Yes, the joys of summer. Warm temperatures, sun, outdoors, and BUGS! Mosquitoes, gnats, flies, and other things that make summer less than enjoyable. You could buy commercial bug spray, but there is any alternative. If you are tired of all the cancer causing, chemical concoctions that you put on your skin to keep bugs away, you may want to look into essential oils.
Essential oils are amazing, ancient remedies for many conditions. They also can be used around the house to decrease your toxic burden and are especially great for people with chemical sensitivities and allergies. High quality essential oils are distilled from the organic or wild sourced plant. They should be pure without added carriers when you buy them. A high quality oil is like a chemistry lab in a bottle! The chemistry behind different essential oils is fascinating and very complex, but that is why they work the way they do. Just as “medicine” is a man-made product designed to produce a certain result in the body, essential oils are nature’s medicine and can positively impact the body when used properly.
Since essential oils are nature’s chemicals it makes sense that some oils would be effective for warding off pesky summer insects. The oils that have the terpene group in their chemical make-up have among their beneficial qualities, insecticide. Many people have used citronella candles to keep bugs away. Citronella is one of these natural ingredients that has the terpene subgroup camphene in it. No one wants to walk around burning a citronella candle constantly, so what else is there?
Thankfully, Nature’s Sunshine carries a full line of top quality essential oils. One that everyone should have on hand is lavender. Not only does it help repel bugs, but it is good to soothe the itching if you have already gotten bit. Others that are highly recommended for natural insect repellent are patchouli, lemongrass, peppermint, clove, thyme, pine, tea tree and lemon.
One blend you can try as insect repellent is as follows: Combine 5 drops lavender, 5 drops lemongrass, 3 drops peppermint, and 1 drop thyme. This can be used undiluted on the feet or add these oils to 1 cup water and spray it on the body using a fine mist sprayer.
Even your pets can use help with the bugs this summer. Fleas and ticks are always a problem. The nice thing is that many essential oils are safe to use on your pets. Lavender is one that can be used. I recently was having a lot of problems with ticks on my cat. I would regularly pull out at least one tick a day out of him. In an effort to stop this, I put a drop of lavender and a drop of patchouli on the fur on the back of his neck and he hasn’t had any ticks for over a week. Not only has it kept the ticks away, he smells really nice. For fleas on dogs, the recommendation is to add 1-2 drops of lemongrass or eucalyptus oil to the shampoo you are going to bathe your dog with. One caution is not to use this in addition to flea shampoo.
Now that summer is here, you do have options when it comes to protecting your family from insects this year. If you would like more information about Nature’s Sunshine essential oils or any of the other terrific natural health products from Nature’s Sunshine, go to http://CantonFitnessNSP.mynsp.com or call the Canton Fitness Center and talk to Dawn. Remember, at the Canton Fitness Center, the motto is “Believe in Your Health. We Do!”