Podcast 274: Thorn Medicine

Have you ever wished you had thorns? Have you ever felt like you needed to protect your heart, your space, your peace of mind, or your time from a world that asks too much of you – or takes without asking? You’re not alone. This is what thorn medicine can bring you.

Thorns aren’t weapons, they’re defenses. They don’t seek an animal or human out with the intent to cause harm, they hold space and define boundaries. Touch me here, says the rose, but not there. Admire my flowers, says the motherwort, but don’t you dare clutch my seeds. We can learn from this.

We can take the medicine of thorns into ourselves. We can do this literally, not only (oh, “only”!) metaphorically or symbolically. Most all thorny herbs, and particularly the thorns themselves, carry a key herbal action: astringency. This is an action which literally pulls things together, and holds things together.

Each plant’s thorn is different, serving its own purpose. Hawthorn’s long, widely spaced thorns evolved to counter the hungers of the giant sloth, and they retain that shape long after the lumbering herbivore went extinct: they are the living memory of a predator past. Ocotillo’s inexhaustible rows of spines render it no more easy a prey than the cactus who share its landscape. Thistle spikes out from every possible surface, asserting itself in all directions as its firework flowers reach for the sky. Which thorns are yours?

Pull yourself together. Hold your boundaries. Make a safe space.
Then, within that thorn-walled refuge, your flowers will unfold.

Thorn medicine is only one form of support herbs can offer our emotions. Our Neurological & Emotional Health course is a user’s guide to your nerves, your emotions, and the herbs who can lift you, hold you, brace you, and sustain you. We teach holistic herbal strategies for addressing both neurological & psychological health issues. It includes a lengthy discussion of herbal pain management strategies, too!

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Episode Transcript

Katja (00:15):
Hi, I’m Katja. And I’m here at Commonwealth Holistic Herbalism in Boston, Massachusetts. Ryn is doing some work on the brand-new Stress Management course that’s going to release in one or maybe two more weeks by March 1st. So, I’m really, really excited about that. And I’m taking a little break to share one of my favorite topics with y’all, which is thorn medicine. And by thorns, I mean really and truly the pokey parts, right? It’s not a metaphor. I really mean the stabby parts of plants. So in 2026, we have been talking about all kinds of herbs for happiness. You heard those little air quotes there, right? And by that we mean herbs that will help you to get grounded, get centered. And release enough stress so that you are able to experience moments of joy, even if you are in a hard time. That you’re able to experience moments of kindness, even if you are surrounded by cruelty. That, that you can allow moments of beauty to energize you so that you can move forward into your day and not be crushed by stress, or grief, or overwhelming badness everywhere. So, we’re not talking about take this herb. It will make you magically happy. But herbs that will help you get to that place where you can access those feelings. And so talking about thorns is actually part of that work. So, here I’m thinking like rose thorns, hawthorn thorns, ocotillo thorns. It’s a really special kind of medicine, so I’m very excited to talk about it with you.

Katja (02:15):
But first, our reclaimer. All right, well, you guys know what it says. It is we’re not doctors. We’re just educators. Herbalists are not licensed in the United States. So, these ideas are for educational purposes only. I hope they’re really helpful for you, but every body is different. So, this is not like dogma or any perfect way that you should be living your life, or doing herbs, or whatever else. It’s just hopefully something that is helpful to you and will help you think about working with herbs in a cool, new way. Okay, that was it. I got it all, right? Like I didn’t miss anything? I think I got it all.

Emotional Work with Herbs: Specificity & Not Magic

Katja (02:54):
Okay. So, before we jump into the actual thorns themselves and how to work with them because I’m going to get really specific, there’s two other things that we need to address first. And the first one is that when we’re talking about herbal emotional work, working with herbs for the purposes of doing emotional work, we need to get really specific. We can’t talk about herbs for depression, or like I’ve been talking about herbs for happiness. We can’t even say herbs for happiness, and then say oh, you know, I really mean about accessing joy and accessing moments of beauty. Because that still isn’t specific enough. We have to be really specific about each individual person. Like what is blocking this person’s ability to access those moments of beauty and joy and kindness in their lives? Is that that they are locked down in rigidity because they don’t feel safe? Is that that they are depressed in a numb way, and they’re not able to access any feelings at all? Is it that they are so overwhelmed by anxious feelings and worry that they aren’t able to make space for accessing happiness, right? All these different things are different. We’re going to choose different herbs for each one of these.

