Episode #105: Essential Oils with Jodi Cohen

Why You Should Listen

In this episode, you will learn about the use of essential oils in supporting health recovery and health optimization.  

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About My Guest

My guest for this episode is Jodi Cohen.  Jodi Cohen is a bestselling author, award-winning journalist, functional practitioner, busy mom, loyal friend, and unshakable cheerleader dedicated to helping you and your family regain vibrant health.  She is the founder of Vibrant Blue Oils where she combines her training in nutritional therapy and aromatherapy to create unique proprietary blends of organic and wild-crafted essential oils.  Her journey to essential oils began with her own health struggles when anxiety, depression, and exhaustion led her to being barely able to function.  Simple tasks like answering the phone or doing laundry were completely overwhelming.  Jodi has helped over 50,000 clients heal from brain-related challenges including anxiety, insomnia, and autoimmunity.  She had tried intense restrictive diets, expensive supplements, and all sorts of therapies.  These helped a little, but very little.  She was constantly treading water and barely stating afloat, but not improving.  Her protocols kept her from drowning, but never pulled her out of the deep water.  Everything shifted when a friend gifted her a box of essential oils with an assurance that they would help.  She began formulating essential oil blends based on her knowledge of physiology.  Her first was to support her own exhausted adrenal glands and within minutes she felt like herself for the first time in months.  She finally had a life vest.  Eventually, friends and clients tested the formulations with similar success.  As the author of the #1 Bestselling book, Healing with Essential Oils, Jodi was inspired to educate clinicians and individuals after personally experiencing the profound physical and mental benefits that essential oils could deliver.  For the past ten years, Jodi has worked closely with healthcare practitioners - including MDs, NDs, nurse practitioners, chiropractors, acupuncturists, health coaches, nutritionists and yoga instructors - to discover the best essential oil protocols in clinical practice to support underlying imbalances that often lead to disease, including supporting sleep, stress, digestion, inflammation, detoxification, and blood-sugar imbalances.

Key Takeaways

• What are essential oils?
• How are essential oils administered?
• Are there vibrational properties to essential oils?
• How might oils be used to support mental and emotional health, including anxiety and depression?
• Can essential oils help support the adrenal glands?
• How might essential oils be used to optimize our external environment in terms of mold or EMF exposure?
• Do essential oils support improving sleep?
• Can essential oils be used to assist the body in detoxifying?
• How might essential oils be used in addressing MCAS and reducing systemic inflammation?
• Can essential oils be used to modulate the immune system?
• Is there a role for essential oils in supporting dysbiosis and SIBO?
• Can the health of the vagus nerve be optimized through the use of the oils?
• How might essential oils be helpful in those dealing with Lyme disease, co-infections, and biofilms?
• What role might oils play in supporting fatigue, hypercoagulation, endocrine function, blood sugar, and dental health?

Connect With My Guest

http://VibrantBlueOils.com

Related Resources

Parasympathetic Checklist

Interview Date

September 19, 2019

Transcript

Transcript Disclaimer: Transcripts are intended to provide optimized access to information contained in the podcast.  They are not a full replacement for the discussion.  Timestamps are provided to facilitate finding portions of the conversation.  Errors and omissions may be present as the transcript is not created by someone familiar with the topics being discussed.  Please Contact Me with any corrections.

[00:00:01] Welcome to BetterHealthGuy Blogcasts, empowering your better health. And now, here's Scott, your Better Health Guy.

[00:00:14] The content of this show is for informational purposes only and is not intended to diagnose, treat or cure any illness or medical condition. Nothing in today's discussion is meant to serve as medical advice or as information to facilitate self-treatment. As always, please discuss any potential health related decisions with your own personal medical authority.

[00:00:35] Scott: Hello, everyone, and welcome to episode number 105 of the BetterHealthGuy Blogcast series. Today's guest is Jody Cohen and the topic of the show is essential oils. Jodi Cohen is a bestselling author, award-winning journalist, functional practitioner, busy mom, loyal friend, and unshakable cheerleader dedicated to helping you and your family regain vibrant health. She is the founder of Vibrant Blue Oils where she combines her training in nutritional therapy and aromatherapy to create unique proprietary blends of organic and wild-crafted essential oils. Her journey to essential oils began with her own health struggles when anxiety, depression, and exhaustion led her to being barely able to function. Simple tasks like answering the phone or doing laundry were completely overwhelming. Jodi has helped over 50,000 clients heal from brain-related challenges including anxiety, insomnia, and autoimmunity. She had tried intense restrictive diets, expensive supplements, and all sorts of therapies. These helped a little, but very little. She was constantly treading water and barely staying afloat, but not improving.

Her protocols kept her from drowning, but never pulled her out of the deep water. Everything shifted when a friend gifted her a box of essential oils with an assurance that they would help. She soon began formulating essential oil blends based on her knowledge of physiology. Her first was to support her own exhausted adrenal glands and within minutes, she felt like herself for the first time in months. She finally had a life vest. Eventually, friends and clients tested the formulations with similar success. As the author of the #1 Bestselling book, ‘Healing with Essential Oils’, Jodi was inspired to educate clinicians and individuals after personally experiencing the profound physical and mental benefits that essential oils could deliver. For the past ten years, Jodi has worked closely with healthcare practitioners - including MDs, NDs, nurse practitioners, chiropractors, acupuncturists, health coaches, nutritionists and yoga instructors - to discover the best essential oil protocols in clinical practice to support underlying imbalances that often lead to disease, including supporting sleep, stress, digestion, inflammation, detoxification, and blood-sugar imbalances. And now my interview with Jodi Cohen.

[00:03:01] Scott: In my own journey with Lyme disease, I used a number of essential oils as part of my wellness toolkit. I remember sitting down on Sunday afternoons with various combinations of oregano and thyme and Basil, and several others making capsules that I would use throughout the week. That was many years ago, and the application of essential oils in supporting health optimization has continued to evolve. And I'm excited today to have Jodi Cohen here with us to share her experience with essential oils, and how they have changed her life and the life of so many others. Thanks for being here today, Jody.

[00:03:33] Jodi: Oh, it's such a privilege to join you.

[00:03:36] Scott: Tell us a little bit about your personal health journey, and how that led you to essential oils and to doing the work you're doing today with these powerful tools.

[00:03:45] Jodi: My personal health journey actually began with my second child who was pretty much ADD, and every parenting class I took didn't seem to help. And then one day a friend noticed that he was being well-behaved until she fed him a Ritz cracker. And then he became just dysregulated and had no impulse control. And she said, “Gosh, you know, my brother was on Ritalin his whole life and it turned out he was just allergic to some weird foods. You should see a nutritionist.” And I thought, well, that's easy. I've done everything else. Took him to a nutritionist, took a few key inflammatory foods out of his diet, and I had a different child. And my mind was so blown that I went back and studied nutrition because like you, you know, when you're searching for an answer, and then you find one, you want to share it with everybody. And that background came in really handy when life dealt me my next blow, which was my husband at the time was super depressed and living with you know, being the caregiver is almost- it's challenging in ways in addition to being the patient. And so he finally sought help in a hospital. And the minute it wasn't my job to care for him, all of those years of you know, putting myself last and foregoing exhaustion just hit me like a Mack truck. And I couldn't really function or get up and yet I was a single mom now, my kids were five and seven. And nothing that I had helped me in the past was enough.

And so friends that had been following my journey showed up with a big box of essential oils and said, “We think this is going to help you.” And I asked, “Well wait, how do I use them?” They said, “Nope, you're intuitive, and you're smart, you're going to figure it out.” I know, right? But I knew it was my adrenal and my hypothalamus and I knew how to test for those. So, I just tested the box like we would muscle test supplements; is anything in here going to help my adrenals? And I got five and I know you know a lot about muscle testing, and that's kind of unusual. Usually, you're able to narrow it down to one or two. And then it occurred to me, oh, wait, I can combine them. So, I figured out how many drops of each, and being an essential oil novice, I did it in a shot glass in the kitchen. But then when I applied them on my lower back, on my adrenals, it was such a profound and immediate shift. I suddenly felt like myself, you know, and all that delayed maintenance, cleaning the house, doing the kids laundry, going to the supermarket, everything got done in that one day. And it was so dramatic, that I thought, wow, I have no idea why this is working but clearly it works.

