Tag Archives: David Stewart

The 12 Rules for Safety with Essential Oils

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The 12 Rules for Safety with Essential Oils

By David Stewart

1. Keep them out of the reach of children. Consider them as you would any therapeutic product in your home.

2. Keep a bottle of vegetable oil handy. It will dilute an essential oil and slow down its rate of absorption if there should be any discomfort or skin irritation.

3. People with sensitive skin can use a patch test to determine if they would react to a particular oil. It is generally safe to apply essential oils to the soles of the feet even for people with sensitive skin.

4. Pregnant women should consult their healthcare professional before using essential oils. Those oils with hormonal quality should probably be avoided during pregnancy. Some of these oils are: sage, clary sage, blue tansy, tarragon, niaouli, cypress, myrtle and wild tansy.

5. Essential oils rich in phenols (the hot oils) should be used with caution when applying to the skin. Use caution when apply to any sensitive areas, such as the throat and face. Before applying oils to the tender skin of young children.

6. Keep essential oils away from the eye area where even the vapors can cause irritation. Do not handle contact lenses or rub the eyes with essential oils on your fingers. Oils with high phenol content can damage lenses and irritate eyes. If essential oils accidentally get in the eyes, pour vegetable oil in the eyes to stop the burning. Don’t use water. Water will drive the oils in faster increasing the burning sensation.

7. Essential oils may be applied on or around the ears, but don’t pour essential oils directly into the ears.

8. People with epilepsy, high blood pressure, or who are prone to convulsions should consult a healthcare professional before using essential oils. Hyssop, fennel, and wild tansy oils should probably be avoided in these cases.

9. Most commonly used essential oils have been designated by the FDA as being “Generally Regarded as Safe” for oral usage. This designation is abbreviated as “GRAS.”  Before ingesting, GRAS oils may be, at your option, diluted with honey, milk, rice milk, olive oil, or other lipid dissolving liquid.

10.  In using essential oils in bath water, first add a dispersant, like a gel or liquid soap, to avoid concentrated droplets that can sometimes gravitate to sensitive areas of the body. There are always ways to safely disperse oils in a bath given in most books on applied aromatherapy.

11.  Some oils are phototoxic. When applied to the skin, avoid direct sunlight or the rays of healing lamps for at least 12 hours afterwards. These oils are: Angelica, Bergamot, Bitter Orange, Grapefruit, Lemon, Lime, Petitgrain and Rue.

12.  Keep essential oils in tightly closed glass bottles away from light and stored in cool places. (Normal room temperatures are cool enough.)  In this way, they will maintain their balanced chemical composition in potency indefinitely.

All things considered, essential oils are among the safest of all therapeutic modalities and one that is safe enough for even amateurs and untrained users.  Nevertheless, the more you know and understand about essential oils, the better and safer your results will be.

The Blood Brain Barrier

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THE BLOOD-BRAIN BARRIER
By David Stewart, Ph.D.,R.A.

It was thought for years that the interstitial tissues of the
brain served as a barrier to keep damaging substances from reaching the neurons of the brain and the cerebrospinal fluid. Instead of a barrier, it would be more accurate to consider it as a sieve or filter through which only molecules of a certain size or smaller can pass.

Most of the molecules of the substances used in chemotherapy are too large to pass through the blood-brain filter, which is why doctors say that chemotherapy doesn’t work on brain cancer. Some of the smaller molecules get through, but not the whole suite of drugs intended.

Doctors don’t know for sure, but it seems that in order to cross the blood-brain barrier, only molecules less than 800-1000 atomic mass units (amu) in molecular weight can get through. Lipid solubility seems to be another factor which facilitates passing through the blood-brain barrier. Water soluble molecules don’t usually penetrate into brain tissue, even when very small. The molecules of essential oils are all not only small, but lipid soluble as well.

In fact, when it comes to essential oils, small molecules (less than 500 amu) are what they are made of. That is why they are aromatic. The only way for something to be aromatic is for the molecules to be so small that they readily leap into the air so they can enter our noses and be detected as odor and smell.

