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Help for Women with Fibroids
By: Susun
S. Weed
Wise Woman herbal and home remedies are simple, safe
ways to help yourself when you have a diagnosis of uterine fibroids.
Uterine fibroids are solid muscle tissue growths in the uterus. They are
also called fibroid tumors, myomas, or leiomyomas. Fibroids occur so
frequently (in up to half of all women over forty) that they could be
considered a normal irregularity. The occasional fibroid can become
enormous (medical literature reports one that was 100 pounds!), but the
majority (80%) remain as small as a walnut.
Fibroids are the number one reason American women have hysterectomies.
The causes of uterine fibroids are unknown, but estrogens, especially
estradiol, promote their growth. After menopause fibroids disappear. But
because estrogen levels can rise during the early menopausal years,
previously asymptomatic fibroids may grow in the years just before the
cessation of menses, resulting in symptoms such as feeling of heaviness
in the belly, low back pain, pain with vaginal penetration, urinary
frequency or incontinence, bowel difficulties, or severe menstrual pain
and flooding.
Women of color are three to nine times more likely to have fibroids than
white women, and theirs will grow more quickly.
Fibroid tumors are not cancer, not malignant. Tumor means a swelling or
a growth, not a malignancy, not cancer. Less than 0.1% of all uterine
fibroids are malignant.
Small fibroids often disappear spontaneously. Larger fibroids are more
difficult to resolve, but not impossible to control with natural
measures.
²The “root chakra” (lowermost energy center in the body, which
includes the uterus) said to store unexpressed anger. It is believed
that any unwanted growths in these organs can be countered by allowing
the anger to safely discharge.
²One woman’s fibroids (and menstrual cramps) disappeared within three
months of beginning a vigorous exercise program. Exercise helps insure
regular ovulation, and irregular ovulation seems to worsen fibroids.
²Consuming three or more servings of whole grains or beans daily not
only reduces the size of fibroids but offers protection from breast and
endometrial cancers as well.
²Red clover flowers (Trifolium pratense), are one of my favorite
infusions, but use during the menopausal years may increase difficulty
with fibroids.
²Strengthening the liver with herbs such as dandelion, milk thistle
seed, or yellow dock root helps it metabolize estrogen out of the body,
thus reducing fibroids.
²Vitex or chasteberry tincture, 25-30 drops two to four times daily,
often shrinks small fibroids within two months. But results come from
long-term use — up to two years.
²Ask someone to burn moxa over the area of the fibroid while you
envision the heat releasing the treasures in your uterus. What is locked
up in this fibroid? What can you give birth to?
²Acupuncture treatments can shrink fibroids.
²Poke root (Phytolacca americana), used internally as a tincture (1-10
drops per day; start small) and externally as a belly rub oil, has
gained a reputation as a profound helper in relieving pain and
distresses from fibroids. CAUTION: Poke is considered poisonous; it is
not often found for sale. This is one remedy you may have to make
yourself to try.
²Warm castor oil packs on the belly, or ginger compresses (soak a towel
in hot ginger water) relieve pain and help shrink the fibroids.
²The use of progesterone to treat women with uterine fibroids is hotly
debated. One side holds that fibroids are created by lack of
progesterone. The other side makes, to my mind, the better case: that
progesterone increases fibroids. Evidence? Fibroids increase in size
during pregnancy, when progesterone production is high, and atrophy
after menopause, when progesterone levels decrease. Whichever side is
right, eating more whole grains and beans usually changes
estrogen/progesterone ratio for the better and shrinks fibroids.
²Reduce fibroids by reducing your exposure to estrogen: avoid birth
control pills, ERT/HRT, estrogen-mimicing residues from herbicides and
pesticides used on food crops (eat organically-raised products). Tampons
that are bleached with chlorine may mimic the bad effects of estrogen,
too.
²Lupron (leuprolide acetate), a drug which induces “artificial
menopause” by shutting down the body's production of estradiol causes
a significant decrease in fibroid size within 8-12 weeks. Fibroids do
regrow to about 90 percent of their original size when the drug is
withdrawn however.
²Major advances have been made in surgical treatments for women with
fibroids. There are many options now besides hysterectomy (removal of
the uterus), including hysteroscopic resection, uterine embolization,
myomectomy, and suprecervical hysterectomy. Since these are fairly new
procedures, take the time to find a surgeon who is skilled in the
procedure.
²Hysterectomy can be a life-saving procedure, but by the age of sixty,
more than one-third of American women will have given up their wombs to
the surgeons. The presence of non-symptomatic fibroids is never
sufficient reason, to my mind, for a hysterectomy. Of my students and
apprentices who have had hysterectomies because of fibroids, those who
“did their homework” — that is, helped themselves before and after
their surgery with all the tools at their disposal — seemed to fare
much better than those who did not.
²With very few exceptions, no woman is healthier without her ovaries.
So, even if you elect a hysterectomy, keep your ovaries.
These Wise Woman ways, and lots more, are in my book New Menopausal
Years the Wise Woman Way, available from www.ashtreepublishing.com.
They are arranged in order of risk: the safest first, the most dangerous
last. If you have a uterine fibroid and it is a problem, begin with the
mildest remedies first. Set a time limit for your use of any remedy,
but, except in an emergency, don't go on to stronger remedies until you
are sure the safer ones aren't effective for you. As with any advice,
you are the best judge of what works for you.
Visit Susun Weed at: www.susunweed.com
and www.ash-tree-publishing.com
For permission to reprint this article, contact us at: susunweed@hvc.rr.com
Bio:
Susun Weed, green witch and wise woman, is an
extraordinary teacher with a joyous spirit, a powerful presence, and an
encyclopedic knowledge of herbs and health. She is the voice of the Wise
Woman Way, where common weeds, simple ceremony, and compassionate
listening support and nourish health/wholeness/holiness. She has opened
hearts to the magic and medicine of the green nations for three decades.
Ms. Weed's four herbal medicine books focus on women's health topics
including: menopause, childbearing, and breast health. Visit her site www.susunweed.com
for information on her workshops, apprenticeships, correspondence
courses and more! Browse the publishing site www.ashtreepublishing.com
to learn more about her alternative health books. Venture into the NEW
Menopause site www.menopause-metamorphosis.com
to learn all about the Menopausal Years the Wise Woman Way.
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