Why I Talk About Essential Oils

About a year ago, I was introduced to essential oils. Like any bad introduction, not much was told to me about oils or this oil in particular. It left me feeling....awkward. I was told this oil would help me feel strong and courageous. I was about 7 months pregnant, so courage wasn't high on the priority list. What I wanted was help with swollen feet, heartburn, feeling gigantic and SLEEPING. I wish a proper introduction had been made, for it might have saved me a lot of issues and time.

Fast forward several months, and a different friend posted about how that SAME OIL helped with her husband's snoring! I figured my husband would like it if I stopped snoring (and crazy-talking in my sleep, but that's for another day). So began my relationship with Young Living essential oils. I started researching what they were, what they did and how I could get my hands on some. Like a good little (ex)journalist, I wanted to get to the bottom of the story, so I researched for mooooonths.

Back in April, I finally ordered my starter kit. The day it arrived, I had what I am pretty sure was strep. Fever of 103, swollen glands, sore throat. I was miserable. When my oils arrived, I began ingesting them, putting them on my neck and throat, diffusing them into the air...and by Saturday (3 days later), I was golden. Granted, I was also a little cranky and detoxing, due to the overkill on how much I used right off the bat, but the fever, sore throat, swollen glands were all gone. Since then, I've been getting more and more familiar with the oils that came in the starter kit. We're learning how to replace medicines with oils, treat common things more naturally and I'm loving it. Call me Granola Girl ;) (But don't, because compared to other Denverites about as non-granola as they come!)

So, just as an idea of some things to do with the kit oils and an introduction to what comes in the kit, here are a few of the things I have used oils for the last month:

• Stress Away: This, combined with lavender, is like "lights out" for us. Also great in a bath when you get threatened with a lawsuit or find yourself snapping at your husband for no reason....hypothetically.
• Lemon: Good for detoxing your body and/or weight loss. I put it on my swollen glands and also drink it in some water to help detox.
• Purification: Put it on scrapes and cuts on my hands. I put some in my face cream to help clear up acne. I've also diffused it to make the air in the house fresher.
• Frankincense: LOVE THIS. It's good for skin issues, so I put it on a sun spot on my face and in my cream that I am applying to my post-baby belly stretch marks.
• Joy: Put it over your heart or in an Epsom salts bath.
• Peace & Calming: A looooot of people find this helps them sleep. For me, it jazzed me up a little. I prefer to put it in an Epsom salts bath to help relax.
• PanAway: Super pain oil! (PanAway/PainAway). This helps kill aches and pains!
• Peppermint: I use this a ton. It's great for bringing down fevers (I heavily diluted it and put a drop on Selah. It brought her fever down 3 degrees in 40 minutes). It also works wonders on headaches and migraines for me. When I start to wean Selah, I can apply it to my chest to help dry up the milk supply.
• Lavender: A MUST-HAVE for us. This was the one that hooked us for sleeping! We put a little lavender on our wrists before bedtime and sleep like rocks. It's also great for cuts, itching, bug bites.
• Valor: Lessens my snoring!! I put it on my big toe and instead of a gargling freight train, Adrian reports that it's a nice soft heavy breathing :)
• Thieves: My favorite. Hands down. This one killed my strep, attacks Adrian's colds and I put a drop on my toothpaste every morning to help freshen breath, kill illnesses and whiten teeth. The other day, Adrian asked me if I had used my Thieves. I hadn't (it was packed for a trip!). He said he could tell a difference in my breath having not used it a day.

Thus far, I have made a "night night mix" for us with lavender, carrier oil and the Stress Away. I made creams with coconut oil, frankincense and lavender for Adrian's mom and aunt. I added Purification to mine and use it on my stomach and face. I made a pain cream for A's dad with coconut oil, PanAway, peppermint and Valor. He texted me last night and said he could hardly finish a walk because of knee pain, but within 30 seconds of putting the pain cream on, he was feeling good! We diffuse lemon, lavender and peppermint for allergies. I'm going to start the "weight loss trio" which is lemon, peppermint and grapefruit. 

