It’s a thrill to the senses to be alive and kicking in our startlingly green and pleasant land as the young summer stakes her claim to the throne like a wanton, voluptuous empress – Catherine the Great of the four seasons – and beautiful, lush, fecund and profoundly verdant though she is, like any young potentate, she can be a cruel mistress, as anyone who suffers the annual torments of hay-fever will tell you. Each year the problem seems to grow more intense and widespread as the mix of pollution, higher temperatures from global warming and presumably, the, as yet, uncharted effects of GM crops, create an increasingly formidable airborne cocktail. Even just writing about it is threatening to cause an itch in my throat and the corner of my eye. I’d never suffered it myself until I moved to New Mexico for 4 years in the later 70s, where the unfamiliar, exotic cottonwood pollen had a field day, if you’ll excuse the pun, with my respiratory system. Fortunately, I was studying Chinese medicine at the time and regulating the condition became a pet project for my teacher, who, being the utter genius he was, sorted it so effectively, I’ve never been troubled by more than the hint of a tickle ever since, even when pollen count’s soaring. I subsequently employed his method, which essentially boils down to filling a teapot, in my own healing practice over the years and found it to be equally effective when treating others, no matter the actual airborne allergen involved. This is because it works on building the resistance in general, so I thought I’d pass the essential data on to you, as not only could it help you considerably if prone to hay-fever but could also be of overall benefit in terms of boosting your immune response in general. According to the style of Taoist medicine I was taught, it’s your kidney energy that lies at the root of your ability to resist external pernicious elements of any kind, whether airborne or otherwise and at this time of year, as always, nature herself, provides the perfect remedy: stinging nettles. Wearing gloves if you like, though it’s not essential and I recall my teacher guffawing when I suggested it (‘you’re so English’, he used to say), pick off the uppermost leaves, as, apart from being hardly stingy at all, these are the freshest and hence most full of healing energy. Two or three plants’ worth, or sufficient to fill a small paper bag, will be enough to make a pot of strong tea, which is approximately one day’s dose. It’s preferable to pick them every day but picking enough for the week ahead is a good second best. Third best, of course, if you have no time or penchant for the wild, is to buy nettle tea in a health shop, though obviously this won’t quite pack the same punch but will still do the trick nonetheless. Meanwhile, your relationship with the physical world and your body’s capacity for effectively processing external stimuli such as allergens and subsequently stabilising itself, is governed, say the Taoists, by your spleen energy, for which a most effective natural stimulant at this time of year, is honey, preferably locally produced, as this also seems to provide a quasi-homeopathic effect on the system, honey being produced, as it is, from local pollen. Hence why it’s not just self-indulgent to plonk at least two teaspoons’ worth in each cup of nettle tea you drink. Of course, though, on the frontline of this campaign, are your lungs, whose energy supports your breathing apparatus and membranous tissue (hence the itchy eyes) . Mullein, (available from herb shops), is highly effective for supporting your lung energy and opening up your breathing passages. It also happens to make you feel extremely clear-minded, as opposed to the mental fuzziness, that normally accompanies hay-fever. You can either make a fresh pot of tea with it, or simply add it in equal measure to the nettles. Between cups of tea, it also helps to eat beetroot, as not only does this increase your vitamin C levels, which as you know, is helpful in all respiratory conditions, but also, as its colour would suggest, helps make you more sanguine and hence confident in your body’s capacity to protect itself from the dreaded tickle, that you too may enjoy the blessings of the empress this summer without having to use too many tissues, eye-drops or anti-histamines.
