The Bitter Truth

Let’s be real. Getting sick, either in the short or long term, can be incredibly frustrating, painful and inconvenient. In modern capitalistic society, most of us don’t have the time to take a couple weeks (or longer) off to fully recover from whatever illness or health challenge we may be experiencing. It’s an impossible part of a system that’s designed to keep us struggling towards maximum production without refilling our internal well of health, self-knowledge and rest.

That said, when we do have the opportunity to integrate the illnesses we experience, they can be extraordinary portals into uncovering deeper layers of ourselves. The rest and reflection illness often forces us into can be a pathway to self-understanding and finding purpose. In this episode, Bailey and I talk about the value of health challenges in our personal journeys to becoming the herbalists we are. May this episode bring you some solace and inspiration in these dark months!

Connect with Bailey McNeill of Bailey Interbeing:

* Instagram

* Integra Collective: https://www.integracollective.org/

Connect with Abbey Cmiel of Abbey Joy Healing

* Instagram

* Website

Bitter of the Day: Roble Sabana (Tabebuia rosea)

* Immune support

* Grounded nervous system support

* Anti-parasitic, anti-fungal, anti-bacterial

* Glucose/blood sugar regulation

* Fights infection

* Reduce digestive challenges

Our teacher, Kealy Rudersdorf of KIS botanicals in Mastatal, Costa Rica

Grounding tools through health challenges:

* Relational practices of herbalism for connecting to herbal allies as friends

* Journaling

* Meditation

* Nature walks without your phone

Robin Rose Bennett: The Gift of Healing Herbs

Initiations in the female reproductive system:

* Menarch

* Menstruation

* Birthing

* Birth release

* Menopause

Top herbal support for the winter:

* Elderberry Rosehip infusion (steep the tea 8-12 hours overnight)

* Roble Sabana antiviral tincture

* Fire Cider (with garlic, onion, ginger, hot pepper, oregano, ACV, honey)

* St. John’s Wort for seasonal affective disorder* not to be combined with SSRI’s or other medications (ask your doctor)

Thank you to the amazing Joseph Campbell of Durham, NC for creating the fun intro and outro beats and producing this episode!

Kate is my dear friend and practitioner of holistic pelvic floor care and I am SO grateful to have her on the podcast! In this episode, we go deep into the energetics of the pelvic floor, how to care for your womb space, and how to birth the life of your dreams. It was such a treat to learn from her expertise and I know you will love diving into this womb wisdom.

Kate Coletti is a Midwife, Holistic Pelvic Floor Practitioner, Mother, Teacher, and Healer based in Sonoma, CA. You can find more information about her offerings here:

Kate’s Website

Instagram: @wildwomanwellness

Enlightened Birth

Book A Session with Kate

Manual Medicine Mentorship

Holistic Pelvic Floor Trainings and Resources- Tami Lynn Kent

Wild Feminine Book

Wild Feminine Website

About your host:

Abbey Cmiel of Abbey Joy Healing is an Ayurvedic Practitioner, Body Worker, and Herbalist who specializes in Female Reproductive Care. Abbey offers lymphatic body work and Breast, Uterus, and hormonal care in Sonoma & Marin County, CA. You can book a session with her here.

You can follow along @abbeyjoyhealing and @bitter_truth_podcast on Instagram

Thank you to Curtis James of @muunjuun for the amazing intro and outro beats!

Welcome to the 8th episode of the bitter truth podcast!

I was so happy to chat today about a topic that is incredibly near and dear to my heart: breast health and how you can tend to your breast space at home! This is a topic many of us were never taught about and is essential for our overall health. In this episode I share some of the basics of lymphatic self-massage, as well as food and herbs that can support your hormonal, liver, and lymphatic health.

For more information about my business Abbey Joy Healing and to book a reproductive care session for breast health, you can visit my website www.abbeyjoyhealing.com

Bitter of the Day: Vitex/Chaste Tree

* Helps to regulate hormones in our bodies

* Can increase progesterone levels over time

* Try taking for three months to regulate female reproductive hormones during reproductive years

The seven tissues in Ayurveda: Lymph, Blood, Muscle, Skin, Bones, Nerves, Reproductive

Listen to the Podcast Episode with DeAnna Batdorff

Liver support herbs: Dandelion, Burdock, Turmeric, Milk Thistle, Artichoke, Vitex

dhyana Essentials Practitioner Referrals list

More about the Lymph:

* Our body’s immune system

* All of the lymph flows through the subclavian drain (underneath the collarbone) back to the heart