That is why oils for cooking or massage, such as corn, peanut, sesame seed, safflower, walnut, almond, canola, olive and other oils pressed from seeds are not aromatic. Sure, they have a smell, but you can’t smell them across the room in minutes as one can when you opens a bottle of peppermint, hyssop, or cinnamon oil. Essential oils of every species cross the blood-brain barrier.

This makes them uniquely able to address disease, not only from a physical level, but from a more basic and fundamental level-that of the emotions which are often the root cause of physical illness.

A QUICK COURSE IN CHEMISTRY
Because of the tiny molecular structure of the components of an essential oil, they are extremely concentrated. One drop contains approximately 40 million-trillion molecules. Numerically that is a 4 with 19 zeros after it: 40,000,000,000,000,000,000. We have 100 trillion cells in our bodies, and that’s a lot. But one drop of essential oil contains enough molecules to cover every cell in our bodies with 40,000 molecules. Considering that it only takes one molecule of the right kind to open a receptor site and communicate with the DNA to alter cellular function, you can see why even inhaling a small amount of oil vapor can have profound effects on the body, brain, and emotions. Sometimes too many oil molecules overload the receptor sites, and they freeze up without responding at all, when a smaller amount would have been just right. This is why we say that when using oils, “sometimes less is better.”Sometimes more is better, too. Knowing the difference is the art of aromatherapy.

Essential oils are mixtures of dozens, even hundreds, of constituents, all of which are composed of carbon and hydrogen and sometimes oxygen. All essential oils are principally composed of a class of organic compounds built of “isoprene units.”An isoprene unit is a set of five connected carbon atoms with eight hydrogens attached. Their molecular weight is only 68 amu, which is very small, indeed. Molecules built of isoprene units are all classified as “terpenes.” Terpenes are what make essential oils unique in the world of natural substances.

PHENYLPROPANOIDS
Phenylpropanoids are compounds of carbon-ring molecules incorporating one isoprene unit. They are also called hemiterpenes. There are dozens of varieties of phenylpropanoids.

They are found in Clove (90%), Cassia (80%), Basil (75%), Cinnamon (73%), Oregano (60%), Anise (50%), Peppermint (25%). While they can create conditions where unfriendly viruses and bacteria cannot live, the most important function performed by phenylpropanoids is that they clean the receptor sites on the cells. Without clean receptor sites, cells cannot communicate, and the body malfunctions, resulting in sickness.

MONOTERPENES
Monoterpenes are compounds of two isoprene units, which is ten carbon atoms and sixteen hydrogen atoms per molecule- molecular weight 136 amu. There are an estimated 2,000 varieties of monoterpenes.

Monoterpenes are found in most essential oils: Galbanum (80%), Angelica (73%), Hyssop ((70%), Rose of Sharon (54%), Peppermint (45%), Juniper (42%), Frankincense (40%), Spruce (38%), Pine (30%), Cypress (28%), and Myrtle (25%).

While offering a variety of healing properties, the most important ability of the monoterpenes is that they can reprogram miswritten information in the cellular memory. With improper coding in the DNA, cells malfunction and diseases result, including lethal ones such as cancer.

SESQUITERPENES
Sesquiterpenes are compounds of three isoprene units, which is fifteen carbons and twenty-four hydrogens per molecule- molecular weight 204 amu. There are more than 10,000 kinds of sesquiterpenes. Sesquiterpenes are the principal constituents of Cedarwood (98%), Vetiver (97%), Spikenard (93%), Sandalwood (Aloes) 90%, Black Pepper (74%), Patchouli (71%), Myrrh (62%), and Ginger (59%). They are also found in Galbanum, Onycha, and Frankincense (8%).

Sesquiterpene molecules deliver oxygen molecules to cells, like hemoglobin does in the blood. Sesquiterpenes can also erase or deprogram miswritten codes in the DNA. Sesquiterpenes are thought to be especially effective in fighting cancer because the root problem with a cancer cell is that it contains misinformation, and sesquiterpenes can erase that garbled information. At the
same time the oxygen carried by sesquiterpene molecules creates an environment where cancer cells can’t reproduce. Hence, sesquiterpenes deliver cancer cells a double punch-one that disables their coded misbehavior and a second that stops their growth.

