Arthritis, Raisins and Gin

I came down with arthritis in my hands only recently. Greg has had to deal with it even longer. We regularly take anti-inflammatory meds to help ease the pain.

Take note lil' children. I was once like you. Nothing stopped me. But the body wears down and the more brutal you were to it during your youth, the more vengeful it becomes as you age. Bodies are mean like that. They're vindictive. And I was a very bad girl in my youth. There was nothing I wouldn't try, even if I got injured. Pain is temporary, right?

Uh...no. LOL.

Greg always relied on pain meds and anti-inflammatories, but I am so leery of drugs. I avoid them as much as possible--much to the consternation of my doctor. I would rather live with the pain than subject myself to a lot of foreign chemicals. But sometimes it's too much, and I'll cry Uncle and take the drugs.

Given this history, I put myself on the hunt for alternatives for arthritis relief. There are a lot out there, but in order to make this scientific I need to take only one remedy at a time to see if it helps, so it is a slow process.

I started with the drunk raisin remedy. It's an old standby that seems to have a lot of supporters. I put Greg on it a week after I started. Here are our findings.

Although some fans say that their arthritis disappeared after six weeks, ours only lessened. But it lessened to the point that now I can open a door or make a fist. I couldn't do that two months ago.

So it DOES work. It wasn't a complete recovery, but it provides enough relief that we'd be happy to continue it.

According to everything I found on the internet, you need to take NINE drunk raisins a day. I have not found anywhere why it has to be nine. I mean...some raisins are smaller or bigger than others, so why nine? But nine is the accepted holy number.

Gin: We used Bombay Sapphire which is what Greg had in the house. I got in trouble later because evidently this is "special" gin, the kind Richard Marcinko drank all throughout his Rogue Warrior series.

What the heck? It's gin.

But not all gin is created equal. For this remedy to work it MUST be made with real juniper berries. Supposedly, this is the ingredient that reacts to the sulfites in golden raisins.

Golden Raisins: I have read one report where they used regular raisins, but in my research, nearly everyone used golden raisins.

Do NOT use this remedy if you are sensitive to sulfites or suffer migraines.

Fermenting: Put the whole box of raisins in a bowl. Cover with gin. You want every raisin to touch the gin. Cover with cheesecloth.

Leave for a week or so until the gin has soaked into the raisins. Once the raisins are plump with the gin, store covered with a lid or plastic wrap in the fridge.

Dosage: Eat 9 raisins every day.

It helped us.

Which is better than another arthritis remedy I found.

Bee sting therapy.

I'll wait on that one. I'm not that desperate yet.