sleepy thyme

My body is unusually sensitive to not only pharmaceuticals but also it seems some herbs. I’m fond of زعتر za‘tar, a Middle Eastern herbal blend of thyme (Thymus vulgaris), sumac, sesame seeds, and salt, all ground up together. Combined with olive oil, it makes a yummy, classic seasoning for bread. I have some I mixed up last year.

Well, as you know, ground herbs and spices lose their savor over time. So sometimes I sprinkle a little extra, newer, thyme into it on my plate for more flavor. Whenever I do that, it’s inescapable that eating straight thyme like that has a powerful soporific effect on me. Just a few pinches of the stuff will knock me out faster than Ambien. I mean Ambien just helps me to sleep; thyme actually forces me to sleep. Soon after eating it, my eyes start closing and I’m seized with an uncontrollable urge to lie down and nap. I’m guaranteed to be out like a light and sleep very soundly for a minimum three hours. Cannot, must not be used before driving or operating machinery.

In Middle Eastern culture, it’s believed that thyme is a good brain food that promotes the intellect. School kids are fed za‘tar at breakfast on exam days. Ha! If I were to go back to university to take some courses and tried that… it’d be ridiculous. Major flunkitude would be the result.

I’m guessing the reason thyme has a reputation as good for thinking is its calming effect on the brain. The reasoning would go something like this: when you’re agitated and upset, you can’t think very well, right? So calm down the brain and it will function better. Jethro Kloss made the same claim for sage (Salvia officinalis), which also has a sedative effect on me when I drink tea made from it. The two herbs are close relatives in Lamiaceae, the mint family. Even though there are many other well-known herbs in Lamiaceae that don’t knock me out. Well, all I can say is the effects are highly dependent on an individual and her body’s reaction to different substances.

I have a memory of a Celestial Seasonings tea with that name. I think there was a bear in pajamas on the tin.

Sleepytime it was, and yes my thread title was an intentional pun on that name. The original formula for Sleepytime tea back in the 1970s included skullcap, which is the strongest herbal sedative and pain reliever I’ve ever found. Somewhere in between valerian and opium. But they’ve long since revised the formula and removed the skullcap, leaving chamomile as its main soporific. It didn’t have any thyme, though.

Part of posting this was wondering if anyone else was affected by thyme as much as I am. I cook with thyme as a flavoring a lot, and when flavoring a big pot of fricassée it doesn’t have any effect on me. Drinking it as tea or sprinkling it raw directly on my food is what wipes me out like nobody’s business. But all the sources on herbal medicine I’ve read don’t mention the soporific effect of thyme, so maybe I’m the only one who’s affected by it this way.

I have to be really careful about what I put into my body because it can be so sensitive to stuff. Doctors who don’t understand this keep prescribing me meds that either knock me on my ass or make me wired all to hell instead of helping me. Which is why I generally prefer herbals to pharmaceuticals, but thyme knocks me out too, albeit in a much gentler way than most pills. I wanted to explore if its reputation as an intellect booster might be in any way connected with this sedative effect. Counterintuitive as that might sound.

Moved MPSIMS --> IMHO, which is where medical anecdotal/advice threads go.