So, I am hooked, to say the least. I'm really excited to order more on Friday! I'll be getting some cedarwood for sleep (and hair regrowth for Adrian...shhhh), Progessence Plus to manage my migraines and hormones, more Thieves, orange and grapefruit!

Sorry if this sounded like a sales pitch. After months of researching and my husband being super skeptical, I was soooo excited to find that the oils actually worked for us for really practical things. If you have an issue you're trying to find a solution to, let me know. I'd love to research and help you find an oil that addresses that, you know, because I'm a stay-at-home-mom with a ton of time on my hands ;) But for real, just wanted to share some of the really practical ways that YL oils have helped us! I'm going to be doing a couple classes in June (in TN and CO), so if you're interested, come to one of those and let's chat!

Nine Months Has Come and Gone

Mobility.

That word, more than almost any other, describes Selah more aptly than I would have thought possible of a 9-month old! Mobility and personality. If I thought she had personality before, she has upped the ante these last several weeks.

Seh is a charmer, that's for sure. Give her a room full of people and she will work the crowd for all she's worth. She smiles a ton (an adorable, little scrunchynosed smile that says, "See how fun I am?"), waves at everyone and everything  with both arms until her whole body wiggles, bounces and squeals if you sing to her and claps her hands to show how pleased she is with life. She's crawling and cruising and tonight - even standing unsupported.

After moooooonths of her only knowing how to shake her head "no," although she didn't grasp the meaning, she has finally mastered the "yes" nod. And she will bobble her adorable little head around from no to yes and back again until you join in the head shaking.

Speaking of shaking, I think she'll be a mover and a shaker and a real go-getter. The little lady can move incredibly fast. Her favorite things lately to speed-crawl for are Ben (getting closer to catching him), clumps of Ben's hair when he's not around, pens and markers and various specks of things she finds on the floor. Whether she's crawling to something really quickly or grabbing something and crawling away with it, she has definitely figured out how to get from point A to point B really fast.

I don't think we have much longer until her speed crawl turns into a speed walk. She has been cruising from the coffee table to the couch, or legs to a toy, for a few weeks now. She pulls herself up on anything that will stay still long enough. One of her favorite bedtime games (when she's supposed to be winding down in her crib) is to stand up, fall down, stand up, fall down. If you see her doing it, she gives a big crinkly-nose grin.

Selah is eating a lot more solids now, including Mum-Mums and some kind of little Gerber snacks. She is holding strong at 2 teeth, but fussiness this last week makes me think #3 isn't far behind. She gets super excited when she sees me grab her spoon for some solids or a bowl for finger foods or snacks. I'm still trying to figure out how to begin easing her into more solids and more normal mealtimes. She does so well with 5 meals a day (nursing) and solid snacks that I'm not motivated or super sure how to get her nursing less and eating more like a kid. Is it too early? With an anniversary vacation later in the year, I want to be sure she'll be OK eating normally and taking fewer bottles. Any tips?

She is seriously the most exhausting and most fun little person to be around, all at the same time. She is such a joy, and so sweet and obedient. God has graciously blessed us. We pray every night that He will pursue her and that she will come to genuinely know and love Him at an early age! Until that day when she meets the heavenly Father, it's (a challenge but) a complete joy to parent her!

Motherhood

A lot has been written about motherhood. Far wiser minds than mine have attempted to capture the essence of this sacred union between a mother and child, and have come far closer to expressing it with eloquence and grace. I don't want to re-invent the wheel, just make some observations on this thing called motherhood, since Mother's Day was yesterday and Selah hits 9 months tomorrow. Many would say that means I've been a mother for 9 months now, but I'd argue that motherhood began before that. Yesterday I got a lot of "Happy 1st Mother's Day!" which, while I appreciate the well-wishes, rubs me a little wrong. The idea that motherhood begins when you hold your child doesn't take into account the months, sometimes years, that have been spent preparing for this high calling that God has planned for you and that motherhood begins well before you actually get to hold the baby in your arms.

