Medicine- Folk and otherwise

 Medicine: Folk and Otherwise

Believe it not, it's still on the market.

Growing up with a dad who had medical training, and a mom who came from an immigrant family  was an adventure.

First,there was my dad's way of dealing with illness. As a doctor, he had access to medications that regular people did not. For coughs, our family took a mixture of codeine cut with a few drops of sweet wine. As kids, we were only given a safe amount. As a teen, I remember getting a full dose and falling asleep for hours.Our family doctor made house calls only if we were too sick to go to his office. He would arrive with a monster syringe and administer penicillin. Dad's medical connections usually resulted in a same day visit.   A few years later, oral antibiotics became prevalent and we were given bitter tasting pills.

If you had bad digestive symptoms, Dad used a mixture of paragoric (tincture of opium) and belladonna to calm cramps and ease the discomfort. For everything else,  Kaopectate, which stopped you up for days and tasted like....crap.

For muscle aches, my dad used a foul smelling salve called Iodex, which I suspect contained iodine and stunk like dead lobsters. For fever, there was children's aspirin, which I loved to chew. And then,  my favorite  cure for when you were really feeling lousy, a concoction from the Old Country called "goggle-moggle"..no relation to Google.  This was a mixture of hot milk and honey laced with whiskey. A glass would go a long way to ease your throat and make you sleep like a baby.

My mom came from a large immigrant Russian -Jewish family and had her share of peculiar remedies. She was a strong proponent of Alka-seltzer, which made sense since it contained aspirin, and if you had a persisent fever, a colonic or enema would temporarily bring it down. There were also alchohol rubs and when you had a bad cold, Mom would put melt an open jar of Vicks in hot water until it liquified. First you would breathe the vapors, then she'd slather it on your chest and cover you with a sweat shirt. You were sent to bed to enjoy the resultant fumes.
One summer, we were staying in Michigan and my maternal gramdmother came out to visit. For a swollen mosquito bite, she insisted that my mother make a poultice of bread to draw out the infection. My mom's leg got much worse. She called my father in the city, and he drove out with  strong antibiotics.
 Sometimes the old ways simply weren't the best.