11/25/2025
I brought my rosemary inside for the winter. It’s a simple ritual that carries generations of meaning for me. I’m amazed by the growth of this plant in just one season.
On my father’s side, my heritage traces back to the Levant, where some of the world’s oldest monastic communities built their lives around herb gardens. In the monasteries of Lebanon, Syria, Palestine, Egypt, and the Sinai, monks cultivated rosemary, sage, thyme, mint, lavender, fennel, and hyssop. These plants were (and are) used for digestion, memory, circulation, and everyday nourishment.
These gardens became living medical libraries, influencing both Arabic medicine and, later, European monastic herbal traditions.
On my mother’s side, her Eastern European ancestry carries its own long history of herbal healing. From kitchen gardens filled with dill, chamomile, horseradish, rosemary, and mint, to generations of women who used herbs for cooking, medicine, and seasonal living. And my mom herself has always loved gardening. Some of my earliest memories are of her tending plants, teaching me that caring for something alive is its own kind of medicine.
Modern naturopathic medicine draws from all of these traditions: botanical medicine, food as therapy, Mediterranean and Eastern European herbal patterns, and a whole-person approach grounded in both history and evidence.
Rosemary itself supports cognitive function, circulation, and inflammation balance. I’ve always been drawn to this plant since my days of walking around the herb garden at Bastyr University during medical school. It also connects me to the roots of my family, my heritage, and the global traditions that shaped my profession.
Tending this plant through this last spring, summer, fall, and into the upcoming winter reminds me that healing is both ancestral and modern, scientific and personal; it’s something passed down through gardens, kitchens, monasteries, and families.
