Snake Oil or Essential Oil?

I’ve never been the incense-burning type and I’ve been skeptical of essential oils. I lumped them in the ‘snake oil’ category and thought they were probably a scam more than anything.

My mind has been changed in a profound way. We were introduced slowly to the world of essential oils, mainly by including them in my homemade cleaning products and hand sanitizer recipes, and have now jumped in feet first. One naturopath doctor explained that she sees essential oils as a missing link in medicine, and we’ve certainly been impressed as we’ve started to use them.

We know that plants and herbs have medicinal properties.  Essential oils, properly distilled, are actually highly concentrated essences of the plants.   For example, 86 lemons are required to make one ounce of lemon oil.   These high concentrations can have impressive effects.

Our Experience

My toddler has been getting random hives and welts, usually right after her naptime. These hives usually last about 4 hours and we’ve not been able to figure out what causes them. I rubbed lavender essential oil on the bottom of her feet and the hives were gone in only 15 minutes. I couldn’t believe my eyes, so we tried it the next time she had them – same result.

My son came in the house with two giant mosquito bites on his leg. I took a picture so I could show you, but my camera couldn’t quite get the focus right. I rubbed Purification essential oil blend on him and the welts were gone in about 30 minutes. The intense itching stopped shortly thereafter I applied the oil.  Later that day, he only had two small red spots where the giant welts had been.

The next day, my son’s legs were sore from playing so hard. He was laying on the couch and whining all morning! I remembered that I had some Pan-Away, a blend of essential oils, so I rubbed that on his legs. Ten minutes later, he was running around playing and didn’t complain any more!

My friend’s husband started getting sick right before they were due to leave the country.  She’d been sick the week before with the same thing and it took her about 8 days to recover!  That was due to have him sick for almost their entire trip!  She gave him some Thieves Essential Oil along with some collodial silver and he was well in 2 days!  I could keep going with more and more stories!

I’m impressed.  Our experiences only scratch the surface of the potential of these oils.  Sacred Frankincense is being used in clinical trials at OU, and they are seeing people with Stage 4 breast, bone, and brain cancer become cancer free!  CANCER FREE!  The oil actually digests the cancer.  Absolutely amazing.    From the National Institute of Health’s website: “Future pre-clinical and clinical studies are urgently needed to evaluate the safety and efficacy of Boswellia sacra essential oil as a therapeutic agent for treating breast cancer.”   Many of these oils are also amazingly high in anti-oxidants, and are anti-microbial, anti-bacterial, and anti-viral.

Important Caution

All essential oils are not created equal.   I learned recently that most oils in the U.S. that you can buy over-the-counter have been cut with petrochemicals.  You might remember a discussion on this blog about lavender and tea tree oil and their potential to cause hormonal disruption in boys.  This hormonal disruption is certainly possible – but it’s due to the petrochemicals!  So, please, don’t run out and buy oils from your local health food store without thoroughly researching their product standards.  Most oils sold in stores are intended for perfume or aromatic purposes.

Furthermore, to be labled “Pure” in the US, oils only have to contain 5% of the oil!  That doesn’t sound pure to me!

I feel like I’ve been introduced to a ‘hidden treasure’ and I’m excited to share more with you about what I’m learning.  Look for more posts to come explaining some more of the how’s, why’s, and background on essential oil, but I wanted to start with sharing some of our personal testimonies.  If you’d like more testimonies, check out Oil Testimonies.

** If you live in the DFW area, I am hosting a free class on Monday night, May 14 in the Grapevine area.  Email me if you’d like to come! **

* These statements have not been evaluated by the FDA. These products are not intended to diagnose, treat, cure or prevent any disease.

4 Comments

  • Flmomof4

    I am a YL rep and am SO excited to see a skeptic turn around! There are so many testimonials that trying to think of just ONE has me stumped. What I will say is my hubby & 12 y/o have horrible asthma – serious asthma! Everything sent them both into an attack! So, I started using RC on their lungs at night for a peaceful rest. This went on everynight for a week and at the end of the week hubby noticed he wasn’t using his inhaler quite as often and “I” will vouch that he was not SNORING nearly like he use to! Here we are 3 years later and BOTH hubby & the 12 y/o have NOT suffered from seasonal allergies or had an asthma attack in over 2 years!!! **ALSO, our 3 y/o was an 8 week preemie – subjected to the threat of RSV during his first few months of life. While using RC on hubby & the 12 y/o, he reaped the benefits from inhaling the oils!!! He contracted a virus right before his 1st birthday but since then… he’s never had even so much as the sniffles!! He LOVE LOVE LOVES oils! Peace & Calming is a nightly ritual <3 A family of 6 an none of us have been to the doctors in almost 3 years! IMHO… let's prevent a potential problem instead of putting a band-aid over it! ;D

  • GTH

    LOVE, LOVE, LOVE Young Living Essential Oils! Our family has been using them and other products from the company for over 15 years now. It has kept our family healthy with very few doctor’s visits.