[00:06:18] Scott: I should give you some essential oils, and you could come over to my house and clean for a day. I could use some help.

[00:06:26] Jodi: I think we are, you know, you have to kind of commit to a daily ritual with that. Otherwise, it builds up. But yeah, I agree with you.

[00:06:35] Scott: So, for those that are not familiar with essential oils, what are they? Where do they come from? What types of chronic conditions might people have that they could be interested in learning about essential oils? Where do they fit in?

[00:06:50] Jodi: Yeah, so essential oils are really the concentrated essences of plants; of seeds, roots, resins, barks, flowers. And if you think about it, concentrated means like the intense healing portion of it. So, for example, it might take 25 bags of peppermint tea to equal one drop of peppermint oil. And if you think about our history with plants, and using plants as medicine, it's really concentrated medicine. And what's interesting is that different parts of the plants do different things, right. So, if it's grown in a damp environment, like mint, it can help with dampness and congestion in our body. If it's grown in heat, like black pepper, it can help with warmth and moving things. So, when you know how the different plants work, you can selectively combine them to help move congestion and stagnation in the body, which is kind of at the root of most of our disease. When we're in balance and everything's flowing properly, we're pretty much able to heal ourselves, like what we're talking about with cleaning the house. If you do the dishes every day, it never builds up and becomes a problem. If your body can clean out the garbage every day, it never builds up and becomes a problem. So, essential oils can help your body get into balance. You know, if you have a lot of delayed maintenance, it can help you get back into balance, and catch up with the detoxifying or, you know, helping oxygen and blood flow to your brain or helping your body communicate so that it can release the right neurotransmitters and hormones.

[00:08:24] Scott: What are some of the types of conditions people are dealing with that they seek you out and the oils that you formulated?

[00:08:31] Jodi: Yeah, it can be as basic as you know, a new mom who's just tired. I can help a lot of people with insomnia. You know, it can be people who just have slight hormone imbalances and digestive issues to people on the chronic end of the spectrum, like those suffering from conditions like autism, Lyme, autoimmunity, any kind of dementia. Anytime you can help to open up communication with the brain, you can really impact in a positive way those conditions that rely on communication with the brain. And the lack of communication is part of the underlying root of the problem.

[00:09:11] Scott: I've seen numerous ways that people have talked about using essential oils over the years, sometimes topically, diffusing them in the environment, even orally in some cases. So, how do you recommend people introduce oils into their routine? Can they be an adjunct to essentially any protocol or are there some contraindications or side effects that people need to look out for?

[00:09:33] Jodi: Yeah, I'm a big advocate of first do no harm. And so my intention is really to help the beginner and the intermediate user. Some of the advanced techniques like internally taking the supplements, which can be helpful for biofilms. If you're working with a practitioner, I have no problem with that. But it's kind of like a novice going into the gym and saying, like, I'm going to lift 50 pounds. No, start with five, you know, work your way up. So, the easiest kind of most non-invasive way to introduce oils is just to smell them. It can be as simple as a bottle here, just opening up a bottle, you know, and smelling it. And what's interesting, just like you get full with food, you'll often find that you get kind of filled with oil, like after three to seven times smelling it, you stop smelling it, so you have enough. Another really great way to apply oils is topically, especially when you combine them with certain reflex points or acupuncture points, because when you combine modalities, you almost optimize the synergy of both of them, the sum is greater than both of the parts. So, for example, if you put oil on an acupuncture point, like, I like San Jiao 17 right here, it's just like it stimulates the point just like a needle would but you can keep it on longer. So, some people actually use oils on their feet after a chiropractic adjustment, because it just helps them hold the adjustment longer. In terms of contraindications and synergies, what oils really do is they open you up and they move things. And so the only contraindications is when pregnancy is a concern, right? Because you don't necessarily want to move the baby before the 40th week of pregnancy. So, that's why everyone really airs on the side of caution. And also in young children, they're just so open and it's so easy to shift them with the slightest switch shift into balance, you don't want to overwhelm their systems. So, I really don't advise oils on anyone under two years of age. And if you are pregnant, I would really encourage you to discuss it with your doctor before using it because we don't know what happens, and we don't want your unborn child to be a guinea pig.

[00:11:37] Scott: Yeah, it's interesting that you mentioned the essential oils being combined with acupuncture or chiropractic. My acupuncturist actually uses oils as part of her, she uses needles, but then she also uses the oils as part of that same session. And it's really, really a nice combination. With the amount of oil that one might actually be using, usually just a very small amount, do you think that the benefits of essential oils are as entirely chemistry or is there an aspect of frequency, vibration that also accounts for their potential?

[00:12:09] Jodi: Frequency, we're all energy beings and there's a lot of research that each organ in our system has a different energetic frequency. And when that frequency is imbalance and broadcasting clearly, that's when we're in health. And so one way that you can work with the body energetically is to bring that frequency back into balance. You can do that with tuning forks, if you hit the right pitch, all of a sudden, the organ goes into balance. You can also do that with combinations of oils. Each oil has its own frequency almost like a color, and you can combine the oils just like you would combine colors to match the frequency of healthy organ tissue. It's the principle of resonance of matching. You know, when you hit a tuning fork on one side of the room and then hit a tuning fork on the other side of the room, they'll match. That also happens in nature, you notice that birds fly together, or you're in an audience, people start to clap together and it becomes a resonant experience. So, you can use combinations of oils that match the frequency of healthy organ tissue overlaid on those organs, tissues and that will bring it into balance.

[00:13:15] Scott: So, we're essentially then using the essential oils as a way to bring coherence to tissues or organs in the body?

[00:13:23] Jodi: Exactly. You can also use it to cancel out dissonance, to kind of cancel out toxins that are external that yes, that's exactly what we're doing.

[00:13:31] Scott: Beautiful, beautiful. Many people listening to the show are dealing with some things like chronic Lyme disease, mold illness and related complex medical conditions. So, let's talk about some of the challenges that people face in those conditions, how essential oils might be helpful. I'm going to kind of walk through this maybe in the order that I think of when approaching recovery from a chronic condition. So, I usually like to start with the mental emotional side of things. If we think about emotional traumas and conflicts and how those can set the stage for adrenal exhaustion, which you already mentioned, and immune suppression and ultimately chronic illness. How can we use oils to help the body deal with our emotional backdrop in terms of that being a contributor to our health challenge? And then what's the connection between emotions and different organs and how the oils can then support us?

[00:14:20] Jodi: So, oils are amazing for helping to manage organs. I'm going to actually start with the last question. Dietrich Klinghardt believes that when we have any kind of trauma, we hold it in the body. And Chinese medicine often correlates different traumas with different organ systems. For example, grief is associated with the lungs, anger and rage is associated with the liver, worry is associated with the spleen. And what Klinghardt finds is, it's almost like running a two-legged or three-legged race. You can't really move forward in detoxifying until you experience and work through the emotion because it keeps the body stagnant and stuck. It's almost like what he calls an interference field, it's a block in the movement. And so the wonderful thing about oils, especially smelling oils, is that you can access that region of the brain that stores the emotions and stores the memory and rewrite your own script, often in combination with techniques like Annie Hopper's limbic retraining. But what's interesting about essential oil research and the olfactory system in particular, there's a Nobel Prize winner named Linda Buck who’s out of Seattle. And what she started looking at is, what parts of the brain and the olfactory system are actually responding to that predator danger response. And she isolated specific areas of the brain that respond to that.

And then her next question is, is there anything that can offset that dangerous signal, that fear response that keeps us stuck in that fight or flight state where our adrenals are overworking. And she discovered that rose essential oil actually counteracts that fear response, that smelling rose oil basically, cancels out the fear response so our body can stay healthy and strong. The other great thing is that you can use essential oils, because they have the direct channel to that part of the brain. That kind of categorizes the emotions, to help release those emotions. It's also wonderful, you can use them in combination with the organ. So, if you're working through grief, you can use some oils over the lungs through grief. And obviously, the lungs are what we use to breathe in and breathe out. So, you can very intentionally, again, combining modalities, either tap on the lungs or breathe through the lungs to help release the grief. And then when you release that emotion, then the toxins often metals can move forward. And you know, it's like the first step, then the second step.

