Dallas Morning News – December 9, 2021

Skin Help and More

Not to replace advice from your doctor, but I do have some suggestions that might help with certain common personal issues. I have experimented myself, taken suggestions of others and have come up some techniques that can help with rashes, warts, moles, liver spots, cracks on finger tips and even those little crusty pre-cancerous growths.

Poison ivy and other plant-caused rashes can usually be quelled with the sap from comfrey. It can also help with warts, moles and other growths on the skin.

Comfrey

Comfrey is a very interesting plant. It’s a tough, pretty perennial and an excellent ingredient for the compost pile but has other uses. Both the above-ground plant parts and the roots have been used on the skin for the relief of swelling and inflammatory disorders such as bruises, sprains and pulled muscles for many years. I put leaves and stems in the blender, create a green slurry to keep in a glass container in the frig. Daubing this comfrey juice on warts and moles works great for me. The surface ones melt away quickly, the deeper “seed warts” take longer. I do not recommend ingesting it in any way as some herbalists do.

Dark liver spots on the back of you hands? Piece a cake. Wipe hydrogen peroxide from the grocery store on the spots every few days. The spots will slowly fade away.

Those little crusty growths that pop up for many people and are commonly cut or burned away for fear of skin cancer can be excised with the milk from figs. No – that’s not a misprint. Daubing the white juice that oozes from the stem or fruit when broken off onto these suspicious skin spots burns pretty sharply but the growths often vanish. They have for me and many others.

Daubing the white juice that oozes from the stem of figs is beneficial

I’ve mentioned this before but it bears repeating. Gardeners, like me, that do work in cold wet soil often suffer dry, cracked skin, especially on the finger tips. I have tried every skin ointment and salve on the market and none have ever worked well for me, save one. Shea butter is incredible. I now use it year round and it really helps keep the skin in nice shape. No split finger tips any more. The the brand I like best is The Body Shop.

How many of you have toenail fungus? Oh, put your hands down. Cornmeal is the solution. Cornmeal is the cure for just about any topical fungal problem. For the toenails, soak your feet in a warm slurry of cornmeal and water. Any cornmeal will work but whole ground organically grown corn would definitely be the best for this use.

I am not a medical doctor or even a PhD, but I am the Dirt Doctor. Being a doctor of dirt gives me great observational skills. If any or all of these techniques work for you, you’re welcome.