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Barbara Fernandez – Medicine Woman

FeaturesBarbara Fernandez - Medicine Woman

Amandala interviewed Barbara Fernandez, aka “Aunt Barbara,” on Tuesday, and she told us that she has been a healer almost all her life.

While she has no recollection of the first time she played doctor, she said that her grandmother and aunt both did and conveyed to her the following story:

“My grandmother told me that I was going for 2 years old when I did her first healing.

“My grandmother had a lady that washed for her and she came and stretched out her foot on her step, and this lady couldn’t work, because of the pain in her foot and the little girl (now Mrs. Fernandez) came to pry down on the lady to see her foot. But they drove me away; told me to go play. My aunt and my grandmother told me the same thing.

“She got some ashes from the fire hearth and a leaf and poured it inside the woman’s big sore and she screamed, and said, ‘She [Mrs. Fernandez] has a little demon. Get rid of her!’

“After maybe 2, 3 hours, [the sick lady] sent and told my grandmother not to punish the girl anymore because ? when she woke up she had no pain. She said that the girl did something, but it was good. My aunt said that she went and visited the place [where the lady lived] and found that the old lady was so comfortable.”

Ms-Barbara's-stall

Aunt Barbara said that during her childhood days in Gales Point Manatee, the children used to play shop, and they sold flowers and herbs. They would indicate which herbs were good for which malady.

But that playtime fun eventually turned to a real career for Aunt Barbara. She remembers a man from the same village that saw her interest in traditional healing and he taught her about the herbs of the wild. She called him “Old Man,” but doesn’t remember his name.

He taught her about the bitter, reeking ?contribo? and its powerful medicinal value. The herb, according to Aunt Barbara, is good to make medicines for loss of appetite, constipation, fever, and other conditions.

She also recollects that she used to make her own herbal concoctions for her neighbors? children and feed it to them and they would try it and feel better. Some people thought she was crazy.

I just like the idea that I could do something for somebody,? says the Medicine Woman.

“I think when I was maybe in my early teens [when] I used to go at the seashore and look at the sky and I asked the Lord what I would be, I asked [The Almighty] to please help me, that I may be able to do something for my people, people in general that need help, that I may be able to help them in someway or the other so that when I go away from this world to the next one I could hear my name call still.”

She said that she wants to be remembered for the good that she has done in the world.

Don?t ask her too much about her healing secrets though. We tried and Aunt Barbara was very tight lipped.

All she would convey is that she has all kinds of medicines for all purposes. What she does not have on hand she sources from the wild.

(This personality was recommended by Mrs. Ingrid Cayetano, the wife of Pen Cayetano.)

Some Herbs

Balk: Balsam, Billy Web, Cabbage Bark, Cedar Bark

Leaf: Anato, Apasote, Chamomile, Crucifixion, Man-To-Man, Peppermint

Seed: Anato, Bizzie, Calabash, Oil Nut, Wangla

Root: Blood Root, Burr-Burr, Ebolite, Snake Weed, Wild Yam

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