I brought these for the first time about 12 months ago after I split up with a tosspot of a boyfriend, he chose the day before I had an important exam to start acting like the biggest twat in the world.... and no, he wasn't a cheat.... just a complete idiot who knew the stress I was under with my exams and felt like he wanted to do his best to make my life just that little bit more stressful.

I'd never used Bach before but minutes after splitting with him I was on the phone to my mate asking how the hell I was supposed to concentrate on a big exam after finding out my childhood sweetheart was actually a total div. It's not that I wanted him back, I don't play girly games and telling him to jog on was for good as far as I was concerned but I was still aware that he was going to leave a massive hole in my life and it was hard to think of my future at all... let alone sit through a 3 hour exam the very next day. She told me to calm down, stop panicking and meet her outside the shopping centre in an hour. Not for retail therapy but she'd just discovered Bach herself and she thought the brand would have something to help me get through this exam and also the panicky feeling I had in the pit of my stomach about what my ex was going to do next.

I decided to buy Rescue Remedy because on the label it seemed like it would help with the symptoms I was getting, Rescue Remedy is also available in dropper form but I didn't like the idea of that and the bonus with the pastilles is that I could take a couple into the exam with me to suck on while working.

The pastilles come in a 50g tin and they are elderflower and orange flavour, they are like hard boiled sweets which are quite small but as long as you suck them and don't start crunching a single pastille will last for ages. You don't want to be chewing them anyway because they go madly sticky then and will stick to your teeth big time. The flavour of them is like a watered down orange, to me they taste a bit like barley sugar sweets and I think that must be the combo of the orange and elderflower flavours.

The most important thing you probably want to know is if they work. Well yeah, they do kind of. I wouldn't say they are a miracle cure for stress and if you suffer big time with panic attacks and stuff like that then they probably won't do all that much at all for you. I think the psychological effect of actually sucking the sweet is very calming and within a couple of minutes of putting one in my mouth my stomach had stopped doing those horrible flip flops that happens when you're feeling a bit panicky, it also seemed to clear my head enough for my to concentrate on my exam.... something I didn't think would have been possible after the crappy few days I had had immediately before that.

I think the Rescue Remedy works by taking the panic away slightly so that I could get my own emotions under control, it's not exactly a placebo because the pastilles do have a calming effect all on their own but they will only work if you are willing to help yourself by chilling out a bit and realising that whatever has stressed you in the first place is not the end of the world.

I do recommend these, a tin costs about £5.00 and they keep good without all sticking to each other so even if you only need them here or there they're not going to go off as long as you make sure the tin is done up properly.

Recommended..... don't think of them as a miracle cure because they're not but they will help you to calm down enough to sort your own emotions out.