Let's talk Honey!

I remember reading somewhere ages ago that Honey is the one food on the planet that will never go bad.  You can store it in your pantry for a decade and it will still be edible. It may need a little softening up - but it won't go bad. 

well, eight years ago when my daughter got married, we had a very big open house party the night before the wedding at our house for all the guests, out of town guests, and acquaintances who weren't invited (like some of our neighbors) and others who were invited but couldn't attend the actual wedding.  Since we had so much family coming from out of town it made sense to celebrate more than a few hours on the big day.  What we didn't expect was the coldest December day in pretty much Texas history - so - friends of ours loaned us outdoor heaters for the back porch. All was well- until we realized the pit bull had accidentally (I presume) stuck the tip of his tail in the heater - sigh - it was a pretty nasty burn. What the vet decided to do to treat it was - Honey.  I was shocked.  A special raw honey was coated on the tail and then the tail was wrapped - it actually did help the dang thing heal- though the dog was not at all happy with having his tail wrapped, but that's another story for another day. 

Fast forward to recently and my husband has occasional challenges with skin rashes thanks to exzema. Well, his shins - yep both of them - broke out in a rash and nothing he was doing was helping. I happened to read that honey helps with eczema. Really? How about that. So, since we have a massive jar of raw honey that a friend of ours gave us from their beehive, we tried it. At night I'd put it on his rash and then I wrapped it in nonstick gauze pad before bed.  We did this every night for a week or so. Then we did it whenever it flared up over the next several weeks. At the end of a couple of months, the rash was gone and hasn't flared up again. Now, I have no idea what causes eczema to flair on occassion, but the honey brought instant relief to the itch and slowly but surely did the trick. 

Now we fast forward to a couple of weeks ago - I developed an odd itch on my wrist. No redness, no obvious rash, but if you rubbed your finger across where it itched it felt a little rough, almost scaly, maybe just dry, but basically not normal.  When I went to my doctor for an authorization to travel in January, I asked about the wrist and she glanced at it and said, eczema just buy an over the counter steroid. Well, the first thing I thought was how odd - in all my decades, I've never had trouble with rashes, or eczema but, okay.  What I didn't have was time to go shopping for some cream - so - what's good for the gander is good for the goose (lol - literary license to flip that old saying) and I tried the honey.  Like with hubby, I'd spread it on at night, but since it's on the upper side of my wrist, I didn't bother wrapping it - just let it dry. And I'm happy to report that it's really helped with the itching. In the day time I use coconut oil if it itches so I'm not sticky against things, but it's been a week since I put anything on and only yesterday did is start to itch a smidge, so today I've put honey on again. As long as I'm not going anywhere, it works just fine! 

I truly love old fashioned remedies. There aren't a whole lot of them in my family, but the ones that I remember growing up are- rice water for diarrhea , you cook rice in twice or three times as much water for the regular amount of time - then drain the excess water into a glass and drink it. Works really well. I remember once, there was a nasty stomach virus going around that had everyone spending a week or more close to the potty (lol) - when the bug caught a friend of ours family, she thanked me at church the next week. Mentioned she remembered what I'd said about rice water and she'd made it for the whole family. I said, that's for something you ate, probably won't work for a virus and she happily reported that it did indeed help- everyone else had the virus for a week or more and her family was over it in just two or three days. She was very happy and I wrote it off as one of my grandmother's remedies never to forget. 

The other one, that I haven't used in decades, is apple peel tea. One of my kids was having belly aches. She peeled an apple, boiled the peels and served the water as warm tea. Worked like a charm.

I'm betting she had a lot more home remedies, but sadly, I don't remember them, if I ever knew them. 

What I wish I could stumble across is a good remedy for coughs. Not from a cold, or flu, but that annoying allergy cough that won't go away after allergy season is gone. My doctor calls them bronchial spasms. Basically, it's an irritated cough. My lungs are irritated from coughing so I cough more, then the cough makes the lungs more irritated. Same with talking, more talking makes the lungs more irritated and more irritated lungs cough - vicious cycle.  I've tried pineapple juice - which is tough because I'm on heart meds. I've tried elderberry syrup, which works sort of well. I've swallowed a teaspoon of honey, which kind of helps too, but I may need to try it warm, that's what an aunt says. 

Do you have any home remedies you swear by?