Saved by the Bush

My mom is my hero.
I can understand why you'd be slightly confused by that statement since I may or may not have written ten blog posts which may not have painted her in the best light. A few of them may or may not have been slightly homicidal in tone, but this is not about pointing fingers or placing blame, it is about giving credit where credit is due and taking a moment to salute the unsung heroes in everyday life like Kern Jeremiah does in his blog 'People who help others'.

There are some problems like homelessness and pollution that leave us scratching our heads and asking someone who knows more than we do to give us a hand. In some cases, if we are very lucky, they offer -in very Mama-like fashion - unsolicited advice that turn out to be just what we needed all along,

My mother is very fond of saying that "common sense was made before book" and "medicine was there before doctors".  If you take a minute, you will realise that she is right. Books are made up of information gathered by people who lived and learned and passed on their experiences and medicine was all around us before we started paying an arm and a leg for someone to drug us into good health.
Jinnel Anderson's blog 'Kitchen Medications' takes an in-depth look at the medicinal benefits of simple herbs, spices and foods that we eat everyday.

Pregnant or nursing mothers eat differently than everyone else. Foods like pineapple, nuts and corn which are just delicious the rest of the time becomes no-no's when pregnant. However, ochro a.k.a. okra is a food that Mama strongly recommended when my due date started to draw near. According to my mother, this slimy food should be eaten by expectant moms because the slime makes the birthing process easier. I don't know if it actually works but anything that would make pushing a watermelon-sized bundle out of a mango-sized opening less painful can't be all bad, right?

Mama swore by Vervine for lactating moms as it increases milk production. When my baby was born, I was all gung ho to do the whole breastfeeding thing. My mother would picked and boil a handful of the shaggy, green leaves, I would drink an unsweetened teacupful every evening and come morning I was ready for milking. It has the added benefit of being a blood cleanser or a 'cooling' as we know it.

Caraille is so bitter that not everyone can cook it and not everyone can eat it. I remember as a child sucking on the red, sweet seeds of the ripe fruit but I think I was fully grown the first time I ate and enjoyed fried, green caraille. It is great for people with diabetes as the Bitter Gourd, as it is also called, helps control blood sugar. For my baby though, Mama suggested not the fruit, but the leaves.
My daughter used to get these heat rashes and the remedy was a bath using water with caraille leaves to keep her cool. Carille is also a cooling and can be drank for the cold but definitely not by me...yuck!

There is (slightly) better tasting stuff that can be drank for a cold. My mother's favourite is Baccano. The dried leaf, when boiled and drunk, will get that phlegm off your chest within days. Christmas, Shining and Cerio Bush are some other cold remedies that are free to use if you can get your hands on them.

There is a lot more that can be added to my mom's eat-this, drink-that list but this isn't just about that.
It is about thanking the hero in my life who unselfishly gave advice and assistance and is a major reason that I can say to you all, without feigned humility, that I am an awesome mother. Mama's invasion, I mean inclusion, in my daughter's life and during my pregnancy played a pivotal role in my winning the Mom award.
And yes, self-appointed trophy still counts.