Essential Oils

I’ve known about the benefits of essential oils for quite awhile, but until recently I’ve not had much experience with them.  I explained in my Drug Free post that my mom raised us on natural remedies and we very very rarely sought medical advice from conventional doctors.  Her focus was mostly on homeopathic and herbal remedies in conjunction with vitamins and minerals, so my exposure to essential oils didn’t really come about until I was more or less on my own with my personal health care.  Honestly, I’m not entirely sure when I really started looking into it… But I know it peaked once I started massage school in 2008 and I was around more people who knew them and used them.  I had heard of how beneficial they were, but never really explored them until my training in massage therapy.  Naturally that would come from using oils on the skin in my practice, but I also learned about them in conversation about, of course, alternative and natural healing remedies (since a lot of my classmates shared that interest! Ah it was refreshing being at that school…).  I do remember the first oil I started using in daily life, and that was lavender.  I used it for everything – healing cuts or scrapes or any kind of open wound, healing skin infections, taking the itch out of bug bites (and healing them, too), healing and easing burns, you name it.  And it worked!  I pretty much quit using Neosporin or anti-itch creams or anything like that – lavender was doing the trick!  Tea tree oil was the next one, but I couldn’t stand the smell… its anti-infectious properties were pretty powerful though, so I’d keep it on hand if I felt I needed a step up from lavender.  Peppermint and eucalyptus were two more that I added to my “medicine cabinet” – me with my allergies and Justin with his seasonal sinus infections, those two became pretty helpful in those unwelcome situations!  We would boil water and add a few drops of each to it, then put a towel over our heads to kind of create a tent around us and the water and create a little mini sauna to breathe in the steam.  Doing that a few times a day for a couple days definitely helped!

Earlier this year (2012) I got involved with Young Living Essential Oils and learned more about Therapeutic Grade Essential Oils and even more about the healing properties of oils and the different kinds that are available.  I’ve been impressed with Young Living – the fact that they organically grow and harvest their own plants, the rigorous process they go through to maintain the plant’s healing properties as they extract the oils, and the purity of the oils, are just a few features I really like about the company.

But I’m not writing this to try to make a sales pitch – I just want to share my experiences and newfound knowledge about yet another excellent method of natural healing!

I had done a little research on lavender, so allow me to share: its healing properties were first discovered by French scientist René Gattefossé when he severely burned his arm in a laboratory accident.  He found that applying lavender not only took the pain away, but it promoted tissue regeneration and sped up the wound healing.  Lavender oil is antiseptic, antifungal, anti-inflammatory, and analgesic, just to name a few of its wonderful properties.  Turns out it’s also a great bug repellant! Citronella is too, and over the summer I combined the two oils with coconut oil and applied it to Harlee’s skin, and lo and behold it worked!  If he DID get bit (which was usually due to me missing a spot or forgetting to put it on) I’d just put lavender on the bite straight and it’d be gone within a day.  Great stuff!  Harlee’s definitely no stranger to lavender at this point – anytime he gets a cut or a scrape (and what toddler doesn’t?) guess what Mom reaches for immediately?  No Neosporin for this little guy!  (Did you know that people who repeatedly use Neosporin can develop a contact dermatitis, which is a poison ivy-like reaction?)  I generally like to avoid products with petroleum jelly in them anyway (Neosporin lists white petrolatum as an inactive ingredient).  It’s derived from crude oil (as is the stuff that powers our cars and plastic bags are made of), which you probably don’t want on your skin, but if that’s not enough, it clogs the pores, preventing the skin from being able to breathe, and can therefore lead to premature aging of the skin, among other things (think about what’s in your makeup, ladies!  See why more “natural” based cosmetics like Bare Minerals are on the rise lately?).  For more information on that topic, click here.

I got off-topic there, so getting back to the topic at hand, allow me to share more about another wonderful oil – Peppermint!  Just breathing it in lets you know it’s wonderful for the sinuses.  That and eucalyptus, but eucalyptus has a very strong aroma that not many people care for, which makes peppermint a great fall-back (but if you do like eucalyptus and have sinus issues, I highly recommend it!!).  I already mentioned dripping it into boiling water and breathing in the steam, but I now have some great suggestions for the kiddos too!  Poor Mr. Harlee got a runny nose not long ago (but what kid doesn’t, right? ‘Tis the season, after all!) and I rubbed it on his feet at night (the pores on the soles of your feet are some of the largest in your body, so usually anything applied to the feet can affect you internally).  His symptoms eased up quicker than I could have imagined!  Upon more researching I discovered that peppermint is also excellent for digestive issues, and I read of some people mixing it with coconut oil and rubbing it on their belly to easy stomachaches.  I got to use Justin as my guinea pig for that one – he had some indigestion and I applied the peppermint/coconut oil mix to his abdomen and within the hour he said the pain had eased up.  Sweet!  I now have an option for Harlee in case he ever gets tummy troubles!  One more great use for peppermint that I’ve found, too, is putting a drop of it in a spoonful of honey and swallowing it to soothe a sore throat.  Works like magic!