Katja (04:30):
And so we could look at any person and say that person has depression, or that person has anxiety, or that person has whatever. But we still need to be more specific so that we choose the right herbs. Because depression isn’t specific enough. We have to just be super, super clear about exactly what we mean. This person’s depression has them stuck on the couch watching the same Netflix show over and over again. That person’s depression has them working way too many hours in a day. It’s going to be different herbs. All right. Remember that is true not just for emotional work but also for physiological work as well. We always want to be super specific. A medical diagnosis is not specific enough to do herbal work. Because although medical diagnoses are real, those are just words that are used in the medical system. They are not fundamental truths. They are descriptions. And those descriptions are specific enough for the medical environment, but they are not specific enough in the herbal environment. So, my theme here is specific. We want to be really specific. We will find a better match, we’ll have better success in choosing herbs that really work for the person, the more specific that we get. Okay.

Katja (05:58):
The second thing that I want to put out here, and both of these things we’re going to talk about more as we go on. But so when we talk about herbs in emotional work, sometimes that can get to sounding a little woo woo. And y’all know we like the science here. So, I want to put the science part right up front, especially as we’re talking about thorns in general. All right, ready? The first half of this is herbs work in the body, and emotions are also in the body. We think about emotions as being ethereal. We think of them as vapor. We think of them as intangible. But that is not true. That’s not accurate. Your emotions are in your body. My emotions are in my body along with my liver, and my kidneys, and the fascia, and everything else. Neurotransmitters and hormones and all the other things that are impacting emotion, they are real, actual, physical things. They’re tangible. They’re measurable. And the messages that they are sending around the body are being influenced by our physical state, by our environment, by our experiences. All this messaging is flying around in every direction between all the bits of the body, right? Between the brain, between the liver, between the stomach, between all the things, right? The body bits, the brainy bits, but it’s all body. It’s physical, real stuff. So, when you’re thinking about herbs for emotions, this is not magic. It’s just thinking about emotions as part of the physical body, which we don’t usually do in our society. But it is actually true, right? Whew. Okay.

Katja (07:55):
So, what does that specifically mean about thorns, and how they might help us with emotional stuff? I’m going to tell you. I’m going to be specific about how rose thorns, are different than hawthorn, are different than ocotillo, are different than whatever. They all have different effects. Okay, but first off, why should they work at all? Thorns are astringent. All the plants that we’re going to talk about have some astringency in their aerial parts. That means the leaves and the flowers. And then that astringency increases in the bark-y stem-y parts of the plant, which is where the thorns are. And then that astringency typically increases even more in the roots. Now, this does not mean… Now that I’ve said oh, the leaves and flowers. Oh, the stems and thorns. Oh, the roots, they have the most astringency usually. This doesn’t mean that the roots are better, and so you should be out there astringency maxing. I don’t mean that. But I feel like you kind of have to make that little disclaimer whenever you say oh, and this has the most. Because in our culture, right, we’re always out there maxing. We’re always out there looking for what’s the thing that has the most. You don’t always need the most.

Katja (09:15):
And so in this case, we are talking about thorns and their specific Goldilocks amount of astringency. And most of the actions that we’re going to describe in much more prosey, much more poetic language, really just comes down to various ways of pulling it together. And that’s just astringency, right? Astringency literally is pulling tissues together. That’s literally the action of astringents. It pulls your stuff together, right? So, that’s what we’re doing emotionally. We are pulling it together a little. We are also giving it a little more structure, giving it a little more strength. Because that’s what happens when you pull things together. All right. So, not magic, not mystical, not woo woo, not weird. Actual stuff you can see with a microscope happening behind all this stuff. So, even though from here out, mmm, some of this stuff might sound poetic and whatever. Just remember, it’s grounded in science, all right? Okay.

