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Medicinal Properties Of Lavender
Medicinal Properties Of Lavender

Video: Medicinal Properties Of Lavender

Video: Medicinal Properties Of Lavender
Video: 7 Health Benefits Of Lavender 2024, March
Anonim

Lavender soothes and heals

lavender
lavender

On my bedside table is a small, beautifully designed sachet filled with fragrant herbs. Friends gave it to me more than a year ago when I complained of insomnia. Indeed, after receiving this gift, I began to fall asleep and sleep better.

Before going to bed, I breathed in the spicy wonderful aroma emanating from the sachet, calmed down, and after that the drowsiness approached - I fell asleep. This sachet is still on the nightstand, only I put it in a plastic bag so that the aromas disappear less. From time to time I take it out, inhale the scent, which has become a little fainter, but still reminds of a warm edge where the grass grew, packed in a bag. What kind of herb is this that can calm and induce dreams? This amazing plant is lavender.

Remember the famous hit of the famous singer: "Lavender, mountain lavender - blue flowers of our meeting with you …". It is with these crushed flowers and leaves collected on Crimean plantations that my sachet is tightly filled.

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Lavender is a perennial aromatic plant of the Lamiaceae family. Its generic name - lavender (Lavandula) comes from the Latin word lavare, which means "to bathe." The fact is that the ancient Romans widely used flowers and herbs of this plant for aromatizing baths.

By the way, since ancient times, the inhabitants of those countries and regions where it grew in the wild, used the flowers and grass of lavender to scent bed linen and scare away moths and other harmful insects that do not like its smell. To do this, they filled small cloth bags, such as sachets, with dried lavender and placed them in cabinets and dressers, where they kept linen and clothes.

In total, there are about thirty species in this genus, but in our country they grow on an industrial scale - in the Crimea and the Caucasus - mainly narrow-leaved lavender, or real (Lavandula angustifolia). It is sung about her in the song, because this plant is very unpretentious, drought-resistant and grows even on rocky soils. It blooms in the Crimea from July to August. It is her flowers that are harvested for medicinal and cosmetic purposes at a time when half of the flowers will open on the plant.

lavender
lavender

By the way, some of our growers have learned to grow lavender near St. Petersburg. She is quite winter-hardy, but she loves light, loose soil, a sunny, elevated place and does not like close water standing in the ground and, in general, waterlogging. The lavender you see in the photo grew near St. Petersburg, on the south side of the greenhouse.

This plant is propagated by seeds or vegetatively (by dividing the bush).

It is a shrub that grows in height from 40 centimeters to 1 meter. It has oblong, narrow, gray-green leaves, and at the end of the stems there are many purple-blue flowers, collected in a spike-shaped inflorescence. They unfold gradually, lavender bloom lasts almost a month, emitting a strong, unique "lavender" scent. This aroma is due to the fact that the whole plant, and especially the flowers, contains a volatile essential oil. It is the most valuable ingredient in lavender. This oil is obtained on an industrial scale by the method of distillation of flowers with steam.

All the beneficial properties of lavender flowers are due to their rich chemical composition.

Lavender essential oil contains most of all - up to 60% - the substance linalyl acetate, which determines its unique aroma, as well as many medicinal properties. It also contains other aromatic substances - borneol alcohol, geraniol and others. Biologically active organic compounds - coumarins, flavonoids, phytosterols and anthocyanins - with medicinal properties were also found in lavender inflorescences.

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Medicinal properties of narrow-leaved lavender

lavender
lavender

Due to the presence of such substances in the plant, lavender flowers have a diuretic, anticonvulsant and sedative effect. In traditional medicine, they are used to treat kidney and bladder diseases. Raw materials of medicinal lavender are used in the composition of dietary supplements.

In folk medicine, the range of application of raw materials and lavender oil is much wider. For example, folk healers use lavender essential oil as a choleretic, sedative, carminative, bactericidal, anti-inflammatory, and disinfectant. For example, they recommend using lavender angustifolia essential oil as an antimicrobial agent for steam inhalation for pneumonia, bronchitis, laryngitis, tracheitis.

