I actually have 3 active deer tick bites right now, they are a constant presence this time of the year here on the farm and with the dogs picking up loads of them daily in the forest. When I'm on my own I sleep in a big pile with my 4.5 dogs. This would not be possible if I had any remnants of fear of lyme or deer ticks, since I will often wake up with them crawling on me, biting me or wake up with one in the morning that attached itself during the night. But having lost all fear of them, they're no worse than mosquitoes and really I prefer them to mosquitoes because they are easier to handle than a hoard of winged vampires.
When my system is less clean I notice the bites itch much more furiously than they do when I've got a lot of raw organs in my system and I haven't been eating too much trash (cooked and starchy/sugary foods for me).
Golly, when I think about the paradigm shift that accompanies RVAF in regards to microbes, it never fails to astound me. It's like the borders have totally shifted. Now where I was once concerned with germs, I'm concerned instead with toxins. I can drink from a duckshit filled pond without a second thought about the biological content, but instead I'm wondering if any pesticides have leeched in to the water. Or someone can sneeze close to my face without phasing me, but I'm wishing they would just take their chemically 'perfumed' skin far away!
But I really rather prefer to be preoccupied with chemicals than microbes! One is useful and beneficial, the other a tragic waste of energy and resources.
That's where it's at LCO! Yeah. Exactly. When you finally hit your right diet, get over all the challenges and get into that zone of eating all those fears fly out the window. I just don't get colds or flus so I can care for people with them without a second thought. The only time I feel sick is when I'm eating something that's not right for me or when I'm exposed to something unnatural and toxic and then I want to run.... fast. Your example fits perfectly, I am much more frightened of someone wearing a nasty perfume than I am of someone with a contagious disease!
What herbs are useful for is the stages up to the point where you hit that sweet spot. Al is totally right that different herbs worked different for different people. When I was at my weakest with candida garlic was a friend and helped, but the real healing came from the changes in diet - meaning what I cut out of my diet - because garlic and all those herbs Al listed are foods! It's about knowing what foods work for you and which ones don't and when - because it changes even for the same person over time.
Herbs and healing helpers can go even further to give one a feeling of security. For instance if I should get intestinal bugs - so what? I know what herbs can kill them even if I'm not at my peak where they don't have a chance of survival in my system - which is the norm.
Great point though about where the magic is - it's in a rock-solid immune system - that's where it's at.