[00:16:47] Scott: Yeah, that's amazing. I've heard Dr. Klinghardt talk about how looking at urinary excretion of mercury in a specific person is often low, and then they do a psychological intervention and see very, very high levels of mercury then coming out. So, once they deal with the emotional issue that's kind of trapping those in the system, then the body can finally release it. So, I mean, it's definitely very powerful. How does one know if they don't do muscle testing, for example, and you have a number of different tools with Vibrant Blue Oils? How do they know which oils to use for different emotional issues? Do you have different products that you formulated for specific emotions? Tell us about that.

[00:17:27] Jodi: We have an entire line of blends for emotional support because I was bumping into that in my own healing. My issue was always the liver and the gallbladder which is anger. And you know, as a woman raised at a certain time, I stuffed it. I know somebody would do an injustice and I would just be nice. I would never - you know, rock the boat. So, when I started realizing that in using oils to help shift out my own anger and let that go, I was allowed to really move forward in my healing. I have Hashimoto’s and that was my obstacle really helping to detoxify the liver, and start to see my numbers go down. And it was so profound that I realized this is a really critical part of healing that you can address with plants, you can address with flower essences, you can address with oils. So, we have a whole line of all the Chinese medicine organs that are impacted by emotion. And we've tried to be really clear and giving people checklists and spelling it out so that they can self-identify, oh, gosh, that sounds like me.

[00:18:28] Scott: And one of the things for practitioners listening, one of the things I love about Vibrant Blue Oils is that you guys do have a test kit. So, practitioners that do muscle testing can get the test kit and then see which of the different products might be appropriate for a given client that they're working with. Talking about stress and emotions, we know the adrenals can become unable to really adequately support us when we're dealing with the chronic illness. How might we approach supporting the adrenal in health recovery?

[00:18:55] Jodi: One of the things about the adrenals is that they kind of have two gears their primary job is, we're helping us respond to emergencies, with emergency energy, like the stress hormone cortisol. And so what happens is our hypothalamus tells our pituitary gland to tell our adrenals to release cortisol. And then what's supposed to happen is, once the emergency has passed, or we have sufficient levels, the production turns off. What sometimes happens is we get stuck in overdrive and we're constantly releasing cortisol until we've deficit spent for too long, and we just hit rock bottom and hit adrenal fatigue. So, we're vacillating between kind of hyper adrenal overdrive and hypo under driving. And there are lots of supplements that can help you produce more cortisol when you've run out or comment down a little bit when it's too high. But what I love is adaptogenic herbs that are kind of the balancers. So, if you're too high, they bring you down. If you're too low, they bring you up. And that's how I see essential oils, we have a blend called Adrenal that helps you to balance that space in the middle. But if you think about it, your adrenals are really downstream from your brain. So, if your hypothalamus in your brain isn't getting the signal that the adrenals have produced sufficient cortisol levels, and that they can then turn off, you're going to kind of continue to kick out cortisol.

So, I love to do a two-pronged approach, actually supporting the adrenals and supporting the hypothalamus. The other factor that can come into play is your sleep cycles, your circadian rhythms. Often, we have clients who are physically exhausted but their mind won't stop thinking and they can't fall asleep. That's because the stress hormone cortisol and the sleep hormone melatonin work in tandem with each other. And it makes sense, right? If the lion is chasing you don't want to fall asleep, you won't survive. So, if you're worried and thinking about things, your brain doesn't necessarily know the difference between physical threats and mental or emotional threats. So, it's going to respond with cortisol no matter what. So, when you're trying to get to sleep, if you can take sublingual melatonin like BioPure’s a great option, or we have an oil that you can put, kind of on the top of the head, sides of the head in the back of the head that triggers the pineal gland to naturally release melatonin. And if you think of a teeter totter, right, cortisol is high, melatonin is low, if you bring melatonin back up, it forces cortisol levels down so you can naturally fall asleep. And also, if you're struggling with anxiety at night, it helps to bring the anxiety levels down.

[00:21:27] Scott: Beautiful, beautiful. Let's talk about our environment, which is so critical in optimizing our treatment outcomes. When I think of the environment I think of mold, I think of electromagnetic fields. I know in the mold arena, I've heard mixed perspectives on whether or not diffusion of essential oils is a good thing, or if that potentially makes the environment worse in terms of the molds producing more mycotoxins. So, what's been your experience in terms of improving the indoor environment from a mold perspective with essential oils?

[00:21:57] Jodi: My experience of improving the indoor environment from a mold perspective has been mixed. Because as you know, mold can be really complicated and really hard to eradicate or it can be pretty basic. If you want to try spraying a surface with a combination of vinegar and thyme or oregano and possibly hydrogen peroxide, and you see that the mold goes away, then it's a simple problem and go for it. If it doesn't go away, it's a deeper problem. It means there's probably a leak behind the surface. And you don't really want to, you know, you want to bring in the big guns because staying in a toxic mold environment is not going to be great for you. And I think that's the situation where if you're a diffusing, and you have a bigger problem, that's not-- First of all, it’s not going to solve the problem, and second of all, it can contribute to the problem. But the one thing that I found and actually our mutual friend, Amy Derksen loves this formula. You can't necessarily control your environment. And if you're in a super moldy place, you need to fix that. But what you can control is your body's response to it, you can help modulate your own immune response. And we have a blend called Histamine Balance that includes blue tansy essential oil, which is great for this. This is not a forever solution. If you're in mold, fix it or move. But if you're traveling, and I go to San Diego a lot, and for some reason the hotels there are always moldy. So, I always take the Histamine Balance. And that helps me navigate a moldy hotel and not fall off the deep end for a couple days. Or Amy likes to diffuse it in the clinic even if people are really sensitive to smells, we were talking about resonance and dissonance earlier; there's something about this combination that includes blue tansy and other flower essences that seems to cancel out the toxic effects of mold.

[00:23:44] Scott: Wow, beautiful. So, let's then talk a little bit about EMF sensitivity. That's becoming such a big topic, such a big issue for people, everyone's concerned about 5G coming to their neighborhoods. Are there any oils that can help the body be less sensitive to the impact of the EMFs? Obviously, we can't reduce the incoming exposure, but can we use oils to make the body and the cells more resilient?

[00:24:07] Jodi: I have been on the cutting edge of finding essential oils and other remedies to negate the impacts of 5G because I live in Seattle in the test area for 5G. I'm literally surrounded by it. So, I've had a lot of people with a lot of devices in my home. And one of the things that I've always been checking is, if I apply certain essential oils, does that bring the rating down? And there are two that always seem to be effective; rose and lavender. I don't know that they're effective enough that if I did nothing else, it would be enough. But what I'm finding is that, again, you can't control the external challenges. The only thing you can control is your own resilience to tackle those. So, by applying rose over the heart, and at the bottom of the feet, especially at night, I do feel like it amplifies my own field and helps me stay more in alignment, you know, despite the dysregulation that's coming at me externally.

[00:25:04] Scott: Beautiful. The next thing I think about is people being too sympathetic dominant. And when we're in that sympathetic dominant or fight, flight, freeze kind of state, it's really difficult to heal, we need to shift into more of a parasympathetic, rest, digest and detox mode. So, how do we use oils to kind of calm the nervous system, thus supporting our healing process?

