18/11/2025
Chickweed is one of my essentials. Love it. And you can eat it!
That scruffy patch you just cleared? The one making your wild edges look untidy?
It's chickweed. *Stellaria media*. And it's anti-inflammatory.
Let's be honest. You want everything controlled. Clean lines. No messy bits. So you blast anything green that dares appear where it shouldn't. Keep it all looking respectable.
Meanwhile, your bathroom cabinet is full of creams for eczema. Lotions for sunburn. Treatments for inflammation.
The plant you just killed does all of that.
The other day, I watched someone yanking chickweed out whilst complaining about their persistent skin irritation. The irony nearly broke me.
They were literally ripping up the thing that could help them. Then driving to Boots to buy another tube of hydrocortisone cream.
That's when it hit me. We've trained ourselves to seek solutions anywhere except where we actually are.
I stopped clearing that patch in our community garden years ago. Not because I'm neglectful. Because that 'mess' has pulled out splinters my tweezers couldn't grip. Soothed burns better than aloe. Calmed insect stings faster than antihistamine cream.
The shift from control to relationship. From destroying to using. From seeking answers in pharmacies to recognising them at our feet.
Traditional communities didn't care if chickweed looked tidy. They crushed it into poultices. Made it into healing creams. They weren't being backward. They were paying attention.
👉 What healing are you clearing away because it doesn't look right?
