Dr. Teal's Epsom Salt

I came back to the place of my friend with a broken foot--- the house of disability won't be full without the contribution of my own disability, I figure... 8-O lol

She asked me whether there was something I need when she was about to place an order online last time.  Since I used out all of her Epsom salt, I said... Epsom salt... the cheapest kind that you can find

The Epsom salt, apparently, arrived with me yesterday... and some fancy kind as well...

Dr. Teal's Epsom salt it is, which contains also eucalyptus and spearmint essential oils.

How do I like it?

One thing I have to say is that, in addition to the fact that my body likes Epsom Salt bath, I slept like a baby even with the smallest part of the 25/4 mg dose of Seroquel... That is relaxing... gotta tell you...

My friend like it, too... apparently, the steam from the bath permeated the entire place and she could even smell it all the way from her room. 8-O lol

Wyndmere Essential Oil- Breathe Easier

When I got the Breathe Easier Essential Oil by Wyndmere, it was when I was having some concerns about my dear respiratory system.

This oil contains: Basil, Niaouli, Eucalyptus, Pine, Rosemary, Lavender and Cedarwood essential oils.

One thing I can tell you after using it for almost a year is that, although I am not sure whether it helps my respiratory system, it surely calms my whole existence down when adding a few drops into either my bathing water or my foot soak.

Ginger

My friend with a broken foot made my mom and I some vegi juice today and we had the tasty juice at lunch... including ingredients such as celery, apples, carrots, broccoli stem and ginger.

Not quite sure yet how well da juice will help me in the digestion department yet...

My mouth was runing... running... running.... like a waterfall....

It was not until later did I realize that... oops... I seem to be feeling something funny...

One thing I know is that... I was all energetic... OMG... so very overflying with energy on a day with the smaller piece of my 25/4 mg Seroquel.... and I think it might have something to do with the two huge chunk of ginger we added in there...

It works far faster than anti-depressants... and I became instantly all hyped up....

It reminded me of this experience I had back a while ago when trying to find relief for my insomnia though simple things such as foot-soaking.

One day, I read somewhere online that Ginger helps getting the damp xi out of our body and can help people relax as well.  So, I decided to try out foot soaking with slices of ginger... though don't quite remember whether I boiled it or not...

The outcome?

Well, it helped my insomnia... rather than my sleep...

I was wide awake after soaking my feet in the ginger water and was lying in bed counting them sheep till the cows came home... 8-O lol

The lesson learned... what works for the others might not work for us...

After observing its effect on me, I decided... foot soaking with ginger or drinking vegi juice with ginger might be a good thing early in the day rather than something to do after mid-day....

Thanks for taking interest in my sharing.

After my foot soaking with Epsom salt, time to go night night.

Tea and sleep

Those nights of having problems falling asleep and/or staying asleep must have traumatized me quite a bit because, after getting back to NYC, I can't stop rethinking about them things I tried out to shut my head down.

Surely, many things could have contributed to them endless sleepless nights....

For me, it might have something to do with the fact that, for those year or two, I had to cut the dosage of Seroquel down from 500-600 mg of Seroquel to 25 mg..... till today's dosage of roughly 25/4 mg...  Since Seroquel used to knock me down like a charm at bed time, the decrease, surely, would have caused some turmoils to the activities of neurotransmitters in my beautiful head.  

My shrink had prescribed sleeping pills but, unfortunately, I am one of those who would get the sleeping pill hangover- not to mention the risk of developing dependence on the pills. 

That was the reason why-- in addition to drastically cut down the consumption of Coffee, I started to try out all alternatives possible to put myself to sleep. 

This is the time when I started exploring the potential of herbal tea.... starting from Lavender and Chamomile.  

For Chamomile tea along, I had tried out most of the common brands that you can find in the supermarkets or pharmacies such Bigelow, Stash, Celestial, Yogi etc.  One conclusion I have after testing them out is that... just as all animals are equeal... Though all chamomile tea should be equal, some seems to do a better job helping me falling asleep than the others.

Guess, sort of like... although all froggies might be da prince, sometimes you might have to kiss a few en route in order to find da prince... 8-O lol

One kind of tea that I found most potent in knocking me down is the Yogi Bedtime tea... perhaps, it has something to do with the fact that the Valerian has been used for sleep disorders although, if you check the info provided in MedlinePlus, you might get the feeling that scientifically based studies don't seem to provide too much support for its effect.

Regardless what the experts say, the only thing I know is that... something worked for me and it could be the addition of Valerian.