[00:25:28] Jodi: If there is only one thing that your listeners take from this interview, I hope they take this away. Essential oils are an ideal tool to both stimulate your vagus nerve, which was the on-off switch between your sympathetic fight or flight state and your parasympathetic rest and digest it and also to detoxify the vagus nerve. So, if they're new to the idea of the vagus nerve, it is the longest and pretty much the most important of all of your 12 cranial nerves. It starts at the very back of the head, winds around on both sides behind the earlobes and then through pretty much every organ. It's what innervates the organs and it's the information highway that communicates between your brain and your organs. That means it's telling your gut, basically your whole digestive cascade to turn on, your stomach to release hydrochloric acid, your gallbladder to release bile, your pancreas to release enzymes, it's in charge of the whole motility wave. So, if you're constipated, that's an issue. If you're suffering from SIBO and food is sitting too long in your small intestine, that's an issue. It's the anti-inflammatory channel. It's what allows the release of acetylcholine, the anti-inflammatory hormone. And so what happens is chronic stress, not just chronic stress, but toxicity and often toxicity around the neck. I work very closely with Dr. Christine Schaffner and Dr. Dietrich Klinghardt, and a lot of what they find is that these microbes in the mouth, be it metal amalgams or cavitations, or root canals or even just gum issue, you know, they're all trying to exit.

You know, you're in the movie theater, somebody else - they're trying to get out and their exit route is the trigeminal nerve. And where does the trigeminal nerve intersect? By your vagus nerve, right there. So, if it's dumping toxins, and there's any inflammation in the neck because your lymphatic system isn't flowing, or your vascular system isn't working as well, it gets congested. And Dr. Klinghardt has actually started doing sonograms on the neck to see the vagus nerve and the healthy was supposed to be kind of small and triangular. They're finding that they're super inflamed, because what's happening is these toxins are getting stuck in the stuck lymph system. And then nerves have a really high affinity for these toxins. So, they're getting into the nerve. And then they're impacting the signaling between the brain and the body. And that's where everything goes awry. Like anyone who has multiple symptoms, they've got heart palpitations and gut issues, you always, always, always have to think of the vagus nerve because that's what runs through both sections. And oils, I especially like a blend of clove and lime, you know, all roads lead to Rome, there can be a combination of things. But applying it on the vagus nerve, it does two things, it kind of activates that signal, which it's like working out a muscle, they call it vagal tone, it builds up that resilience, so that it's more resilient in the future. But also clove and lime has historically been used in dentistry, to help detoxify the mouth.

And when you can start to detoxify that nerve, then it allows for it not only, you know, if you have a leak in the ceiling, you can put a bucket under it to catch the water. And that's kind of a temporary solution, but at some point you need to fix the roof. You know, when the vagus nerve is not signaling as it should, you can stimulate it and activate it and there are a number of ways you can do that, you know, that feel invasive like getting surgery for an electrode, splashing your face with freezing water, gagging yourself. They were really hard for me to execute and for the clients I've tried to encourage but you know, oil, it smells good and it literally takes one second, I'll show. You just flip the bottle, boom. Even if you do that twice a day, when you brush your teeth, that will make a huge impact on your health.

[00:29:08] Scott: So, when we're talking about parasympathetic tone, and vagal tone, which of your products that you formulated do we want to look at?

[00:29:17] Jodi: You want to look at the Parasympathetic Blend, if you're already super into oils, and you have clove and lime, just mix equal parts and dilute. But it's a great combination because clove is super stimulatory and also has a component called eugenol that has amazing effects for the brain. And lime has very small molecules. And what's great about combining oils is you can take the best qualities of both of them and get that in a new blend.

[00:29:43] Scott: And is that the same blend and that will support vagal tone?

[00:29:46] Jodi: Yes, it supports vagal tone, and it detoxifies. And then the other component of that is you really want to do something to open up the lymph channel in the neck. We have a Lymph blend, Castor oil works great, any kind of dry brushing, lymph massage, anything you can do to move your body is really important. And the lymph does not drain evenly, it drains more aggressively on the left side. So, you also want to make sure that you're helping to open up the left clavicle so that you know you're mobilizing the garbage and then you want to make sure it leaves the body.

[00:30:19] Scott: Beautiful. Sleep is such an important issue for people that are recovering from a chronic health challenge. There's also so many contributors to not sleeping well. We know EMFs can be one of them, we know cortisol can be another. What are some of the essential oils that you found helpful in supporting sleep optimization?

[00:30:37] Jodi: Yeah, sleep is interesting because it's not just one factor that contributes to poor sleep. You could have-- a lot of people have no problem falling asleep. And then they're wide awake at 1am. And maybe they can come over and clean our kitchens. You know, or other people wake up at around 3am and they're kind of groggy, maybe they need to use the facilities. So, it's really important to understand what time you're actually waking up and what's the root cause of sleep. So, if you're having-- if you're struggling to fall asleep at night, and you're wired and tired, that is very likely that you need more melatonin. And melatonin is interesting. I have a lot of clients who've taken pills, and they're like, “Oh, they don't work for me.” Remember, it's really hard to get remedies into the brain. So, an easier way to assimilate melatonin is either through a sublingual formula, like I like the BioPure melatonin, or using essential oils, which then cross into the blood brain barrier and can trigger your pineal gland to release melatonin. If for some reason you're waking up in the middle of the night and you're wide awake, that's often a blood sugar wake up. So, what happens is your body says wait a minute emergency, we're out of fuel, and then your adrenals kick in to release cortisol as your emergency fuel. If you think about how energy is then transported into your cells, it's your pancreas that kind of jumps in and helps with that effort. So, we have a blend that gives the pancreas kind of optimal function and just smelling that, putting a drop of it on a cotton ball in your pillowcase often helps you calm down enough so that you can rest slowly fall back asleep. And then the third kind of wake up is often the liver or hormonal wake up. You know, liver time is 3am. That's when it's the busiest and processing all the toxins. So, the more you can give your liver the vitality to do its job, be it either with an oil that vitalizes the liver, or even taking binders so that when the liver is processing garbage, it can leave the body, that can really help you sleep through the night.

[00:32:35] Scott: So, with the blood sugar issue, one of the scenarios is that your blood sugar goes down enough in the middle of the night, but then the body produces cortisol to bring it back to a more normal level. Sometimes it even overshoots and gets a little bit high in terms of the blood sugar then. But are you saying that the Pancreas formula that you have can help to stabilize that blood sugar thus leading to better sleep. Is that what--

[00:32:59] Jodi: Yeah, it's called nocturnal hypoglycemia, I believe is the term. Yeah, that's exactly what I'm saying that it helps. Basically, the reason you're so awake is your adrenalized and until the adrenal level drops back down, you're going to stay awake, and it's going to be really hard to fall back asleep. So, if you can help the body move the energy into your cells faster, then it will be easier to fall asleep.

[00:33:23] Scott: And do you generally find that people using that formula before they go to bed is good? Or do they if they kind of wake up in the middle of the night, is that the time to use it?

[00:33:31] Jodi: I suggest both and I also, you know if that's your issue, then I would encourage you to work on your blood sugar during the day as well. And also to help eat something that you know when we talk about blood sugar, this is the reason the keto diet is popular. Fat burns slower than carbohydrates. Fat is like the log on the fire, and carbohydrates are like the kindling. So, the more you can have some kind of nut butter, avocado, even coconut oil or coconut manna before bed to stabilize your blood sugar, the more likely will sleep through the night.

[00:33:59] Scott: And if using the Liver formula that you have, would we be topically applying that over the liver, would we be smelling it? How would we use that?

[00:34:07] Jodi: I prefer topical application, it's kind of my favorite. And you can even do that the poor man's castor oil pack, you know, castor oil can be very complicated or very simple. Some people like - put a burlap cloth and then wrap in plastic, the heating pad has electromagnetic frequencies. So, one of those hot water heaters or you can just put castor oil on and use your body heat and wear kind of a ratty t-shirt because it's messy.

[00:34:33] Scott: Or I could buy the castor oil and put a couple drops of the oils, mix it all together and do it, right? Can I use the essential oils to amplify the effects of the castor oil?

[00:34:42] Jodi: Yes, that's exactly what I recommend. And if you even want to multitask a lot further, you can do an Epsom salt bath and put castor oil and the essential oils on your liver and combine all three before bed.

[00:34:54] Scott: Wow. Beautiful. Let's talk a little about toxicity. We know how critical that is supporting the liver, kidneys, lymph, extracellular matrix, the gut, skin and lungs; so important in terms of optimizing the terrain so that we don't have a terrain that really is hospitable for these microbial overgrowths. So, how do we use oils to support detoxification and drainage?