* Almost half of our lymph nodes are in the gut (especially the small intestines)

How to move the lymph:

* Movement: Walking, dancing, laughter, breathing, jumping on a rebounder

* Self Massage

* Support liver detox: eat bitters every day (turmeric, dandelion greens, grapefruit

* Neti Pot, Dry Brushing, Gua Sha

* Poop 1-2x per day to detox: Flax, fiber, beans, magnesium glycinate

How to care for the breast/chest space:

* Listen to the emotions that are connected to your breast/chest and heart space

* Consider your relationship to nourishment

* Feel your breast/chest every day

* Get a gua sha for self massage

* Castor oil on the breasts with a warm compress or hot water bottle - very anti-inflammatory and detoxifying

* Add a few drops of Frankincense Essential oil to your massage oil of choice for breast cysts or inflammation

* Decrease inflammatory foods: chocolate, nuts, red wine, gluten, processed sugar, alcohol, conventionally raised meats

* Avoid antiperspirant deodorant

* Spend time bra-less

* Dental health is key! Floss, brush & care for your teeth! More info from Gaye Mason Walden of Holistic Breast Health

Foods for Breast Health:

* Eat lots of fiber for hormone detox: cruciferous veggies

* Essential Fatty Acids: Flax, Chia, Sardines, Mussels, Oysters

* Seaweeds for Iodine

* Sweet Potatoes for progesterone

Flow for self breast/chest massage:

* Start beneath the clavicle and upper chest

* Massage the armpits

* Massage the outside of the breast

* Make circular motions with your hands underneath the breast and up the sternum

* Massage along the top of the breasts/chest

* Work your hands closer to the center/the nipple

* Take extra time underneath the breast if you have matted lymph due to wearing bras

As always, thank you to the amazing Curtis James of @muunjuun for making the very groovy, very fun intro and outro beats!

Wow, what a juicy conversation with my dear friend Katie Ring! Katie in an Ayurvedic Chef, body worker, health counselor, and now provides post-partum meal support! It was such a treat to dive into how food and nourishment can connect us to our deepest pleasure, and thereby help us heal our bodies. I hope you enjoy this episode!

Connect with Katie

Meal Delivery, Ayurvedic Health Consults, Sensual Suppers, Post Partum Doula support

https://www.awakenwithkatie.com/

https://www.instagram.com/katiering_/

The elements of fall and how to support your body in these times:

* We are at the crux between summer (hot/dry) and winter (wet/cold)

* Need to balance the hot and cold, as well as wet and dry

* Fall is dominated by the Vata dosha (Air and Ether) so we need more grounding and nourishing

* Eat seasonally in the fall: squash, sweet potatoes, apples, pears, pomegranates, figs, feijoas (guava), prickly pear

* Integrate brassicas for cleansing and detox properties (broccoli, cauliflower, kale, brussel sprouts)

* Ayurveda meal balance: 60% building foods (grains, protein, healthy carbs, fats), 40% cleansing foods (brassicas, legumes)

* Integrate healthy fats: tahini, sesame seeds, pumpkin seeds, walnuts, almonds, cashews, bay nuts (add on to oatmeal, chia pudding, yogurt)

* Incorporate seaweed in meals

* Increase citrus for vitamin C and bitters - add citrus peels to your meals

* Collect your veggie scraps to make a broth- add carrots, celery, onion, parsley, thyme, bay leaf, seaweed, coriander, apple cider vinegar

Yarrow (Achillea millefolium):

* Energetics: warming, slightly drying

* Drink ¼ C of chopped yarrow leaves/flower or dried yarrow stepped in hot water if you feel yourself getting sick- can add ginger and honey for taste

* Yarrow provides digestive and immune support

Food as pleasure:

* Practice sitting down to eat

* Take time to eat breakfast

* Eat with good company

* Sit outside and listen to nature rather than your phone or TV

* Practice eating in silence every so often

* Try eating blindfolded with loved ones

* Try eating with your hands

* Make an ancestor plate to nourish the past and future generations

Stay tuned for our perinatal offerings!

* Ayurvedic Body Work

* Post Partum doula care

* Fertility consultations

* Nourishment, Stress Reduction, Safety

Thank you thank you to Curtis James of @muunjuun for the amazing intro and outro beats!!

