes the oomph that you
need is relaxation. Right?
Right. Sometimes you needrelaxation, like it's a two by
four and you know, to , youknow, wax somebody, you know,
metaphorically. Uh, and so whenwe talk about catalyst as like
(09:30):
the mover, the power, the like,whatever, just remember that,
that don't be thinking, oh,well only strong stabby hot ,
like intense thing . Becauserelaxation can be intense. You
can have intense relaxation,you can have strong relaxation,
you can have really catalyzingrelaxation. So just, just
(09:51):
remember that that is also inthis category. Yeah. We're not
gonna exhibit that in these twoformulas.
Speaker 3 (09:57):
. Yeah . In
this , in this, in this
particular case , actually,both of these, yeah. Yeah. So
like the juniper. Juniper isagain, aromatic rich plant,
really strong. Right. You canget the juniper berries here,
and if you have some, if youhaven't already, then you know,
grab one and just chew on itand feel the flood of the
aromatics in your mouth. It'llmake you salivate. You'll feel
(10:19):
the fumes kind of rising upinto your sinuses. It should
feel pleasant, I hope, but , yeah . Yeah .
Speaker 2 (10:24):
That sounded a little weird, but it's actually
quite nice. Yeah, yeah, yeah ,
Speaker 3 (10:27):
Yeah. Yeah . But it's, it's powerful stuff. And
you know, with juniper and alsowith the yaro and the golden
rod , all these aromaticcompounds, we keep using that
word aromatic because you cansmell them, right? Mm-hmm
. And what doesthat mean? Well, it means that
they float on the air and theyreach your nose. Uh, that's
true. If you just open the jaror sniff the flour , it's true.
(10:48):
If you chew the berry, it'strue. When you pour hot water
on them and make your tea,there's a big flood of scent
that comes up to you. Mm-hmm . So those are
also small molecules. They needto be small in order to float
on the air like that. And thatmeans that they can move
through your body easily. Theycan move through the mucus
membranes, they can movethrough the digestive
(11:10):
membranes, they can get intothe blood circulation. They can
zip all around your body, andyour body will ultimately
eliminate them. And where doesit do that? The kidneys
the urinary system, which iswhere your infection was. And
hey, guess what? Thesecompounds can also kill
infections. Mm-hmm . Oh , it's all
coming together.
Speaker 2 (11:29):
Yeah. Really, when we're talking about volatile
oils, like volatile components,these are almost always super
antimicrobial. If a plant hasantimicrobial action, there are
other constituents that are notvolatile oils that can provide
that. But most commonly youwill see that that is also a
(11:52):
plant that has a, a highfraction of volatile oil
content. Hmm . Um, so that isthe case with the yarro flower
and the golden rod, and alsothe juniper here. Um, and this
is also why I really want thoseflowers, because, because yarro
as a plant, golden rod as aplant, these are plants that
have high volatile oil contentin general, but then within the
(12:17):
plant specifically, the flowershold more of that content than
the leaves do , right?
Speaker 3 (12:23):
Yeah. Yeah. So, all right .
Speaker 2 (12:27):
So, so yeah. So that primary position there is
getting the antiseptic actionto the place we need it. It
doesn't matter if you drink it,that does not help your UTI .
What matters is, does it get tothe actual kidneys and bladder
and tubes? And, and so if youare drinking something that has
(12:50):
constituents in it that do notget to that location, then it's
not going to help the UTI . Butin this case, these volatile
oils are going to be eliminatedfrom the body through the
kidneys, through the urinarytracts, and, and be removed
from the body in the urine. Um,and then also bonus, both of
these have diuretic action,right? So they're also doing
(13:11):
some stimulation in the kidneyskind of saying, Hey, you know,
I think we should pee rightnow. That seems like a great
idea.
Speaker 3 (13:18):
Yeah, yeah. Sort of general approach to the, the
UTI is, we want to kill somemicrobes and we wanna flush 'em
out as much as we can. Mm-hmm . So this is not
something that we would adviseyou to prepare as a tincture
blend and just take squirts oftincture and not drink any
fluid all day long. Right,right, right, right, right. Or
to like, mix powders of all ofthese and just take them by the
(13:38):
spoonful and not have anymoisture in your day. That
would be weird. Yeah. But alsonot very effective. Um, we want
to, we wanna flood the system,
Speaker 2 (13:47):
Right ? Yeah , yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah . So just
quartz of this. Yeah . Mm-hmm .
Speaker 3 (13:50):
Yeah. So let's not leave out though the linden the
marshmallow, the chamomile ,because they're really
important to this formula. Youknow, it is possible to
irritate your kidneys if you,if you go hard and heavy, if
you were to be like, I'm justgonna take juniper and I'm
gonna make the strongestpossible preparation of this, I
can and drink that all daylong, you might feel more
(14:12):
irritation. Mm-hmm . In your
urethra, you might feel alittle extra braininess going
on. 'cause that's a very fieryhot herb there. Um, and that'll
irritate. But Linden,marshmallow, even Kamile , they
offer things that are soothingto those irritated mucus
membranes. Part of thediscomfort is that your body's
(14:33):
reacting to the infection. It'sreacting with inflammation, but
inflammation in your, yoururethra isn't super pleasant.
, You know? Yeah . So wecan combine these elements that
are soothing to that, that arecalming the inflammation, and
that are also improving theintegrity of those mucus
membranes. You know, when a,when a mucus membrane is
(14:54):
inflamed for a long time, it's,it's functions get compromised.
Like you can feel that easierin your sinuses. You have a
runny nose , uh, or a sinusinfection. It starts out sticky
and thick. You blow your nose alot after several days of this,
the mucosa have been inflamedand irritated for a while . Now
they get permeable. And nowit's just like watery
(15:16):
grippiness .
Speaker 2 (15:16):
And, and also like, you feel the kind of stabby
hotness, they're extrasensitive in there. They're
just like really sensitive.
Yeah. Yeah .
Speaker 3 (15:22):
Right, right. So when it's a UTI , same
situations going on in thesemucosa, and they, they could
use some love. So themarshmallow, the lindon,
they're giving that love.