[00:35:15] Jodi: That's a really great question. And what we have to remember is that toxicity kind of starts when we sleep, right. Our brain actually shrinks by 60% and our lymphatic system in combination with our brain cells, called glial cells almost work like a car wash. It's called the glial lymphatic system or the glymphatic system, and they put the … or the cellular fluid through the brain and then that's ideally, supposed to drain down the neck and leave the body. But if there's congestion in the neck, then it's a hydraulic system, it gets stuck in the brain. It's kind of like a traffic jam, where nothing's moving. So, the first step is to really make sure that your lymph is flowing down your neck, and out of your system. And the oils that I recommend are Parasympathetic to help with the vagus nerve, and then our Lymph blend, and along the neck aggressively and then over the left clavicle. And then in the other areas where the lymph nodes are really clustered. So, under the arms, and along with bikini line. So, that's step one is just getting things out of the-- Well, first, they have to leave the cell and get into the intracellular matrix and then get into the lymph system. And then their next step is the gallbladder, right? It goes through the liver, and then it's the gallbladder and specifically, the bile of the gallbladder, that carries these toxins into the intestines where they can then leave the body in the feces. So, if your bile is stagnant and not flowing, we have an oil that helps to kind of make the gallbladder and the bile, less viscous and better functioning. And it's really great. I've had several people who actually were planning to get gallbladder surgery and just decided as a last resort, I'll just try this for a week. And they were able to avoid gallbladder surgery and you know, surgery causes scars and other interference fields. So, I always if you can avoid something that cuts you open, I advocate for that. So--

[00:37:01] Scott: Plus, we actually need our gallbladder, it does serve a purpose.

[00:37:04] Jodi: Yeah, it does, as does our spleen. But yeah. So, anyway, I recommend an oil over the gallbladder, we have one for the liver. And then what's interesting is the small intestine, there's the intestinal mucosa, which helps assimilate the nutrients. And that could be activated with the vagus nerve. We also have an oil for the intestinal mucosa, which just helps the motility and moving things through and out of your system.

[00:37:30] Scott: Beautiful. So, the next thing I wanted to chat about was inflammation, mast cell activation syndrome, histamine, we touched a little bit on histamine and the blend that you've put together that you might use in let's say, a hotel that has a mold issue. I think that's going to come into play here as well. But I want to talk a little about mast cell activation syndrome and histamine related issues. My observation has been that if we can reduce inflammation in the body, everything else that we do works better. And we can also then approach things with less aggressive tools. I know, in my past use of essential oils, I know Frankincense was a common oil that really helps with inflammation, can even help with immune modulation, if people are autoimmune. Tell us a little bit about your perspective on mast cell activation syndrome and histamine intolerance.

[00:38:16] Jodi: Yeah, those are related to the vagus nerve. And I think it gets to Annie Hopper’s theory that if your, your body's designed to keep you safe, and you're supposed to have a reasonable response to safety. For example, if you're walking in the woods, and you freak out because you see a snake and it turns out to be a stick, that's an overreaction. And sometimes we just get stuck in overdrive and our body keeps getting stuck in overdrive. And part of that is your vagus nerve is your anti-inflammatory pathway. So, if you're not able to send the appropriate anti-inflammatory signals down the vagus nerve by releasing the anti-inflammatory neurotransmitter acetylcholine, everything else is going to get backed up and get more intense. So, step one, is really to ensure you're addressing the vagus nerve, that you're stimulating the vagus nerve, that you're detoxifying the vagus nerve, and the oils for that are our parasympathetic blend and our Lymph blend.

And then step two, one of the challenges is, is inflammation is kind of an unnecessary response, right? It brings heat, it brings blood flow, it mobilizes that part of the body, and it's really designed to be chronic, and then you heal and you get better. The challenge is once inflammation gets into the brain, and your glial cells get activated, it's very hard to find that off switch to turn it off. Some people say there is no off switch. I've heard Chris Shade of Quicksilver talk about CBD oil as the off switch, and I think he's onto something. I do believe that plant oils are the off switch. I think that's one of the reasons that CBD works so well for brain inflammation. I also think that's why Frankincense works pretty well. We found a combination of oils that you can apply on the brain that helps to turn off the inflammation, but you really need to address it, you know, it's like an all hands fire. You can't just spray one part of the house, you really have to address it from all angles. So, you know, getting really intense with your diet, helping to support your vagus nerve, helping to turn off inflammation in the body, everything that you can do. And then also you mentioned modulating your immune response; that's something that gets into overdrive, and it's either overactive and you get autoimmunity, or it's underactive, and all of these pathogens are kind of wreaking havoc in your system, and you're not able to stop it.

The first point I want to make is that it is your vagus nerve that turns on your immune response. Because when you're in danger, when you're in survival mode, everything that's not essential to your survival in that moment turns off. Your ability to digest your food turns off because all of your blood is routed to your extremities, so you can run really fast and escape. It doesn't really matter if you can assimilate your nutrients. Your immune system is turned off because that's not really relevant to that moment. Your detoxification system is turned off again, the blood is routed from the liver, the gallbladder to the other organs. So, in order to really turn on your immune system and start with immune modulation, you have to be in that parasympathetic state and your vagus nerve has to be able to signal in your body like, hey, we're turning on inflammation, we're shifting gears out of fight or flight. The second thing is that there are oils that-- one of the interesting things about oils, you know, they're natural. So, there's a lot of reasons that their chemistry and their mathematical frequency, it's very hard to become, you know, antibiotic-resistant is kind of a common term. You can become resistant to man-made drugs, you can't really become resistant to oil. So, that's where they fill that gap that Western medicine isn't really able to touch.

So, especially there are certain oils that are really hot, you know, like clove, like nutmeg, like oregano, like thyme, and everyone has their own combination of this blend, it's called thieves by some people because it was discovered back in the Middle Ages during-- Everyone was dying from the plague and they were stealing the gold teeth out of dead people's mouths and somehow not dying themselves. And so when they were apprehended, they were offered a plea bargain, tell us how you didn't die and we’ll lessen your sentence. And it turned out to be this combination of oils that you can apply every night on the bottom of your feet or the bottom of your children's feet while you sleep, and it just bolsters your own immune modulation. Again, an example I use is if you're driving in traffic, and sometimes someone cuts you off, and you don't care, you know, you're having a good day, maybe they're in a hurry, doesn't matter. Other days, same exact situation, someone cuts you off and four-letter words fly out of your mouth. The only variable that was different was you and your own resilience. So, when you're able to modulate your immune system and give your immune system more resilience, you can have pathogens in your presence, but they don't impact you. And so that's really our goal is to get everyone to the state where they're so aligned in their own health that doesn't really matter what toxins are present, what EMF frequencies are present, because they're going to be fun.

[00:43:02] Scott: So, when we talk about autoimmunity and this hyperactive immune response, and usually it's a combination of hyperactive and underactive or hypoactive, it's usually not just one or the other. But when we think about autoimmunity, and immune, hyper activation, we think about things like PANS, PANDAS, Hashimoto’s, I think there is an autoimmune aspect of Lyme disease that most people experience as well. So, in terms of modulating that immune response, is the Parasympathetic blend the one that might be the best fit in that scenario as well?

[00:43:34] Jodi: Yeah, I mean, we work very closely with a lot of practitioners who deal with chronic illness. And the two that they love the most are the Parasympathetic and the Lymph because we all have our tools, right? Like there's certain supplements that we know work for most people. But there are also gaps in those protocols, there are certain-- it's almost like that part in your back that you just can't itch. And so what's really challenging is getting lymph to flow and stimulating the vagus nerve in a non-invasive, easy way. So, those are the two tools that everyone relies on. The other thing that people really like, you know, when our body is in a chronic battle be it with Lyme, or our own immune system, it's exhausting. It takes so much energy to stay on and in fight mode all the time. So, the Adrenal blend is really great because it bolsters the patient's energy, you need energy to heal. And if you're exhausted, it's really hard, even some of the protocols you know, even taking like more than seven supplements in one day, can feel overwhelming, especially if one's a powder, one's a liquid, one's a pill, they're at different times, it can feel like a lot. So, you really need to give patients kind of the mental and physical energy to feel like they can manage this. And so supporting the adrenals early on is a really good way to ensure that people are better able to actually adhere to protocols.

