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sculpture Performance: Hell Hath No Fury Becoming Cailleach at Womaning 2.0 - First Person Plural Performance
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Sculpture 2017 Sculpture 2016 Ireland, photography: offerings Raku Reishi Mushrooms, ceramic sculpture Ireland, photography: minilith series Ireland, video and performance Exhibition images 2016 Photography 2016 Risograph Prints 2016 Performance 2015 Sculpture 2015 2014
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Herbal Apothecary

Donna trained as an Herbalist for 3 years and established Spiral Herbal Remedies in 2017. Prior to this, Donna worked as a Registered Nurse at Beth Israel, a Harvard Affiliated Hospital in Boston for 13 years. That's why you'll find links to some of the research on each of the Herbs she uses. As 21st century humans, our bias is towards evidence-based healing. The best part? It's all there. Funny how that works. Our ancestors knew what they were doing. 10's of thousands of years of hypothesis, trial, evaluation, repetition should be enough evidence but alas, it helps sometimes to see how the NIH weighs in.

Speaking of Ancestors!! In 2016, Donna attended an Artist Residency in Ireland. She had been curious about Herbalism so she looked up Irish Herbalism prior to attending. Much to her shock, she discovered that her father's family - Troy - ran an Herbal Medical School in Munster County from 1400-1700. Before leaving Ireland, she met with the Irish Herbalism Scholar who asked what her mother's maiden name was. That's when Donna discovered that both sides of her family had been Herbalists in Ireland. Lee is a derivative of the Gaelic word for medicine - Leighis. Her mother's family were Herbalists as well.

​Irish Herbalism was outlawed in 1700 under British Colonization when Indigenous Irish were not allowed to have a profession, be educated, own land, or speak Gaelic. That ended the legacy of Herbalism on both sides of her family. No one knew anything about this long history. Donna's mother was intuitively tuned into healing while she was growing up and she believes that was the genesis of her healing endeavors. 

Herbalism ended in Continental Europe in the Middle Ages, when autonomous women, operating outside of the Patriarchy were labeled "witches" and burned at the stake. It is thought that up to a million women were killed. A large percentage of them were Herbalists.  They were able to heal people without the church. They were also organizing protests against wealthy landowners claiming common land for themselves. A law, Malleus Maleficarum was created by these two factions and the killing ensued.​

Donna inhabits this tradition at a crucial time in our history when Big Pharma's focus has turned towards profit and Allopathic medicine focuses on treating illness, not prevention. Donna also sees this as a radical feminist act.

She honors and is grateful to the cultures that held onto these healing traditions and especially to her teacher Karen Rose, of Sacred Vibes Apothecary for sharing her broad depth of knowledge.

Donna is dedicated to ongoing study, including how nutrition, our environment, industrialized farming, and our microbiome play a role in health. Contact her here for a 1-hour consultation or stop by the shop for a free 15-minute consult. 

Donna now teaches Herbalism from this broad perspective. Find more information here.

Spiral Herbal Remedies reopened our shop at 810 Washington Ave, Brooklyn, NY in May of 2021. We're open daily from 12-7. Tuesdays are the day she makes a lot of the medicine for the shop. We're currently experimenting to see if it's worthwhile to keep the shop open on that day.