The American Medical Association (AMA) has said that if they could find an agent that would pass the blood-brain barrier, they would be able to find cures for ailments such as Lou Gehrig’s disease, multiple sclerosis, Alzheimer’s disease, and Parkinson’s disease. Such agents already exist and have been available since Biblical times. The agents, of course, are essential oils-particularly those containing the brain oxygenating molecules of sesquiterpenes.

THE TRIPLE WHAMMY
The big triple punch combination of “PMS” (Phenylpropanoids, Monoterpenes, and Sesquiterpenes) found in essential oils is very powerful in addressing many illnesses, injuries, and disease conditions. That is because this combination offers the following:

First, you clean the receptor sites allowing the proper transfer of hormones, peptides, neurotransmitters, steroids, and other intracellular messengers. (The Phenylpropanoids do that.)

Second, you deprogram or erase the wrong information from cellular memory stored in the DNA. (The Sesquiterpenes take care of that.)

Third, you reprogram the cells with the correct information so they can function properly. (The Monoterpenes do this.)

These three classes of chemical components are why essential oils can sometimes affect a healing that is nearly instant and also permanent. What they simply do is to restore the body back to its natural state of balance and health. While a specific oil may have one or two of these three classes of compounds as its predominant chemistry, all the Biblical oils contain some of all of them. This is one secret to their amazing healing abilities.

So there you have it in a nutshell: The way the blood-brain barrier works and the biochemistry of one of the ways essential oils can help achieve a healing.

The Chemistry Of Essential Oils

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by Dr. David Stewart, Ph.D.
The Chemistry of Essential Oils

If you tell most medical doctors that essential oils bring about healing with no negative side effects, they won’t believe you. This is because in medical school, students are repeatedly told by their professors that all effective medicines have negative side effects, and if they don’t then they can’t be effective.

When I was in medical school one professor emphasized this point in a colorful, graphic manner with specially prepared slides. In each slide specific drugs were depicted as evil looking demons or goblins. As he presented each picture, he explained, “Although ugly and capable of doing harm, these ‘demons’ are also the bearers of some good. So long as the benefits outweigh the risks, we use them,” he  summarized. “We have no choice,” he continued, “because if a drug has no dangers, then it can have no benefits. That’s just the way it is. And that’s why it is essential that only qualified physicians be allowed to prescribe medicines,” he concluded.

Actually, the professor was telling the truth. Within the  restricted practice of allopathy (MDs) the only real medicines are physician prescribed pharmaceuticals. Such medicines always do have negative side effects. All of them.  No exceptions. Hence, doctors are trained to accept the bad with the good as the price of effective medicine.

The Danger is in the Drug Itself

The dangers of prescription drugs are intrinsic to the drugs themselves, not in how they are administered. No matter how careful the physician in prescribing and how compliant the patient in following doctor’s orders, even then deaths and damages occur. In fact, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control, more than 100,000 Americans die every year, not from illegal drugs, not from drug overdoses, not from over-the-counter drugs, and not from drug abuses, but from properly prescribed, properly taken prescriptions. In this country, more people die from doctor’s prescriptions every ten days than were killed in the 9/11 terrorist attacks.

Why is this so? Why do allopathic drugs always have undesirable effects (along with their apparent benefits) while one can find healing with natural products, such as essential oils, with no undesirable effects? Here is why.

Why Companies Deliberately Sell Dangerous Products

It is illegal to patent any natural product. The way to big profits in the medicine industry is to create an unnatural substance that never before existed in nature, then patent it, and obtain a monopoly. Hence, the molecules of pharmaceutical drugs are all strange to the human body. In all the history of humankind, such molecules were never encountered or taken into any human body. Hence, the body does not easily metabolize them. God never made your body to accept and deal with these chemicals and antibiotics.

