Health, Beauty and Lifestyle with Denise McNamara

Patricia McGettigan grew up in a house in Inverin where flowers and herb would be used as remedies for common complaints. Once married, she moved first to Donegal and then to the UK and anywhere she set up home she would grow herbs and use those to create teas and tinctures.

These she would dole out to family and friends for complaints ranging from sore joints, constipation, stomach issues, sleep.

A trained beauty therapist, holistic masseur with training in aromatherapy and dealing with gut problems, it was during the pandemic that she decided to immerse herself in training in herbalism and get qualified with the Herbal Study Academy.

Accredited by the American Association of Drugless Practitioners, it is an online school founded by Tuam-based herbalist Patrick Murphy which allows people to pick and choose what aspects of herbal medicine they wish to learn about with a view to living healthier or to practice in the field.

“While I’ve always done it myself, I decided to get really deep into it because I love it, it’s an utter passion for me,” explains Patricia.

“The things is, everybody knows a bit about it, they just forget what they’ve learned when they were small when their granny or grandad would reach for the old-fashioned cure.”

Patricia practices from her home in Inverin where she does consultations with people before deciding which herbs and teas would suit them best. A consultation costs €50.

“They come in and have a chat as long as they want so we can try to get the cause of the problem. They might have a headache but it could be a stress headache, the problem could actually be coming from the gut as a result of die but it manifests itself as a headache.

“You have to start slow and give time to let herbs work. It’s better for the body to get to the root cause. It’s easy to treat a symptom, it’s harder to find out why the body is reacting the way it does.”

For more, read this week’s Connacht Tribune.

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