[00:44:51] Scott: So, once we've dealt with a lot of these foundational items, then I think about the microbial aspect of health optimization. I think we need to do all of those other things first, and not just focus on the microbiome piece. But I do think that things like viruses and from Dr. Klinghardt’s work, the endogenous retroviral activation, I think those are significant stressors that can impact our health. Are there specific oils that can help us dealing with these chronic viral related stressors?

[00:45:17] Jodi: Yeah, and I really love that you laid that foundation first. Like this is one of those like, don't try this at home kits. Like don't jump into taking oregano oil internally until you've made sure that you're actually draining the body. That's like yelling fire in the movie theater before the emergency doors are open, you're just going to cause more damage. So, yes, but before, this is not your first step, it's not even your second step. First step is to make sure that you're sleeping and that you're balancing your stress response. Second step is to make sure that the exit doors are open, so that when you start to clean house and kill bacteria and viruses and pathogens, that you're not causing more problems, or mobilized metals, and then you can really start to get into mobilizing these metals and other pathogens. And the other thing that I want to say is that you absolutely want to take binders. Essential oils are not a substitute for supplements, they work nicely in tandem in combination with them. So, I think that you can combine certain supplements with oils, the ones that I love are kind of the immune-supporting oil, like the Immune Support this what we call it, other companies call Thieves, the Histamine Balance to really kind of modulate your own reaction. Because also, as you know, when you detoxify intensely, it can be really hard on your system. And you can feel worse before you feel better. And no one really likes that. You want to feel like you're moving forward. So, sometimes it's better to go slightly slower and you know, slow and steady wins the race as opposed to racing to the finish line. But the ones that I recommend are Histamine Balance, Lymph to keep everything flowing out of your system, our Parasympathetic, and then any immune-modulating oil, so like Immune Support or Thieves.

[00:47:01] Scott: So, if we then look at using the Immune Support formula that you have would that be one, we would just put on the bottom of the feet and then get a systemic benefit, or would we use it in some other way?

[00:47:12] Jodi: You can do a couple of things. You can put it-- so basic level, just put it on the bottom of the feet, it's a little bit hot, but the bottom of your feet. They have a couple of benefits, they're super thick. And so even if it's a hot oil that might make your skin red if you apply it somewhere else in the body like over your throat, it usually won't do that there. And then they're all the reflex points on the bottom of the feet that you're touching. So, that helps to carry it in the body more quickly. If you want to get more advanced, you can certainly use certain acupuncture points, like I like spleen 6, which I can't show my foot, but it's a little bit above where your ankle bone is. And I can send a link to a graphic for later. So, kind of aligning it with reflex points and acupuncture points helps you really specifically target your lymphatic system. Another point that I like is a liver gallbladder point between the toes, it’s kind right between the big toe and the other toes. So, you can get far more advanced and specific. But even if you're doing this that you know basic beginner, just putting it on the bottom of my feet, because that's what I can kind of handle at the moment, you'll get benefit.

[00:48:13] Scott: Beautiful. So, we talked about that Immune Support then for the virus and retroviral activation piece. What if we move into gut, dysbiosis, SIBO, parasites, Candida, is that a similar formula there? Or is there something else we'd want to think about for those types of microbial overgrowth?

[00:48:30] Jodi: You know, one of the challenges I just want to say with getting things into your gut when you're not assimilating your nutrients is that whole absorption issue. So, there are definitely like topical, you know, remedies that you can apply. But you also want a two-prong approach because you want to kind of feel it from the inside out and the outside in. So, Parasympathetic, absolutely, especially for anything gut-related like SIBO, where the motility housekeeping wave is coming into play. You want to make sure you're activating your vagus nerve. Candida is complicated because it's fungus, as we were talking about, and it's often so intertwined with metals. There's a lot of research that can do to actually grows to protect your body from metals. And so I actually don't think that oils mobilize metals, I think there are other tools that do that, you know, chlorella is a great one, zeolite, there are a lot of things that you can do. I would do this with a practitioner because this is not basic, do it at home stuff. But the oils that you can use to support this protocol are something for the vagus nerve, like parasympathetic. And then we have one that really is great for the intestinal mucosa because what you're trying to do is, is kind of hit it from all sides. And so that just helps support the beneficial flora because it's a little bit of a war in there, right? You've got your good bugs and your bad bugs that are kind of trying to fight for dominance. So, the more you can support your good bugs, the better chance you have a victory.

[00:49:56] Scott: And if somebody has something like intestinal parasites, then would the essential oils be an adjunct to something else that might be required to more directly address the parasites, or do we think that the essential oils are the full approach?

[00:50:10] Jodi: I don't think they're the full approach. I actually think colonics are great for parasites, but I think the parasites are also an emotional issue. It's a boundary issue. And we do have a small intestine blend for boundaries, especially us women who are like, you know, I'll do that for you. You know, I'm a mom, I'm a daughter, I'm a friend, I'm a sister, and I'm just my boundaries sometimes get compromised. And I was noticing when I had parasites, I had an infestation of these Indian meal moths which, interestingly, peppermint essential oil, that's what you do for them if you ever get them. They're disgusting, but they hate the smell of peppermint. So, you just spread it on your counters. But I noticed that when I started addressing my own boundaries, you know, like saying no to people, saying I can't talk to you now, but I can talk to you at this time and using our boundary blend, which we call small intestine support; that really made an impact. And somebody, it was Amy Derksen that was testing me and I went back the next time and I did her protocol of the parasite supplements, you know, around the full moon and everything. But I also really used my oil and they were gone, they weren't showing up.

[00:51:13] Scott: Beautiful. So, people listening, dealing with Lyme disease, I'm sure they're going to be interested in can we use essential oils to help deal with Borrelia and Bartonella and Babesia and all of these things that can be significant factors in our overall health, especially dealing with Lyme disease; how do we potentially use the oils to help with those issues? And is it the Immune Support blend or is it something else?

[00:51:37] Jodi: I think those-- I'm going to say this that I think essential oils are great for certain things, I don't think they're great for everything. I think when you start getting into that level of complexity and viruses, there are a lot of tinctures that Dr. Klinghardt works with. And what's interesting is that – cistus tea is a great tea for Lyme, we tried cistus oil, it didn't test as well. And part of that I think has do with oils are concentrated and they're powerful. And sometimes I think especially with chronically ill people, less is more. And so when you're going after the big guns, you know, he has a lot of protocols that are oil-based, that kind of attract them to it. I don't use oils for that level of complexity because I think you really need to be very, very specific, and very monitored. And what I try to do in my company is set everyone up for success so that if they go home and they do it by themselves, they're not going to hurt themselves. So, I feel like that is kind of out of the realm of what you should be using essential oils for. I think you should be working with a clinician for that.

[00:52:41] Scott: Yeah, that makes total sense. And one of my goals has never been to empower people to self-treat. I think they always need to have a partnership with a practitioner in the realm of Lyme disease and mold, illness and so on. It is so incredibly complex. And I do want to empower people with information, but then hopefully, that the information they're going to go take and talk to their practitioners or and see how it fits in with the broader protocol that is being managed.

[00:53:04] Jodi: The one thing I do want to mention that I forgot to say earlier. So, Amy Derksen actually asked me to formulate our Sinus Support formula, which she based off a company that can no longer produce it and you take a Q tip and you can do this with the Histamine Balance one as well, and just kind of gently go around the inside of the nasal passageway. Because one of the challenges of mold is eradicating it because it stays so long in your system. So, you really need to be very clean and clear about clearing out your nasals very frequently. You know, it can land in your tonsils and your sinus cavity. So, that's another low hanging fruit safe to do at home way to kind of treat these things.