Speaker 2 (15:33):
Yeah. Yeah. Also , um, marshmallow, Lyndon and
chamomile , they all have , um,like on the nervous system, a
soothing action as well. Andwhen you have a UTI that
irritability does not just stayin the urethra, like your
nerves are also irritated,you're all of you, like
(15:54):
emotionally, you're irritatedtoo. You know, we don't always
give UTIs enough credit.
They're real infections.
They're serious. Um, and justlike, you know, if you have a ,
a respiratory infection, you'rerunning a fever, you're, you
know, like whatever, you stayhome from work, you stay home
from school. Right. But nobodyreally stays home for UTI, but
I, I really just wanna advocatefor that. Mm-hmm
(16:16):
. It , it's a real infection.
And so all the stuff about,like, all the nervous system
components of that besides thepain, right. Like that's,
that's like a whole separateissue. Right. It just, it
hurts.
Speaker 3 (16:26):
Yeah. Plus pain, pain leads to fatigue, you
know? Yeah. Like when it'sthere all day is constant, like
it's irritated, it'suncomfortable. I can't quite
find a good way to sit
Speaker 2 (16:37):
, you know ,
Speaker 3 (16:38):
Like that wears on you, that drags your energy
down. Yeah . Um, and your bodygenerating the immune response
to combat it takes energy,takes resources. Yeah. So, you
know, sleep is the secretingredient in all of these
formula.
Speaker 2 (16:54):
. Yeah. It's
really true. Mm-hmm
. But at anyrate, yeah. I, I did , I do
wanna, like, the mucus membraneactions of these three ly and
marshmallow chamomile are, aresuper important, critically
important, but I don't wannadiscount the nervous system
actions too , because that's,that is a huge part of helping
somebody just get through thiswhole experience. Mm . With
(17:16):
less misery, . Yeah.
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (17:18):
Flavor wise , this formula, because of the juniper
in particular, you're gonnahave a little bit of a hint of
a gin sort of a situation.
Mm-hmm. Right?
The, the juniper is thedominant taste that comes
through there. And then likethe flowery yarro golden rod
combo, the chamomile , likewith its own sweeter type of
(17:39):
floral flavor and smell to it.
Speaker 2 (17:41):
And lynden too, a little on the , on the sweeter
side. Mm-hmm .
Yeah. The juniper, you know,you , you don't need very much.
Like if you're making a wholequart of tea mm , five or 10 of
the little berries, you don'treally need more than that.
Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 3 (17:56):
Yeah. That'll do
Speaker 2 (17:57):
It. And if you're feeling super irritable or if
you have compromised kidneyhealth to begin with mm-hmm .
Um , maybe you have a UTI andalso you have some kind of like
low grade chronic kidneyinflammation going on. Oh, then
maybe leave the juniper out forthis, for this formula.
Speaker 3 (18:19):
Yeah, we probably would. All right . The next
one.
Speaker 2 (18:23):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (18:25):
All right . So in this one we're gonna combine
Heather Calendula marshmallow'sgonna reappear here alongside
catnip and fennel, and thenCedar, Cedar , in this case,
we're thinking of cedar leaf.
Yeah. Um, and by the way, whenwe say cedar, we're ,
we're thinking of Fuji Plata .
(18:46):
Um, yes. Because the word cedarcan be used for tja species and
cedrus species, and a couple ofothers as well. So if we say
cedar and for our PO heretoday, we mean Fuji Plata .
Mm-hmm .
Speaker 2 (18:57):
Yeah. And so what you , what you normally get
with the cedar is like the, thetips like the last oh 3, 6, 8
inches of the, of the branch,just the like delicate twiggy
part and then the mm-hmm . Scaly leaves.
Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 3 (19:15):
Uh, so we actually tend to think of heather and
cedar right next to each other.
Yeah. And this is probably justbecause of our history with the
plants. And when we started toreally dive into both of them,
it was at the same time. And wewere like, well, let's put 'em
in the same tea . And turns outthey taste amazing together.
Speaker 2 (19:33):
They're so good, so good . They're so good
together. Yeah. Um, and soalthough we are assigning
cedar, that catalyst positionhere , um, in terms of
quantity, normally the catalystyou don't need as much, but in
terms of quantity , um, therewas quite a bit of cedar and
heather, like they were sort ofequal parts, Cedar and Heather.
(19:54):
Yeah. Um, and flavor wisethat's awesome. But urinary
wise , that's awesome too .
First off, super diuretic, youare going to pee. Yeah.
and , um, and we've gotthose volatiles there. Uh , so
we've got the antimicrobialaction and we've got the
diuretic action, and so Yeah.
(20:15):
Quartz of this and you, you'rereally well served . Yeah.
Speaker 3 (20:19):
Yeah. You know, action wise or formulation wise
, it's like Heather andCalendula are playing the major
role. Cedars that catalyst,marshmallow, catnip and fennel
are in that support, supportrole there. Um, and they, we
can divide them by actions hereas well, right? Like Heather
and Calendula. Heather's veryinteresting. Heather is both an
aromatic with some kidneyaffinity. It's got the diuretic
(20:40):
quality, but Heather is also alymphatic herb. Hmm . And like,
as a general rule, neverneglect your lymphatics when
there's an infection going onmm-hmm . There.
It's critically important tokeep that lymph circulating. So
this is a formula where we'repaying attention to more than
one fluid Yes . Of thebody. Yep .
Speaker 2 (21:00):
Um, and then when we get into that support position,
the, oh, you know, wait, wedidn't talk much about
calendula beyond the , um,lymphatic action. Right. But
Calendula also has a vulneraryaction for the mucus membranes.
Right. So we're back in thatplace again. And that's like
crossing over, really. Wecould, we could have like an
(21:22):
herbalism debate about how tobreak up the actions in this
formula. Yeah. Because thecalendula and the marshmallow
are functioning together withthat mucus membrane soothing
action. Um, so there's likejust a lot of piggybacking
going on,
Speaker 3 (21:37):
And there's, there's the , um, the affinity driver
quality of this formula aswell. So that is like calendula
is when you take it by itself,or say if you take it in a
formula with like ginger andum, and chamomile , then your
focus is on the digestivetracts. But here we've got
calendula alongside Cedar andHeather, and they're like,
(21:59):
we're going to the urinarysystem, you're coming with us,
Speaker 2 (22:02):
, ,
you know , so ,
Speaker 3 (22:04):
Uh, so they're, they're bringing calendula
along with them to that systemspecifically. Mm-hmm
Speaker 2 (22:10):
. You
know, and marshmallow has a lot
of urinary affinity as well.