Colds can also be treated with a decoction of fresh flowering lavender plants. After all, this broth has antiseptic, antispasmodic and soothing properties.

Traditional healers prescribe lavender essential oil to patients to improve blood circulation in the brain, increase intestinal tone, and improve appetite. And outwardly, lavender oil is recommended for the treatment of burns, purulent wounds, skin diseases, for resorption of scars and active regeneration of epidermal cells.

Heals lavender oil

For cough: for treatment, mix a teaspoon of honey with two drops of lavender oil. This mixture also reduces bronchial inflammation.

For headache: with severe pain in the temples, rub 2-3 drops of lavender oil into each temple in a circular motion.

From depression: the aromas of lavender essential oil or the lavender flowers themselves, thanks to the soothing properties of this plant, help in the treatment of depression, constant anxiety and anxiety syndrome, stress and tension. Aromas can be obtained using a sachet with dried lavender flowers, or from a bouquet of fresh flowers in a vase. You can also use oil vaporization in scented lamps. Lavender can be kept in a room in any form, you can put inflorescences in a vase, use scented lamps.

For acne: If you have red colds on your body, you can also use lavender oil. To do this, you just need to drop one drop of oil on your finger and lubricate the pimple with it.

Lavender for the prevention of insomnia

lavender
lavender

Lavender is useful for those who suffer from sleep disorders, insomnia and nervous exhaustion. Its aroma has a positive effect on the receptors of the brain, it helps the body to relax and sleep peacefully. You can, as I did, leave a sachet or any bag of light fabric with crushed inflorescences and lavender grass on the bedside table before going to bed.

It will spread the scent of this plant and help you sleep. You can also use a special scent lamp, they are now on sale. A cup of water is placed in it, to which a few drops of lavender oil are added - it is also now sold, for example, at exhibitions. If you use such a fragrance before going to bed, then the bedroom will quickly fill with the wonderful scent of lavender. And then the body will also relax, and sleep will come.

If you don't have one, you can take a small container, fill it with hot water and add a few drops of lavender. Soon the aroma of this plant will spread throughout the room. Of course, the lamp is more efficient, because as long as the fire burns under the cup and until the water and oil have completely evaporated in it, it will produce aromas, but in the case of a container filled with hot water and oil, the effect will continue until the water cools … By the way, the aromas of lavender obtained with the help of such a lamp help to fight against colds.

There is another way to deal with insomnia. The recipe is as follows: you need to pour one teaspoon of dried lavender flowers with one glass of boiling water, insist and strain this infusion. Drink it before bed.

Infusion of lavender flowers

To obtain it, you need 3 teaspoons of lavender flowers, pour 400 ml of boiling water and leave for 10 minutes. Then strain and take during the day for half a glass half an hour before meals - for migraines, palpitations, neurasthenia, bronchitis, rheumatism, and also as a choleretic agent.

Lavender tea

It is taken to treat the stomach - relieve spasms, discomfort. Tea is prepared from one teaspoon of lavender flowers, which are poured over a glass of boiling water. The tea is settled for 5-10 minutes and filtered. This tea should be prepared and taken three times a day.

Healing baths with lavender

They are recommended for people suffering from hypotension, as well as with nervous exhaustion. For this, a decoction is prepared from 60 g of dry or 200-300 g of fresh leaves and lavender flowers, which are poured with 1 liter of water and slowly heated to a boil. After that, the broth is infused for a quarter of an hour and poured into the bath. It takes 15 minutes to take such a bath.

Contraindications

Like many other medicinal plants, lavender is contraindicated in pregnant women. It is forbidden to take lavender preparations for patients when treating them with preparations containing iodine or iron, as well as with their individual intolerance.

In any case, as with treatment with other medicinal plants, it is necessary to consult a doctor.

E. Valentinov

Photo by Olga Rubtsova

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