[00:53:41] Scott: Beautiful. Let's talk a little bit about biofilm. So, one of, at least from my understanding, one of the nice things about essential oils is that they're not as impacted by biofilms, that they can actually kind of still move into biofilm communities and help address what's being kind of protected from the immune system and others we might be taking. Is that your understanding as well or are there certain essential oils that at a certain point in treatment when we want to address the biofilm aspect of it that we can use those to help break down those harmful biofilms? And I say harmful biofilms because not all biofilms are bad. But what are your thoughts on biofilms?

[00:54:19] Jodi: Yeah, so and if people don't know, biofilms are kind of like this protective little shelter that can harbor pathogens, fungus, metals, and help them really lie undetected, especially in Lyme. That's one reason that Lyme can go undiagnosed for so long because it's impossible to detect. Or like people who take an antibiotic and it works for a while. And then it stops working, you often want to look at biofilms. And so basically what it is, is it's this protection that shields this colony of toxins. And so the minute you open that protective shield, which you can do with essential oils, because unlike antibiotics, they aren't really bacteria resistant, but just think of it you're opening up this floodgate. So, again, this is not your first step, you want to make sure that you know the exit doors are open before you scream emergency. But yes, this is where things like what you were doing, we're taking oregano and thyme internally, can really be powerful. But again, that's something that I really advise you do under the care of a practitioner. I believe Dr. Klinghardt has like an ozonated form of the oregano that he likes people to use. But just because you're opening the floodgates, and that water can flow in different directions. And you could cause temporarily a little bit of harm. So, be careful using it. But the answer is yes, it can be used that way.

[00:55:36] Scott: Beautiful. Let's talk about a few of the common symptoms that people deal with and get your thoughts on these and how we might approach them. So, energy and fatigue are really common complaints in the chronically ill community. How do we use oils to put a little more fuel in our tank, so to speak?

[00:55:52] Jodi: Yeah, and you are the one who introduced me, Annie Hopper. Thank you for that. I think she's really brilliant and she has some great ideas. So, one of the things that she talks about is kind of when your system is stuck in overdrive and stuck in survival mode all the time, it overreacts to everything. And it kind of triggers-- there's this theory, vagus nerve infection hypothesis, that a little infection in the vagus nerve can set you into this state where you think everything is an emergency. And so what happens when you have an emergency, you trigger sickness behavior, right? So, you get tired, you feel achy, you feel in pain, you feel rundown. So, there's a really big theory that I actually buy into that a lot of these symptoms have to do with sickness, behavior, kind of gone wire, you know, limbic system, overdrive of sickness behavior. And so one of the ways that you help to treat this is really to help detoxify the vagus nerve. It really comes down to detoxify in a very smart and thorough way, which I keep looking at Christine and Dr. Klinghardt’s protocols, and Amy Dirksen, that's where they start. Start with everyone.

So, the more you can, you know, if you think about, when you have 20 things to do in a day, everything you're thinking about takes up so much energy. Toxins are kind of low hanging fruit, they take up a lot of energy for your body to process and deal with. And that's why we start by kind of cleaning out our environment and making sure that we're not taking any new toxins we don't need to. And then we start by cleaning out our body. So, the more you can address the toxic load and just help your body detoxify and heal; that's another reason that like fasting or juicing or all these things, you're giving your digestive system arrest and you're allowing toxins to release. So, I think that's an important component that should be considered especially when it's really, really chronic fatigue. When it's more mild fatigue, you know, it's four o'clock and I crave a cup of coffee or a muffin, you know, or I just can't keep my eyes open past 8pm. That's the kind of thing that's easier to address that you can address with either energizing oils like our Lymph blend, mint is really good, peppermint is energizing, our Adrenal blend. It really depends on you know, how extreme things are and what's going to help that person where they're at.

[00:58:13] Scott: Another common complaint people have is cognition, cognitive ability, brain fog. You talked a little bit earlier about how smelling the oils can kind of get right through the olfactory system and into the brain. So, what are some of the oils we might think about if we want to just get a little bit more of a mental edge back as we move through our day?

[00:58:13] Jodi: Yeah, rosemary is great. And it's interesting because all of those issues, including like anxiety, and depression, anytime the brain is inflamed in periods, you know, the ability of your neurons to talk to each other, and that kind of function. So, anything you can do, it's really your forehead, your prefrontal cortex that helps with your cognition and your focus. So, even applying like a little bit of peppermint or a little bit of rosemary on the temple can make a big difference. Another great show tricks that I learned from our colleague, Titus Chiu, if you're having a lot of anxiety or panic attacks, he says that, that is the right frontal lobe, that's over activating. And so the way to balance that is to activate the left frontal lobe and you can do that by smelling something through your left nostril. I have a child who gets very anxious before doing a sporting events or homework. And so I always have our smell things left nostril, it works so quickly, that has been a life-altering trick. So, I hope some of your listeners will appreciate that.

[00:59:29] Scott: So, if we're dealing with let's say, anxiety or depression, we're going to potentially smell some of these things to help. What are some of the blends that you formulated that can help from an anxiety and depression perspective because those are also two symptoms, people dealing with chronic Lyme, mold illness, very, very common, and really, really negatively impact people's lives. So, how can we support mood neurotransmitters, anxiety, depression with oils?

[00:59:52] Jodi: So, anxiety and depression I see as slightly different things. For anxiety, it's almost like you're too wrapped up and you want to help them balance and calm down. So, parasympathetic, you can apply it right behind your earlobe on the - bone or smell it through your left nostril. Adrenal, putting it on your low back helps you kind of ground and center and feel calmer. You can even you know, if you're new to oils, and you're just like, I'm not so sure about this, you can buy lavender at your supermarket and just try smelling it through your left nostril and see if it makes a difference. For depression, that's really brain inflammation and you want to help calm it down. You know, rose oil, as I mentioned, actually blocks that fear-based response and fear can be paralyzing. Fear is really the opposite of feeling safe, right? And we need to really feel safe to function. And when we don't feel safe, sometimes we isolate and you know, we're stuck in freeze. So, even rubbing some rose oil over your heart. Frankincense is amazing for depression. Frankincense is kind of an all-around player, it's really good for a lot of things. It's just got a very distinctive smell. It's very resony, and so I would encourage people, if you smell it, and it doesn't smell good, it's probably not your fit. You usually are attracted to what you need, you know, just like you might crave a hamburger when you need iron, or chocolate when you need magnesium. You know, follow your nose, you'll know if something is right for you or not.

[01:01:16] Scott: Let's talk a little bit about hypercoagulation and oxygenation. So, when we have chronic infections, oftentimes the blood becomes more viscous or sticky, what's called hypercoagulation that can make some of the other things that we're doing treatment wise maybe not be quite as effective and not getting as deeply into the body. Oxygen can be affected as well and be a little bit lower. So, do essential oils have the potential to help with the circulation hypercoagulation and oxygenation issue?

[01:01:45] Jodi: Yeah, so what you're really talking about is stagnation and the flow in the body. So there's certain essential oils like a Cypress actually. If you think about what trees do, they help to move the nutrients, you know, from the roots up to the leaves. So, tree oils are really great circulation, like birch is actually great for energy. Cypress is really great for circulation. Black Pepper helps with movement, so they can help to an extent but you know, like everything, you need to look at the underlying issue of what is causing this. Dr. Klinghardt, like he sometimes thinks that they're parasites that hang out in the neck in the veins, because that's where all the nutrient-rich blood is. So, it's a little bit like a band-aid at a certain point, you need to get to the underlying root issue, and I'm not sure that oils are the best for that. But they can certainly help with flow and movement and the release of stagnation.

[01:02:35] Scott: Let's talk then about supporting the endocrine system. So, many people with chronic illness have lower hormones, maybe low testosterone, estrogen, progesterone, those types of things, they feel like their tank is empty. How do we support hormone balance with oils and is it by focusing on those - testosterone, estrogen, progesterone? Or is it by supporting higher up like you mentioned earlier, the hypothalamus that then kind of access that master regulator?

