Aromatherapy for Pregnancy and Labour

Aromatherapy is hugely beneficial in a variety of ways in pregnancy, but must also be used with caution and care!

The term ‘aromatherapy’ has been widely misused in the last few years, so what exactly does it mean? Well, it is just about using essential oils which are extracted from plants, flowers, herbs, trees, resins and fruits as a therapy. This can be done in a variety of ways, such as through massage, adding them to baths and steam inhalations, sniffing them neat or just burning in an oil burner.

When the oils are used in a massage they are added to a carrier oil, in a very low dilution, and in pregnancy only 1%. 1% means that only one drop of essential oils would be added to 5 mls of carrier oil.

Finding Our Purpose in Life

Well I had already started my blog on ‘What happens in a massage’ but got waylayed with messages that were coming at me from everywhere about our ‘purpose’ in life and how we go about truly finding and following, what we are meant to do with our short and precious time on this planet. A line in Walt Hampton’s blog (whose book is great by the way!) made me sit up straight – ‘Is your ladder against the right wall?’, and a quote from Mark Twain ‘The two most important days or your life are the day you are born and the day you find out why’.