Only started Passiflora caerulea from seed. And yes, maypop is P. incarnata. I've read that Passiflora seeds should be germinated fairly soon after harvesting & if left too long, they tend to enter dormancy. I germinated mine much warmer than Penz did & provided soil temperature about 25-30 C (78-85 F). They seem to like the warmth & germinated quickly in about a week. Cover them with about 1 inch planting media & keep moist. If you plant them too shallow, they'll sprout but the seed coat will tend to stay on. Give them time to send their 1st roots down & by pushing up through the soil, the softened seed coat is helped off. Sorry I have no experience with starting the others from seeds.

Well I got really curious since sinus clogging and throat clearing have been a life long problem for me - solved at age 43 - simple dehydration. Since I have solved my problem I've merely kept up with it but for quite some years I have wondered just how the dehydration caused my symptoms. So! Tonite I Googled >Dehydration and SinusDehydration and Dry CoughIt would seem there are many causes and dehydration is one. I did not persue this at length - just enough to see that my observations (of myself) were valid. Here is just one site of interest. The Effects Of Dehydration : Your Health Journal http://www.lensaunders.com/wp/the-effects-of-dehydration/ And here are 3 statements I copied which confirm my observations: Avoid cold water or ice water because that just shocks the body and you just end up going to the bathroom with very little being absorbed Without enough fluid in the body, the mucus will thicken, making it difficult for the cilia to move it through the sinuses. I advise patients to drink plenty of water, as dehydration can make the mucus more tenacious and difficult to clear; (from the throat). This, of course, doesn't mean that I consider my suggestion to be the true solution; just that it was/is a valid consideration among many. Here is a link that might be useful: The Effects Of Dehydration : Your Health Journal

I disagree, partially. You should only trust your instinct when science hasn't provided an answer for a while. Instinct is a decent "backup". Science is essentially instinct, backed up with evidence. "Trust your instincts" is basically a nice way of saying "go with your gut". I think that's a crazy way to poke your way through the darkness when you're dealing with a child who looks like they can't breathe. I just spent a sleepless night worrying about my boy's ragged, irregular breathing, and snotty coughing interfering with his feeding. I was scared, nervous, and didn't really ever feel like I was doing exactly the right thing. But frankly, that's just tough for me. I pulled an all-nighter of fear so that my wife, a doctor, could finally get some regular sleep. She woke up, walked into the bedroom, and basically diagnosed the problem as a non-problem in minutes with an aspirator, warm water, and a minute or two at the breast. As a parent, you just have to accept a certain amount of uncertainty, and the notion that some problems don't have obvious, immediate solutions. My boy's a premie, so nobody's more scared of the sniffles or apnea than I am. But MAN, I was amazed the way some of the other parents treated those poor nurses in the NICU. I'm not calling doctors infallible. I think we're just going through a cultural swing from one ridiculous extreme to the other. Fifty years ago doctors could do no wrong. In movies and books they were treated like demi-gods who could talk to anyone like they were illiterate peasants. Now the opposite absurdity is coming into effect. Now, in our hyper-commodified society, where everything has a price, we treat doctors like we treat a waiter at a cheap cafe. Like some pack animal that's there to suit our every whim, immediately. I've also noticed that, with our criminally inefficient health care system for the rich, we tend to take that frustration out on the nurses and doctors who are basically just the public "face" of our system. Parenting, though, is still the same, more or less. It's nervewracking, and makes you feel sometimes like you're just sitting there watching someone asphyxiate. But you're not (mostly). And thank God we don't just "trust our instincts". If we did, we'd still be burning women at stakes for "witchery" and bleeding people when they sneezed too loud at parties.

Anglophilia, you have struck me as a strong, sensible person. Going through tests, especially the difficult and painful ones as you have done, sleeping as you did with the tubing, is not really feeling sorry for yourself. You're allowed to complain and hurt : - ) Glad you posted, and happy to see you have received so much great support! My thoughts are with you as you await results and outcome.