With the arrival of fall, we are called to take stock of our daily practices and assess what is really serving us. My teacher DeAnna Batdorff says “Fall is for Follow through”. This idea has really stuck with me: how do we create the life of our dreams by following through on our visions and setting ourselves up for success? In Ayurveda, there is a concept called “Dinacharya” which is essentially our daily routine. Building in daily practices of healthy food, herbal, and lifestyle choices is what adds up to greater health and capacity in the long run. In this episode, I share some of my favorite practices that help me stay sane and well amidst the challenges and joys life brings.

Show notes from Dinacharya: Daily Practices for overall wellbeing

Where to contact me: [email protected]

www.abbeyjoyhealing.com

@abbeyjoyhealing and @bitter_truth_podcast on Instagram

Local Native-Led organizations in Sonoma County:

Heron Shadow- The Cultural Conservancy

Segorea Te Land Trust

The Botanical Bus

Today’s Bitters: Better Bitters from Herb Pharm

Dinacharya: Daily Routine

My morning routine:

* Take Basal Body Temperature for Menstrual Cycle Tracking: Listen to podcast ep with Caitlin McMurtry on Cycle Tracking

* Get sunshine on the face for cortisol balance

* Brush Teeth

* Tongue Scrape

* Neti Pot: approx 1 tsp of sea salt in body temp distilled water

* Drink warm salty water: ¼ tsp- ½ tsp of Atlantic Gray Sea Salt or other gray sea salt in a glass of warm water for electrolyte balancing

* Some type of movement! Yoga (I like Yoga with Adriene), gentle weight lifting workout (I like HASfit), or rebounding (tiny trampoline)

* Eat a protein rich balanced breakfast- aim for 20-30 grams of protein along with complex carbs and healthy fats

* Avoid looking at phone until brushing teeth

Tips throughout the day:

* Take herbal bitters (I like bitters in the form of tincture) 15 minutes before meals

* Eat a healthy protein-rich lunch (sardines, ancestral blend ground beef)

* Try drinking a splash of apple cider vinegar in water before meals for blood sugar regulation

* Take small breaks throughout the day to move body (walk, shake)

* Add herbal medicine to your daily life (herbal teas, herbal spice blends in meals)

Nighttime tips:

* Avoid looking at phone for the last hour of the day

* Try sleeping with phone in another room or away from your bed

* Dinner is the lightest meal of the day because digestive fire is the strongest mid-day and the weakest at night

* Change lights around the house to warmer/lower lights

* Abhyanga: Oil body with sesame or almond oil, wait a bit, and then shower without soap to rub the oils into the body

* Shakti Mat

* Castor Oil on breast/chest/liver/belly with warm water bottle before bed

* Eye Mask to allow body to go into deep sleep

* Mouth taping: 3M micropore tape

Thank you to Curtis James of @muunjuun for the amazing intro and outro beats!

I spent the last week staying at my dear friends Dewey & Matthew Raybon’s house in the Bywater of New Orleans, and had a blast connecting with them and the beautiful plants that surround and fill their home. The trip was a amazing reunion of the Integra Collective’s members: Bailey McNeill, Dewey Raybon & Cameron Conklin.

Over the course of the week we nerded out on our favorite herbal medicines, the ways we navigate health challenges, and our favorite elixirs. We drank bitter concoctions daily with Dewey’s extensive medicine/bartending cabinet- swirling up mixes of sparkly water, vinegars, juices, and bitters to make delicious mocktails for the late-summer heat.

Sadly, Cam had to leave before we recorded this episode, but Bailey, Dewey and I had a blast sharing our quick-and-dirty top recommendations for connecting to herbs and herbal community. Here are our notes from the show!

Thank you to our teacher and retreat co-facilitator Kealy Rudersdorf of KIS Botanicals

Top tips for wellbeing from Bailey & Dewey:

* Wear an eyemask to sleep for deep rest

* Spend time outside: skin in the sun, feet on the earth

* Eat enough! Be conscious around restrictive diets

* Build a daily relationship with your favorite plant

* Walks (combine with a weighted vest or ankle weights if you so choose!)

* Incorporate herbal medicine into your daily meals! Make “sprinkles” of blends of herbs, nuts, seeds, and salts

* Make infusions of herbs in oils and vinegars to add to your foods (try thyme in your olive oil)

* Bioregionalism: Work with the plants outside your door

* Finding community around herbalism to learn and grow together

More about us! The Integra Collective hosts immersive programs and events that connect people to their bodies, communities and the Earth in service of a more regenerative future. Over the last three years we’ve hosted three festivals and three retreats connecting people to local herbalism, music, art, and more! Stay tuned for our Earth Body Spirit Retreat in North Carolina Fall 2026 and other upcoming events in California. You can follow along @integracollective on Instagram.

