Essential Oil Myths

Essential oils can be found in the health arsenals of many moms nowadays. And why would it not be? The therapeutic benefits that these essential oils claim are very promising. As parents, we want to provide our children with the safest, and hopefully, more natural alternatives for their health.
With its proliferation, there have been many exaggerated claims for these oils, which you can find in Facebook groups and even in books. But how do you weed out the myths from the truth?
Today, let us dive into the most common myths you may encounter:
- All essential oils are safe to use regardless of how you use them because they are all-natural. Essential oils are beautiful products of nature, but they should be used with caution and care like anything in this world. While essential oils are amazing products of nature, they have already been ‘artificially’ concentrated through the extraction process. According to the Essential Oil Safety Masterclass, I attended with Robert Tisserand, author of Essential Oil Safety and the founder of Tisserand Institute, the concentration of the essential oil that you have in a bottle is something that you cannot find anywhere in nature. Because it is so concentrated, the power of these essential oils is highly potent, so we need to use them in minimal amounts and safe dilutions, mainly when applied topically on children and to those with hypersensitive skin.
- Essential oils will never go bad. This is simply not true. A lot of essential oils, especially citrus oils, would go rancid in a year. This is attributed to the process called oxidation, where oxygen can bond with your oil’s carbon atoms, altering its composition. Because it is already in its altered molecular state, your essential oil may not bring the benefits that you are expecting. One way to test this is to compare your newly-opened orange essential oil to your one-year-old orange oil. You will notice that your ‘aged’ oil does not smell vibrant anymore or may even have an odor that seems quite “off.” Oxidized oils can cause skin irritation.
- Essential oils will not cause skin irritation. Many claim that oils cannot cause allergies or skin irritation and attribute to detoxification when rashes appear. This has little to no truth in it. According to the National Association for Holistic Aromatherapy (NAHA), dermal or skin reactions that may occur with essential oils include irritation, sensitization, and phototoxicity/photosensitization. In addition, several oils are highly irritating to the skin, such as lemongrass, oregano, cinnamon bark, and clove to name a few.
- Essential oils are just like their source – they offer vitamins and minerals. Many people substitute their lemon with lemon oil in water, thinking they provide the same vitamins and minerals as the fruit. However, essential oils do not contain any of these nutrients. Essential oils are composed only of chemical components, and in the case of lemon essential oil, d-limonene with very different therapeutic benefits from that of Vitamin C.
- There is only one company that sells therapeutic-grade essential oils. Sad to say, there is no international regulating body for the quality of essential oils in the market. It is, thus, necessary to know your source and the practices they engage in. My own benchmark is the reputation of the brand that I am using. I joined several aromatherapy groups to check out different brands aromatherapists use. I also check if they follow the guidelines set by organizations such as NAHA or AIA; both promote the safe use of essential oils. I also am inclined towards companies that issue a GC/MS report. GC/MS or gas chromatography/mass spectrometry is a report that shows the different chemical constituents of an essential oil and their ranges. The bottom line is to find the company that resonates with you. Test their oil (do not hoard yet) and see if they work for you!
- You have to have ALL essential oils. Well, if you are a hoarder and you can afford it, why not? But a lot of essential oils can be a substitute for one another. For example, citrus oils that contain d-limonene have similar therapeutic actions; linalool that can be found in Lavender (Lavandula angustifolia) can be found in Ho Wood and Rosewood, and so on. Study your essential oils so that you can maximize using them.
Essential oils are here to stay, and if you intend to use them regularly to promote your family’s vital energy, it is crucial to know how you can use them effectively yet safely. Learn more about essential oils on my Youtube channel or through different resources on this blog.
7 things I wish I knew when I started with essential oils
My journey with essential oil education started when I burned my son Santi, who was then 18 months, with Young Living Thieves diluted at 1% for his ringworm. This “protocol” was what I saw in my MLM groups before and not doing any diligent research on essential oils and copying recipes left and right, I unintentionally harmed my baby.
Since then, I have been passionate about educating parents about the safe and effective use of essential oils because I would not want any other parent feeling guilty for harming their children when their intention was only to integrate these wonderful aromatics and therapeutic essential oils into their wellness toolkit.
However, the Internet and social media groups are full of misinformation hinged on essential oil companies trying to sell all their oils and making their users use them indiscriminately. Most safety guidelines are not discussed and so it has been the role of many aromatherapists and aromatherapy organizations like the National Association for Holistic Aromatherapy (NAHA) to promote safe and effective aromatherapy.

