Oiling Away the Pain With Essential Oils

It’s been nearly a year since I started using a blend of essential oils to help deal with the lingering effects of back pain sustained through a serious injury in 2013.

Not only am I happy that I made the discovery that these oils could have health benefits, today I am even more positive in my appraisal of them.

This stems from an improved sense of well-being and good health a month after I started taking a daily capsule of melaleuca oil as a substitute for a glucosamine-chondroitin supplement.

It isn’t just my joints that feel better, I have more energy and am better able to manage the extra work that a recent influx of business has brought my way.

Alleviating Discomfort

For a while, I felt so good that I was able to stop the daily morning application of the blend I had been using for back pain. However, some morning stiffness required a recent resumption of it.

Yet, every time I suffer from those morning strains, the oil appears to relax the muscles and chase away whatever causes that discomfort. (Discomfort which, unfortunately, may be “the new normal.”)

Not a Cure-All

Yet, at the same time, my journalistic background compels me to add the caution that these high-priced oils cannot be treated like a cure-all for whatever ails you.

For example, last year a woman told me that if I had a sore throat, the same melaleuca that has limbered me up would be an excellent way to combat a sore threat.

The first weekend of January I had the unfortunate opportunity to test that out when a nasty winter virus of some kind put me in bed for three days.

The verdict: the melaleuca did nothing. That, despite trying rubbing it on the outside of my throat and sticking a couple drops on my tongue, both recommended in the book my wife purchased at a seminar.

All I can say is I’m glad we had several bags of cough drops in the house. I was still chewing on them the following weekend when a business trip took me away from home.

Trial and Error

Should you decide to give some of these oils a try, a bit of trial-and-error experimentation may be in order. Don’t go whole hog on any particular one until seeing whether it works for you.

Still, I heard one of the best recommendations last January when an old friend came into town for a funeral. He talked about how his two, rather typical, rough-and-tumble grandsons were going wild until their mother rubbed some oil (can’t remember which kind) on the bottoms of their feet. Instantly, they calmed down.

I can’t say you will see the same kind of dramatic results, but I still think they’re worth a try. All you have to lose is a little pain.