Protective Thorns & Rose When You’re a Hunted Bunny

Katja (10:24):
So, let’s talk about some specific thorns and specifically how they can help you. Well, first let’s talk generally about thorns. What is even, why do plants have thorns, right? Protection. It’s to protect the plant. It’s to protect that plant’s resources. It’s to protect the plant from harm, from predators. Oh, we don’t think about plants as having predators, and we certainly do not consider bunnies to be predators, right? But if you’re a lettuce, a bunny is a predator, right? Okay, well, bunnies are not going to eat your rose bushes. Well, they might nibble at a couple of leaves, but that’ll be about it. But there are lots of animals out there. Let’s settle on deer. It’s a nice sort of middle-sized animal. And also there’s a lot of them around. And they want to eat my garden, and they want to eat your garden. And they want to eat all the plants everywhere. And they start before the leaves are out. They’re like ooh, tasty buds early in the spring. Eat it up. Destroying the whole plant’s lifecycle for the year, no problem. Let’s munch that. That’s why plants have thorns. To protect themselves from being eaten. And so already we can be thinking about that in our kind of poetical way, right? Of like okay, thorn medicine is about protection. Thorn medicine is about protecting me from stuff that wants to strip all my resources away, stuff that wants to get me, whatever. And you could wrap yourself up in a bramble of thorns. And if somebody’s trying to get you, they’ll probably still get you, right? This is metaphorically speaking here. But it is that aspect of feeling like you have that protection, of feeling like you are not just hanging out there open to everything. Of feeling like you’re pulled into yourself.

Katja (12:34):
You know how when you are really overstimulated, and you feel like your filters are way too open? Those are the times when you say things that you maybe shouldn’t have said. But also those are the times when you’re just overwhelmed by all the stuff coming in at you. That is like a way too open state, and emotionally that leaves you really vulnerable. That is exactly the sort of situation where people talk about you need to toughen your skin. You have thin skin, and you need to thicken up your skin, right? Like you’re easily offended or easily upset by things. And so that openness is just really leaving you open for emotional upset, emotional injury. So okay, so often we talk about plants like yarrow about thickening your skin. When you feel thin skinned and you need armor and whatever. Okay, but so in this case we’re talking about thorns and their ability to protect you from the things. And even sort of create a barrier between you and emotionally the things coming at you. Okay. So, that’s our general overall.

Katja (13:46):
So, let’s start with rose. And here I’m talking about wild rose, but really many roses will do this. The more fancy your garden cultivar is, then maybe the less effect. But on the other hand, astringency is astringency. And ultimately when we are… We’re going to tincture. All these are going to be tincture. When we tincture it, you’re going to know that it’s astringent. You’re going to feel the astringency. So, my kind of criteria here is if it’s not sprayed by any kind of pesticides, and if it doesn’t have any weird growth enhancers or whatever. But if it’s just sort of maybe your grandparents planted it like however many years ago. And they used to tend it and have prize roses, but now it’s sort of neglected. And it’s just been kind of growing kind of wild on its own lately. That’s going to be a fine rose to manage. We had a rose like that in one of our apartments when we were living in Brighton. And certainly this rose bush had been planted by the original owners who by that time were like 90 or maybe would’ve even been older than that. But by the time that we got there, it was just rambling all over the place, right? So, wild rose is awesome out in the wilderness. But if you have a mostly gone wild rose in your yard, and your soil’s okay, then I would still say go with it.

