People are figuring out what they can do to boost their immune system with the COVID19 virus running around the country. I have been amazed at stores and online suppliers running out of herbs, homeopathics and supplements that might relate to immune boosting for a virus. What I am not hearing is how to take good care of yourself when you get the virus.  If we start treatment immediately that supports our body’s best efforts, then it should be less severe.

Don’t blow it in the home stretch! Taking NSAIDS or acetaminophen for reducing pain and fever, for example, aspirin, ibuprofen, celebrex and Tylenol, when you finally get the virus will short circuit your body’s best immune response, fever.  Viruses are very heat sensitive, they have a fatty coat around them that melts when it is too warm. A fever is your body’s best defense! Don’t get in it’s way and trip it up when the going get’s tough.  If you regularly take NSAIDS for arthritis or pain, think about whether you can stop them temporarily, so you don’t interfere with your fever.  It will allow your body’s immune system to do its best work right from the beginning. 

Some ideas for staying comfortable, but still supporting your body’s best defense mechanism are:
1. Use hydrotherapy to ease symptoms and keep the body working. I have a small book on Amazon, Naturally Healthy at Home, holistic first aid, herbs, homeopathy and nutrition. (It is also on Kindle.)  The chapter on water therapy explains about warming socks, hot foot bath, in addition to other water therapies.  The best way to do a foot soak is to alternate hot and cold water three times, starting with hot water with Epsom salts and ending with cold.  Your feet should end up very red and warm from excellent circulation.  The pumping action stimulated by alternating the hot and cold affects the whole body positively. Since the body is a closed system and it gets all the blood moving.  Doing this at the beginning of a virus can sometimes be all you need to do.

2. A normal body temperature is generally around 98.6 F or 37 C.  If it goes above that at all, it is a good thing for you and bad for the virus.  So a fever of 100 to 101 is a good thing.  This current virus does not generally create a real high fever initially.   We want it to go high enough to deactivate the virus and speed up the enzyme response.  Try not to get in it’s way if possible.  If you are very uncomfortable, a tepid (not cold) bath can be helpful.  Cool cloths on the neck or forehead can feel good.  Know that short term pain is long term gain.

3.  Another way of helping the body deal with the fever is to drink or steam with some hot herbal teas that are known to be diaphoretic, or sweat inducing.  Sweating cools us back down again. Some herbs you might make a tea with, would be chamomile, tulsi (holy basil), peppermint or yarrow.  There are other diaphoretic herbs you might be able to get more easily in your area.  I get chamomile and tulsi tea bags at Trader Joe’s.  These herbs also have a  calming and anti-viral effect. 

To do a steam, place the herbs or tea bag in a large bowl, add hot water, then sit with a towel tent over your head and the bowl, for 15 minutes or so.  It will soothe your upper respiratory system and be anti-viral both

4.  Of course there are homeopathic remedies that help your body feel better thru the course of the virus.  I have read and listened to homeopaths all over the world to see what is the genus epidemicus remedy for COVID19 virus.  The most recent and reliable information I have seen is from a homeopathic doctor in France where 50% of the patients were helped significantly by Bryonia or Arsenicum album.  If you are not familiar with homeopathy, so this information isn’t helpful to you, please schedule with me for a free fifteen minute consult on my website, DrValeria.net/Book an Appointment,(under Contact).

5.  When people are coming down with the COVID19 virus, before they even have any symptoms, they are reporting a loss of taste and smell.  Taste and smell can be closely linked to adequate Zinc in your body and taking Zinc is helpful when the body deals with a virus.  So, I have added a Zinc capsule into my current regime.

6. Humidifiers with diffusers can be used in your home or office with some of our lovely, good smelling and anti-viral herbal essential oils.  I really like Thyme, but cinnamon, sweet orange, sage and rosemary are all good possibilities too.  You get the herbs right to where you need them on your mucus membranes.

7. I have recently found fresh oranges to taste very good to me and have been eating one or two a day.  I was pleased to hear an herbalist explain that they are high in Hesperetin which theoretically prevents COVID19 from attaching to my cells.  It is always nice to have some confirmation of our intuition.  Usually with a fever, it is better to eat very lightly, but drink plenty of fluids.

I hope this is helpful and calming to you.  You have more control than you may have thought in dealing with any virus and especially COVID19.  Research and history have shown, for a virus, not starting with a NSAID that suppresses fever is hugely helpful to your recovery.  The homeopathic doctors of 1918 lost very few patients using no aspirin in their treatment.  Aspirin was newly discovered in 1918 and used a lot conventionally.  Probably in the next three years, as it ebbs and flows, we will all have a version of this highly contagious virus, mild or severe and I want you to have your best shot at coming through it safely by avoiding NSAIDS and appreciating your fever.

Go to my website www.DrValeria.net and schedule  a free consult with me if you have any questions. 

