Essential Oils 101
We know they smell nice, but can oils help in my time of need?
Have you wondered what’s up with essential oils?
Oils are one of those remedies that sometimes get a bad wrap. Like most natural products, they’re overlooked for their simplicity and earthiness. We know they smell nice, but can they really help me in my time of need with a headache or a cough?
When I was suffering day in and day out with debilitating pain in my esophagus and stomach, I experimented with many different prescriptions recommended by my doctors and gastroenterologists for months and even years. I wanted so badly for one of those meds to provide some relief. Unfortunately, that wasn’t the case.
Relief came from a tiny, simple, amber bottle of a digestive blend essential oil, given to me by a dear friend who had watched me suffer and wanted to help.
Dropping the oil directly on my tongue and swallowing, surprisingly I felt the first bit of relief that I’d felt in over two years. That was a turning point for our family’s health and the start in my interest in natural remedies.
Having an open mind (and honestly, TOTAL desperation), moved our family to try something new. Fast forward a few years and essential oils have helped us in more ways than I can count and are now a big part of our household health and first aid.
We use them for both short-term and long-term fixes. For example, burns, sore muscles, scratchy throats in the short-term, and for balancing the GI system, improving breathing during exercise, and so on for the long-term. Short-term, you might use an oil once or twice, whereas long-term you could make oils part of your daily routine while they work to balance your body and improve and heal the issue overtime.
Over the years, we’ve come to learn quite a bit about when and how to use oils. We’d love to share some of what we’ve discovered.
With my kiddos home sheltering in place due to the COVID-19 pandemic, we decided to make a video together teaching some basics about essential oils.
Check out the video below, Essential Oils 101, and read on for a summary.
P.S. I’d LOVE to teach more about oils in the future (they’re one of my favorite things to talk about!), so comment below or email me if there’s interest.
Essential Oils 101:
What are essential oils?
-Essential oils are a distilled oil from plants, trees, flowers, grasses, etc.
-They’ve been around for thousands of years! (They were used in Ancient Egypt!)
-Make sure you oils are completely organic and pure with no fillers or synthetics. We love and use doTERRA brand essential oils.
How do you use essential oils?
-Aromatically (by smelling the oil from the bottle, in your hands, or with a diffuser)
-Topically (directly on the skin where you need it or on the bottoms of your feet)
-Internally (taken in a glass of water, directly on the tongue, in capsules, or in cooking)
Our family’s favorite ways to use essential oils?
-Sleep (make a diluted roller bottle including lavender, cedarwood, and other oils for the kids’ bedside for them to apply as needed)
-Stomach aches (peppermint, ginger, and clove applied directly on the stomach or on the feet)
-Coughs (peppermint, spearmint, and eucalyptus applied to the bottoms of the feet and in a diffuser overnight)
-Burns (lavender applied directly to the burn—we keep a bottle in the kitchen at all times for cooking accidents)
-To replace toxins in house products (we use doTERRA’s pre-made laundry detergent, hand soap, cleaner for kitchens and bathrooms, hand sanitizer, bug spray, toothpaste, and so on to replace the synthetic and unnatural products that we used to use)
When you’re getting started:
-Evaluate the needs of your family (where can your health improve?)
-Pick oils that are easy to use
-Learn specifically how to use your oils to meet your needs
Overall, oils have greatly improved our health and we continue to learn more about how to use them. I know that they are often overlooked and I too was a skeptic for a long time (again, it took MAJOR desperation for me to try them), but if you’re looking for more natural options to improve your health and the health of your family and even your pets, oils are a great tool to have in your toolbox.
I’m so grateful for a sweet, sharing friend, who years ago was aware of my discomfort and wanted to help.
Because I had a lot of questions when I wondered how to integrate oils into our home, I’m offering a FREE 30 MINUTE CONSULT one-on-one to help get you started. Just email me to set up an appointment! whitneybeancoaching@gmail.com.
That’s it for now guys, thanks for reading!
-Whitney