Wait, wait, hold the phone – you can swallow the oils?  Well, this is why I went with Young Living oils – the Therapeutic Grade label that they carry means that they’re pure enough to be safe for consumption (although you should still use caution – they’re pretty powerful in their own way, and the labels say which ones aren’t recommended for consumption or which ones should be diluted due to the nature of the plant).  The oil brands you find that are labeled “For aromatherapy use only” usually means they have additives in them to help stretch them out a bit and therefore make them less expensive.  But I’d rather spend a little extra if it means I’m avoiding potentially harmful chemicals and I’m getting the highest quality and potency of the oil.

Last, but not least, I like to use essential oils for immune system health for all of us at home, normally applied to the feet as I mentioned above but also diffused in my oil diffuser/humidifier so we can breathe in their healing properties.  There are quite a few oils that have strong properties such as antibacterial, antiviral, antifungal, anti-inflammatory, and a whole host of other qualities that are good for our health.  Fortunately Young Living made life easier by offering Thieves – an oil blend of clove, lemon, cinnamon, eucalyptus, and rosemary – clove being one of the most antimicrobial, antiseptic, antifungal, antiviral, and anti-infectious of all essential oils.  I like the story of the history behind this oil blend too – legend has it that a group of 15^th century thieves rubbed these oils on themselves to avoid contracting the plague while they robbed the bodies of the dead and dying.  The thieves were forced to tell what their secret was in exchange for a more lenient punishment.  Now that’s power!  I’ll rub a drop of this on the soles of Harlee’s feet at night and, knock on wood, in conjunction with everything else I’ve been doing like the probiotics I mentioned in a previous post, he’s been pretty healthy!  Another great thing about the Thieves oil is that it has a numbing sensation (that we don’t feel on our palms or soles, fortunately), and diluted in coconut oil it’s really effective for teething!  So effective, in fact, that Harlee stops crying within SECONDS of having it rubbed on his gums.  And we’re killing two birds with one stone, with all the great healing properties this oil blend carries!  Way better than Oragel, if you asked me, which numbs not only the mouth but the throat too, which can lead to choking or inhaling saliva.

The benefits of Thieves doesn't stop there.  Harlee and I both have been dealing with this persistent cough that won't leave us alone.  I finally mixed a drop of Thieves with some almond butter hand cream (Burt's Bees) and rubbed it all over my chest and throat, and Harlee's too.  Wow, ever since I started doing that, it's cut my coughing in half, if not more, and Harlee's too!  Finally some relief!

Another great one for not only immune health but general health is lemon oil.  I love the research on this, done by Jean Valnet, MD.  This showed that vaporized lemon oil can kill meningococcus bacteria in 15 minutes, typhoid bacilli in one hour, staphylococcus in two hours, and pneumococcus within three hours.  This research also shows that even a 0.2% solution of lemon oil can kill diphtheria bacteria in 20 minutes and inactivate tuberculosis bacteria.  Wow, sign me up!  I need to just diffuse this every day and night!  I do actually put a few drops in my bottled water, not only to take advantage of its great health benefits, but to add a little flavor too!  It’s a natural antidepressant too.  Hmm… come to think of it… I did start adding lemon to my water around the time of my biggest shift in the healing process of my postpartum depression… Perhaps there’s a correlation?

Essential oils have been used for thousands of years.  I tried doing research on the origination of it, but it seems as though it can’t exactly be tracked – the history of their use goes back to ancient China, India, Egypt, Greece, and Rome, just to name a few.  But I did notice that in all the history I’ve read, essential oils have been used for their medicinal properties, not just because they smell nice!  Although I don’t want to discredit aroma – breathing in these oils can definitely offer healing benefits as well, not just physically but mentally and emotionally too.  Take Frankincense, for instance – it stimulates the limbic region of the brain, the center of emotions, and can elevate the mind and help overcome stress and despair.  Sandalwood is another popular one, especially in incense – it stimulates the pineal gland as well as the limbic region of the brain and can help remove negative programming in the cells.

Hopefully that wasn’t too much information overload for you!  Trust me, there’s more where that came from, and I’m excited to learn more as I go along!  Isn’t Mother Earth incredible?  I am just in awe at the healing capabilities she possesses.  She definitely does not get the respect she deserves.

I’m sure I’ll post more about essential oils in the future, but for now that’s the most prominent information that I have.  I hope you enjoyed it and learned something new today!