So just to get you started, I compiled some things I wished I knew when I started using essential oils:
- Not all essentials oils are safe.
There are a lot of oils that are not safe for babies. In fact, I highly discourage the use of essential oils on children below one and minimum use for children below two. There are some safer products than essential oils such as hydrosols. P.S. if you are a mom who wants to be empowered on how to use essential oils safely and effectively on your kids, please do watch out for my upcoming workshops.
- Less is more when it comes to essential oils.
To paraphrase one of my favorite authors, Robert Tisserand, “While essential oils are natural, their concentration is something that you can not find in nature.” In my practice as an aromatherapist, I have found that a 1% dilution – 2 drops of essential oils in 10mL carrier oil – can already be very powerful as a complementary therapy to certain issues (congestion or insect bites, for example). Always start low and just increase the drops when totally necessary.
- There is no need to use essential oils all the time.
Even if my oils are just with me, I don’t use them all the time. Essential oils are still considered xenobiotics. Xenobiotic is a term used to describe chemical substances that are foreign to animal life and thus includes such examples as plant constituents, drugs, pesticides, cosmetics, flavorings, fragrances, food additives, industrial chemicals, and environmental pollutants (Patterson, A., Gonzales, F., Idle, J., 2010)
It is thus important to be mindful of how the body processes the essential oils and if they are not needed, we are just adding extra load to our internal organs.
- There is no therapeutic grading for essential oils.
It’s either 100% essential oil or not. A pure essential oil would deliver its therapeutic benefits based on its chemical composition regardless of the brand. The term “therapeutic grade” is just a marketing term some companies use to imply that their oils are better than others, thus claiming higher pricing. I have seen more affordable pure essential oil brands that delivers the same benefits as other essential oils claiming to be the only “therapeutic-grade oils in the market.
- Essential oils have shelf-life.
Contrary to what is being promulgated that essential oils do not go bad, they actually do. Essential oils with lighter molecules such as the ones in the citruses are prone to the process of oxidation. Essential oils that have oxidized may cause (1) skin sensitization; (2) degradation or loss of therapeutic benefits, and/or (3) in some rare cases, turn into a toxic, harmful substance.
- Essential oils do not have vitamins or minerals.
Another one of my favorite myths to bust. Lemon essential oil do not contain vitamins that you can see in a lemon. Plain and simple. Let us compare the composition of these two:
This is what you will see in a LEMON JUICE. As you can see below, it contains phenolic acids and Vitamin C.

Now, this is what you will see in a lemon essential oil from a gas chromatography/mass spectometry report of one of the batch for Plant Therapy essential oils – all chemical constituents, no phenolic acids and certainly, NO VITAMINS AND MINERALS!
So please, if you want the vitamins, just juice some lemon and stay off from putting your essential oils in water because it may cause some gastro-intestinal irritation or damage in the long run.
- You don’t need to hoard all essential oils.

Yes, you heard me right! Unless of course you want to and you can use them.
First, a lot of oils can do so many things. Lavender can be used for pain, for anxiety, for sleep, for skin issues and this is the same for many other oils. Know what your oils can do so that you don’t need to always buy.
Second, think about the shelf-life issue I mentioned above. Hoarding them and keeping them stashed thinking they will live forever is waste of your money.
Lastly, think about the plant material that goes into the production of a bottle of essential oil. Just to give you an idea, according to Ecowatch, we use 250lbs of lavender plant to product 1lb of lavender essential oil. If we use too much, more than we really need, we also risk the fast depletion of these plants in nature unless we are sure that there are conservation practices in place.
Soooooo, saying all these, I hope that you learned a thing or two. If you found this helpful, please spread the word and share with your fellow oilers. Let us all practice safe oiling!
References:
Patterson, A., Gonzales, F., Idle, J. (2010). Xenobiotic Metabolism – A View Through the Metabolometer. Chem Res Toxicol. 23(5), 851–860. doi: 10.1021/tx100020p
Klimek-Szczykutowicz, M., Szopa, A., Ekiert, H., (2020). Citrus limon (Lemon) Phenomenon—A Review of the Chemistry, Pharmacological Properties, Applications in the Modern Pharmaceutical, Food, and Cosmetics Industries, and Biotechnological Studies. Plants (Basel). 9(1), 119. doi: 10.3390/plants9010119