For Radiant HEALTH and a Lovely FIGURE

August 8, 2006 5:50 PM

So my mum-in-law was visiting Dover Castle last week, when she spotted this 1940s replica postcard which she sent to me. It talks about how the stalwarts of the Women's Auxiliary Air Force (WAAF) supposedly took "bile beans" for things like nervous debility and "female complaints." This term always sounds (at least to me) so quaint and condescending; a search on it led me to the quackery of patent medicine, one of the prime purveyors of which was Lydia E. Pinkham (“Only a woman can understand a woman's ills.”). I'd feel smug and advanced about how far we've come if only it weren't for the resurgence of the term on herbal remedies sites. We may have come a long way baby, but we've still got some work to do in women's medicine, at home and abroad apparently.
posted by Zinger (23 comments total)

We'll drink a drink a drink
To Lily the Pink the Pink the Pink
The saviour of the human race
For she invented medicinal compound
Most efficacious in every case.

Old Ebeneezer
Thought he was Julius Caesar
And so they put him in a Home
Where they gave him medicinal compound
And now he's Emperor of Rome.

Johnny Hammer
Had a terrible ss..ss..ss..ss..ss..ss..stammer
He could hardly s..s..say a word
And so they gave him medicinal compound
Now he's seen (but never 'eard)!

etc., etc., etc.
posted by TheOnlyCoolTim at 5:57 PM on August 8, 2006

excellent post
posted by milarepa at 6:13 PM on August 8, 2006

Thanks TheOnlyCoolTim. I so did not want that song in my head!
posted by tellurian at 6:16 PM on August 8, 2006

Well, I understand the feminist distaste for the semantic load of "female complaints". I can't speak to Bile's Beans...although just from a branding standpoint I find it hard to believe that it sold as well as it did, for as long.

But from an herbalists/aromatherapist view, the link that you have to the herbal compound seems like a pretty good blend of known and proven herbs. Would I ingest a compound from a company that doesn't have to meet FDA standards for manufacturing? Probably not. Would I mix up a batch of tea with very similar ingredients if I was feeling all bloaty and mean during certain hormonal events? Yes. In fact, I have most of them here at the studio. On the other hand, despite having tons of organic herbs/flowers and whatnot around the place, I would never sell a product for internal use because herbs can be just as powerful as pharmaceuticals, and there's no way of knowing how someone will/could/might react.

For example, in that compound you linked, one of their ingredients is black cohosh. Cohosh can cause uterine contractions, causing spontaneous miscarriage. The compound in cohosh that causes the uterus to contract is a glycoside known as caulosaponin. This compound causes the blood vessels in the heart to constrict, thus having a toxic effect on heart muscle if the dosage is not correct.

That said, I do make an PMS aromatherapy line of products that are herbal/essential oil based. I wouldn't use the terminology "female complaints", because frankly it's way too Eisenhower, but it's quite obviously a product aimed at a condition that only women have.
posted by dejah420 at 6:43 PM on August 8, 2006

I take Xiao Yao Wan for PMS. It's a Chinese Patent Medicine, and it works wonders, especially for fibocystic breasts related to my cycle (my boobs don't swell and hurt when I take it steadily throughout the month). I'm all for ending gender disparity in health care, but looking at my own family's history shows that those who've visited doctors least have lived the longest. I'm wary of Health Care, Inc., waving a feminist consumerist flag, just as I've been sold on Coming A Long, Way, Baby on the work front. Now we all get work for the man (or the woman) until we die, and get carved down to living cubes and killed with the modern pharmacopia. One might prefer a short, brutal life to that, after all.
posted by eegphalanges at 7:34 PM on August 8, 2006

I saw this ad painted on an old brick building in York last year ... now I know what it was for.
posted by pombe at 8:50 PM on August 8, 2006

Whenever I take my twice-daily dose of Floradix, I think of Lydia Pinkham.
posted by padraigin at 9:03 PM on August 8, 2006

Let's not forget Carter's Little Liver Pills (until the government made them take the "Liver" out), and Beecham's in the UK. Wonderful pills that people took for whatever amorphous thing ailed them.

We'll never really be an evolved race till we stamp out homeopathy and the new-age quackeries. Here's where to start.
posted by QuietDesperation at 9:29 PM on August 8, 2006

Perhaps someone can help me solve a long running dispute...

My taiwanese girlfriend insists that women shouldn't drink cold water at all, because of certain 'women's issues' and apparently this is common knowledge across asia. Also it's good to eat red beans during one's period to make it proceed faster? (maybe because they're red right?)

Also just yesterday she said that you should have only warm drinks with your dinner because it helps to dissolve any oils in the food that might stick to your stomach (assuming that's bad).

Can anyone help me verfiy/disprove any of this without appeal to the chinese medicine paradigm?
posted by leibniz at 12:58 AM on August 9, 2006

pombe, that's just around the corner from my home! :)
posted by hardcode at 1:16 AM on August 9, 2006

We'll never really be an evolved race till we stamp out homeopathy and the new-age quackeries. Here's where to start.

