Teething is something that causes a lot of discomfort in babies, and you feel utterly helpless during the process.
This leads to plenty of sleepless nights for both parents and babies. This will usually start when the baby is between four and seven months.
You may feel like you’ve exhausted all your options, but have you ever thought about using essential oils?
Aromatherapy is becoming a popular practice and utilizes essential oils for therapeutic benefit.
Many essential oils are said to have a number of benefits, such as helping with feelings of anxiety, depression, and even pain relief.
What Are Essential Oils?
Essential oils are extracts from plants. Different parts of the plants, such as the flowers, leaves, bark, or fruit, are steamed or pressed, releasing the compounds that produce the fragrance of the plant.
It can take many pounds of a plant in order to produce one bottle of essential oil!
What Are Essential Oils Good For?
Although there isn’t enough research to support the claims that essential oils can be remedies for a number of illnesses, many believe that they can help a number of conditions such as depression, anxiety, nausea, insomnia, and a low appetite.
How they work is, when they are inhaled, the scent molecules will travel up from the olfactory nerves, the first cranial nerve, and travels directly to the brain, impacting the emotional part of the brain.
You may be wondering if these oils are safe to use on your baby.
The American Association of Naturopathic Physicians states that no essential oils should be used on babies that are less than three months old.
If they are old enough, these oils should be diluted before applying to the skin, as they are potent and can cause reactions. They can be diluted with a cream or carrier oil.
Before using any essential oils on your child, you must carry out a patch test first in case they are allergic.
You can do this by applying a very small amount (the size of a dime) of diluted oil to your baby’s leg or arm.
You should then wait for 24 hours and see if there is a reaction. If there is, it would cause some redness on the skin.
If there is no reaction after 24 hours, then the likelihood is that your baby is not allergic.
The safety of essential oils on babies will differ depending on the child, so before doing anything it is best to consult an essential oil practitioner, pediatrician, or aromatherapist.
How Can Essential Oils Help Teething Pain?
While essential oils cannot cure a baby’s pain completely, they may help to relax them and alleviate some of the pain.
How oils may aid in this respect is by maybe alleviating the inflammation of the gums.
This will reduce their tenderness and may reduce the pain the child is experiencing.
They may also reduce infections or even prevent them. This will avoid complications and further pain experienced by the baby.
The oils can be diluted with a base or carrier oil and massaged directly onto the gums. Another method is to massage the jawline with the essential oil.
Although this method is not directly working on the gums, massaging the jawline can help the baby feel relaxed and help them sleep.
Previous research has shown that chamomile oil can relieve teething pain in babies.
Simply mix a couple of drops of the oil with a base or carrier oil, and gently massage it in a circular motion onto the baby’s gums.
An alternative application method could be to dip a soft cloth in chamomile tea and have the baby chew on the cloth. This could relieve pain and irritation.
Lavender is very popular in aromatherapy due to its calming and relaxing qualities, so it is no surprise that it could be used to help with the teething process in a baby.
Rather than physically using it on the child, inhaling it could relieve some pain the baby may be experiencing.
If you have an essential oil diffuser, you could diffuse some lavender oil in the baby’s room.
An alternative method is to dip some cotton balls in lavender oil and place them near the baby’s crib.
Close oil has a compound within it called eugenol. This compound has been considered to be an effective remedy for toothache in adults, and for teething pain in babies.
This is an oil that should only be used if your baby is over the age of two.
Simply mix the oil with a carrier oil, and softly massage it on the irritated gums of the baby.
This is another oil that should only be used if your child is over two years old.
Copaiba oil has been used in traditional medicine because it has many antiseptic and anti-inflammatory properties.
Aside from this, research has shown that it also has pain-relieving benefits, making this a great option to help your child during the teething process.
Like the previous options, be sure to mix this oil with a carrier oil, before using it on your baby.
Final Thoughts
The teething period is tough on parents and the baby involved.
Using essential oils may be a good natural remedy for helping to relieve some of that pain.
It is important to note that no essential oils should be used on babies less than three months old, and some of the oils in this article are specifically for babies of an older age.
Before trying out any of these natural remedies, it is always best to speak to a doctor for their opinion.
Hi, my name is Hannah Shiftle, and I started using essential oils 15 years ago. At first, I was dubious of them, much like a lot of people. However, as I began to use them on a daily basis, I quickly discovered how much of a difference they had on both my physical and mental health.
Through Oil Health Benefits, I will be sharing my knowledge and passion for essential oils with you, providing readers with all the information they need to know. From the best oils to use for illnesses, to understanding what makes essential oils pure, I have covered all these topics.
