Episode 82: Sleeping Soundly and White Grapefruit

doTERRA: Sleep is an incredibly important—but often neglected—part of our overall health and well-being. When we don't get enough sleep, our body notices and other health issues can start to arise. So doing everything you can to get better sleep at night is absolutely vital. And today, we're going to show you some natural solutions to help you get your best sleep.

Welcome back to Essential Oil Solutions with doTERRA, the podcast where you'll hear exciting, useful, and simple everyday uses for essential oils from experts in the field. If you like what you hear today, rate, review, and subscribe wherever you listen. We always appreciate hearing from you.

Today, we're excited to talk to Sharla Butler, a member of the doTERRA product marketing team, about how to utilize doTERRA products to support your body's sleep. Sharla, thank you so much for being here with us today to talk about this topic that I think affects everyone's life.

Sharla Butler: Yeah, thanks for having me! I agree.

doTERRA: So my first question for you is how can essential oils help me to create a relaxing environment?

Sharla: Well, there are a lot of essential oils, and I feel like a lot of people are very confused about which one to use. And my rule of thumb for using essential oils is to smell them. And if it's something that really agrees with you, it's something that you should use.

And relaxing is a term that is subjective to everyone, correct? So I think by smelling an oil and deciding whether or not it's for you is a good place to start. And some of the ones that I would start with that create a good relaxing environment that are known for those things are like Neroli, for example, or Spikenard or Cedarwood. And a really popular one is Clary Sage, which I don't think a lot of people know about. And Lavender, of course, is the most popular one that most people know of and that is used by probably more people in the world for that same reason.

Some of the other ones that are really good are like Melissa or Ylang Ylang. The florals tend to have a good aroma that cause a good relaxing environment and there's also oils, like I said, like Cedarwood, Siberian Fir, Sandalwood, that are the tree oils that also create a good environment for relaxing and meditation, for example. I know a lot of people use that as a practice for relaxing.

doTERRA: I love all of those suggestions, and I love the advice to just smell the oil and see what you connect with. I think that's wonderful.

Sharla: A lot of them will blend together and create a really nice blend that is personal to you and creates the environment that you want.

doTERRA: So moving past just our environment, how about using oils internally? What doTERRA products can I use internally to help me get better rest at night?

Sharla: Well, Serenity is a great one for that and we do have that in a softgel. Serenity Softgels are probably the most popular one to take internally. Also Copaiba Softgels are a popular one, and Adaptiv. And they're used for different reasons.

Serenity is usually used to help create calm in restlessness and help relax. Adaptiv is usually used for calming occasional anxiousness. And Copaiba can be used for either one of those things and also paired with either one of those to help encourage those oils to be the best that they could be.

doTERRA: Everything's better with Copaiba, right?

Sharla: That's right!

doTERRA: So Charlotte, my final question for you is what essential oils or supplements do you like to incorporate into your personal bedtime routine?

Sharla: The one I like the most is, of course, Lavender. But I also enjoy Neroli Touch. I use that one a lot. Or the Neroli oil for that matter. Those two are popular. I also like Clary Sage. It's nice in a bath. It helps before bedtime. Diffusing any of those—Serenity is also a good one to diffuse at night, helps get calmed down, the restlessness, and prepare yourself for bed. And then Adaptiv can be used for also a bath or to diffuse at night. So I feel like those three are the best—that work the best for me.

doTERRA: Well Sharla, thank you so much for talking with us today, sharing your advice and your bedtime routine. We really appreciate it.

Sharla: Thank you.

doTERRA: The forbidden fruit. The smaller shaddock. One of the seven wonders of Barbados. The grapefruit has been called many things in its history. And compared to the lemon or the orange, the grapefruit is a fairly recent addition to the citrus family. It was first spotted on the island of Barbados in 1750 by Reverend Griffith Hughes, who documented his find in his book The Natural History of Barbados.

