Monday, April 12, 2010

Ancient healing?

I am a nut for National Geographic and any kind of documentary about other cultures or past civilizations. Don't get me wrong I hated history in school but love to see and learn about it from the TV. I guess it's just the way I learn.

One night I forbid my husband to change the channel. I was so into a documentary about Egypt and the medicine that was practiced in those times. I found this so interesting. I was a nurse and I'm a lactation nut. So when these two aspects collided I was fascinated!

The extent of knowledge the Egyptians had about the human anatomy is to be respected. They obviously knew more than we ever can claim we do. With no "pills" and "syrups" to fix illnesses they had medicine.



One of the reasons was because they valued the milk from a lactating mother. They understood it's healing abilities. They knew it was more than just milk.
We still need science to prove to us that the best option is human milk, and all the benefits that come from it. But the Egyptians were much smarter and saw the benefits that it was created for.

When your child has a sore throat what do you give her? I usually reach straight for honey. This has antibacterial properties and the Egyptians knew this too. 

So can you guess what they did? They understood the benefits and healing properties of human milk and knew that honey also had healing benefits, so they mixed them together and made a cream this way! That could be applied to cuts, sores, scraps, and burns. This is not excluding all the injuries that were received on the battle field!

It is recently a study clarified why human milk is so beneficial for our babies. The study found that there are stem cells in human milk. This means that the development and growth of your child doesn't stop at birth (which you already know, because we are not born to fend for our selves at that exact moment, we are not born already as adults). We still need help for our body to "finish" the job where the placenta could not. This is why human milk is so beneficial and this is the same reason why it is such a great cure.

Pink eye? Human milk. Ear ache? Human milk. Cuts and scrapes? Human milk. Even sore throat can benefit from a little human milk.

I do not discriminate in my house. If it's so great for the kids, it is great for hubby too! Now I know that you are shocked and maybe feeling a bit wheezy. You are thinking that you would never go to that extreme. But think about it. He has ear ache, you have human milk. It costs nothing to express a few drops into a shot glass and use a medicine dropper and "drop" it into the ear canal. He will have relief within moments. And if there is an infection, like was the case with my husband the last time around, it will help fight it; naturally.

All my years as a parent and lactation nut I have met only one doctor that didn't believe (or rather just didn't want to promote) in the benefits of human milk. Every doctor, nurse, midwife and pediatrician I have had the pleasure of interacting with have all know and promoted the healing benefits of human milk.

I think this brings new meaning to the words "breastfeeding saves lives". This too was stated in a recent article. It said that if only 90% of women in the U.S. would breastfeed their babies for 6 months a total of 900 babies would be saved and more than $13 billion would be saved in health costs.
We need to find the respect and value that the Egyptians had for the lactating mother. This alone will save our species.

1 comment: