Relax with Aromatherapy and Nurture Yourself for Winter Wellness.
Got too much on your to-do list? Slow down and smell the pine and balsam! Delegate whenever possible—and make some quality time for yourself.
My latest book, Fat Flush for Life, the Year-Round Super Detox Plan to Boost Your Metabolism and Keep the Weight Off Permanently offers a number of mind-body strategies to stay calm amidst all the stressors in our lives. During detox—especially in the winter when your body naturally slows down—it’s important to be gentle with yourself.
A hot bath is an excellent way to reduce holiday stress, soothe muscles, care for winter skin, and encourage detox by opening up and stimulating lymph flow—releasing toxins through perspiration. Adding essential oils supercharges your bath by including the benefits of aromatherapy.
Healing Aromatherapy
Essential oils are distilled from flowers, leaves, and roots of wild or organically grown plants. Your nose inhales aromatherapy oils, sending a soothing message to the portion of your brain that initiates feelings of well-being and harmony, as quickly as your skin absorbs these oils.
Aromatherapy also helps reduce water retention (or “fake fat”) so common this time of year) and fat deposits in the body. If you’re still sore from shoveling out in the last snowstorm, adding essential oils to your bath also relieves muscle aches and tension. Too keyed up to sleep well? Essential oils in your bath can promote beneficial deep sleep, important in maintaining a healthy weight and overall wellness.
Add 10 drops of your favorite aromatherapy oil to a hot bath. You can combine oils but don’t use more than a total of 10 drops. This winter, try aromatherapy oils like lavender and rose to help reduce cravings and stress. Rosemary essential oils also relieve muscle aches, pains, and even arthritis.
Other oils for winter wellness? Geranium is antibacterial, antifungal, anti-inflammatory—and supports the adrenal glands, so important in relieving stress and protecting the thyroid. Essential oil of thyme helps build immunity, while marjoram and sandalwood are calming oils that help relieve stress.
Here’s a quick tip from Fat Flush for Life: To extend the healing benefits of aromatherapy, put a few drops on cold light bulbs in your home or office. When you turn on the light, the heat from the bulb will automatically diffuse the scent, helping you “chill out” automatically.
Love Yourself—and Your Lymph
Most people mistakenly consider massage a luxury. It’s not! Research finds that massage can stimulate nearly 80% of stagnant lymph back into circulation. All too often overlooked, the lymphatic system—called the “garbage collector of the body”—transports all kinds of toxins and wastes that the liver fails to process.
Unlike blood that the heart pumps continually throughout the body, lymph circulation depends entirely on your own movement (so don’t sit for long periods of time), dry brushing, and massage. The lymph-rich areas you want to stimulate include the arms, chest, face, and neck. Remember The Fat Flush Fitness Plan? It’s full of pictures and detailed descriptions for self-massage that can help you “love your lymph” and detox naturally.
When massage targets the areas that have the highest concentration of lymph vessels, you can boost lymph flow by 20-fold, dramatically enhancing the elimination of fats and toxins. Equally important this time of year, massage helps decrease belly-fattening levels of cortisol, lowering stress and leading to a slimmer, happier you.
Also establish some healing winter rituals. In Fat Flush for Life, I recommend setting aside one day each week to rest, reflect, and rejuvenate (Sabbath ritual) this time of year. And meditate for at least 10 minutes to clear and rest your mind.
DIY Pampering
Equally important over the busy holiday season is making time for fun. Schedule a DIY home spa evening with your girlfriends. Your skin is your body’s largest organ of detoxification—and probably needs a little extra TLC this time of year.
“Gift” each other with nontoxic, natural personal care products and aromatherapy oils. And share beauty secrets. Here are some of mine:
• For fine lines and wrinkles, pierce a capsule containing 200 IU of natural Vitamin E (d-alpha or mixed tocopherol), and rub this oil gently onto wrinkled skin every night before going to bed. (This works wonders on cuticles too!)
• For puffy eyes (something my online pals asked about in response to a recent blog), steep herbal tea bags in water for 20 minutes and then refrigerate. Place a cool, wet tea bag under each eye. Tea contains inflammation-reducing tannic acid that quickly reduces puffiness. I find chamomile tea especially refreshing and helpful in toning sensitive skin around the eyes.
Nurturing Support
Whether you’re trading beauty tips or chatting over the phone, your circle of friends always makes life brighter and funnier. Women respond to stress—even holiday stressors—differently than men do, because of hormonal differences.
A landmark UCLA study shows that women under stress produce brain chemicals that open them up to making and maintaining friendships with other women. According to Laura Cousin Klein, PhD, one of the study’s lead authors, women release the hormone oxycotin as part of their stress response, which makes us gravitate to family and friends.
The Fat Flush Forum has long offered this kind of nurturing and supportive environment. Even online, friends help us live longer and healthier lives. I invite you to join our Forum and discover how wonderfully encouraging Fat Flushers can be.
Just in Time for Holiday Giving
Fat Flush for Life is NOW Available! Order today!
Sources:
Fat Flush for Life
www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19831048
www.anapsid.org/cnd/gender/tendfend.html
www.lymphomation.org/lymphatic.htm
www.naha.org/faq_safety.htm
Visionary, health guru, diet/detox expert, author, spokesperson, role model, and natural foods icon, Ann Louise Gittleman has always been a trendsetter. 
So glad to see you mentioning lymph health. I dry brush almost day and my skin looks so much bettr.
Can’t wait to try vitamin E on my cuticles!
What a nice idea for girl time too.
the lymph is the river of life
Can lymph massage help with cellulite?
I really love grapefruit and just found it’s also an essential oil. It’s great in my bath water.
Thanks for this nice article!
Lympth massage is VERY helpful for cellulite as is Classic Fat Flush (phase 1 two week Fat Flush) and jumping on trampoline