Lomatium dissectum

[GraceUnderPressure]

I know from searching the old posts that several here have tried lomatium. I would love to hear your feedback on it even if you got no benefit.

 

I had read about the rash it can cause before I bought it, but the few pictures that I saw looked nothing like the recent rash my family has experienced which as I mentioned in my previous post about our mystery rash was very much like the symptoms of rubella.

 

Not realizing that it might be lomatium, I did not try any of the recommended supportive measures they suggest for those who develop it, though we were already taking several other immune supportive herbs like astragalus, andrographis & ashwagandha along with OLE & monolaurin.

 

Anyway, I ran across some info & pix on an autism forum last night that have me wondering if my dismissal of the idea was based on a mistaken understanding of it. That & the fact that I thought my DH had not had any & he developed the rash, too - but I asked him last night & he says that he believes he had at least a couple of doses before he went into the hospital last week. Still, every single one of us developed the rash & it lasted longer than 2 days which was not consistent with what I had read about it either.

 

I am going to call Jane at Barlow Herbal tomorrow to ask more questions, but I would really appreciate hearing from those of you who have tried lomatium & what you experienced.

[Stephanie2]

just wondering if this is an herb or a homeopathic remedy?

[GraceUnderPressure]

It's an herb & it seems to be potent.

http://www.barlowherbal.com/product_info.php?products_id=38&osCsid=m7q2b7knb52kt7q88g78rtm734

http://www.lomatium.com/

http://www.naturalnews.com/020091.html

http://www.healthline.com/natstandardcontent/desert-parsley

 

Apparently, if you are going to have the rash, it appears approx. 7-9 days after you begin taking it & can take ~a week for all the spots to go away depending how badly you get it. You will want to keep that in mind if you decide to try it so you can plan for keeping yourself &/or child at home because everyone will think they have something catching & be freaked out if you go out in public!

 

If you are not as clueless as I was, you can start off much more slowly & carefully & it should decrease the reaction so it's not so bad - if this rash we just had is a lomatium rash as I am thinking it is, then it does feel just as if you are sick with a virus. Ours had virtually all the symptoms of rubella & my ds18 had a fairly high titer for that when Dr. R tested him which really has me wondering! If it is coming from the plant, rather than the plant stirring up something latent, then it does sound kind of homeopathic, doesn't it? Except no dilution! Wish I had diluted it now!

[MichaelTampa]

I posted on this a few months back. This is an herb that is in the "Buhner protocol". (Several people have a set of herbs figured out to help for lyme, Buhner is one of them.)

 

I tried it. I felt like it helped me a little bit, but not greatly. I took it for probably a couple months, when it appeared it no longer was of any help for me. One of the benefits for lyme is to help strengthen the immune system, but it has the antibacterial antiviral type properties. It is something the native americans used successfully to avoid the influenza.

 

I did not have any reactions to it on the skin. I do know someone else who took it and did develop the rash in about 5 days. It was uncomfortable and so on, it was a while back and don't remember too much of the details. The place that sold it provided information explaining that this does happen sometimes, particularly if you take too much too soon, and I think they said it was a kind of allergic reaction to the herb that would be a one-time event. At this point, I'm a little hesitant to believe this explanation, in that this same person also tried an herb, Enula, well known for being good to treat parasites/worms and babesia (a lyme coinfection). In a few days on Enula and her skin had perhaps hundreds of things that looked perhaps mostly like boils or really bad pimples. I am sure this was a result of toxins/die-off, as she did go too fast (as she had with the lomatium). And so I do wonder if maybe that skin rash from the lomatium was also toxins/die-off of something. This person found occasional good use of the lomatium as a one-time take-this to feel better kind of thing, does not have PANDAS, but does have lyme, which really means she has plenty of bacterial and viral and parasitic infections (plenty of opportunity for die-off).

 

[side note, Stephanie, if you're still working on the kill-the-strep theory, and looking for herbal stabs in the dark to try, this might be on the list, as a stab in the dark though. No promises, I don't know that it is or isn't really strep that's your problem there, only that it has a history of dealing with influenza and that seems close.]

[GraceUnderPressure]

Michael, did you try it on just yourself or on your child as well? My ds18 seems to react to viruses rather than strep (plus as I said before, we picked up a bug we haven't been able to clear for months now). I was hoping this might help him with those issues.

 

I talked to Jane Barlow today at Barlow Herbal & she told me that there are several theories about what causes the rash, but they all seem to boil down to some form of detoxing. She was surprised to hear that our whole family developed a rash. Makes me wonder if there is some pollution in our area - or maybe our house - of which we are ignorant.

 

Anyway, my ds18 & ds7 - both my PANDAS/PITANDS leaning kids had the worst rashes of all of us. I was observing that it seems to have affected us according to how dysfunctional our immune systems are, but then that could be related to how much detoxifying we need to do, couldn't it?

[MichaelTampa]

I don't have any kids, I tried it on myself, and then one other adult I spoke of tried it. Don't know of any kids trying it. It could be something in your house, I suppose, mold, perhaps. But really, if your whole family got a rash, I am guessing that your whole family has a chronic infection that deserves some attention.

 

Yes, I think need for detox and compromised immune system are going to go hand in hand. I the the rash is really detoxing, but the need to detox is increased by killing some of the chronic infection, and you get behind on the detoxing and all that with the compromised immune system from the chronic infection.

[GraceUnderPressure]

Thanks, Michael! I stumbled across a dad named Stan Kurtz who has been teaching parents of kids with autism how to treat viral kids & realize I may have put my foot into it this time. I'm trying to learn more asap as my ds18's tics are worse now and I'm hoping I haven't gone & pushed him further into this mess. Ibuprofen seemed to help the first couple of days, but not any more. I'm already doing dandelion root & milk thistle for liver support. Would you have any suggestions?

[MichaelTampa]

I think the reaction your ds18 is having is a big clue of some infection going on, with him and perhaps the rest of the family. I don't know the dosage you are using, but you might consider continuing at a lower dosage. Perhaps the increased tics is from die-off/herxing, and backing off will make it more manageable. I know some have been helped by epsom salt baths as well, perhaps consider trying that, see if it helps. If it's really difficult even at a low dose, I think that just indicates the seriousness of the infection he has. But, regardless, you may want to push any current doctors you have, or find a new one, who can really explore what infection might be going on there.

[GraceUnderPressure]

Thanks! I will do that! Dr. R isn't familiar with lomatium, but he has always been very open & flexible, in addition to his own lengthy experience, so we should be able to figure something out!