Nature’s Collagen
Picture this: You’re spending $50 a month on collagen powder, dutifully mixing it into your morning coffee, hoping it’ll erase those fine lines and soothe your achy joints. Meanwhile, that expensive tub might be quietly poisoning you with heavy metals. Worse? Your body’s probably breaking it down before it ever reaches your skin.
Here’s what the supplement industry doesn’t want you to know: Your body already knows how to make collagen. It just needs the right tools, and nature’s pantry is overflowing with them.
Why Your Body Is Screaming for Collagen
Collagen isn’t just about vanity. It’s the most abundant protein in your body, literally holding you together. Think of it as the scaffolding for your skin, bones, tendons, ligaments, organs, and blood vessels. Type I collagen alone makes up 90% of your body’s collagen supply, giving strength to your skin, bones, and connective tissue.
But here’s the harsh reality: As you age, your collagen production nosedives. For women, it plummets even faster after menopause. Add sun damage, smoking, alcohol, poor sleep, and stress to the mix, and you’re watching your body’s foundation crumble in real-time.
The consequences? Wrinkles and sagging skin are just the visible signs. Underneath, your tendons weaken, your joints ache more, your blood vessels lose integrity, and even your digestion suffers. This isn’t just aging… it’s your body crying out for support.
But how do you know if your body is actually depleted? Here’s the truth: collagen deficiency doesn’t always announce itself with wrinkles. It can strike younger people too. That nagging joint pain you’ve been blaming on “inflammation”? It might actually be deteriorating cartilage, your body’s collagen stores running dry.
There’s a simple test you can do right now to check if you should be concerned. Press your fingernail into the skin on the back of your hand and hold for 3 seconds. Release. Does the indent bounce back immediately, or does it linger?
Click here to find out what this means for your collagen levels and whether you need to take action now before the damage becomes irreversible.
The Dirty Secret Behind Collagen Supplements
Walk into any health store and you’ll see shelves packed with collagen powders promising miraculous results. But let me pull back the curtain on this billion-dollar industry.
First, the FDA doesn’t review these supplements for safety or effectiveness. Manufacturers can slap any claim on the label without proving a thing. Those “clinical studies” you see advertised? Most are industry-sponsored and show minimal benefits at best.
Here’s the kicker: Collagen supplements sourced from fish, cows, and pigs can contain hazardous levels of chromium, cadmium, lead, and arsenic. Cadmium destroys your bones and kidneys. Lead damages your nervous system and heart. Arsenic disrupts your cellular function. You’re literally paying to ingest toxins.
Making your own skin salve takes time most of us don’t have. If you’re buying one, choose 100% organic, non-GMO ingredients your skin can recognize. My wife and I personally use this calendula salve for cracked skin, cuts, insect stings, and minor burns.
It works faster than drugstore ointments, smells like actual herbs (not synthetic fragrance), and costs less than chemical-loaded “healing creams.” Sometimes the smartest move is letting expert herbalists do what they do best.
Even if you find a clean brand, your body breaks down those peptides in your gut and redistributes the amino acids wherever it decides, not to your face or joints. As the Cleveland Clinic bluntly states: you cannot direct collagen to specific body parts. That expensive powder? Your body might be using it to build stomach lining instead of smoothing wrinkles.
If you’ve ever taken supplements, been exposed to pesticides, or lived in a modern environment (spoiler: you have), your body is holding onto chemicals it was never designed to process. Here’s why: our bodies weren’t created to contain plastic particles, heavy metals, or synthetic compounds.
They literally don’t have the biological machinery to flush these toxins alone. It’s like asking a horse-drawn cart to compete in a car race. You need support from the outside. Not more pills. Not synthetic “detox teas.” But from nature itself, fresh leaves of potent plants, cut fine and infused properly to bind and escort those toxins out.
This is what a real detox looks like: a Lymphatic Flush made from dandelion root, cleavers, red clover, and burdock. Herbs that grab heavy metals and chemical residues at the cellular level and sweep them through your lymphatic system.
Use it at least once every three months before these toxins create cascading problems you can’t ignore. Your collagen will thank you when it’s no longer under siege. Here’s how to make it step by step and with pictures.
Nature’s Collagen Blueprint: Feed Your Body What It Actually Needs
Here’s the revolutionary truth: Instead of swallowing pre-made collagen, you need to give your body the raw materials to manufacture its own. And nature provides everything you need.
The Building Blocks
Your body builds collagen from amino acids. Specifically glycine, proline, and lysine. You’ll find these in fish, poultry, eggs, legumes, and grass-fed meats. But amino acids alone won’t cut it.