Be well,  Dr. Valeria

I am writing today from the island of Erraid off West Scotland. I just arrived today from Findhorn Foundation to this affiliated community. It was a six hour drive. The left side of the road driving, roundabouts, narrow lanes with pull outs all made me glad I was not driving!

Last week was called Experience Week, and what a wonderful experience it was! It was a wonderful time to both experience Findhorn Foundation (https://www.findhorn.org/) and the sustainable community and eco-village plus a time to better connect in to my heart and with my classmates. My class had twelve members and we all bonded very quickly. It was a wonderful blend of ages and more men than women. I have not been in such a wonderful mixed gender community for a long time. The class was also a lovely mix of English, Scots, French and Spanish – all speaking English with their own accents. It took me a couple of days to really understand everyone’s names – I had to see them in writing to really grasp them. The Experience week process has been very similar for many years and was quite effective, along with our group having amazing focalizers, in pulling a group together as a community. I hope to stay in touch with all of the members of my group and perhaps to visit them during my travels. One of my classmates came to the island community neighboring Erraid, called Iona, for a week. We expect to see each other once during the week.

Findhorn is lovely, green grass with yellow Scotch Broom in bloom, Scottish, coastal community, the weather varied between cold windy rain to lovely sunshine. We stayed in dormitory type rooms with the bathroom down the hall for our class in a place called Cluny Hall where our classes were also. We spent a couple of hours a day doing community work, called “Love in Action”. I worked in the kitchen, other classmates worked in the gardens. It was all done at a lovely pace with regular tea breaks.

I found the community to be authentic and honest about their problems and possible solutions. They are currently working on revamping their organization to flow easier. I don’t have an urge to live here, but appreciate the good work they are doing. I saw a Living Green Machine that processed their sewage using plants and bacteria so that it met the Scottish standards for reclaimed water. I visited their gardens for flowers and vegetables they are growing and of course dipped my hand in the sea once. I can’t get that close to the ocean without touching it.

During the Experience week an opportunity to live for a week with a community and share in their life and work came up on the island of Erraid. I decided to take the opportunity and traveled by van across Scotland this morning, leaving Findhorn at 5:30 AM. We are 11 people on the island today and it is beautiful, windy and cold here. We shared a dinner of lentil curry and rice plus rhubarb sauce for dessert. They made a gluten free biscuit and bread to go with it. Another permanent person here is gluten free, so it was easy to add me in. The rhubarb reminded me of my Aunt Gladys’ rhubarb sauce, a little tart.

One advantage of the island is I have good internet connection – so I will be able to make calls on Wifi in addition to doing this blogging, email, etc. that I have not been able to do easily for awhile. My phone plan allows me to call free only over Wifi.

After this week I am going to do a week of meditation retreat back at Findhorn before I leave for Greece on May 2nd from Edinburgh. I met with the instructor (called a focalizer here) and really liked him. I feel I will be more solid in knowing myself when I am done with these three weeks and in addition have many new, good friends.

I am moving down my list to get ready to go.  I did my taxes, met with physicians, going to meals with friends and packing.  It is definitely bittersweet the saying good bye’s and the excitement of my new adventure in travelling.

The house appraised less than the selling price, so I agreed to lowering the price.  I couldn’t see putting it back on the market, unpacking the decor, having to go thru inspections, appraisals, etc again and maybe not be any better off for it.  It is a relief to have it done and know all will most likely be finished February 24th.  The house does feel kind of bare and like I am living in someone else’s house – which I almost am.

Julie has been a great help coming regularly to help me pack the complicated things – the decor, the photos, the garage.  The garage is all done except a wire shelf that has gravity clip shelves.  I have it upside down in the garage and have banged on it until my hand was sore, but one shelf will not drop!  Dad and Ric have dealt with disassembling this shelf in the past and I know it was sometimes difficult.   I am thinking of adding some penetrating oil to get it to free up.

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I had a wonderful hike yesterday going up Cathedral Rock near Sedona. These photos are ones Pam took. She and I drove up together. A friend of mine, Stephun, joined at the trail head.  It was great to have good friends with me and gorgeous weather.  It was harder than the last time I went before I started treatment, but I made it to the saddle.

It is interesting how I am parceling out the things important to me to friends to keep while I am gone.  Stephun is going to use the massage table from my office, Pammee is going to store my homeopathics in her closet, Cheryl is going to keep my cat Skyy, my cousins in Washington are going to keep my drums, my car on Kim and Ken’s farm in Oregon.  I will be spread out all over the west coast.

My reading recently has been the MoonSpinners by Mary Stewart about a woman hiking and having adventures on the island of Crete and Outlander by Diana Gabaldon about the Inverness area of Scotland.  Fun way to relate to the areas I am travelling to, but I don’t plan on having as much adventure as those heroines did.