How to Stock Your Aromatherapy Medicine Cabinet For The First Time

Aromatherapy is the use of essential oils and other aromatic plant materials to affect a person’s health and mood in a positive way. For anyone who is interested in alternative treatments, aromatherapy is one of the most easily accessible practices that someone can begin and for which there can be much help derived for many different medical conditions. While it should not be used as a replacement for medical attention, aromatherapy can be a wonderful addition to modern Western medicine, though only in the last twenty years has aromatherapy been considered to have legitimate medical uses.

Difficulty: Moderate

Instructions

Things You'll Need:

• Dark cool place to keep your items
• Lavender essential oil
• Tea Tree essential oil
• Peppermint essential oil
• Rosemary essential oil
• Roman chamomile essential oil
• Eucalyptus essential oil
• Rose Geranium essential oil
• Carrier oil such as Almond for massage
• Epsom salts
• Band-aids
• Gauze
• Cotton balls
• First aid tape
• Paper
• Writing implement

1. Make a list of the sort of every day ailments you and your family suffer from. This will help you to get an idea of some of types of ailments you want to have essential oils on hand for.

2. Find a cool, dry place to store your aromatherapy products. Essential oils don’t last long in direct sunlight or in warm temperatures.

3. Purchase lavender essential oil. Lavender is good for healing cuts, burns, bruises, infections and even insect bites. The scent also has a wonderful, calming effect on the person using it.

4. Purchase Tea Tree essential oil. Tea Tree essential oil is a very strong disinfectant and antimicrobial. It also happens to be one of the safest essential oils you can use. It is used for fighting colds, healing acne, healing sunburn and a variety of other uses.

5. Purchase Peppermint essential oil. It is used to fight headaches, flu and colds.

6. Purchase Rosemary essential oil. Rosemary is wonderful for relieving pain, improving circulation and is also a great decongestant.

7. Purchase Roman Chamomile essential oil. Roman Chamomile is an anti-inflammatory and anti-spasmodic meaning it is wonderful for relieving cramps, muscle sprains, swelling, burns and even arthritis.

8. Purchase Eucalyptus essential oil. Most of us have heard of Eucalyptus since when we have colds we take cough drops with it. It is wonderful for treating colds and can open up clogged sinuses, and act as an expectorant helping to get rid of the mucus in the sinuses and lungs.

9. Purchase Rose Geranium essential oil. Rose Geranium is great for all skin conditions, so is very good to have on hand.

10. Purchase other first aid items such as band-aids, cotton balls, gauze and first aid tape, Epsom salts and a carrier oil such as Almond oil.

11. Put your essential oils in your aromatherapy medicine cabinet along with other first aid products.

Tips & Warnings

• Start out small. It’s OK to purchase only a few bottles of essential oils at a time to see how you like them.
• Test a drop of any essential oil on the skin to be sure there is no allergic reaction before using in bath water, while making bath salts or in massage oil.
• Replace any essential oils that are two years old that haven't been used. Over time they lose their effectiveness.
• Don't purchase essential oils in clear bottles as they deteriorate quickly losing their effectiveness.
• Don’t take essential oils internally. Some are poisonous. The only time you should do this is if you are instructed to do so by a Naturopathic Physician.
• Keep essential oils away from children as they can be harmful if taken internally. You should never use essential oils on very young children or infants unless they are prescribed by a Naturopathic Physician.
• Not all essential oils are created equally, some companies use synthetic oils or dilute their essential oils with vegetable oil. Scents such as lilac and rain are synthetic and if a particular essential oil line carries these then most likely all their oils are synthetic and you should avoid them. The way to determine if the essential oil has been diluted with vegetable oil is put a drop on a piece of paper. If the there is a oily residue is has been diluted and you should avoid it.
• Don't use essential oils with pets unless prescribed by a veterinarian who is schooled in their use with pets. Some evidence suggests that they can be harmful to cats.

Resources

• Your aromatherapy medicine chest
• Essential oils