Vitamin C is non-negotiable. Without it, your body literally cannot assemble collagen. This is why sailors developed scurvy—their gums bled and skin fell apart when deprived of vitamin C. Load up on citrus fruits, berries, bell peppers, leafy greens, and tomatoes.
You also need zinc and copper to cross-link collagen molecules and create strong, flexible tissue. Find them in shellfish, nuts, seeds, and whole grains. One quick note: Skip synthetic vitamin C pills! They stress your kidneys with fillers your body doesn’t recognize; instead, use whole-food sources like nettles, rosehips, and elderberries (more on this powerful vitamin C source below).
Your Secret Weapons: Herbs That Command Your Body to Make More Collagen
This is where herbal medicine shows its true power. Forget passive nutrition, these herbs actively stimulate collagen production:
Rosemary & Lemon Balm: Studies show that rosmarinic acid from these herbs dramatically increases type I procollagen secretion. In fact, lemon balm extract normalized collagen production in damaged cells to healthy levels. Add fresh rosemary to your roasted vegetables or steep lemon balm tea daily.
Here’s the challenge with lemon balm: sourcing quality leaves is harder than it looks. Sure, you can forage it, but that means finding a patch far from roads (away from exhaust fumes and runoff chemicals), correctly identifying it, and investing hours you probably don’t have.
Buying it dried from stores? You’re mostly getting flavor, not medicine. The volatile compounds that stimulate collagen production evaporate during commercial drying. If you do forage fresh lemon balm, you’ll need to wait weeks for it to infuse into a tincture, and here’s the thing: tinctures are the gold standard for herbal remedies because alcohol extraction pulls out ALL the medicinal compounds, not just the water-soluble ones.
So you can spend weekends foraging, processing, and waiting… or you can get the most potent lemon balm tincture from the most trustworthy herbalist in the US right here.
It’s actually cheaper than the fuel to drive to foraging spots, cheaper than collagen supplements, and you know exactly what you’re getting: maximum potency, zero guesswork.
Sea Buckthorn: These vibrant orange berries are packed with fatty acids and antioxidants that trigger fibroblast proliferation—the cells that manufacture collagen. Sea buckthorn oil firms skin, accelerates wound healing, and fights inflammation. Drizzle the oil over salads or take a teaspoon daily.
Turmeric: The golden healer does it again. Curcumin upregulates COL1 gene expression, literally telling your cells to produce more type I collagen. It also protects existing collagen from inflammatory breakdown. Add fresh turmeric to bone broth, curries, or golden milk.
Nettle: This one pulls double duty, protecting existing collagen while supporting new formation. Studies show nettle extracts inhibit collagenase and elastase, the enzymes that literally shred your skin’s scaffolding. Its polyphenols fight inflammation and oxidative stress in skin cells, slowing “inflammaging.”
Plus, nettle provides bioavailable silicon that supports collagen matrix formation in bones and connective tissue. Add 5-10g dried nettle leaves (or blanched fresh nettle) during the final 15-20 minutes of simmering to infuse minerals and polyphenols without bitterness.
Now let’s talk about working with nettles… because it’s not for the faint of heart. Beyond the sourcing challenges every herb presents, nettles have a special gift: they sting like hell.
It’s almost impossible to harvest, wash, or process fresh nettles without getting zapped, and those stings kill your motivation instantly. I know people who’ve abandoned this miraculous plant entirely because they refuse to deal with the pain. And honestly? I get it. Getting stung while trying to make medicine is the opposite of zen.
But here’s your workaround: let a professional herbalist do the dirty work for you. For years, Nicole Apelian, a survival expert and master herbalist, has been providing her potent stinging nettle tincture to people who want the benefits without the battle scars.
I use it monthly in recipes and remedies, and the results speak for themselves. All the respect for the craft, none of the suffering. Sometimes the smartest thing you can do is let nature’s experts handle nature’s defenses.
Garlic: While not as potent alone, garlic’s sulfur compounds support collagen formation and prevent breakdown. Crush fresh cloves and add them liberally to your cooking.
Protect What You’ve Built
Making collagen is only half the battle, you must protect it from destruction:
- Shield yourself from UV radiation. Sun damage generates free radicals that shred collagen fibers like paper. Wear sunscreen and protective clothing.
- Prioritize sleep. Your skin repairs and produces collagen while you rest. Skimp on sleep, and you’re sabotaging your own efforts.