For the women who are adopting and have yet to meet their child - are they not yet a mom? What about women who have suffered the heartbreak of a miscarriage (or several)? For women who have labored and given birth to a stillborn baby, are they not mothers? Why then, are the nine months of a woman carrying a child close to her heart, rearranging her life, her priorities and her thinking, not considered part of motherhood?

You don't become a mother just because you give birth. You don't become a mother just because you change a diaper, or nurse a child at your breast, or stay up all night with a sick little one. These things are often part of the mothering journey at some point, but not for all. Likewise, giving birth or changing a diaper or staying up all night doesn't make you a mom. Motherhood is making sacrifices for another, often one who can't give you anything in return. It is a journey of re-prioritizing and making decisions that are for the betterment of a little soul. It is a constant, continual pouring out of yourself - your finances, your health, your free time, your heart.

Before I ever met Adrian, someone told me marriage makes you realize how selfish you are, and that parenting makes you really realize how selfish you still are. Parenting is in a lot of ways, a lot like marriage. It's a call to lay down your life for someone else, often without thanks or reciprocation. However, unlike marriage, you don't get to choose that person you're going to do that for. In many ways, you are called to lay down your life for someone you've never met and frankly, have no guarantee to ever like. And yet - you do it.

You let outsiders in to scrutinize your life, social workers, doctors, random old ladies in the grocery store. You empty your bank account to buy the safest gadgets (and the cutest clothes). You worry over the health of a tiny being you've never met. You give up caffeine, alcohol, milkshakes - things you love. You wake up in the middle of the night terrified that something is wrong with this tiny person you haven't met or named yet. You avoid travel and electric blankets and hot tubs and endure back pain and foot pain - gladly. And that's all before the child ever physically enters your life. You stay up late, get up early, wake up hourly. Feed till you're empty and spent. You take 3 showers a day to get the puke and poop off yourself, do load upon load of laundry, and deny yourself the little things that once meant so much to you.

As I was watching Killers tonight (that old movie with Ashton Kutcher and Katherine Heigl? I'm about to spoil it in case you haven't seen it), something struck me. After receiving a positive pregnancy test, she said, "This stopped being about what I want the moment I saw those two lines." Isn't that the truth? From the moment you find out you're entering the road to parenthood - you're a parent and it's no longer about what you want. Responsibility, decisions and sacrifice don't wait until the child has arrived and breathed our air for a certain amount of time. It begins with the beginning - conception, but that doesn't mean it suddenly becomes about what the baby wants. There's rampant idolatry in our country where our children are concerned. How do you find a balance between loving them, caring for them and not idolizing them? Where do you draw the line between being amazed at the gift God has given you, and worshipping the gift-giver instead of the gift? We do anything for our children, forgetting that the ultimate calling isn't to sacrifice for this child solely for them, but so that someday they would come to know Jesus and give him glory in their lives.

I love motherhood. Looooooooove it. Completely surprises me to say that, but it's true. I (mostly) loved being pregnant, the labor experience and the daily tasks of being a mom. If you had asked me two years ago my thoughts on this motherhood thing, I would have told you I was not excited about it. I used to be so independent. So against clingy, needy beings (except puppies). I hate(d) bodily fluids of all sorts and very much valued my alone time. You know what? Having someone depend on me, cling to me, puke on me and want to be with me constantly is surprisingly okay, even enjoyable. I won't say I gave up my cleanliness or independence or solitude willingly, but God is graciously allowing me to change. He is changing my heart.

What a blessing it is to have gone from a woman who feared children, to a woman who worships her child, to a woman who is learning (sloooowly) what it means to worship the Creator and not the tiny creation. I am a far cry from where I'd like to be in all respects, but I praise God that he is molding my heart for Him as a mother - a journey that started 18 months ago.

So, adoptive moms, pregnant moms, moms of 8, moms of babies who are already in heaven, moms-in-the-making (and dads in all stages too), take heart. God has called you to an incredibly tough task: to pour out your life for others, to love them mightily, not to worship them but to point them in worship to the One who poured out his life for us.