Katja (15:31):
All right. But for our mental visualization here, think about a wild rose. This is why that part is important. Because a wild rose forms a bramble. The vines grow up, but there’s no trellis for them. There’s nothing for them to hold onto. So, they grow up a certain amount, like maybe four or five feet, and then they start to arch over back towards the ground. And they kind of make this – I don’t know – like a sea urchin. Like you know those sea urchin skeletons, and they kind of look like a pin cushion, but they’re made out of spines. Yeah, I always think about that. But it’s just like this umbrella that goes all the way down to the ground and is made of thorns. Okay. So, if you’re out in the woods, and you come across a thicket like this. The other thing that you will notice is that on the ground there are little, tiny trails where all the chipmunks, and the bunnies, and the squirrels run around underneath the rose bush, underneath the umbrella of thorns. Because no hawks can fly into that. Foxes can’t push their way into that. For these little furry creatures it is a literal physical protective barrier. We’re working with it emotionally, but for them it is physically giving them a space to rest before they go out and find some more lettuce to eat, or sunflower seeds, or whatever it is.

Katja (17:04):
So, using that image in your mind when you’re thinking about how can I work with rose to help me. I mean, okay, all the thorns have some astringency. They’re going to help you pull it together. But we can get more specific than that. So, when I’m working with somebody or myself feeling like their to-do list, or their obligations, or their whatever is stressing them out, is hunting them. Like they’re a cute little bunny, and their inbox is going to come and devour them. That’s when I’m thinking about rose. Because that’s literally the purpose that rose is serving in the ecosystem. And so emotionally, sure, all the thorns will help you pull it together some because they’re all astringent. But how are we pulling it together? Just exactly the same way that it’s happening out in the wild, right? It’s just going to give you that feeling of a place to rest where your inbox, or your to-do list, or your calendar can’t get at you for a few minutes. And just ooh, okay, calm your heart. All right, I think I’m ready to go back out there. I think I can do this. There’s got to be some good lettuce out there somewhere, right?

Hawthorn When a 3,000-lb Sloth Wants to Destroy You

Katja (18:21):
All right, so the next one is in the same plant family actually, hawthorn. And so hawthorn, this is so interesting to me. So, in the book, The Once and Future World, that was written by someone whose name I should remember. Oh, I can actually see it on the shelf from here. Maybe it’s MacKinnon. If you Google The Once and Future World, it’ll come right up for you. Or if you put that in an internet search, it’ll come right up for you. Okay. So, when he was writing about hawthorn, like the prehistoric versions of hawthorn, the development of the plant itself, how it evolved over time. He was back not all the way to the dinosaurs, but in the very early mammal stages of North America. And at that time there were giant sloths. And you probably have seen a picture of a sloth that is furry, and kind of looks like a Muppet, and has really long claws, but they’re not sharp. They’re clearly like this guy is hanging from a tree with his really long claws, right? He’s just chilling out being a hammock, being a furry animated hammock. Not too animated because they don’t move fast, right? And literally they look like Muppets, shaggy, shaggy Muppets. And they’re like, what, bigger than a golden retriever maybe a little bit? Or, you know, smaller than a panda bear? Okay. That’s not what we’re talking about here. The giant sloths were like 3000-pound animals. So, that’s bigger than a really big cow.

Katja (20:27):
You know, there are some cows that are five feet maybe at the shoulder. But if you think about a Holstein, and that is maybe almost six feet at the shoulder. Okay, that cow is like 1500 pounds. So bigger, like two Holstein cows, right? A really big animal is what I’m talking about. And so the reason that hawthorn developed thorns, and hawthorn thorns are like three inches long, but they’re not close together. So, today a deer can walk up to a hawthorn tree and daintily nibble at the leaves in between the thorns. It’s not going to do it super-fast, but its face can fit in between the thorns usually. But this 3000-pound creature used to go up to trees and put a hand, a paw, a claw, or whatever at the base of a branch. And pull it forward, and strip all of the leaves off, and stuff all of them in their mouth. And that was like one bite, and the whole branch was gone. And so this creature was eating an entire tree in a few bites. And so hawthorn developed these thorns that prohibited or was to protect itself against this behavior. Can you see where I’m going to go with this now in our emotional metaphor? When you feel not like a fox is after you, not like a hawk is after you, but like a 3000-pound creature is about to come and demolish you. Hawthorn thorns, that’s what they’re made for.

