It’s been a while since I’ve blogged about anything personal or anything unrelated to photography. I don’t plan on making a habit out of this, but something really amazing has recently happened and I can’t withhold myself from sharing any longer.
In January I was introduced to doTERRA Certified Pure Therapeutic Grade Essential Oils. At the time my son was approaching three months old and I was very interested in learning about natural alternatives to traditional medicine for both my son and our entire family. At the time he had not yet had a cold, virus or really been sick at all but I wanted to be prepared. I am so thankful that we found them when we did because one month later River began to break out in a terrible rash. After taking River to the doctor it was diagnosed as eczema and we were given a steroid creme to treat it. Before I go much further, let me just say that we are not anti-modern medicine. For those of you who don’t know, my husband is in his second year of residency as an emergency medicine physician. He prescribes medications everyday to patients that need them and is thankful to have life saving medicine readily available. However, we are firm believers that natural is best if possible. This translates to all aspects of our life. We try our best to live healthily by eating a variety of fruits and vegetables, (organic if possible, non-GMO), we exercise, drink a lot of water, avoid sugar, sedentary activities etc… When we found doTERRA, the essential oils fit right into our lifestyle. We use the oils daily and for so many different things, but before I jump ahead any further let me go back to my first story.
When I came home with the steroid creme for River’s eczema my husband was very weary of using it. We used it a few times but after he shared with me the side effects of long-term use I quickly started reading through my Modern Essential’s Usage Guide (Oil Bible) to find a better solution. What I ended up making was a roll on with a mixture of Lavender, Geranium and Maleluca essential oil with fractionated coconut oil as the base. This has become our alternative to steroid creme. So, you are wondering if it works? See for yourself.
River’s eczema is actually an allergy to dairy. I had to cut dairy out of my diet for his eczema to completely clear. Until recently we haven’t had any milk at all in the house. However, I started to suspect that his allergy was getting better because I had been able to sneak ice cream and cheese hear and there without a noticeable flare up. I decided to use milk as an ingredient in something that I ate as a test. Well, River accidentally got his elbow in some mashed potatoes that I made which had a small amount of dairy milk in them. They also were on his hands and then he touched his face and his stomach. I was upstairs when this happened, but Dan called out, “You need to come downstairs and bring the oils!”. He had an immediate reaction to the dairy and broke out in white whelps. I immediately applied our eczema blend roll on all over. Within 10 minutes the whelps were gone and within 20 minutes all redness and rash was completely gone. No sign.
When I mention that we use the oils for River’s eczema treatment some people are surprised because they have been told that you should avoid scents with sensitive skin conditions like eczema and they would be correct. Conventional lavender, geranium and even melaleuca (tea tree oil) is either partially or even entirely synthetic. This false replicates do further irritate skin and can cause allergies themselves. I have actually met people who claimed they were allergic to tea tree oil but when they tried doTERRA’s oil they had no adverse reaction. Because doTERRA’s oils are pure, non-synthetic, completely natural and organic oils, they can be taken internally. Something that you absolutely can NOT do with other brands of essential oils.
We are in love with doTERRA’s CPTG oils for so many reasons. We have used them to kick colds, stomach viruses, mastitis, hormone related issues and headaches. We use them daily as bug spray, sunscreen (which yes, you can use on your baby-something you cannot do with conventional sunscreen), anti-itch/bug bites (if we forget oils before a walk), relaxation and flea control for our dogs. We diffuse oils aromatically to boost our immune system and mood. I could go on and on, but I’ll try to not drag this on too much further since this is indeed a photography blog… Full disclosure, I am set up to sell doTERRA oils. It was an accidental success. I only signed up because I wanted to purchase the oils at a discount, but after sharing my successes with friends my new “business” took off. So yes, now I have a little oil website that I am about to direct you to, but I promise my intentions for posting are pure at heart. More than anything I want to spread the word about natural healing.
If you are interested in learning more, here is a link to my doTERRA website: http://eoils.doterrapro.com/ there is a fabulous video under the learn tab. Fair warning, it is about 30 minutes long, but I would highly encourage you to at least listen to it while doing the dishes if you don’t have time to sit down and watch it. I also will be posting more about how we use doTERRA in our own home on my personal blog.
If you don’t have 30 minutes, here is a short little fun video about Vanderbilt using doTERRA’s oils in their emergency department!
So why now? Why did I just now decide to blog about the oils after 6 months. doTERRA is offering an incredible promotion currently. Basically, if you sign up during a certain time, you receive $100 worth of free products. This is really stellar. I wish I could sign up again. Seriously. If any of this has tickled your fancy, feel free to enter your info on my doTERRA website to receive more information or email me at kate {dot} leverenz {at} gmail {dot} com.