Botanical Medicine at the CAMH Sunshine Garden

As I make my rounds on errands around my neighborhood, I can’t help noticing all of the green spaces and wondering how they have been used and how are they currently being used. They represent that interface between plants and people that I find so fascinating. On one such occasion a few weeks ago, I was walking past the CAMH (Centre for Addiction and Mental Health) campus near King and Shaw and I noticed a walled garden adjacent to a derelict greenhouse. Clearly they had always been there, but for some reason I just hadn’t registered their existence until that moment, and all of a sudden I had so many questions: how long had these places been here? what were they used for? what was growing in there now? why did they appear to be abandoned? So, I decided to do a little digging.

The internet was surprisingly little help, though I did learn that CAMH had built a new “State of the Art” greenhouse just last year in 2018, and I read something about a “Sunshine Garden” as well, but there wasn’t much detail I was able to find online. Time to continue on foot! I had never really had a reason to enter the CAMH campus or its buildings before, but after becoming thoroughly lost, I was able to find a friendly receptionist who gave me the contact information of the Senior Media Relations Specialist (Sean O’Malley), who in turn passed me over to the Director of Community Engagement (Janet Mawhinney) who got me in touch with Natalie Boustead. Natalie works with Food Share, an organization whose website states that their mission is “to increase access to, knowledge of and consumption of vegetables and fruit through community led projects.“ One of Food Share’s initiatives is The Sunshine Garden at CAMH.

Natalie graciously offered me some of her time to meet and discuss her activities at CAMH and also just to generally nerd out about plants. I met her at the beautiful new greenhouse, the smell of fresh potting soil and friendly microbes wafting towards me as I opened the door. She and some CAMH clients were on their way to the garden beds to clean them up and plant this year’s crop of herbs, vegetables and a variety of other plants.

Part of Natalie’s job is to create a therapeutic garden experience. I asked her to elaborate on this and she said:

“I’ve realized that more than singing Kum Ba Yah and meditation walks, the people here want to have meaningful work to do.”

In other words, garden therapy often involves “gardening” as the sweaty, bent-over, dirty-hands verb rather than the garden as a relaxing space in and of itself. That said, it’s nice that, although the garden does produce a crop, selling that crop is not necessary to the maintenance of the space as funding has been secured for the past decade and hopefully well into the future to keep this space alive.

“It’s a low stress place… everything is just about learning.”

I noticed that the design of the garden was roughly semi-circular and pitched on an embankment that created a shape reminiscent of an amphitheater. It felt very inclusive, like it was simultaneously creating a distinct space but also a place where people would come together for a common goal. As Natalie and her fellow gardeners got to work, I walked around to see what was coming up from last year. I noticed some Serviceberry, Yarrow, something that resembled Giant Hyssop (a Japanese species of Agastache, Natalie later informed me) along with Self-heal, Chives and Mint.

“I’ve found about 12 species of bees on that Mint” Natalie told me “It’s a very important part of the garden. A lot of medicinal plants are actually pollinator friendly.“

Not being educated in plant-based medicine at all, I generally don’t feel very comfortable speaking on the subject except in an historical or cultural context, but I wanted to know more about what Natalie had to say regarding the medicinal value of the plants in this garden.

“All plants are medicine in one way or another” she told me. We talked about how most people now seem to think of medicine as super potent pharmaceuticals that you either get at a pharmacy or are prescribed by a doctor. Many of these, by the way, have active ingredients that are either derived from plants or are synthesized versions of chemicals first discovered in plants. “Like how Aspirin comes from Willow bark” said Natalie. Taking a broader view of the word “medicine” though, we agreed that really any plant that you use to benefit your body can be thought of as medicinal. That would include teas, balms, lotions and even food if you take the broadest possible definition. Personally, I really like to rub leaves and smell them, it makes me feel good! So in a way I could call those perfumed plants that I keep around me “medicinal.”

I asked about some of Natalie’s favourite plants to make tea out of, which is another thing that I love to do. “Lemonbalm, Mint and Nettle is a great combo” she said “as well as Echinacea, Evening Primrose, Rosemary, Yarrow and Lavender.” I know these plants well, but I have to admit that I haven’t tried most of them in tea. I think this will be the year that I start trying.

As I waved Natalie goodbye and walked home, I wondered to myself “why is it that so many of the people I know seem to have hesitant feelings around medicinal plants?” I asked my partner Alan about this when I got home: his mom is a retired nurse. “I’ve learned from her that there are a lot of drug interactions with common plants that can be pretty scary… like Grapefruit.” It’s true that drinking Grapefruit juice can increase the effective dose of several pharmaceuticals, causing severe adverse reactions. As Alan told me this, he was brewing himself a pot of Chamomile tea, something he does on a daily basis. “Would you like me to pour you some?” he offered.

I can’t say I was expecting to learn about botanical therapy when I first wondered about that derelict greenhouse on Shaw Street. By the way, the reason that those spaces were in disrepair is that upcoming construction will destroy the walled garden and the old greenhouse. Natalie told me that she would do her best to salvage what she could and plant it in the Sunshine Garden. It was a solid adventure, overall, and I hope to be interacting with Natalie again in the future. I offered to help her choose some native plants for some of the beds she’s tending. In any case, I would say this is another example of the mantra I repeat to myself often: slow down, looks closer, and always consider another perspective.