As an older mother of ten children, I recently found myself beginning to tire, slow down, and show the effects of getting older. Being 54 years old, and in the last three years adding two more preschoolers and an infant to our already large brood by foster/adoption, slowing down is not an option for me. I began to look for things that would help strengthen me and give me more stamina.
There were several things I learned to take for energy and calmness. St. John’s Wort and Luminex from Melalueca products were good for the stress that came with getting my new infants through their babyhood, and for getting the older child we adopted through the trauma of losing her biological family and adjusting to ours. Melaleuca’s RestEz was also a plus for relaxing my weary body enough at night to get to sleep and sleep all the way though the night, something that menopause was making difficult. There were several other vitamins and herbs I researched and used as I waded through the mire of things becoming older brought about. But by far, the one that seems to have made the most difference for me was Green Tea.
An older body has a more difficult time keeping weight off, and energy wanes quickly. In my case, keeping up with a one year old, four year old and five year old, as well as my preteen daughter, several teenage boys, and three grown children was taking a toll. The worst was my left wrist, and my right knee. My wrist hurt so much, that I was beginning to consider going to the doctor with it. I had tried over the counter pain killers, and nothing was working. My right knee was giving out on me, and didn’t seem to want to bear my weight, which wasn’t too considerable, at 4 feet 11 inches tall; I weighed 120 pounds, which was at the high end of the BMI scale, but still within it. It would also pop, and once that happened, it would hurt terribly for the rest of the day. I was getting desperate to find relief for these two problems. That was when I discovered Green Tea.
I read that Green Tea would help with arthritis, as it has anti-inflammatory properties, and I had wondered if that was what was wrong with my knee and wrist. I was also getting the arthritis knots in my finger joints, so I knew it was well on its way. I began to buy bottles and gallon jugs of diet Arizona Green Tea. I would try and drink two quarts over the course of the day. Within a couple of weeks, I found that my knee and wrist had both quit hurting. I also found that I had more energy, and that a little bit, although not much of the weight had dropped off. I wondered if it was the sheer amount of fluid I was drinking, but I quickly found out when I ran out of green tea and tried water instead, that it was really the tea.
As much as I preferred the Arizona Tea in a gallon jug, once my children decided they liked to drink it too, we began to go through too much to keep it around all the time. I bought some Lipton green tea bags and began to brew it at home. I buy the kind that includes ginseng and honey. It seemed however, that I couldn’t get the flavor just right; green tea tends to be a bit bitter if you are not careful. I finally invested in a tea maker. It’s small and sits on my counter. I also went into my garden, and cut a large amount of peppermint leaves, dried them in my dehydrator, and I add a handful of those to the tea bags. It greatly improves the taste, and has the added benefit of being good for your stomach and breath. I put some Splenda in it to sweeten, and there I had it, the perfect cup of tea! My children don’t clamor for this tea as much as they did for the bottled stuff, so I brew three quarts a day when I get up in the morning, and this is just the right amount for me, and to share. If we run out, I just brew another smaller amount.
I recently got busy with Christmas, and failed to make the tea for four days. On the fourth day, my knee began to pop again, and I began to have trouble getting up from a kneeling position when cleaning my house and tending to my babies. I quickly began to make the tea again, and in a very few days, my knee was better again. I’m a believer!
The only drawback I found was that if I didn’t get the two quarts drunk before mid-afternoon, I would have trouble all through the night having to get up to visit the bathroom. That was easy to take care of; I just make sure I get most of my green tea quota drunk before this time. And I try not to drink a lot of it just before leaving the house, so I won’t have the problem of finding a bathroom when I’m away from home.
Other benefits of green tea are that it helps prevent tooth decay and has some cancer fighting ingredients. Also, I had begun to notice that my hair was thinning, and I could actually see the places on each side of my forehead where it was almost gone. Reading up some more, I brewed a mixture of green tea, and rosemary, mixed this half and half with vinegar, and put it in the shower to pour over and massage into my scalp when I washed my hair every other day. Lately, I checked, and those thinning spots have almost completely filled in with new hair. And only a little bit of it is gray, mostly it’s the very dark brown color of my youth. My hair is waist length, and using this mixture rather than conditioner has left my hair shiny and tangle free.
Green tea has been a great benefit in improving my health and making my life much more pleasant as I go through my day to day activities. I highly recommend it!
