Adoption and Essential Oils

This is my brother and my sister-in-law.  I love them to pieces.  They adopted three little ones last year and they torture my heart by not living close enough for me to be an appropriate aunt!  Alas, they've heard my guilting and pleading, and remain 17 hours away from me nonetheless.  To their benefit, they sometimes whisper sweet words of hope in my ears of moving to a one-state-away radius.  They do this to keep my heart aflutter and stay my whining and belly-aching. 

My sister-in-law, Brittiny, has long-since been dubbed the Martha Stewart of the family.  She has some information stored away in her brain for every topic under the sun, and continually has ideas from a wide range of topics including how to organize your home, to how to create your own, chemical-free bug spray.  It's astounding, really.  She has been a fan for quite some time of doTERRA Essential Oils.  Have you heard of them?  She sells them HERE, if you're interested. 

Let's face it.  Our kids, who have been through abuse, neglect, long periods of stress and chaos, often have some resulting issues with which they deal:

having trouble sleeping
anxiety
bonding
headaches
sensory disorders
night terrors
growing pains
bed wetting
    and so much more

And there are two sides to these problems.  One is that we can sometimes feel a little helpless in what to do.  And the other is being fearful of filling our kids with a ton of Rx medicines every day.  My oldest son has headaches nearly every night.  They are almost always caused by tension and stress.  But I don't want to give him daily Tylenol.  It's not have I have any issue at all with medications, but I don't want to endanger his kidneys from daily pain killer use, and I don't want him to build a tolerance to pain killers when he's only 9 years old.

But this is what I love about essential oils.
Different oils act as home remedies for many issues that come up with my children.  And I don't have to worry about the chemical side effects.  My son, Sugar Monkey, struggles with going to sleep.  It's really a common issue for adopted kids.  Their little bodies are super-alert if they are in any level of fight/flight mode, and they often pop back awake after nightmares.  But I can use a little drop of lavender oil that reduces anxiety, and let's my little guy fall asleep quicker, and sleep better.   He loves it.  It's a little bonding moment every night at bed time when we doesn't let me forget to run a drop or two on him.  It's a smell for this oil, and the scent has become part of a ritual that he loves.

Returning to my anxiety-ridden All-Star, we use peppermint.  Most of his headaches are at bedtime.  My guess is that it's a combination of the build-up of today's stressed, mixed with the quiet to begin worrying about tomorrow.  All we need is something that will ease the headache enough for him to go to sleep and then his body will calm itself down.  Peppermint!  We rub a little on his temples, and he closes his eyes.  It is very tingly once applied, and it helps my son feel like we're doing something that will help.  And he can slowly drift off to sleep.

The oils are:

all-natural, therapeutic grade

provide sensory responses to our children's needs

help emotionally, even if their pain is more mental than physical

provide relief without harmful effects

provide a way to DO something, when you don't know what to do

Brittiny recommended THIS website as a great reference place to answer your questions about essential oils in general, and which ones can be used for which issues.  If you have any direct questions about adoption and essential oils, you can email: info@emptychairministry.com, and she can respond.

Do you use essential oils with your children?  Do you use essential oils personally?  What are your experiences?  We'd love to hear what you think!