Katja (22:22):
Again, this is just a matter of helping you pull it together. Your perception is I’m about to be destroyed. Like everything I have is going to be taken. Hey, that might also be true. Like I don’t mean to say this is all in your head. Sometimes it’s all in your head. Or sometimes it is exaggerated in your head. There’s reality, and that is stress and true, but then your head makes it a little bit bigger. Okay, that happens. Sometimes it is just flat out you are literally about to lose everything. You’re going to get evicted from your apartment. You’re going to this, you’re going to that. You’re going to whatever. Okay, well, hawthorn is not going to stop those things from happening to you, but they are going to help. It is going to help you pull yourself together so that you can deal with it. And if that is not happening, but some bad stuff is happening, and you’ve made it a little bigger in your head. It helps you to pull that together. So that you have a more realistic perspective about what is really going on and how you can handle it. How you can move through it, how you can get help for it, whatever. That’s really what this is about. We can’t always change what’s going on around us. But we need to be able to pull ourselves together so that we can react in a way that is good for us. That is aligned with what is important to us. That is going to help us get through it. That is whatever is the healthy thing in that particular situation.

Ocotillo When Your Thorns Need Attitude

Katja (24:09):
All right So, we’ve got Rose hewn you’re a cute little bunny. We’ve got hawthorn when a giant 3000-pound prehistoric creature is going to gobble up all your leaves. So, the next one I want to talk about is Ocotillo. This is a plant… Rose and hawthorn, they grow all across the country, and also in Europe, and also in many other places. Ocotillo is a plant that grows in the desert southwest. And it’s really… You can’t be really unique. Unique doesn’t really actually need any modifiers, but wow, ocotillo is unique. It is giant. And by giant I mean it can be 15 feet tall. It can be taller than that. Like staffs that do have some leaves when it’s time for it to have leaves. And at the very top has flaming orange flowers when it’s time for that. Because it’s a desert plant, right, so sometimes it doesn’t have any leaves, or flowers, or anything. It just looks totally dead. But the part that is interesting here is that the staff that goes up to end up in flowers is covered in so many great, big thorns that you cannot grab this plant. You cannot just reach out and be like I’m just going to… No, no, you cannot do it. Because it would just… It’s never… You can’t. You would just be stabbed in every part of your hand.

Katja (26:02):
And so just imagine this plant. And it is not like a central trunk with branches everywhere. Each branch comes basically out of the ground. So, all you see is just these individual arms reaching up high, like really high, much taller than you just covered in thorns. And okay, a rose thorn is like a quarter of an inch or something like that. Don’t get me wrong, sharp and stabby, but not huge. Hawthorns might be like three inches, or they might be even longer than that depending on the species. Ocotillo thorns are, hmm, like two inches. Maybe a little bigger, but I feel like two inches. So okay, they’re hefty size-wise, but also there’s just no space in between them. You could just barely kind of like if you had a Q-tip, you could carefully put the Q-tip and touch the central part of the stem in between two thorns just with a Q-tip. But there’s just thorns everywhere. Being able to visualize this plant, like I realize I’ve just spent a lot of time describing what this plant looks like, but you kind of need to know that.

Katja (27:32):
Because when what you need is a giant, enormous billboard of back the F up. Get away from me. When you need to fully assert yourself. When you wish you just had a baseball bat that was covered in thorns that you could go around whopping people with. Do not hit people. I’m not condoning violence, whatever, okay. But when you wish you had that, now visualize this plant that is just thorns to the sky. And so I feel like when you need your thorns to have attitude. When you need to pull it together and also kind of have a little middle finger going on, that’s ocotillo. There is no mistaking what you’re trying to say here. Yeah. And so, sometimes you just need a little oh, okay, I had a little break. I had a little protection for a few minutes. And sometimes you need to be like ooh, don’t eat me. But sometimes you kind of need to have some attitude as you pull yourself together, right? That’s ocotillo, for sure. Okay.

