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Essential Oils For Bruises
When someone gets a bruise, they generally just let it alone and leave the body to do the healing. But sometimes, a bruise can be painful or can take a particularly long time to heal, and in those cases, it can be beneficial to have some essential oils that you can use for bruises. Luckily, there are several that are effective, treating the cause behind the bruise itself and even the pain or discoloration from the bruise. Essential oils may help a bruise look better cosmetically, heal much faster or not be as painful.
How Do Bruises Form
A bruise happens when a part of your body impacts with something else. This causes the capillaries underneath the skin to break. Bruises are several different colors depending upon what stage the bruise is in. When you first sustain the injury, the area will look very red because when the capillaries burst, the blood leaks out. You will notice as the days go by, the bruise will become blue or purple. You will know that the bruise is healing correctly when it turns a yellow or brown color; usually a week after the injury was sustained. In the cases of bruises that do not heal properly through the body’s natural processes, essential oils can be used to treat them.
What Prevents a Bruise from Healing Properly?
Sometimes the bruise doesn’t heal properly. There are two things that can happen if the bruise doesn’t heal like it should; the first is called hematoma. A hematoma is when the body pools blood in a certain location that separates it from the rest of the blood. The bruise will become hard and may actually increase to a larger size than it was when you first sustained the injury. If this happens, your doctor may need to use a needle to drain it. There is also a problem if the body decides to deposit bone material – calcium – at the site of the bruise. You will know this is the case because the bruise becomes firm and tender to the touch. The only way to diagnose this problem is with an x-ray.
Beyond the Scope of Bruises
Besides bruising, essential oils can help with related conditions like cuts, scrapes, bites, stings and burns. That’s because many essential oils have properties that treat these types of injuries, such as being anti-inflammatory, anti-fungal, antibacterial and analgesic. Of course, not every essential oil is appropriate for every type of injury listed above, but the point is that no matter what sort of injury you have sustained, there is probably an essential oil that will work to heal it, and reduce the pain, swelling or other symptoms.
Methods of Application for Bruising
There are a few different methods of application for bruises. One of the most common ways is to gently massage the oil into the area of the bruise, which may be tender. If you don’t want to rub the oil directly onto the bruise, you can do a hot or cold compress. This is simply a washcloth that is run under hot or cold water and then wrung out; then the essential oils are added to it and it is pressed against the bruise for a few minutes, several times per day. You can also mix the essential oils with a carrier oil – which  makes it the consistency of a lotion – in order to apply it.
Bruises that Require Medical Attention
Most of the time, a bruise is not a serious problem. But there are some reasons that you should be wary of a bruise and seek medical attention. For example, if you can’t understand why you have a bruise, or if the bruise may have formed because of a broken bone. Also, bruises may be painful to the touch, but if there is severe pain and swelling, you should contact your doctor right away. Finally, the bruise should take no longer than two weeks to begin fading. If it doesn’t, you should talk to your doctor.
Essential Oils for Treating Bruises
There are a number of essential oils that are good for treating bruises. These are chosen for their particular attributes that help a bruise to heal, or because they are able to help with some other aspect of the bruise, such as reducing pain. Here are some essential oils that you can use to treat a bruise and make it heal faster.
Lavender Essential Oil
Lavender is the best choice of an essential oil to put on directly after an injury that will probably leave a bruise has occurred. That’s because lavender helps to restrict blood flow. You can make an ice pack and cover it with a dry washcloth; then hold it onto the bruise for 5-10 minutes, removing it when it becomes too cold. Pour a few drops of lavender into a carrier oil that will allow you to massage the solution on the bruise. You can do this several times per day and it will help the bruise to heal faster, as well as reduce the pain and inflammation and bring down any swelling.
Cypress Essential Oil
Cypress essential oil can be applied much the same way as lavender, and should also be applied directly after an injury happens, rather than when the bruise starts to form. Both cypress and lavender work to keep the bruise from forming in the first place – which is by preventing the constriction of blood at the injury site. That’s why a bruise forms in the first place, because the blood pools in a specific point in the body, and that’s why the bruise appears dark red or purple. You can do the same thing that you did with the lavender – use an ice pack. Hold it on the area until you can’t stand it any longer and then remove it, repeating this process for about ten minutes 5-6 times per day. Don’t go over ten minutes daily, however, of the bruise may not heal properly.
Helichrysum Essential Oil
The third essential oil that we are going to discuss in relation to bruises is Helichrysum. This essential oil works much in the same way and is the lavender and Cypress essential oil but with a slightly different methodology. Where lavender and Cypress prevent the constriction of blood which is what forms a bruise, the way that helichrysum works is by helping the blood to circulate better. You want to use this essential oil after the bruise is already started to form. Sometimes you don’t know if a specific injury is going to result in a bruise because it may not seem like you have done enough damage to be bruised from it, and so it is difficult to do preventative maintenance like Cypress and lavender essential oil, which is exactly the type of situation where helichrysum can be used. Once the swelling has gone down all you need to do is combine blank with some type of carrier oil, such as olive oil or sweet almond oil, and then rub the solution onto the bruised area very gently. You can do this 3 to 4 times a day until the bruise begins to fade.
Lemongrass Essential Oil
Sometimes a bruise can be particularly painful, so much so that you want to take a pain reliever because of it. Of course, the whole point of using essential oils is to avoid standard treatments like anti-inflammatory and analgesic pain medication that you get over-the-counter, in favor of something natural. However, sometimes the pain from a bruise can be bad enough that you need to do something, and that’s the perfect place for lemongrass essential oil to come in. Lemongrass essential oil is a pain reliever that has its own anti-inflammatory properties. You simply add lemongrass to your favorite carrier oil and then rub it onto the bruised area very gently. Immediately, you will notice that the pain starts to subside but another attribute of lemongrass is that has the ability to help damaged tissue repair itself which means that you will heal faster. Lemongrass has anti-irritant, anti-inflammatory antibacterial and antioxidant properties.
Geranium Essential Oil
Geranium essential oil is our final entry on the list of essential oils that help you to heal bruises faster and repair the tissue that is been damaged by the injury. This is another essential oil that you can use after the injury has been sustained and when you have noticed a bruise starting to form. Mix the geranium essential oil with a carrier oil and then massage it onto the injured area. Geranium has a really great smell and you can combine it with other oils like lemongrass essential oil for pain relief.