Right. We, again, like if youare just starting learning
embolism, or if you've beenlearning for a while , you're
like maybe at an intermediatelevel, then you probably don't
think of marshmallow as aurinary system herb. Um, you're
probably thinking about it aslike a digestive herb and a
(22:31):
respiratory herb, and maybe youlearned it as a topical herb,
which Yes. Um , but you may nothave learned it as a urinary
system herb, but it has a lotof affinity for the urinary
tract and , um, a lot ofimportance too, especially if
we got into kidney stones, butwe're not doing that today.
We're sticking with UTIs, .
Speaker 3 (22:50):
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah .
Because , you know, the herbis, is acting on a tissue type.
It's not like, oh, I am , I'monly interested in these
particular organs of, of therespiratory system or the
digestive system. Mm-hmm . It's interested
in the tissue type, the mucosaand your , all your tubes are
line with those .
Right, right , right. So thatincludes the bladder, the
urethra, ureter . Mm-hmm
Speaker 2 (23:10):
.
Yeah. Yeah. Okay. So catnip andphenyl in this particular
formula , um, you might look atthat and be like, what, what
are they doing there? What dothey have to do with the
urinary system?
Speaker 3 (23:22):
Or you might know those herbs and be like, well,
they taste good. That's gottabe it. Right? Yeah. They taste
good.
Speaker 2 (23:26):
Yeah. And ,
Speaker 3 (23:27):
And look, taste, taste matters. Taste
Speaker 2 (23:28):
Matters. Especially
Speaker 3 (23:29):
When, I'm sorry just No, go
Speaker 2 (23:30):
Ahead. Speaking over
Speaker 3 (23:31):
You do it . Do it .
Right . But especially whenit's like you need to drink
three quarts of this today,
Speaker 2 (23:37):
Speaker 3 (23:38):
Taste matters.
Speaker 2 (23:40):
Yeah. Seriously.
Yeah. If it tastes disgusting,you're not going to do it.
Mm-hmm .
Fortunately in this formula, Ipersonally am not a huge fan of
the flavor of calendula, butmany people are. Um, but really
kinda everything in thisformula is non objectionable.
Like, it , it tastes prettyfine. Um, but still, you know,
(24:03):
we , we do really wanna makesure that you're tailoring
something for , for the personwho's gonna drink it and make
sure that it tastes good tothem. Mm-hmm .
But I don't want catnip andfunnel to just sit in there as
like, oh, well they taste good.
They're just taking up space.
You know, they're just, becausecatnip also has a really good
(24:23):
volatile oil profile. Andagain, those volatile oils are
the antimicrobial aspect. Plusit's very relaxing to the
nervous system, very settlingto the stomach. Um, a lot of
people when they're sick, evenif what they're sick with has
nothing to do with digestivehealth, they'll still get an
upset stomach just becausethat's how their body goes.
(24:44):
Mm-hmm. Um, so ifthat's the case, this is gonna
cover that too.
Speaker 3 (24:48):
Yeah. I mean, one way to look at that is , um, if
you, if you have some , uh,persistent trouble in
digestion, it's got aninflammatory component to it.
There's irritation there whenyou get sick, your body's
amping up inflammation to fightthe sickness, right ? Mm-hmm
. That's whereyour immune defenses are
activated by, but that's alsogonna take existing
(25:10):
inflammation and dial that up alittle bit. So you're like low
grade stomach trouble that youusually manage by having ginger
tablets and chamomile t and allof that. Yeah . Well now it's a
little higher than it normallyis, and so getting these like
calming, relaxing, soothingherbs into there mm-hmm . Is
very beneficial. Mm-hmm .
Speaker 2 (25:29):
Yeah . And then the same with the fennel, just
bringing in a little moisture.
I mean, okay, it's bringing inthe good flavor. Um, it also
has volatile oil constituents,but it's also bringing in some
moisture, bringing in somesoothing action as well, so you
can make something taste goodwith herbs that also serve your
purpose. Mm-hmm .
(25:49):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (25:50):
Alright . So , uh, you could remix these ,
you could , you could combineall of these herbs together
into one, one massive formula.
That would be fine. Um, youcould say, well, I really wanna
emphasize this aspect in termsof taste, or I want to make
sure I get a strongerpresentation of fiery
aromatics, and so I boost upthis and that herb in here.
(26:12):
That's all fine. Formulas arealways flexible, at least in
our opinion, , thatthey're , there's something
you, you start out with andthen you adjust as you go. Yeah
. You say, oh, I want to makethe same basic thing, but
increase the proportion of thisherb and decrease that one, or
swap out this one for anotherherb with similar actions and,
and, and qualities and so on.
Speaker 2 (26:32):
Which actually this is, if you look at it like
these, actually these are thesame formula. These are two
formulas that are actually thesame formula. Mm-hmm
. Um, andespecially if you consider that
the first formula , um,marshmallow, I, I am actually
specifying the leaf in thatparticular situation. Maybe
(26:52):
that formula was for somebodywho doesn't need quite as much
moist action, but then thesecond, second formula it was
specifying the root. And maybethat's for somebody who needs a
lot more moistening action. Um,then you can really say like,
look, there's nothing repeatedin these two formulas, and yet
they are the same formula withthe same collection of actions.
(27:15):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (27:16):
Yeah. That's the way to think about, about herbalism
really, is what are we tryingto accomplish rather than what
herb cures UTI, right?
Speaker 2 (27:24):
, okay .
Yeah. What job are we trying todo and who can help me get that
done? Nice. Yeah. When youthink that way, then you never
have to worry, oh no, I'm outof stock. I suddenly cannot
function as an herbalist. Like,nope , there's another herb who
will do the job. Just thinkabout the action that you need
(27:44):
and who you know, can do it.
