I r
ecently I had a chance to review the book Essential Oils for Childbirth: Using Aromatherapy to Reduce Stress, Alleviate Anxiety, and Lessen Pain with any Birth Plan by Michaela Boldy, RN.
This book is a user-friendly reference guide to educate expectant mothers about the various the health benefits of essential oils, which can be used to improve their childbirth experience. This book has easy-to-understand information on how to safely use essential oils during pregnancy, afterbirth for recovery, as well as extra information for using aromotherapy to benefit your baby and your whole family.
About the Author
Michaela Boldy is a Registered Nurse, a Certified Aromatherpy Practioner, a Certified Infant Massage Instructor, and a Mother to 4. After the author successfully incorporated aromatherapy into her own childbirth, she founded Michaela Boldy Aromotherpy – specifically selling the two labour blends that she had created and used for her own labours. She was successfully able to introduce the use of aromatherapy by midwives and doulas in the San Franscisco Bay Area. As a result of a small trial, aromotherapy was found to be very effective promoting relaxation and reducing anxiety during childbirth, both of which are very important for labour and childbirth.
Essential Oils for Childbirth has 8 Chapters to help you feel confident to use essential oils to ease your pregnancy and childbirth. The information that it provides is research-based and includes information about various studies and personal experiences throughout. Don’t have any knowledge about essential oils or aromatherpy? No problem! This book is perfect for people with no background or some existing knowledge. It is also great for mothers, partners, childbirth professionals, or health care professinos.
You will learn about what aromotherapy is, how essential oils work, how to choose quality oils, different ways to use them, along with safety precaustions. Essential Oils for Childbirth also has bonus information about baby massage, little extras to make your baby happier, and even a chapter with research data on how aromatherapy may help to lower the number of c-sections. Essential Oils for Childbirth teaches mothers and partners to use different essential oils to enhance the birth experience, while offering a variety of easy to create recipes you can make yourself for labour and beyond.
Through my experience, I know that many expectant mothers report some level of anxietty and fear during their pregnancy and during childbirth itself. I’ve seem that aromatherapy can be an easy to implement comfort measure for mothers, regardless of their birth plan or birth circumstances. As a birth doula, I have my own list of favourite essential oils that I pack in my on-call bag, most of which are included in this book! I love that this book covers questions that parents often ask about what essential oils are safe / not safe, as well as how to use essential oils safely, which makes it easy even if they don’t have a doula.
Overall, I found this book an easy and quick read. This is a book that I will be proudly adding to the Bean Family Wellness Library.
Do you want to own a copy of this book? Visit your local bookstore or purchase your copy online on Amazon, or enter the giveaway below!
What can you win?
One winner will receive a paperback copy of Essential Oils for Childbirth by Mechaela Boldy, RN
Disclaimer: I received a free copy of this book from the publisher for review. Receiving this item did not in anyway affect the information that I shared in this article. All the opinions in this article are my own.