Motherwort When you Need to Hold Boundaries

Katja (29:03):
All right. So, let’s add motherwort to this mix. Now, motherwort is not technically thorns. It’s actually spines. But that’s okay because they’re really sharp. So, they totally still count. So okay, motherwort, if it’s really happy, it can grow to be like six feet tall. But kind of usually or like average it’s maybe between your elbow and your shoulder. Okay, well, I’m six feet tall, and it’s between my elbow and my shoulder. And it’s a mint family plant. It’s got alternating green leaves, and it’s got little, fuzzy pink flowers at the base of the leaves. And the stem is so square. Like the corners are exact 90-degree angles like somebody used a T-square to make this stem. All the times that people say that everything in nature is round. I’m always like oh, you have clearly never met anyone in the mint family and especially not motherwort. Motherwort is so square. If you’re out there, and you’re totally square. And people told you that you need to like, I don’t know. Like you always felt like a square peg in a round hole. I don’t know, whatever. Yeah, that’s okay. There’s a whole plant family just for you. So, the thing about motherwort, it’s spininess, it’s stabbiness in the beginning is not really… In the very beginning it’s not there at all. And then you feel it, and it’s kind of like hmm, not very threatening. But once the seeds… The spines come out of the seed pods. And once the seeds start to develop, the spines become very sharp and very tough. And so the stem of the plant is tall, and there’s leaves every few inches. And the seed pods are in circles at the base of where the leaves attach to the stem. And these little circles are covered in spines going in every direction.

Katja (31:33):
Motherwort is protecting its resources, right? Motherwort is saying, don’t you touch my seeds. Don’t you touch my babies. And so a lot of times we talk about motherwort in terms of courage. Motherwort in terms of like especially if you feel like you are the protector. But also motherwort in terms of boundaries giving you the courage to hold your boundaries. And in the case of motherwort we have… Well, all of these have some special things going on. I’m focusing on the astringency because it’s what’s in common between all of them. But there are other factors for all of these as well. And with motherwort, one of those factors is that it calms palpitations and calms the stress response. So, when we talk about motherwort helps you have healthy boundaries, I mean, that sounds pretty woo, right? But it’s really that if somebody asks you something, and you’re afraid to say no. And you’re feeling that stress response, and you’re feeling that threat response. It is really hard to take the risk and do say no. But if someone says something, and you want to say no. And you’re a little bit afraid, but you’re working with a plant that reduces that feeling of fear, reduces the palpitations in your heart. Reduces the other feelings, the heat rising feelings that happen when you have that little adrenaline rush. Then it’s a whole lot easier to stand there and stick to your guns. And say you know, no, I’m not going to do that. Because you’re not having that need to run away kind of response. Okay.

Katja (33:22):
But we also have astringency going on. And since that’s what I’m focusing on, we’ll talk about that. So, when I think about motherwort, I really think a lot about when you feel like you are gathering in your family, your community. If you have children, your children, your pets, your whatever. And you are like mama bear-ing this situation. That’s not really a word. I don’t know. I just imagine or like a lioness protecting her cubs. Or you know, I guess any animal protecting their babies. Because it doesn’t matter how cuddly of an animal it is, they all protect their babies, right? So, whatever animal it is that you like. If you are feeling that way where you are like even a strong person in your community, and you’re providing that for people, and that’s hard. And it is hard. Just because people look up to you to provide protection, or provide guidance, or provide whatever does not mean that you always feel it. It doesn’t mean that you don’t fall apart. It doesn’t mean that you don’t feel weak and scared and want to hide under the covers. But when you need those boundaries. When you need that feeling of I can do this. I can hold it together. Then motherwort is really helpful there.