Non-toxic natural organic substances are usually easily eliminated by the body when their usefulness has run their course. Up to a point, your body can even deal with and eliminate natural toxic substances. But when your body receives a synthetic substance, even one that may seem benign or inert (like plastic), your body does not know how to metabolize and eliminate it. If sent to the liver to break it down into disposable compounds, the liver says, “Hey. What is this? I don’t know what to do with it. Here kidneys, you take it.” Then the kidneys react saying, “Hey liver, don’t send it to us. We don’t know what it is either. Send it to the pancreas. Maybe it will have an enzyme that can deal with it.” Then the pancreas objects, “Hey guys, what do you think you are doing? I don’t want this stuff. Dump it in the blood or the lymph or try the spleen. Maybe the spleen can filter this thing out or something.” Finally, the substance ends up in the long term waste holding area of the body (usually fat tissue, including the brain) where it can remain for years and even for a lifetime, perturbing normal body functions as long as it remains. That’s why you can find traces of prescription drugs in your body taken in childhood, decades ago.

On the other hand, natural molecules, such as those found in essential oils, are easily metabolized by the body. In fact, your body was created to handle them. When an essential oil molecule finds the receptor sites it was designed to fit and conveys its information to the cell, or participates in other therapeutic functions, it then goes on its way to the liver and the kidneys and moves out of the body. Its benefits have been conveyed and its job is complete.

By contrast, the unnatural molecules of man-made drugs attach themselves to various tissues, disrupting normal function for years while the body tries to figure out what to do with them. Meanwhile, they wreak mischief with our bodily functions and even our minds.

Who is in Control?

Another reason commercial drug companies don’t want to sell natural products is that they are not in complete control of their production. When you synthesize everything in a laboratory, you are in control. You can produce your medicines at will, in any quantity, whenever you choose. This way you can meet market demands as they materialize.

When you depend on nature to grow your product, God is in control. You are at the mercy of the seasons. You can only grow so much with a given year’s crop. If a year’s supply runs out before the next crop is ready for harvest, then you and your customers just have to wait. Meanwhile, you lose potential sales and profits.

Drug companies want to be totally in charge of producing their products. They don’t want God to be in charge. By omitting God from the manufacture of their medicines, they have omitted his healing power.

Drugs versus Oils 

Drugs and oils work in opposite ways. Drugs toxify. Oils detoxify. Drugs clog and confuse receptor sites. Oils clean receptor sites.

Drugs depress the immune system. Oils strengthen the immune system. Antibiotics attack bacteria indiscriminately, killing both the good and the bad. Oils attack only the harmful bacteria, allowing our body’s friendly flora to flourish.

Drugs are one-dimensional, programmed like robots to carry out certain actions in the body, whether the body can benefit from them or not. When body conditions change, drugs keep on doing what they were doing, even when their actions are no longer beneficial.

Essential oils are multi-dimensional, filled with homeostatic intelligence to restore the body to a state of healthy balance. When body conditions change, oils adapt, raising or lowering blood pressure as needed, stimulating or repressing enzyme activity as needed, energizing or relaxing as needed. Oils are smart. Drugs are dumb.

Drugs are designed to send misinformation to cells or block certain receptor sites in order to trick the body into giving up symptoms. But drugs never deal with the actual causes of disease. They aren’t designed for that purpose. While they may give prompt relief for certain uncomfortable symptoms, because of their strange, unnatural design, they will always disrupt certain other bodily functions. Thus, you always have some side effects.

Oil molecules send information to cells and cleanse receptor sites so that they bring your body back to natural function. Oils are balancing to the body. Drugs are unbalancing to the body. Oils address the causes of disease at a cellular level by deleting misinformation and reprogramming correct information so that cells function properly and in harmony with one another. With drugs, misinformation is fed into the cells so that some temporary relief may be obtained, but there is never any true healing. Drugs only trade one kind of disease for another.

Because essential oils properly applied always work toward the restoration of proper bodily function, they do not cause undesirable side effects. They are feeding the body with truth. Drugs feed the body with lies. While no amount of truth can contradict itself, it doesn’t take many lies before contradictions occur and the body suffers ill effects.

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