I truly could not be more grateful to have my teacher, DeAnna Batdorff on the podcast for this episode! DeAnna has been one of the most powerful influences on my life and helped me become the practitioner and person I am. She has an unabashed desire to dive into the depths of existence and talk about the things most people relegate to the shadows.

In this episode we talked about DeAnna’s journey to becoming an Ayurvedic practitioner: from being a child who saw spirits, to supporting loved ones in the HIV/AIDS crisis in San Francisco, to living in an Ashram in India and to creating multiple centers for radical health in the North Bay.

I have been so lucky to study with DeAnna for almost 4 years now and absolutely loved getting to hear some of my favorite stories of hers again (and lots of juicy new tidbits!). We even got into some spicy “Ask DeAnna Anything” questions towards the end that I’m sure will make you giggle as much as I did.

Here are some of the fabulous resources we mentioned throughout the podcast:

DeAnna’s Website: https://dhyanaessentials.com/

dhyana Essentials Instagram: @dhyanaessentials

Community Clinics: https://dhyanaessentials.com/pages/community-clinics-1

Abbey’s Community Clinic: https://www.abbeyjoyhealing.com/community-clinics

Stacey Pfiefer’s practice: Sways on the Watertop

Find a practitioner trained by DeAnna near you

Free Ebooks on Lymph, Breath, and Hydration

For this week’s episode I decided to go solo to share why I decided to start this podcast! In this ep, I share why bitters are so important and my journey to becoming an herbalist, Ayurvedic practitioner, and reproductive health specialist. So get yourself an herbal mocktail with bitters and enjoy the ride!

Here are some links to the amazing places & practitioners I mentioned in the episode and plan to interview over the next few months:

Dr. Nicole Fodel of Synergy Holistic Health in Charlotte, NC

The Eco Institute in Chapel Hill, NC

The Occidental Arts and Ecology Center in Occidental, CA

Kealy Rudersdorf of KIS Botanicals in Mastatal, Costa Rica

DeAnna Batdorff of dhyana Essentials in Occidental, CA

To learn more about me and my practice you can check out my website or follow along @abbeyjoyhealing on Instagram.

Thank you to the FABULOUS Curtis James of @muunjuun for making my amazing intro and outro beats!

It was such a joy to talk with Caitlin McMurtry about how to avoid and heal from burnout and support holistic hormone health. She is an incredible resource on all things Fertility Awareness Method, hormones, and general cyclical living. We got into the bitter truth about the challenges of living in the modern world, and how we can integrate practices to support our bodies through times of stress and uncertainty.

Learn more about Caitlin McMurtry at https://www.cyclewiselove.com/ or @cycle.wise on Instagram

* Caitlin’s “Learn to Chart” Book: https://www.cyclewiselove.com/fertilityawarenessbook

Morning recs:

* No screens for the first hour after waking up (and ideally the hour before going to bed)

* Splash cool water on your face

* Do the hard thing you don’t want to do first

* Eat breakfast!

* Try these Protein muffins with collagen powder

Daily practices:

* Throughout the day take breaks to do nothing to teach your body that it is safe

* Put your feet on the Earth

* Turn down the lights the hours before going to bed

Thank you thank you to the fabulous Curtis James of MuunJuun for creating the intro and outro music! Go check out his music!

Welcome to the first episode of the Bitter Truth Podcast - where we take herbal bitters and talk about the truth!

It was such a delight to chat with Fiona McNichols of Embody Wisdom about Mugwort (Artemesia Vulgaris)- one of our all time favorite bitters!

We went deep into the magic and medicinal properties of Mugwort including as a connection to the womb space, a tonic for clarifying your purpose, and a portal to the dream world. Mugwort is truly a plant that contains multitudes.

I highly recommend growing mugwort at your home if you have space, or purchasing from a trusted seller like Mountain Rose Herbs.

Please use caution when taking Mugwort internally and consult a trained herbalist. Mugwort should not be taken by those hoping to conceive or currently pregnant.

You can find more about me, Abbey Cmiel, at @abbeyjoyhealing on Instagram and at www.abbeyjoyhealing.com

And you can learn more about our superstar guest, Fiona McNichols, at Embody Wisdom

Thank you SO much to Curtis James of MuunJuun for producing this episode and creating the super fun beats for The Bitter Truth pod.

Please tell us how you like to connect to mugwort in the comments!