Aromatherapy for Women: How to use essential oils for health, beauty and your emotions. Maggie Tisserand

floor, but if we are already normal then it takes us to the first floor. This would explain why different people have different experiences with this essence. But the common denominator is that clary sage is emotionally uplifting.

      JET-LAG

      My three children arrived back from a two-week stay in Michigan absolutely exhausted. It was their first transatlantic flight since they were babies, so they were not at all ‘seasoned travellers’. On arriving home at 10 in the morning after an 11-hour journey, they each had a bowl of cereal and went to bed. I wasn’t sure whether to wake them up later in the day, or let them continue to sleep in the vain hope that they might sleep for 24 hours. Unfortunately they only managed 14 hours, which meant that by midnight they were wide awake and remained so until 6.30 the following morning. I did not want the strange sleeping pattern to continue for too long, so I woke them up at midday. To say that they were tired would be an understatement, so each had a bath with rosemary and geranium oils, after which their vitality seemed to be increased.

      Over the next few hours they all seemed to be in a depressive, lethargic state, and so I decided to conduct an experiment. I sent one child off to bed for an hour’s nap, as a ‘control’. One daughter had dilute rose oil rubbed onto her neck, hands and wrist. My third child (who had been the most grumpy) was given some oils to smell. I put drops of jasmine, lemon and bergamot oils onto a tissue and wafted this under his nose. Of course he protested, saying that it was horrible, but the reaction was remarkable. Within two minutes he smiled and said ‘I feel better already.’ Every so often he would shiver slightly, as if he were very cold, and described these sensations as being like ripples going through his muscles. It seemed to me that his body was letting go of the stress and tension encountered by most air travellers. His sleep patterns returned to normal much faster than that of his sisters, who needed a nightly massage to get them off to sleep.

      I have my own way of coping with jet-lag; I don’t allow myself to have it. When flying back from the west coast of America, I try to get a flight which arrives mid-morning UK-time. This means that I can drive home and be in bed by about 1 p.m., having set my alarm for 6 p.m. Sometimes it seems hard, but at 6 p.m. I force myself out of bed, and into a rosemary and geranium bath. Then I go to the supermarket to re-stock my groceries, followed by a light meal in a restaurant. Ten o’clock is when I allow myself to go to bed, and just to make sure that I have a deep sleep, I unplug the phones and put some marjoram oil onto a tissue or on the ceramic burner. Next morning, at about 9 a.m., I get up, have another rosemary and lemongrass bath, and tell myself that it’s just a normal day. Then I just go ahead and have a normal day (although I can’t handle anything which requires mental dexterity). As long as I continue the morning rosemary baths, and make sure I am in bed by 10 p.m. then I find that my body rhythms very quickly become readjusted, and I can truthfully say that I do not suffer from jet-lag.

      TRAVEL SICKNESS

      When my children were younger travel sickness was something I tried hard to guard against, because vomit is one aroma which I am not partial to! My eldest daughter would often complain of feeling sick while travelling on motorways. If she had been eating I would give her peppermint oil to smell, as peppermint is renowned for its stomachic properties (calming the stomach). Nervous tension is also a cause of travel sickness, and in this case the aroma of lavender would be more beneficial, as it is soothing and calming. The easiest way to use these essences without fear of spillage is to put one drop of either peppermint or lavender onto a tissue, and breathe in the vapours. Only on one occasion have I needed to clean up the back seat of my car, and then it was my fault for allowing my daughter to eat a huge cream-cake in a motorway service station. If a child (or adult for that matter) is prone to feeling car sick, the choice of foods taken before and during travel should be given careful consideration.

      Lavender and peppermint oil on a tissue is the easiest way of breathing in the soothing vapours. A tissue impregnated with these oils can be placed inside a small plastic bag (sandwich-bag-sized) and popped into the glove compartment. When needed, just tear open a small hole in the bag and inhale.

      TRAVELLER’S FATIGUE

      Adults often have difficulty in sleeping during a long journey, even though they may be completely exhausted, but at least adults can rationalize that they have a sleep problem, and either read a book, watch the scenery or start up a conversation with a fellow passenger. Not so for a young baby or small child. Rational thinking is beyond them, and so their frustration and anger will manifest itself in crying and screaming. Once, whilst travelling by air to San Francisco, I experienced the desperate frustration of a child who could not get to sleep. The little girl was just over one year old, and very cute. For the first four hours she crawled around and played quite happily, until she was too tired to play any more; then the grizzling started. This turned to progressively louder cries until the mother administered a dose of Fenergen (a proprietary sedative for babies). The Fenergen did not send the child to sleep, but merely induced a sort of a ‘high’ which lasted for an hour. Then the screaming started. If you have ever been on a plane with a screaming child you know how it feels. You can’t go out for a walk. There is nowhere to go to escape the noise, and sleep is impossible. I’m rather shy, but when I could not bear to see and hear the distress any longer, I offered to hold the child for a while to give the mother a break. Prior to doing this, I rubbed some lavender oil down the sides of my neck. Walking up and down the galley with a beautiful baby girl in my arms reminded me of the time when my own children were babies, and how incredible babies are. Less than five minutes had gone by before the child was fast asleep and, much to the surprise of the parents, I was able to lay her down in the carrycot, where she slept peacefully until awoken by an air stewardess on our approach to San Francisco airport.

      MENTAL FATIGUE

      Several oils are mentally stimulating, but I have not found one which surpasses basil oil. A drop or two of basil on a source of heat such as a bowl of hot water, or specially designed fragrancer is, for me, as good as going for a walk along the sea front. Not only do I feel mentally alert, but refreshed also. I would recommend that office workers keep a bottle of basil in their desk for use mid-afternoon, when 5 o’clock seems so far away; or when the job demands that you work overtime, but your brain doesn’t quite feel able to cope.

      I have often thought – on reading newspaper reports about overworked hospital doctors struggling to keep awake – that if only they could have a whiff of basil oil, it would perk up their brain cells just as coffee does, but without causing any strain on the kidneys.

      Other oils which are stimulating and are perfect to use in any situation where tiredness is becoming a problem, whether in the workplace, home or car, are: rosemary, rosewood, lemongrass and the citrus oils – lemon, orange, bergamot and grapefruit.

      Basil oil came to my rescue quite by accident one day. Taking my youngest child with me, I decided to drive to Paris to collect her sister who had been staying with friends. We arrived in Calais at dusk, and decided to stay the night, rather than try to drive on the ‘wrong’ side of the road while tired. I checked in to a nice-looking hotel overlooking a quiet square, but had not realized that the quiet square was going to turn into a noisy fairground at precisely the moment we wanted to take an early night. The loud music and shrieks of the happy customers continued until 2 o’clock in the morning, when I was finally able to go to sleep. This was not for long though, as the dustmen (garbage collectors) arrived before dawn, and made so much noise that I gave up trying to sleep. I decided to have a rosemary bath, as I usually do when I need revitalizing, but finding that I had forgotten my rosemary oil, I settled for a basil bath. Basil must be used with caution, as the ingredient which makes it a brain stimulant can also be irritating to the skin. I used just two drops to a full bath, and mixed it thoroughly. I got into the bath feeling absolutely wretched, and convinced that I would never be able to negotiate my way out of Calais, let alone navigate around the Périphérique