[01:03:01] Jodi: I think both. I think that you need to support the hypothalamus, which acts as the master regulator, and when it's imbalanced, then it will signal the release of the optimal hormones and neurotransmitters. You know, the hypothalamus is actually in charge of a lot of hormones in the brain that are really important. But I also think one of the issues of hormones is that the toxins aren't leaving your body, right, and so they're getting recirculated. Like this is a big issue for women with estrogen dominance. So, when I think about supporting the hormones, I actually think higher up so balancing the hypothalamus with essential oils. And then I think about really supporting the gallbladder and the liver, to ensure that the old toxins are leaving the body and not getting reabsorbed. And then I really think about the adrenal because as we know, cortisol has a precursor, which is pregnenolone. Pregnenolone can either be used to make cortisol or it can be used to make progesterone. And if you're in a chronic state of emergency, the body is going to prioritize survival. So, if you can balance those three things, you can help to naturally put the body back into balance so that the hormones flow as they should.

[01:04:07] Scott: So, if our focus initially maybe is starting on supporting the hypothalamus, which of the formulas you've put together would be the one we'd want to look at?

[01:04:14] Jodi: We actually have one called Hypothalamus. And what we're really trying to do it from frequency medicine that matches the frequency of, you know, an intact hypothalamus. And I almost use it as you know, when your phone glitches, if you turn it off and turn it on it, reboots it. I feel like rebooting the hypothalamus is really important, especially if it's so overstimulated in this day and age.

[01:04:39] Scott: Well, and it's interesting because we both are fans of Annie Hopper's work and DNRS, and the hypothalamus being part of that whole limbic system as well, right, the hypothalamus and the amygdala. So, being able to support the hypothalamus makes sense to me even if we're doing something like DNRS, it seems like that could be a really nice pairing.

[01:04:57] Jodi: I had thought of that, that oils would be a really nice component to that. And I also really appreciate that before she even started that she was very straightforward that she did a lot of detox and heavy metals. Because I think just like interference fields, if your body is toxic, and you're trying to help detoxify your emotions, it won't clear as fast if you're doing that at the same time. So, yeah, I agree.

[01:05:21] Scott: So, another symptom I commonly hear people ask about is tinnitus. So, that can be something people experience really impacts their life, very few solutions, very few people seem to understand what the potential causes are. Have you had any luck reducing our resolving tinnitus with essential oils?

[01:05:38] Jodi: I have, as a matter of fact. Christine seems to think that it's kind of metals and parasites near the ear. And so helping to, and actually, what's interesting is that the point that we use for applying the parasympathetic oil, San Jiao 17, is the acupuncture point for tinnitus. So, we've had a lot of benefits. You know, again, it's what you're really doing is detoxifying heavy metals to make sure that you're taking binders as well. But yeah, topically applying the Parasympathetic oil behind the ear has been really helpful for a lot of people.

[01:06:08] Scott: Beautiful. We talked a little bit earlier about dental issues. So, let's talk about the oral microbiome that's really critical in terms of its impact on our systemic microbiome and its imbalance or balance. How might we use essential oils to reduce pathogens in the mouth, to improve gum health, to minimize the impact of cavity patients and generally support better health? Is there a specific formula that you've put together that we can use to really optimize the oral microbiome?

[01:06:36] Jodi: You know, I kind of think that if something's not broken, and it works, I'm a big fan of oil pulling. I like sesame oil or coconut oil. And you can certainly add a drop of Parasympathetic to amplify it, but I think that that's honestly the most effective way to help. You know, because what happens is, the pathogens are fat-based. And so fat likes fat, so you're swishing the oil around in the mouth, and it almost pulls the pathogens out. Like a magnet, I would never have someone swish that much essential oil around. So, use your coconut oil or use your sesame oil, but if you want to add a drop to just kind of add to the process, Colloidal Silver is also a great one to use.

[01:07:17] Scott: Okay, beautiful. So, let's then talk, we talked a lot about these really great oils that you've put together with Vibrant Blue Oils. If you had to pick five of your products that are really at the top of the list for people dealing with significant chronic illnesses like Lyme disease, like mold illness, chronic fatigue, fibromyalgia, those types of things; which ones could you not live without?

[01:07:39] Jodi: I cannot live without Parasympathetic. I think it is something, you know, if people only learn one thing from our entire conversation, if you can help turn on the communication between your brain and your body, it's almost like you've been spending all of this time trying to heal and you're biking uphill against the wind. It's like suddenly you turn around and you're able to bike downhill with the wind at your back, it makes the biggest difference and it helps every single thing that you're already doing, you don't need to change your protocol. It's one small pivot that has a really big impact. So, that is number one. Number two is our Lymph oil because the body is a hydraulic system. If you can help with movement and flow out of the head and out of the body, you're going to feel a lot better. Number three is our Adrenal blend because energy is so important. And also when you balance your adrenals, you kind of balance your resilience like I do every day, those are the three oils I always use. And I've noticed if I'm feeling wobbly are out of balance, of I put the Adrenal on, it makes the biggest difference. I'm just able to like physically be centered. Number four is our Histamine Balance because I do travel a lot, and it just helps me kind of stay resilient. It doesn't really matter what the environment is like I had a trainer one time who I didn't like the music. And he said, it doesn't matter what the music is, it doesn't matter if the football team from Hawaii is playing a snowstorm, the only thing you can control is kind of yourself and your response. And if you're controlling that, if you're modulating your own immune system, then you're going to be fine no matter what. And the fifth one that I love is our Circadian Rhythm one, which helps you to fall asleep and naturally release melatonin. We didn't really talk about melatonin, but it's incredibly detoxifying and healing. So, those are the five I never leave home without. I actually carry them all in my purse.

[01:09:27] Scott: Beautiful. And I know she does because you've pulled them out of your person, and given me the opportunity to try some of these as well. So, if people are interested in learning more about Vibrant Blue Oils, tell us how they can learn more about your work and the essential oils that you've put together?

[01:09:41] Jodi: I want to give you guys a great checklist that just shows you some of the things that might be coming up if the Parasympathetic blend would be helpful for you. It's something no one really compiled, and I decided I needed to do it. So, if you see three or more of these are issues for you, and it will kind of link you to a coupon to buy things but our website is Vibrant Blue Oils, vibrant blue like the color oils.com, and you can always email me at info@VibrantBlueOils, and I try to get back to you within 24 hours.

[01:10:10] Scott: Beautiful. The last question is the same for all of my guests. And that is, what are some of the key things that you do on a daily basis in support of your own health?

[01:10:19] Jodi: I do yoga or some kind of exercise every day. And before I do that, when I wake up, I apply the Parasympathetic blend, the Adrenal blend, and the Lymph blend. And I just love it, it feels like you know, you have these little rituals, like some people it's like getting their morning coffee. But for me, that just makes me feel like I'm in balance, and I have my armor to face today.

[01:10:41] Scott: Beautiful, fantastic. I've learned a lot from our conversation today. I have learned which oil I can get so that I can get busy cleaning up my office and a few other things around here that needs additional focus and attention. I appreciate your time and sharing all this great information and the products that you've put together. You've been very generous with your time and obviously, have so much great information. And I do think for people that are interested there's a tremendous amount of information that Jodi’s has put together on her website. And so I'll have the link to the website in the show notes. But definitely check it out, lots of great stuff there. And thank you, Jodi, so, so much for everything that you're doing.

[01:11:18] Jodi: Thank you.

[01:11:20] Scott: To learn more about today's guest, visit VibrantBlueOils.com. That's VibrantBlueOils.com, VibrantBlueOils.com.

Thanks for your interest in today's show. If you'd like to follow me on Facebook or Twitter you can find me there as Better Health Guy. To support the show please visit BetterHealthGuy.com/donate. If you'd like to be added to my newsletter, visit BetterHealthGuy.com/newsletters, and this and other shows can be found on YouTube, iTunes, Google Play Stitcher and Spotify.

[01:11:59] Thanks for listening to this BetterHealthGuy Blogcast with Scott, your Better Health Guy. To check out additional shows and learn more about Scott's personal journey to better health, please visit BetterHealthGuy.com.

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Disclaimer

The content of this show is for informational purposes only and is not intended to diagnose, treat, or cure any illness or medical condition. Nothing in today's discussion is meant to serve as medical advice or as information to facilitate self-treatment. As always, please discuss any potential health-related decisions with your own personal medical authority.