Mesquite When Your Boundaries Need Attitude & a Few Other Thorny Options

Katja (34:54):
All right. There’s one more that I want to talk about. Well, there’s a whole lot more that I want to talk about. But there’s one more that I want to talk about here first, and that’s mesquite. Okay, now we’re back to real thorns again. Mesquite is a tree that grows in the southwest. And I grew up in Texas, and it grew all through Texas. And if you grew up in a place with mesquite, I don’t need to say anything else right now. But because you might not have grown up in a place with mesquite, let me explain. If you grew up in a place with mesquite, you know a story of the mesquite thorn went straight through your shoe or somebody else’s shoe. Whenever I talk about mesquite to anyone who has lived in a place with mesquite, the discussion always includes the sentence right through the sole of my shoe. If you know, you know. Mesquite is like the rocket spikes of the plant world. Okay, listen. Rocket spikes have gotten kind of trendy right now, but they used to be pretty shocking. And it was an absolute boundary. So, you know, you can think about motherwort if you need to hold a boundary, yeah. But if you really need to get it done. If you need to get it done, and we’re back to having attitude, right? You need to get it done, and maybe you also need to kick some butt while you’re doing it, mesquite. These thorns are like three, four inches long. And they are brutal, and they’re really, really strong. Even though the end comes to a fine point, they’re hard to break. They are really strong. And that’s a quality of mesquite wood anyway, is that it is just extremely, extremely hard. But because of the strength, it really goes right through people’s shoes, like for real. And often enough that everybody talks about that. If that’s the kind of strong you need to be. If that’s the kind of pulling it together you need. Then mesquite thorns are for you. Yeah.

Katja (37:19):
Now, you might not live where all these plants are. You know, hawthorn and rose grow pretty much everywhere. But ocotillo and mesquite don’t grow everywhere. But in the places where they grow, they literally grow everywhere. So, if you have a friend who lives in the southwest, you could be like I need some mesquite thorns. And you can go out with very sharp pruners. And your friend can literally in five minutes get tons of thorns. So yes, okay, those two only grow in a much smaller region. But they grow super abundantly, and it’s not hard to get the thorns. And taking the thorns does not kill the plant, so okay. All right. This, this could be hours long because there are so many wonderful thorns to work with. But I’m just going to list a couple more that are worth your investigation.

Katja (38:20):
So, Japanese barberry, again, everywhere, and lots of people don’t even want it around. So, it’s really easy to get. Raspberry and blackberry, you can get thorns right out of your garden, right? Blackthorn, which is kind of like hawthorn. Okay, so then we also have some spiny ones. Oregon grape, and agarita, and tribulus, again, more in the motherwort direction. They’re spines, but spines are an honorary thorn. And by the way, they’re sharp. So, that’s what we’re going for here. We want that sharpness. But not all thorns go on the list because not all thorns are non-toxic. So, don’t just go out there in the world willy nilly gathering any thorn that you come across because okay, that’s not safe. But any of these are fantastic, and these are pretty ubiquitous, pretty easy to find.

Tincturing is the Way to Go with Thorns

Katja (39:22):
So, how are we going to actually do this, right? You’re like okay, okay, okay, this sounds great. I want some thorns in my life. How are we going to do it? Tincture is the way to go. Because like I said, all of these are astringent. Also, they don’t taste awesome, so we’re not making tea. And also how many thorns would you need to make tea? You’d, probably need a lot of thorns. So we’re going to make tincture. In order to make tincture you don’t need that many thorns. When we take this, we really only need a couple of drops. It’s not like you need big doses of thorn medicine. It’s pretty powerful, and we’re trying to impact an emotional response. We’re not trying to astringe your whole body here, so you don’t need high doses. Which means really if you just make one of those little half-pint jars, or if you want to share with friends like a pint jar of tincture, that is totally sufficient. And even though when we make tinctures, usually we want to like really get as much plant matter in there compared to the amount of alcohol that’s in there. In this case it doesn’t have to be quite so tightly packed, because you’re going to get a lot of the astringency regardless. All right. So, go on out there with pruning shears or good, sharp scissors and just clip the thorns off the plant. Or if you are getting ocotillo, that’s not going to be easy. But you could wear gloves. You guys wear gloves. You could just take like one branch and clip the end off of it. That will mean that that branch won’t flower, so don’t do that to the whole plant.

