39TH Annual Mount Airy Autumn Leaves Festival 2005

Partial Reprint.

Jewelry can have healing effects.

Hematite jewelry can offer pain relief.

By Julie Pharr, staff writer

Winston-Salem - Heidi Fritts knows that she can sell something that works and says that she has found a seller in hematite jewelry.

I'm not just selling jewelry she said I'm selling pain relief.

Hematite or Fe2O3 iron oxide is a sedimentary deposit that is approximately 2.2 billion years old and consists of alternating layers of silver gray hematite and read Jasper,chert or even tiger eye quartz, according to Fritts.

Hematite is an important ore of iron, and its blood red color (in the powder form) lends itself well in use as a pigment, states a brochure from Fritts. Hematite gets its name from a Greek word meaning blood like because the color of its powder.

Ancient superstition held that large deposits of hematite formed from battles that were fought and the subsequent blood that flowed into the ground.

If hematite jewelry is worn 24 hours a day, it prevents and improves certain health conditions, according to Fritts. She says the following list is based on her customers testimonials -- hematite helps with headaches and migraines, neck and back pain, insomnia, stress and nervous disorders, arthritis pain, circulation disorders, bone spurs, sinus problems, menstrual cramps, heart, kidney and liver disease, surgical pain, pinched nerves, blood-pressure and blood sugar, tendinitis, carpal tunnel syndrome, knee replacement and fibromyalgia.

Fritts has experienced an 85% success rate with her customers, and a 100% success rate with arthritis sufferers.

One customer's blood-pressure dropped 30 points she said. One customer lent an ankle bracelet to her friend who was suffering from bone spurs and getting ready to have surgery. Now, she is not going to have surgery because her pain is gone. Fritts, a resident of Winston-Salem, says the hematite does not cure the problem, but alleviates the pain associated with the problem.

I love helping people, she said. I love hearing their stories.

Her customers experienced benefits within three days to up to two weeks.

You have to wear the jewelry 24/7, Fritts said. It's like a never-ending aspirin. The jewelry is up against the skin and the hematite runs through your system.

Fritts is a hematite wearer herself as a victim of arthritis pain in her back. She discovered hematite while at a festival where she was running a sand art booth. She had taken a break from working the booth with her son and found a lady selling hematite jewelry and talking about the jewelry's special benefits. She bought the jewelry thinking that even if it didn't work that she had a nice new necklace.

She wore the necklace and realized its benefits after standing for three days at another festival. Her back would have normally been hurting, but miraculously it was not, she said.