Yes. Nice . Yeah. Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 3 (27:49):
All right . Well if this particular topic is of
great interest to you , um,then we encourage you to check
out our urinary health course.
Uh, like all of our courses,it's primarily through video
content, but you can also getthe audio and put that on your
phone, take a walk and learnabout kidney stones as you
, as you stroll throughthe forest. Um , , yes.
(28:10):
Yes. Like all of our courses,it also comes with access to
our student community. Uh,there's discussion threads
integrated in every lesson. Soyou can be watching a , a
lesson, ask your question, geta response within a day. Mm-hmm
. Um, we've gotPDFs, we've got quizzes for
you, we've got all kinds ofgreat stuff in these
Speaker 2 (28:27):
Courses. Yeah . We try really hard in all of our
courses to accommodate as manydifferent learning style types
as possible so that you canpick the style of resource
that's going to work best foryou to help you get that
knowledge into your brain.
Because listen, who has a lotof time to just sit and study
flashcards? It's a boring, andb, not actually the best way to
(28:48):
learn. So we try to just havelots of resources that you can
just select the one that feelsmost comfortable for you to
learn with. Yeah. Yeah. Uh,hey, I wanted to also put a
plug in for the formulationcourse. Yeah. Because yes,
we're talking about UTIs here,but we're also talking about
the structure of formulationand like strategies of
(29:10):
formulation. And hey, we have acourse for that. Um, so Rin
will put both of those linksinto the show notes for you so
that you can check them out.
And if you have questions, youknow, you can always email us.
We are atinfo@commonwealthherbs.com and
we would love to talk to you.
We would love to help you getwhat you need so that you
(29:32):
become the herbalist that youwanna be. So reach out, we're
here.
Speaker 3 (29:37):
All right everybody.
That's it for us today. We'llhave some more holistic
herbalism podcasts for you. Yousoon. Until then, take care of
yourselves, take care of eachother, drink some tea, drink
some tea, drink some cranberryjuice as well,, and ,
uh, take care of your urethra,please . Bye bye .
Speaker 2 (00:13):
Hi, I'm Katya.
Speaker 3 (00:14):
And I'm Rinn . And
Speaker 2 (00:15):
We're here at Commonwealth Holistic
Journalism in Boston,Massachusetts,
Speaker 3 (00:19):
And on the internet everywhere. Thanks to the power
of
Speaker 2 (00:21):
The podcast , um, I just came in from taking Elsie
out to pee before we gotstarted, and my lips are still
numb.
clearly enunciate, and it'shard because my lips are numb.
You're doing great ,
Speaker 3 (00:36):
It's , uh, it's wintertime forreal , uh, where we live and,
you know, with winter comeinfections, and we tend to
think about respiratoryinfections first and foremost.
Mm-hmm
now, right?
Speaker 2 (00:52):
It's all one word.
Yeah . Yeah .
Speaker 3 (00:54):
Oh, it's cold flu covid. Yeah, we're dealing with
that. Um, but hey, guess what?
We can get infected in allkinds of places , uh, on these
human bodies. Yeah . And , uh,that includes the urinary
tracts.
Speaker 2 (01:04):
Yeah. So I'm really excited to talk about UTIs
today and specifically to talkabout, you know, like if you've
been studying herbalism, you'veprobably learned that like, oh,
if you have a UTI then likecranberry, unsweetened
cranberry juice, and Uber ursi. Listen, there's so much more
than unsweetened cranberryjuice and uber ursi , and I
(01:26):
really wanna branch out. So Iwanna talk about more herbs,
and I wanna talk aboutformulating them , um, for the
people that you're workingwith. Because listen, there are
times that you really maybedon't wanna work with Uber or c
maybe it's not appropriate fora particular situation. So ,
uh, we gotta learn more.
Speaker 3 (01:45):
Yeah. So that's what we're doing today. But first,
let's remind you that we're notdoctors. We're herbalists and
holistic health educators.
Speaker 2 (01:52):
The ideas discussed in this podcast do not
constitute medical advice. Nostate or federal authority
licenses herbalists in the us .
So these discussions are foreducational purposes only.
Speaker 3 (02:02):
We want to remind you that good health doesn't
mean the same thing foreveryone. Good health doesn't
exist as an objective standard.
It's influenced by yourindividual needs, experiences,
and goals. So keep in mindwe're not trying to present a
single dogmatic right way thatyou should adhere to.
Speaker 2 (02:19):
Everyone's body is different. So the things that
we're talking about may or maynot apply directly to you, but
we hope that they'll give yousome new information to think
about and some ideas toresearch and experiment with.
Further
Speaker 3 (02:31):
Finding your way to better health is both your
right and your own personalresponsibility. This doesn't
mean that you're alone on thejourney, and it doesn't mean
that you're to blame for yourcurrent state of health, but it
does mean that the finaldecision, when you're
considering any course ofaction, whether it was
discussed on the internet orprescribed by a physician,
that's always your choice tomake. Mm-hmm
Yeah. Uh, and listen, if youdid choose to work with UI and
(02:54):
unsweetened cranberry juice foryour UTI, you wouldn't be
wrong.
Speaker 2 (02:58):
There's nothing wrong withthat. There's totally nothing
wrong with that. And yeah. Butit's just that , um, you know,
your knowledge doesn't have tostop there, right? You could
know more. Yeah.
Speaker 3 (03:08):
Yeah. Because there's days when you don't
have that herb, or like yousaid earlier, there's days when
that's not actually the rightchoice,
Speaker 2 (03:14):
Right? Mm-hmm
example, let's say we'reworking with someone who has a
really dry constitution, justlike super bone dry, it's gonna
be very hard for them to workwith Uber ursi , and you're
gonna be constantly trying tobalance the, the like, super
drying aspects of Uber ursiwith the fact that their
(03:37):
constitution is already superdry. Yeah . And now let's
imagine that that person has aUTI as they're just coming off
of a covid , a round of Covid.
