Drink More Green Tea!

Stumbled upon this, and had to share!

Bad Lung Day, and another tea

So I haven't had the Traditional Medicinal Respiratory tea in about two days, and when I woke up this morning, I blew a 175 on my Peak Flow Meter. While this number is a record low for the recent months, I'm mostly focused on how effective that tea must be!

So I was wheezing away at work, when I came across a tea bag in someone's discarded cup. The tea bag was one of the biggest I'd ever seen, full of bright green leaves, and made of a thick cloth (which I have since learned is silk), and the bag was sewn shut with thick thread, and that thread is what went down to the tea bag tag. The tag said it was "Mighty Leaf" Brand, and I couldn't help but to look over their website when I got home.

Click to go to their website!

Their website is astounding (and full of sales!), and their tea looks amazing (It is loose leaf tea, already put in pouches for those who have no means to brew loose leaf tea), but they don't appear to have any medicinal tea. You can search for teas by what mood you're trying to achieve (Happy, energized, rejuvenated, relaxed, etc.), but that's about the extent of what they have as far as that goes. Green tea is one of my favorite kinds of tea, since it's good for colds and chest congestion, and also has a little caffeine in it, so I use it occasionally when I realize I'm getting a caffeine headache at 10 PM.

I think I'm going to order some green tea, and possibly some tea to 'rejuvenate', and I'll report back on how delicious, and effective, they are.

Correlations

I'm so excited today, for a few reasons!

First of all, I have made the decision to become a vegetarian (who eats fish), once and for all. I tried it a couple months ago, for about two weeks, and I felt really great. Not only did my asthma improve, but other facets of my life improved, too. I started to crave meat, and tried to promise myself it would only happen once a week, but it was a slippery slope, and the next thing I knew, I was eating meat every day, and feeling horrible about it.

After I ate meat (especially meat like bacon and hamburgers) I would just feel terrible, and sick, and honestly, kind of scared that what I was eating wasn't high enough quality to keep my asthma from getting worse for the night. So, finally, today, my love of delicious meat was surpassed by the memory of how nice I felt when I wasn't eating it. I'm very excited for it, and I can't wait to see how much it will improve my well-being in the long term. I have read case studies where veganism has helped asthma, but I know I don't want to be a vegan, so I can't wait to see how strong the effects of simple vegetarianism has on my asthma.

Also, speaking of asthma, I blew a 300 on my Peak Flow Meter today! For those of you who aren't familiar, a Peak Flow Meter is a way to test lung capacity in the measurement of Liters per Minute (L/min). And now, to give you an idea of the severity of my asthma, someone my age, height, and weight should be able to blow about a 450, while my average is 250. I have been blowing a 250 on a consistent basis for the last few months I've started regularly using the Peak Flow Meter (occasionally hitting 275 on a good day). Now, whether it's my diet, or my new Traditional Medicinals tea, I can't be sure, but I'm hoping I can get it up to 350, which is the suggested bare minimum of lung capacity for me.

The final reason I find myself so excited today, is that I had my first day as a janitor today, and my lungs were actually able to keep up with the stamina I needed to get everything done. This is very rare, and I was surprised I wasn't coughing at all, either! Certainly good things are coming my way, as far as my asthma goes.

An Introduction, and My Newest Tea Discovery

 

This is the tea I drank tonight that finally inspired me to start this: my first blog on my adventures with discovering holistic and traditional medicines (as well as the idea of using diet to help control my ailments). So after trying only a few teas, and finding this one to be the best one so far, I figured it would be a good post to start with.

My initial interest in medicinal herbs was actually started with an onion (we'll get to that story another day), but a close second is my lungs. Anyone who knows me knows that I have a pretty bad case of chronic asthma, and that having no insurance certainly doesn't help anything. I have done a handful of things to ease my pain, and to minimize my inhaler usage (my OTC inhaler actually says that it destroys the ozone...), but I have found that tea is one of the single most helpful things when it comes to asthma.

As you have probably noticed, I chose the domain name of "SteepFor10Minutes" for this particular blog, and there is an amazing reason behind that. If you are drinking tea, any kind of tea, and what to take advantage of the healing properties of that tea, to make it 'medicinal strength', you must steep the tea bag for at least 10 minutes. Most boxes of tea suggest 2 - 3 minutes, but not Traditional Medicinals. These guys actually SUGGEST a 10 - 15 minute steep time (so you know they mean business).

The actual taste of this tea is rather earthy (as opposed to the Yogi 'Breathe Easy" tea which wins the taste test between these two, as it tastes like orange Pez!) However, a little honey goes a long way, and even I could manage to drink it without anything in it (although the tea box reassures you that honey may actually ENHANCE it's effects, something I will certainly have to look into later).

It's a little expensive for tea (just over $5 for a box of 16 tea bags), but so far I think it's totally worth it. My chest congestion cleared up immediately, along with any other wheezing I had. The tea box and bags even look medicinal, which is very reassuring to be drinking a medicinal tea made by people who specialize in that area. This yea (like almost every other respiratory tea) uses licorice and eucalyptus, which helps with coughing and chest congestion, and is almost immediately effective.

I have yet to try any other kind of their tea, but now that I know who they are, and what they do, I am certainly going to keep my eye out for more of them and their teas.