Personally, I find it utterly bemusing that this place still exists.
posted by PeterMcDermott at 2:25 AM on August 9, 2006

Ugh. Try this instead:

http://www.nhs.uk/England/Hospitals/ShowHospital.aspx?id=RRV60
posted by PeterMcDermott at 2:27 AM on August 9, 2006

Great post. Here's another scientific article on Bile Beans which might be easier to access non-subscription.

I've got that Bile Beans postcard as a fridge magnet.
posted by handee at 3:18 AM on August 9, 2006

herbs can be just as powerful as pharmaceuticals

Herbs sold to treat medical problems are pharmaceuticals and should be tested and regulated as such. If you want to sell tea as tea, fine. You just need to show that it is tea and contains what you say it contains. If you advertise tea as having a specific effect on people, however, you have to be able to back it up with good independent tests. So companies try to make a buck by vague advertising, weak claims, sneaky implications. For example:

Sleepytime Herb Tea, a comforting blend of chamomile and spearmint, creates a lullaby of tender flavor to soothe your senses. This 100% natural, gentle cup of hot tea lets you curl up under a quilt of flavor and quiet the tensions of your world. The part of your day shared with Sleepytime is like coming home to find a friend waiting for you by the fire. There's no calm like the sigh from the spirit when you take this moment for rest and reflection ... there's no time like Sleepytime.

This ad copy and the product name imply without making solid claims. Does "creates a lullaby of tender flavor to soothe your senses" mean that "this tea makes you sleepy" or doesn't it? Is it "Sleepytime" tea because it makes you sleepy or just because the manufacturers recommend it for bedtime for some reason they do not specify? Can I take this tea instead of a prescribed sedative? Does it actually work as a sedative? Should I avoid driving after I drink this tea? What is the recommended dosage? How much is an overdose? Do they make any claim that could not be equally made for a glass of warm milk or a cup of regular tea? What sort of claim is being made here?

When the same company makes stronger claims about one of their teas, they asterisk and footnote the hell out of it. They simultaneously claim and disclaim.

The distributors of Bile Beans obviously were not worried about such things. Bile Beans, they say outright, "cleanse the bloodstream" and "keep you fit and cheerful" and so on, with no hedging, no footnotes.
posted by pracowity at 5:04 AM on August 9, 2006

...but looking at my own family's history shows that those who've visited doctors least have lived the longest.

can i be the first to say "duh!"
posted by winjer at 5:05 AM on August 9, 2006

If I take no homeopathic remedies, does that mean I've OD'd on them?
posted by scruss at 5:18 AM on August 9, 2006

Only if we thump you first.
posted by pracowity at 5:49 AM on August 9, 2006

winjer: It's not that my long-lived ancestors didn't have illnesses just as serious as the iatrogenically-killed, early expiring ones. The fact of the matter is the body heals itself, not doctors and not medicines, and often things which prompt doctors to carve one down to a cube and poison one with toxic drugs are what kills people, not the illness itself.

You likely have cancer cells in your body right now. The macrophages of your body usually take care of them. You might have a tumor now, which by next month could disappear, without you ever knowing of it. If you go to a doctor, you're guaranteed to have something "wrong" with you, for which they undoubtedly have a treatment. And if physically you check out okay, I bet mentally there's something amiss. They've got something for that, too. Now, if you never go to a doctor, it's not that you're healthy, but you've never had to opportunity to be diagnosed, treated, nd killed by modern medicine.

In my own family, my grandmother, who was around 87, had senile dementia, and her doctor believed she likely had a cancer of some sort, based on her cahexia. This was confirmed after her death. However, this doctor did not recommend surgery, chemotherapy, and radiation for an 87 year old woman. Some doctors would recommend it, and that is irresponsible.

So, duh.
posted by eegphalanges at 2:27 PM on August 9, 2006

eegphalanges - good luck. I expect you'll be fine. I'll keep trusting those nasty doctors myself.
posted by handee at 3:46 PM on August 9, 2006

I expect to not die with loads of tubes sticking out of me in a hospital, and also to not have my death touted as a miracle of equal rights for women, a triumph in the battle against health quackery, and a further glory in maximizing profits for an HMO.

I'll have a witchdoctor pull the fishhooks out of my stomach via psychic surgery first, thank you.
posted by eegphalanges at 6:05 PM on August 9, 2006

Lydia Pinkham is reportedly distantly related to Massachusetts musician Daniel Pinkham, who (also reportedly) was responsible for composing and performing the harpsichord music used by Boston station WGBH to sign off for the night for *years* (before I moved to Florida in 81).

Derail: I've been trying to locate that music for at least 5 years, including calling the station (which didn't work out either).

Does anyone a) know what music I mean, b) know where to get it or c) have it? It's a harpsichord solo with lots of counterpoint, about 90bpm or so, and I could hum it it anyone was that motivated...
posted by baylink at 8:27 PM on August 9, 2006

baylink, it may be 'Partita for Harpsichord' which is available here (sorry, can't find a sample). Or 'Hommage 224; Wanda' which you can hear some of here. If it's neither of those you might want to try the green, someone's bound to know.
posted by tellurian at 8:57 PM on August 10, 2006

Stupid preview, that 224; should be à
posted by tellurian at 8:58 PM on August 10, 2006