So covid typically is likesuper dry. There's other things
that could be super dry too. Itdoesn't have to be covid. You
could have like a super drybronchitis or a su you know,
like whatever kind ofrespiratory infection that like
(03:58):
really dried you out and youhad that like super dry hacking
cough and whatever. Okay,great. But, and it's common to
get a UTI , like it's common toget other infections when you
have an infection, right? Um,so like, if you already have
the flu or something, a bunchof other pathogens are gonna
have a much easier timeknocking you down than they
(04:22):
would if you weren't alreadylike, weakened because of the
flu, right? So, so it's commonto see this kind of a pattern
where somebody gets something.
Let's say it's covid becausethat's notoriously drying, and
then like on the tail end ofit, a UTI and you're like, this
person has just spent 10 daysbeing the driest they've ever
been in their life. I can'tgive them a ton of over because
(04:44):
it's gonna like, like yeah,it'll help the UTI , but it's
not going to help their lungsat all right now. Mm-hmm .
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (04:52):
Yeah. And if you were to at that point, you
would really need to formulate,you'd be like, all right , my
formula has four partsmarshmallow, two parts
licorice, which is a lot.
Speaker 2 (05:02):
It's a lot
Speaker 3 (05:02):
Actually. Yeah .
tolerable, but , uh, flavor'sgonna be an issue for some
folks, and it gonna be prettyweird, you know, there's,
there's limitations.
Speaker 2 (05:13):
So also, also to just be clear here, you don't
have to put, like, you couldhave the u earthy separate from
the moistening stuff. Sure,yeah. And like marshmallow and
Uber cy together get a littleweird because we get like super
AST stringency and super ul,and then there's like just some
weirdness there, so Okay, fine.
Okay. You could do, if we werein that situation, we were
(05:33):
gonna work with Uber
do something like a whole quartof marshmallow. Hmm . And like
maybe some cinnamon orsomething just to give it a
little nice flavor. Yeah. Andthen like uva
the shot glass . So like every30 minutes a shot glass of uva
, earth ursi all by itself, andthen the whole rest of the half
hour a quart of marshmallow.
(05:55):
Mm-hmm .
Speaker 3 (05:55):
Yeah. This is like an adoption of the Ella
campaign strategy. Yes.
it. I see it. That's cool.
Yeah. Nice. But listen, again,sometimes we can solve these
problems, the , the urinarytract infection, and we don't
even need to call on Uber orsee Mm . You know, it's, we
can, we can work with otherplants. So we , we've put
together , uh, a couple offormulae here , uh, which
(06:18):
neither include cranberryjuice, nor nor uva ursi leaf .
Mm . Um, but are still going togonna make a, a really solid
dent in that UTI chase it awayand help you feeling more
comfortable
Speaker 2 (06:32):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (06:32):
Yeah. So the first one , uh, we'll say all the
herbs in it and then we'll kindof dissect what's going on
here. Right. We've got yaro andespecially if, if you can yaro
flour preferentially.
Speaker 2 (06:45):
Yeah, it does really, I feel it does really
make a difference to have theyaro flour , because you're
gonna get much more of thearomatic profile. And as we
talk about this whole formula,we're gonna talk about those
aromatics. So if you don't, the, but the thing is that you
can't buy yaro flour. You can,or , or I don't know anyone who
(07:06):
sells it. You can buy yaro ,but it'll be mostly leaf and a
little bit of mm-hmm
means that you need to grow itin order to have yaro flour in
quantity. The flip side of thatis yaro is pretty easy to grow.
So if you don't already growyaro , even if you don't have a
garden, but if you have a yard,if you have, neither of those
(07:27):
buckets will work. Um, go aheadright now. 'cause it's like tis
the season for buying seeds.
Buy yourself some yaro seeds ,um, and plan to plant that this
year. Yeah.
Speaker 3 (07:38):
It's so nice to be able to harvest your own. Hmm .
Um, and honestly, when it comesto golden rod as well, that's
another one where we reallylove to harvest our own,
because we can preferentiallygather the flowers just at the
right moment. Like, they're notfully open yet. They're
beautiful, they're super gold,but they're about to open. You
grab 'em in that moment, youget 'em right into the
dehydrator, and they dehydrate.
(07:59):
Beautiful. Yeah. Beautiful. Soeffective. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (08:03):
And also you can buy golden rod and commerce, but
it'll be mostly leaf. Right? Inthis case, we really want the
flour because it is higher inthe volatile oil content. The
leaves are not bad. They'regreat, but they're higher in
the bitter constituents. Mm-hmm.
Speaker 3 (08:17):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (08:18):
Um, yeah . Yeah.
Okay. So yarrow flour , goldenrod . Mm-hmm
Speaker 3 (08:23):
And then linden and marshmallow and chamomile , and
then juniper. And so you canlook at this formula. One of
the ways that we structureformulas is we've got, like our
primary, they're doing the, theheavy lifting, the major work,
the primary job. Uh, so yaroand golden rot are doing that
here. And then we've gotsupport herbs, and they're
(08:45):
often softening the formula,making it more palatable,
making it a little gentler onsome potentially irritable
mucus membranes, for instance.
Mm-hmm
demulcent herbs in thisparticular blend are doing. And
then in the third position, youhave the catalyst, and that's
often strong and active andmoving and , um, and has a lot
(09:06):
of, lot of oomph to it. Andjuniper's playing that role
here.
Speaker 2 (09:09):
Just a reminder, sometimes the oomph that you
need is relaxation. Right?
Right. Sometimes you needrelaxation, like it's a two by
four and you know, to , youknow, wax somebody, you know,
metaphorically. Uh, and so whenwe talk about catalyst as like
(09:30):
the mover, the power, the like,whatever, just remember that,
that don't be thinking, oh,well only strong stabby hot ,
like intense thing . Becauserelaxation can be intense. You
can have intense relaxation,you can have strong relaxation,
you can have really catalyzingrelaxation. So just, just
(09:51):
remember that that is also inthis category. Yeah. We're not
gonna exhibit that in these twoformulas.