Katja (41:12):
But for bark, we don’t need… You know, when we’re harvesting flowers, we want the most beautiful, best flowers. But for bark, if there’s an ocotillo branch that got damaged in a storm, and so it no longer has its flowering top. Take part of that one because damage in a storm does not really change the astringency of the bark at all. And so now you’re clipping off the end of a branch that wasn’t going to flower anyway, so you haven’t done any harm to that plant. And so whether it is ocotillo or whether it is… You know, if it’s hawthorn or mesquite, it’s real easy to just clip the thorns individually. If it’s rose or ocotillo, that’s going to be a little bit harder. So, you can just take a three- or four-inch piece of the stem, and put it in the jar, and tincture it that way. You are going to get the astringency from the stem itself, the bark on the stem itself and the roots. That’s okay. Good. And other than that, it’s a standard tincture. You’re just going to put it in there. You’re going to shake it. You’re going to leave it for a month. If you need it in a pinch sooner than that, feel free. But leave it in there for a month and then drop doses. You can formulate that with other plants that help you in stressful times. You can keep it on its own and then just have that for special. You can make an elixir where you take the flower. Or in the case of hawthorn you might prefer the berry, because the flower is not super delicious. But like let’s say rose, you take all the thorns, and then you take the rose petals and infuse those in honey. And the thorns are infused in alcohol. Mix them together. That’s going to be an amazing elixir.

Katja (43:13):
And if you are in a moment where you just need a moment to pull yourself together and rest before you go back out there, then it’s really nice to have something that is actually on the sweet side. Because it’s not just that this medicine is helping you pull it together, and helping you manage your emotions, and whatever else. But also there’s a little moment of delight in that. And you have captured the smell of the rose petals as well. So, you can get really creative with this, and I encourage you to do so. If you were going to do this with raspberry or blackberry thorns, you can make a honey infusion of some berries. Go right ahead. It would taste so nice. Ah, now I want some. That would be so nice. Okay.

Katja (44:02):
And that’s it. That’s it. Carry it around with you if you’re in a time of high stress, so that you have it always available. You are going to take small doses, a couple of drops, but there’s no reason to skimp on that. You can take a couple of drops every hour if you need to. That’s totally fine. Whatever you need to get through your day. Whatever you need to help you pull it together and stay together until you get to a place where it’s safe for you to fall apart, that’s also fine. You don’t have to never fall apart. You don’t win if you never fall apart. We just want to fall apart in a place where it’s okay to do that. Maybe once your obligations are done, whether that’s work, or the kids are in bed, or whatever else is going on. Or at least maybe just not in a public place because it isn’t fun. It doesn’t feel good to fall apart in a public place. So, that’s fine. We’ve got our thorns for being out in the world. And then if you want to fall apart, you can fall apart at home.

Katja (45:05):
I feel like I have been talking super-fast. I’m really excited about thorns, and I’m really excited about spring. It’s nowhere near. It’s only February 16th. Spring is a long way off. But I have spring in my heart. And I cannot wait to be out there, and gather rose petals, and not have piles of snow everywhere even though I’m grateful for the snow. And I feel like I’m just ready for springtime. I’m ready for all of the beauty of all of the flowers. I’m just ready for it. And so thinking about thorn medicine. Helping me hold it together a little longer until spring comes, actual spring and also metaphorical spring, you know what I mean? Yeah, it’s got me very excited. So, maybe normally you listen to the podcast sped up, and maybe this time you had to slow it down. I don’t know. That’s okay. At any rate, I hope that this is helpful for you. And this is the part where Ryn would say take care of yourselves. Take care of each other. Drink some tea. And get some thorns to help you pull it together. It’ll help. Bye-Bye.