Camille Comet is a Doctor of Pharmacy and Aromatherapist. She uses artisanal essential oils and Boèmia products in her workshops and consultations.
She will be a regular contributor to the site, bringing you her point of view and her secrets as a pharmacist.
In this article, she explores sleep disorders. Discover how to sleep better with essential oils and hydrosols.
Contents :
– Sleep more or sleep better?
– How to use essential oils to get back to sleep?
– Get back to sleep with essential oils: it’s scientifically proven!
– Night-time awakenings: what if it’s … the liver?
Sleep more or sleep better?
Sleep time
Complaints of poor sleep are very common in the adult population of France and most industrialized countries.
Nearly two-thirds of the subjects surveyed complained of at least one night of poor sleep in the past month, and of sleep that was sensitive to variations in the environment, stress at work, or family or everyday events.
Problems experienced
The main symptoms are difficulty in falling asleep, waking up during the night, waking up too early in the morning or a feeling of unrefreshing sleep.
How to sleep naturally?
A mild sleeping pill may be considered for transient insomnia, lasting no more than a fortnight.
Beyond that, the main risk is addiction. Conventional synthetic sleeping pills can even worsen the situation by reducing the quality of your deep sleep, causing drowsiness and dependence… These risks are not universally known, and certainly not taken seriously enough.
Before you fall into this trap, it’s possible to get back to natural sleep thanks to essential oils, hydrosols and simple measures.
Powerful and truly effective, natural sleeping pills have the advantage of being non-addictive and generating restful sleep.
How to use essential oils to get back to sleep?
It’s possible to sleep better with essential oils!
To get to the heart of the matter, I propose two formulas, to be used with quality essential oils. These essential oils should be used only after you have checked that there are no contraindications.
Choosing top-quality essential oils is important for the success of the protocol.
Choose your oils from an essential oil producer like Boèmia. Their high quality will be a major criterion for therapeutic success.
Boèmia is an artisanal essential oil distillery. The distillations are carried out in a traditional, gentle and unpressurized way, respecting the plants and the precise distillation times for each plant, to ensure complete extractions and thus essential oils of complete molecular quality.
Relaxation and sleep ritual for children (from age 2)
Mandarin essence has relaxing, calming and mild hypnotic properties.
Diffuse Mandarin essence with a nebulizer, in a child’s bedroom, 15 minutes before bedtime.
I also recommend applying orange blossom hydrolate on your child’s temples and wrists, massaging gently. Take advantage of this moment to create a calm and relaxed environment, a lock between day and night.
Relaxation and sleep ritual for adults
While children often enjoy a pleasant bedtime ritual (story, cuddle, cuddly toy, etc.), adults are more accustomed to running until the last minute before going to bed.
Setting aside a moment to relax and refocus on the present moment can make it easier to fall asleep and improve the quality of the sleep to come.
Roman chamomile EO 1 drop
Petit grain bigaradier EO 1 drop
Place these two drops on a pillow or handkerchief and inhale deeply.
Chamomile is perhaps the plant with the best-known sleep-inducing properties. In particular, it calms the nervous agitation that affects falling asleep.
Petit grain bigarade can be replaced by Orange or True Lavender, depending on personal preference.
A tip from my own experience: watch out for colored essential oils, such as Orange and Mandarin, which can leave a stain if applied directly to bed linen.
Getting back to sleep with essential oils: it’s scientifically proven!
Essential oils to help you fall asleep in hospital
Sleep is a fundamental human need and therefore a key factor in maintaining health and recovering from illness. Most hospitalized patients, especially those in coronary care units, have sleep disorders.
Environmental factors such as noise, procedural pain, discomfort, the psychological stress of being acutely ill, and disease complications can lead at-risk patients to develop sleep disorders. In intensive care units, patients see their sleep reduced by 30 to 40%.
In this randomized controlled trial, 60 patients were randomly divided into two groups (experimental and control).
Patients in the control group received routine care. In the experimental group, patients received routine care and 3 drops of Damask Rose (Rosa damascena) essential oil on a piece of paper hung on the pillow for three nights. Sleep quality was assessed using the Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index, which relates solely to the patient’s experience.
The present study revealed that Rose essential oil significantly reduced
time to sleep, sleep disturbance, and significantly improved efficiency, subjective quality, and
sleep duration.
An improvement in quality of life was also observed.
This study relies on the patient’s subjective assessment, and does not compare the essential oil to a placebo. As olfaction plays an important role in this protocol, it would be necessary to be able to compare the substance tested with a pleasant-smelling control substance that has no hypnotic effects.
Effect of Rosa damascene aromatherapy on sleep quality in cardiac patients: A randomized controlled trial. Ali Hajibagheri, Atye Babaii, Mohsen Adib-Hajbaghery, Ali Hajibagheri 1, Atye Babaii, Mohsen Adib-Hajbaghery, August 2014, Pages 159-163
Lavender essential oil proves its effectiveness in restoring sleep
Another experiment was carried out using distilled water on the control group, compared with lavender essential oil. Polysomnography was performed.
Lavender exposure increased the percentage of deep or slow wave sleep (SWS) in both men and women. All subjects reported greater vigor in the morning, corroborating the increase in restorative deep sleep. Lavender also increased stage 2 (light) sleep and decreased rapid eye movement (REM) sleep and time to wake up after first falling asleep (waking up after sleep onset latency) in women.
Goel N, Kim H, Lao R. An olfactory stimulus modifiesnight time sleep in young men and women. Chronobiol Int2005;22:889-904.
Night-time awakenings: what if it’s … the liver?
You fall asleep “like a baby” but wake up every night after a few hours’ sleep. It’s common to wake up in the same time slot, after a few hours of sleep.
Chinese medicine treats the organs according to their hourly rhythms and the seasons. Every two hours, energy passes from one organ to another via the meridians. Repeated nocturnal awakening in this time slot (1h/3h) is most often a sign of liver congestion. congestion.
Rather than resorting to sleeping pills, which would only provide a symptomatic response, these insomnias tell you that it’s time to give your liver a boost.
This answer could also be … essential oils or hydrosols!
To begin with, there’s nothing better than essential oils to act quickly and decisively when faced with a clogged liver that manifests itself in symptoms such as waking up at night.
They’re fast-acting and suitable for short-term treatment. Lemon, Rosemary verbenone, Thyme thujanol essential oils come to mind…
For longer-term care, hydrolats will be your allies.
Conclusion
Insomnia is not without danger: it has harmful short- and long-term consequences. Sleep is essential for good health. Experts recommend between 7 and 9 hours’ sleep a night, depending on age and individual needs. Insomnia and sleep disorders must therefore be treated.
The use of essential oils to treat sleep disorders, combined with complementary relaxation therapies, is an interesting alternative for reducing the use of hypnotic drugs and their side effects.
The effects of essential oils on sleep have been scientifically proven by several studies. It’s a natural yet powerful approach.
Preparing for a good night’s sleep also takes place during the day. Managing stress and emotions will be the subject of a future article. (link coming soon…)
See you soon and happy nights!