Speaker 3 (09:57):
particular case , actually,both of these, yeah. Yeah. So
like the juniper. Juniper isagain, aromatic rich plant,
really strong. Right. You canget the juniper berries here,
and if you have some, if youhaven't already, then you know,
grab one and just chew on itand feel the flood of the
aromatics in your mouth. It'llmake you salivate. You'll feel
(10:19):
the fumes kind of rising upinto your sinuses. It should
feel pleasant, I hope, but
Speaker 2 (10:24):
That sounded a little weird, but it's actually
quite nice. Yeah, yeah, yeah ,
Speaker 3 (10:27):
Yeah. Yeah . But it's, it's powerful stuff. And
you know, with juniper and alsowith the yaro and the golden
rod , all these aromaticcompounds, we keep using that
word aromatic because you cansmell them, right? Mm-hmm
they float on the air and theyreach your nose. Uh, that's
true. If you just open the jaror sniff the flour , it's true.
(10:48):
If you chew the berry, it'strue. When you pour hot water
on them and make your tea,there's a big flood of scent
that comes up to you. Mm-hmm
also small molecules. They needto be small in order to float
on the air like that. And thatmeans that they can move
through your body easily. Theycan move through the mucus
membranes, they can movethrough the digestive
(11:10):
membranes, they can get intothe blood circulation. They can
zip all around your body, andyour body will ultimately
eliminate them. And where doesit do that? The kidneys
the urinary system, which iswhere your infection was. And
hey, guess what? Thesecompounds can also kill
infections. Mm-hmm
coming together.
Speaker 2 (11:29):
Yeah. Really, when we're talking about volatile
oils, like volatile components,these are almost always super
antimicrobial. If a plant hasantimicrobial action, there are
other constituents that are notvolatile oils that can provide
that. But most commonly youwill see that that is also a
(11:52):
plant that has a, a highfraction of volatile oil
content. Hmm . Um, so that isthe case with the yarro flower
and the golden rod, and alsothe juniper here. Um, and this
is also why I really want thoseflowers, because, because yarro
as a plant, golden rod as aplant, these are plants that
have high volatile oil contentin general, but then within the
(12:17):
plant specifically, the flowershold more of that content than
the leaves do , right?
Speaker 3 (12:23):
Yeah. Yeah. So, all right .
Speaker 2 (12:27):
So, so yeah. So that primary position there is
getting the antiseptic actionto the place we need it. It
doesn't matter if you drink it,that does not help your UTI .
What matters is, does it get tothe actual kidneys and bladder
and tubes? And, and so if youare drinking something that has
(12:50):
constituents in it that do notget to that location, then it's
not going to help the UTI . Butin this case, these volatile
oils are going to be eliminatedfrom the body through the
kidneys, through the urinarytracts, and, and be removed
from the body in the urine. Um,and then also bonus, both of
these have diuretic action,right? So they're also doing
(13:11):
some stimulation in the kidneyskind of saying, Hey, you know,
I think we should pee rightnow. That seems like a great
idea.
Speaker 3 (13:18):
Yeah, yeah. Sort of general approach to the, the
UTI is, we want to kill somemicrobes and we wanna flush 'em
out as much as we can. Mm-hmm
something that we would adviseyou to prepare as a tincture
blend and just take squirts oftincture and not drink any
fluid all day long. Right,right, right, right, right. Or
to like, mix powders of all ofthese and just take them by the
(13:38):
spoonful and not have anymoisture in your day. That
would be weird. Yeah. But alsonot very effective. Um, we want
to, we wanna flood the system
Speaker 2 (13:47):
Right ? Yeah , yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah . So just
quartz of this. Yeah . Mm-hmm
Speaker 3 (13:50):
Yeah. So let's not leave out though the linden the
marshmallow, the chamomile ,because they're really
important to this formula. Youknow, it is possible to
irritate your kidneys if you,if you go hard and heavy, if
you were to be like, I'm justgonna take juniper and I'm
gonna make the strongestpossible preparation of this, I
can and drink that all daylong, you might feel more
(14:12):
irritation. Mm-hmm
urethra, you might feel alittle extra braininess going
on. 'cause that's a very fieryhot herb there. Um, and that'll
irritate. But Linden,marshmallow, even Kamile , they
offer things that are soothingto those irritated mucus
membranes. Part of thediscomfort is that your body's
(14:33):
reacting to the infection. It'sreacting with inflammation, but
inflammation in your, yoururethra isn't super pleasant.
are soothing to that, that arecalming the inflammation, and
that are also improving theintegrity of those mucus
membranes. You know, when a,when a mucus membrane is
(14:54):
inflamed for a long time, it's,it's functions get compromised.
Like you can feel that easierin your sinuses. You have a
runny nose , uh, or a sinusinfection. It starts out sticky
and thick. You blow your nose alot after several days of this,
the mucosa have been inflamedand irritated for a while . Now
they get permeable. And nowit's just like watery
(15:16):
grippiness .
Speaker 2 (15:16):
And, and also like, you feel the kind of stabby
hotness, they're extrasensitive in there. They're
just like really sensitive.
Yeah. Yeah .
Speaker 3 (15:22):
Right, right. So when it's a UTI , same
situations going on in thesemucosa, and they, they could
use some love. So themarshmallow, the lindon,
they're giving that love.
Speaker 2 (15:33):
Yeah. Yeah. Also , um, marshmallow, Lyndon and
chamomile , they all have , um,like on the nervous system, a
soothing action as well. Andwhen you have a UTI that
irritability does not just stayin the urethra, like your
nerves are also irritated,you're all of you, like
(15:54):
emotionally, you're irritatedtoo. You know, we don't always
give UTIs enough credit.
They're real infections.
They're serious. Um, and justlike, you know, if you have a ,
a respiratory infection, you'rerunning a fever, you're, you
know, like whatever, you stayhome from work, you stay home
from school. Right. But nobodyreally stays home for UTI, but
I, I really just wanna advocatefor that. Mm-hmm
(16:16):
. It , it's a real infection.
And so all the stuff about,like, all the nervous system
components of that besides thepain, right. Like that's,
that's like a whole separateissue. Right. It just, it
hurts.
Speaker 3 (16:26):
Yeah. Plus pain, pain leads to fatigue, you
know? Yeah. Like when it'sthere all day is constant, like
it's irritated, it'suncomfortable. I can't quite
find a good way to sit
Speaker 2 (16:37):
Speaker 3 (16:38):
Like that wears on you, that drags your energy
down. Yeah . Um, and your bodygenerating the immune response
to combat it takes energy,takes resources. Yeah. So, you
know, sleep is the secretingredient in all of these
formula.