- Manage stress. Chronic stress floods your body with cortisol, which literally breaks down collagen. Meditation, deep breathing, and regular movement are non-negotiable.
- Quit smoking and limit alcohol. Both accelerate oxidative damage and collagen degradation at cellular levels.
The Traditional Remedy That Delivers: Medicinal Bone Broth
For centuries, traditional healers have prescribed bone broth for joint pain, skin health, and recovery from illness. Now we understand why: simmering bones for hours releases gelatin (degraded collagen), amino acids, and minerals directly into liquid your body can absorb.
Before you start making this broth, you need to watch this. Nicole Apelian has seen too many people waste time and herbs by making critical mistakes. Go too weak? You’re drinking fancy water with zero medicinal value. Go too strong without proper preparation? Hello, upset stomach, nausea, or worse… herbal compounds are powerful, and dosing matters.
Don’t wing it. Watch her step-by-step video HERE and learn how to make remedies that actually work. The first time, every time.
Nature’s Collagen – Bone Broth Recipe
Ingredients:
- 2 kg mixed grass-fed beef bones (marrow, knuckle, oxtail)
- 1 kg meaty beef shanks or short ribs
- 2 carrots, 2 celery stalks, 1 onion (roughly chopped)
- 4 garlic cloves (smashed for sulfur compounds)
- 2 sprigs fresh rosemary (rosmarinic acid booster)
- 1 tablespoon fresh turmeric (COL1 gene activator)
- 1 bay leaf, 1 teaspoon black peppercorns
- 2 tablespoons apple cider vinegar (extracts minerals)
- 1/2 oz dried nettle leaves (Or use 20 drops of this Stinging Nettle tincture for boosted, pre-extracted potency.)
- 4-5 liters filtered water
- Sea salt to taste
Instructions:
1. Optional but recommended: Roast bones at 200°C for 30 minutes to deepen flavor.
2. Before combining everything, parboil the bones briefly: place them in a pot, cover with water, bring to a boil for 5–10 minutes, then discard that water and rinse the bones. This removes most of the foam and impurities.
3. Place everything (including the cleaned bones) in a large pot with vinegar and water. Bring to a boil, then reduce to gentle simmer.
4. Skim foam (if there is any left after step 2) for the first 30 minutes, then add sea buckthorn if using.
5. Simmer for 8-24 hours. The longer, the richer in collagen and minerals. Add the dried nettles in the last 15-20 minutes of simmering.
6. Strain, season with salt, and cool. Remove fat layer if desired.
7. Store in the fridge for 5 days or freeze in portions.
Drink 1-2 cups daily during cold months, or use as a base for soups and stews. The amino acids and minerals work synergistically with your collagen-building diet. This is nature’s collagen. Not a miracle pill, but a sustainable approach that honors your body’s wisdom. The results won’t appear overnight, but they’ll last a lifetime.
Nature Gives You More Than That
This is nature’s collagen. But you’re just scratching the surface of what plants can do for you.
The Forgotten Home Apothecary contains 250+ remedies that sat on apothecary shelves before pharmaceuticals took over:
- Nature’s Antibiotic that stops infections without prescriptions
- The Mucus Buster that clears congestion in 48 hours
- The Painkiller in a Jar (wild lettuce extract that works like prescription meds, legally)
- Heavy Metal Detoxifier that chelates toxins from your bloodstream
- The Autoimmune Tincture that got Dr. Nicole Apelian out of her wheelchair (she hasn’t taken MS drugs in 20 years)
- The Brain Booster for memory and focus when you need to perform
- Penicillin Soup that fights infections like the old apothecaries did
- Herbal Antiparasitic Flush (71% effective in clinical studies)
- Amish Amoxicillin that strengthens immunity against bacteria
- The Gut-Healing Elixir your ancestors made at home
Every recipe uses plants you can forage or grow. No expensive ingredients. No supply-chain dependence.
Here’s the reality: Pharmacies run out. Prescriptions get denied. But plants don’t abandon you when systems fail.
Winter is coming. When your child wakes with an earache at 2 AM, will you panic or reach for the remedy that works in minutes? When joint pain flares, will you destroy your gut with ibuprofen or use the natural solution that actually restores mobility?
Dr. Nicole Apelian poured 30 years of knowledge into this book. This isn’t theory. Her remedies work because nature works.
At the time of writing this, only 54 copies left at this price. The best time to build your home apothecary was yesterday. The second-best time is now.
Get your copy of The Forgotten Home Apothecary before it’s gone. Your future self will thank you when the remedy you need is on your shelf instead of out of stock at the pharmacy.