Of course, each person is different and you might have to test it out to see whether the Yogi Bedtime tea might work for you.

One thing I noticed, though, was that, during the time when I have to drink this tea religiously at bedtime, I often wake up in the morning feeling more thirsty than usual.   Although I have to remind you that I was not sure whether it was really the doing of the tea since there were many other things I tried out before bed time during that period for one and only one pursuit-- to sleep.

Just a hunch... I guess...  

Sleep well!

Sleepy time

As I am getting ready to go to sleep, I thought of all the tricks I have tried out during the time when one of my biggest night terror was the inability to fall asleep...

The problem with all of the sleeping aids I have tested out so far is that-- voila... some works while others don't. At the same time, the ones that work might help out for a while and, all of a sudden, its effect ceases to exist.

Among them all, the Night Health bedtime balm by Origins seemed to have done a fairly good and consistent job in helping me "out".  All that I had to do is to put a dash of it on my temples and, most of the times, my head would be ready to shutdown in a matter of split seconds.

Can't quite tell you whether it would still do miracle for me today since I haven't used it for a while.

Yet, for those of you who would go to distance to get that sleep you want without turning and tossing for hours in bed, or, without using sleeping pills, this might be something to consider about.

An alternative to the night balm is the Bedtime Face Cream, which also has the Chamomile, Lavender and Mandarin essential oils as the key relaxation ingredient.

Yet, personally, it doesn't seem to be as potent as the night balm if the sole concern is whether you can fall asleep or not.

Both products are, from your cheapskate's perspective, a bit on the pricey end, 25 dollars a piece for the night balm.  At the same time, just because it worked for me doesn't mean that it works for me now and neither does it mean it will work for you either.

The good thing is that, they do give out small take-home samples so that you can see for yourself whether either one works for you or not.

Wish you a good night sleep!

Epsom salt

One thing I did quite a lot when staying with my friend with a broken foot was the Epsom salt bath.

Interesting enough, I have never heard of Epsom salt in Taiwan and even my doctors had no idea what I was talking about when I mentioned Epsom salt. Of course, it might have something to do with the fact that I didn't quite know how to translate the term "Epsom salt" then.  


After some googling around, I found that, in Chinese, Epsom salt is called 瀉鹽 or 硫酸鎂 (Magnesium sulfate or MgSO₄·7H₂O).  Must have learned it in school though gave it all back to my chemistry teacher... oops... please don't take my high school diploma back... 8-O lol

Why is it called Epsom salt rather than Poems salt?  Apparently, one of its first discoveries was in Epsom, Surrey, England back in the Shakespearean time.  That's where the Epsom part came from.

Accordingly, you are supposed to add a whole cup or two of Epsom Salt into your bath.  Yet, usually, I don't use so much and it seems to be pretty effective for me as well.

Personally, I love hot bath and I just read it somewhere that... it is the wrong way to do it.  So they say... use warm water instead because, I guess, if it is too hot, it might strip off too much of the protective oil from our skin.

What does it do for me?

Two thing I am pretty sure about.  First, it relaxes the body and alleviates the pain all over my body (Fibromyalgia).  Second, it somehow sedates me and put me into a jolly good sleep.

When bathing is not an option, I would do foot soaking with Epsom salt instead and it also seems to have similar impacts on me.

Not quite sure about other places, in the US, you can get Epsom salt from pharmacies and grocery stores or other fancy places.

Yet, for me, all that I needed is Magnesium sulfate and I often go with the most economic kind you can find such as the store brand.

I had tried out the Epsom salt with Lavender fragrance before but have now decided to get back to the simplest form of it.  The reason... seems to be a bit backwards to introduce unnecessary chemical components to a process which might help our body to do this thing called... detoxing.

For more uses of Epsom salt, you can check out the info provided by the Epsom Salt Council.

Sleep

According to F. Scott Fitzgerald, "The worst thing in the world is to try to sleep and not to."

I second the opinion.

In recent times, I have been trying to find alternatives to sleeping pills since I am not too big a pill popper.

Amongst the things I have tried out so far, I found the Body Shop Deep Sleep Body Moisturizer to work really well in helping me sleep.  Apparently, the Chamomile essential oil is helpful in putting me to sleep.







As I was talking my walk today, I found out that the Deep Sleep Starter Kit is on discount, 50% off, and find it an excellent buy as a gift.

Of course, different things work for different people and, for the same person, the same thing might work differently at different times.  Would be interesting to see whether it works for my friends.