Speaker 2 (16:54):
wanna, like, the mucus membraneactions of these three ly and
marshmallow chamomile are, aresuper important, critically
important, but I don't wannadiscount the nervous system
actions too , because that's,that is a huge part of helping
somebody just get through thiswhole experience. Mm . With
(17:16):
less misery,
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (17:18):
Flavor wise , this formula, because of the juniper
in particular, you're gonnahave a little bit of a hint of
a gin sort of a situation.
Mm-hmm
The, the juniper is thedominant taste that comes
through there. And then likethe flowery yarro golden rod
combo, the chamomile , likewith its own sweeter type of
(17:39):
floral flavor and smell to it.
Speaker 2 (17:41):
And lynden too, a little on the , on the sweeter
side. Mm-hmm
Yeah. The juniper, you know,you , you don't need very much.
Like if you're making a wholequart of tea mm , five or 10 of
the little berries, you don'treally need more than that.
Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 3 (17:56):
Yeah. That'll do
Speaker 2 (17:57):
It. And if you're feeling super irritable or if
you have compromised kidneyhealth to begin with mm-hmm .
Um , maybe you have a UTI andalso you have some kind of like
low grade chronic kidneyinflammation going on. Oh, then
maybe leave the juniper out forthis, for this formula.
Speaker 3 (18:19):
Yeah, we probably would. All right . The next
one.
Speaker 2 (18:23):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (18:25):
All right . So in this one we're gonna combine
Heather Calendula marshmallow'sgonna reappear here alongside
catnip and fennel, and thenCedar, Cedar , in this case,
we're thinking of cedar leaf.
Yeah. Um, and by the way, whenwe say cedar
we're thinking of Fuji Plata .
(18:46):
Um, yes. Because the word cedarcan be used for tja species and
cedrus species, and a couple ofothers as well. So if we say
cedar and for our PO heretoday, we mean Fuji Plata .
Mm-hmm
Speaker 2 (18:57):
Yeah. And so what you , what you normally get
with the cedar is like the, thetips like the last oh 3, 6, 8
inches of the, of the branch,just the like delicate twiggy
part and then the mm-hmm
Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 3 (19:15):
Uh, so we actually tend to think of heather and
cedar right next to each other.
Yeah. And this is probably justbecause of our history with the
plants. And when we started toreally dive into both of them,
it was at the same time. And wewere like, well, let's put 'em
in the same tea . And turns outthey taste amazing together.
Speaker 2 (19:33):
They're so good, so good . They're so good
together. Yeah. Um, and soalthough we are assigning
cedar, that catalyst positionhere , um, in terms of
quantity, normally the catalystyou don't need as much, but in
terms of quantity , um, therewas quite a bit of cedar and
heather, like they were sort ofequal parts, Cedar and Heather.
(19:54):
Yeah. Um, and flavor wisethat's awesome. But urinary
wise , that's awesome too .
First off, super diuretic, youare going to pee. Yeah.
we've got the antimicrobialaction and we've got the
diuretic action, and so Yeah.
(20:15):
Quartz of this and you, you'rereally well served . Yeah.
Speaker 3 (20:19):
Yeah. You know, action wise or formulation wise
, it's like Heather andCalendula are playing the major
role. Cedars that catalyst,marshmallow, catnip and fennel
are in that support, supportrole there. Um, and they, we
can divide them by actions hereas well, right? Like Heather
and Calendula. Heather's veryinteresting. Heather is both an
aromatic with some kidneyaffinity. It's got the diuretic
(20:40):
quality, but Heather is also alymphatic herb. Hmm . And like,
as a general rule, neverneglect your lymphatics when
there's an infection going onmm-hmm
It's critically important tokeep that lymph circulating. So
this is a formula where we'repaying attention to more than
one fluid
Speaker 2 (21:00):
Um, and then when we get into that support position,
the, oh, you know, wait, wedidn't talk much about
calendula beyond the , um,lymphatic action. Right. But
Calendula also has a vulneraryaction for the mucus membranes.
Right. So we're back in thatplace again. And that's like
crossing over, really. Wecould, we could have like an
(21:22):
herbalism debate about how tobreak up the actions in this
formula. Yeah. Because thecalendula and the marshmallow
are functioning together withthat mucus membrane soothing
action. Um, so there's likejust a lot of piggybacking
going on,
Speaker 3 (21:37):
And there's, there's the , um, the affinity driver
quality of this formula aswell. So that is like calendula
is when you take it by itself,or say if you take it in a
formula with like ginger andum, and chamomile , then your
focus is on the digestivetracts. But here we've got
calendula alongside Cedar andHeather, and they're like,
(21:59):
we're going to the urinarysystem, you're coming with us,
Speaker 2 (22:02):
Speaker 3 (22:04):
Uh, so they're, they're bringing calendula
along with them to that systemspecifically. Mm-hmm
Speaker 2 (22:10):
of urinary affinity as well.
Right. We, again, like if youare just starting learning
embolism, or if you've beenlearning for a while , you're
like maybe at an intermediatelevel, then you probably don't
think of marshmallow as aurinary system herb. Um, you're
probably thinking about it aslike a digestive herb and a
(22:31):
respiratory herb, and maybe youlearned it as a topical herb,
which Yes. Um , but you may nothave learned it as a urinary
system herb, but it has a lotof affinity for the urinary
tract and , um, a lot ofimportance too, especially if
we got into kidney stones, butwe're not doing that today.
We're sticking with UTIs,
Speaker 3 (22:50):
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah .
Because , you know, the herbis, is acting on a tissue type.
It's not like, oh, I am , I'monly interested in these
particular organs of, of therespiratory system or the
digestive system. Mm-hmm
in the tissue type, the mucosaand your , all your tubes are
line with those
Right, right , right. So thatincludes the bladder, the
urethra, ureter . Mm-hmm
Speaker 2 (23:10):
Yeah. Yeah. Okay. So catnip andphenyl in this particular
formula , um, you might look atthat and be like, what, what
are they doing there? What dothey have to do with the
urinary system?
Speaker 3 (23:22):
Or you might know those herbs and be like, well,
they taste good. That's gottabe it. Right? Yeah. They taste
good.
