Meet Arika
Arika Rapson, MA, is a holistic herbalist and owner of Island Herbal Consults based on Lopez Island, Washington. Her focus as an herbalist is on holistic support for chronic diseases that impact daily living, such as EDS, MCAS, autoimmune disorders, migraines and other chronic pain conditions. Additionally, she is certified as a Cognitive Coach and works with clients on areas like brain fog, executive function, nervous system regulation, stress management and neurodivergent support. She lives with her husband James on the edge of the woods on a registered ARK (Acts of Restorative Kindness) – a mix of native and medicinal plants that support a diverse local ecosystem that includes wildlife, pollinators and micro-organisms.
Arika completed the foundational portion of her holistic training through Commonwealth Holistic Herbalism. She first completed the Family Program, where you learn medicine making and about the properties of individual herbs. She then moved on to the Community Program, where you learn about all the major bodily systems, how illness can take root in the body, and how to rebuild health and wellness with herbs and other holistic practices.
Now at the clinical level, her training includes advanced pathophysiology, herb-drug-interactions, customized protocols for complex cases and clinical skills. In order to meet the ever changing health needs of our times, she remain committed to ongoing mentorship, training and peer consultation as an active member of the American Herbalist's Guild (AHG) and through AHG Executive Director Erika Galentin's Herbal Practice Connexion (HPX).
Her Story
Arika first came to herbalism as an individual with significant health challenges and chronic pain resulting from a rare genetic disorder. Conventional medical treatments had been unsuccessful, and at the worst of it she was experiencing high levels of pain four out of every five days.
After moving to Lopez Island in 2018, she began working with local plants on the island and felt a long awaited shift in her body. Connecting with the land opened her eyes to the medicinal plants all around her, and the forest suddenly became alive with medicine. Discovering plants growing wild in her own backyard to be more helpful for her than expensive and hard-to-access medications had ever been, she was able to reduce her medications substantially (in consultation with her medical team) and remove a number of the limitations that had been holding her back for years.
And that’s when she got the bug! Those initial encounters inspired her to go more deeply with her studies so that she could make herbs more accessible for more people. Having been on pharmaceuticals all her life, she especially wanted to bring plant medicine to those whose access had been limited due to concerns regarding herb-drug interactions or whose issues had seemed too complex for other modalities to help with. Plants are powerful, and to get safe, reliable and consistent results (especially when pharmaceuticals are in the mix), you need to get serious about training.
So it was at this point that Arika decided to pursue formal training as a clinical herbalist. It is her passion to bring the best of Traditional Western Herbalism and modern science together to support the challenging health issues of our times.