Speaker 2 (23:26):
Yeah. And ,
Speaker 3 (23:27):
And look, taste, taste matters. Taste
Speaker 2 (23:28):
Matters. Especially
Speaker 3 (23:29):
When, I'm sorry just No, go
Speaker 2 (23:30):
Ahead. Speaking over
Speaker 3 (23:31):
You do it . Do it .
Right . But especially whenit's like you need to drink
three quarts of this today,
Speaker 2 (23:37):
Speaker 3 (23:38):
Taste matters.
Speaker 2 (23:40):
Yeah. Seriously.
Yeah. If it tastes disgusting,you're not going to do it.
Mm-hmm
Fortunately in this formula, Ipersonally am not a huge fan of
the flavor of calendula, butmany people are. Um, but really
kinda everything in thisformula is non objectionable.
Like, it , it tastes prettyfine. Um, but still, you know,
(24:03):
we , we do really wanna makesure that you're tailoring
something for , for the personwho's gonna drink it and make
sure that it tastes good tothem. Mm-hmm
But I don't want catnip andfunnel to just sit in there as
like, oh, well they taste good.
They're just taking up space.
You know, they're just, becausecatnip also has a really good
(24:23):
volatile oil profile. Andagain, those volatile oils are
the antimicrobial aspect. Plusit's very relaxing to the
nervous system, very settlingto the stomach. Um, a lot of
people when they're sick, evenif what they're sick with has
nothing to do with digestivehealth, they'll still get an
upset stomach just becausethat's how their body goes.
(24:44):
Mm-hmm
cover that too.
Speaker 3 (24:48):
Yeah. I mean, one way to look at that is , um, if
you, if you have some , uh,persistent trouble in
digestion, it's got aninflammatory component to it.
There's irritation there whenyou get sick, your body's
amping up inflammation to fightthe sickness, right ? Mm-hmm
activated by, but that's alsogonna take existing
(25:10):
inflammation and dial that up alittle bit. So you're like low
grade stomach trouble that youusually manage by having ginger
tablets and chamomile t and allof that. Yeah . Well now it's a
little higher than it normallyis, and so getting these like
calming, relaxing, soothingherbs into there mm-hmm . Is
very beneficial. Mm-hmm .
Speaker 2 (25:29):
Yeah . And then the same with the fennel, just
bringing in a little moisture.
I mean, okay, it's bringing inthe good flavor. Um, it also
has volatile oil constituents,but it's also bringing in some
moisture, bringing in somesoothing action as well, so you
can make something taste goodwith herbs that also serve your
purpose. Mm-hmm
(25:49):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (25:50):
Alright . So , uh, you could remix these
you could , you could combineall of these herbs together
into one, one massive formula.
That would be fine. Um, youcould say, well, I really wanna
emphasize this aspect in termsof taste, or I want to make
sure I get a strongerpresentation of fiery
aromatics, and so I boost upthis and that herb in here.
(26:12):
That's all fine. Formulas arealways flexible, at least in
our opinion,
you, you start out with andthen you adjust as you go. Yeah
. You say, oh, I want to makethe same basic thing, but
increase the proportion of thisherb and decrease that one, or
swap out this one for anotherherb with similar actions and,
and, and qualities and so on.
Speaker 2 (26:32):
Which actually this is, if you look at it like
these, actually these are thesame formula. These are two
formulas that are actually thesame formula. Mm-hmm
the first formula , um,marshmallow, I, I am actually
specifying the leaf in thatparticular situation. Maybe
(26:52):
that formula was for somebodywho doesn't need quite as much
moist action, but then thesecond, second formula it was
specifying the root. And maybethat's for somebody who needs a
lot more moistening action. Um,then you can really say like,
look, there's nothing repeatedin these two formulas, and yet
they are the same formula withthe same collection of actions.
(27:15):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (27:16):
Yeah. That's the way to think about, about herbalism
really, is what are we tryingto accomplish rather than what
herb cures UTI
Speaker 2 (27:24):
Yeah. What job are we trying todo and who can help me get that
done? Nice. Yeah. When youthink that way, then you never
have to worry, oh no, I'm outof stock. I suddenly cannot
function as an herbalist. Like,nope , there's another herb who
will do the job. Just thinkabout the action that you need
(27:44):
and who you know, can do it.
Yes. Nice . Yeah. Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 3 (27:49):
All right . Well if this particular topic is of
great interest to you , um,then we encourage you to check
out our urinary health course.
Uh, like all of our courses,it's primarily through video
content, but you can also getthe audio and put that on your
phone, take a walk and learnabout kidney stones as you
(28:10):
Yes. Like all of our courses,it also comes with access to
our student community. Uh,there's discussion threads
integrated in every lesson. Soyou can be watching a , a
lesson, ask your question, geta response within a day. Mm-hmm
you, we've got all kinds ofgreat stuff in these
Speaker 2 (28:27):
Courses. Yeah . We try really hard in all of our
courses to accommodate as manydifferent learning style types
as possible so that you canpick the style of resource
that's going to work best foryou to help you get that
knowledge into your brain.
Because listen, who has a lotof time to just sit and study
flashcards? It's a boring, andb, not actually the best way to
(28:48):
learn. So we try to just havelots of resources that you can
just select the one that feelsmost comfortable for you to
learn with. Yeah. Yeah. Uh,hey, I wanted to also put a
plug in for the formulationcourse. Yeah. Because yes,
we're talking about UTIs here,but we're also talking about
the structure of formulationand like strategies of
(29:10):
formulation. And hey, we have acourse for that. Um, so Rin
will put both of those linksinto the show notes for you so
that you can check them out.
And if you have questions, youknow, you can always email us.
We are atinfo@commonwealthherbs.com and
we would love to talk to you.
We would love to help you getwhat you need so that you
(29:32):
become the herbalist that youwanna be. So reach out, we're
here.
Speaker 3 (29:37):
All right everybody.
That's it for us today. We'llhave some more holistic
herbalism podcasts for you. Yousoon. Until then, take care of
yourselves, take care of eachother, drink some tea, drink
some tea, drink some cranberryjuice as well,
uh, take care of your urethra,please
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