What is the origin of the grapefruit?

Now, the genetic origin of the grapefruit is actually a hybrid mix. One ancestor of the grapefruit was the Jamaican sweet orange, which is itself an ancient hybrid of Asian orange. The other was the Indonesian pomelo.

One story of the fruit’s origin is that a certain Captain Shaddock brought pomelo seeds to Jamaica and bred the first fruit. Although, it's more likely that it probably originated as a naturally occurring hybrid between the two plants sometime after they had been introduced there.

Where did the name grapefruit come from?

The grapefruit, like all citrus fruit, is a hesperidium—or a large modified berry with a thick rind—and was known only as the shaddock until the 19th century. So how did it come to be known as the grapefruit?

As it turns out, it's a relatively new occurrence. The first etymology of the name grapefruit is from an 1814 book by John Lunan, where it was said to have the name because of its resemblance in flavor to the grape. But that doesn't really make sense because anyone who's tasted a grapefruit knows that that isn't true. Most scholars think that he was just attempting to explain the origin of a name he ran across.

The most popular belief for where the name comes from is that it actually refers to the shape of the fruit, not the flavor. Grapefruits grow on the tree in clusters which often are said to appear similar to grapes. But there are only a few other languages that make the link between grapefruits and grapes.

In Romance languages, grapefruit usually shares the same name as its ancestor: the pomelo. For example, pompelmo in Italian and pamplemusa in Spanish. In fact, Romanian is the only Romance language to distinguish between the two.

A few other languages have also adopted the American word grapefruit, even though they don't have the same word for grape. Examples of these are Dutch, Swedish, and Turkish.

But this has led some etymologists, chiefly John Ciardi, to suspect that grapefruit is also named after the pomelo. The pomelo’s scientific name is Citrus maxima, which can reasonably be translated as “great fruit,” a reference to both the pomelo and the fruit’s size. After a few decades, that may have gotten corrupted into grapefruit, but we may never really know for sure.

What is the history behind grapefruit?

Unlike other earlier citrus fruits—like the orange, the lemon, and the lime—the grapefruit received a rather cold reception. Although already swimming in citrus at the time, most fruit lovers in Florida found the grapefruit to be too sour to enjoy on a regular basis. As a result, it was not widely planted when the Florida citrus industry was rapidly expanding. In fact, the grapefruit was just considered an exotic novelty fruit until the late 1920s. So how did the grapefruit go from being too sour to enjoy on a regular basis to the popular fruit it is today?

Well at first, the tree was grown only as a novelty in Florida, and the fruit was barely used. Even in Jamaica, where the fruit originates, the trees were often cut down. However, the original white grapefruit was joined by a pink and, later, a red variety that were much sweeter than its predecessors. The discovery of these new shades caught the public's imagination and helped the little-known fruit become a supermarket staple.

White grapefruit also became an extremely popular diet food in the 1930s, both in fresh and juice form. An early pioneer in the American citrus industry was Kimball Atwood, a wealthy entrepreneur who founded the Atwood Grapefruit Company in the late 19th century. The Atwood grove became the largest grapefruit grove in the world, with a yearly output of eighty thousand boxes of fruit. And it was there, in fact, that the pink grapefruit was discovered in 1906.

Today, America loves the grapefruit and is the world's largest consumer of the fruit, with large commercial groves in Arizona, California, Florida, and Texas. But grapefruit isn't just known for its delicious taste. It has also been used throughout history for its many benefits.

What are some ways that grapefruit is used?

In traditional Chinese medicine, grapefruit is classified as a sour food. Sour flavors are associated with specific parts of the body, and sour foods are thought to be astringent, cooling, and they help generate yin.

In ayurvedic medicine, grapefruit is thought to increase pitta energy and pacify kapha. Inhaling grapefruit essential oil is said to stimulate various areas, including third eye chakras. And in ayurveda, it's used to help cleanse the mind and the aura, as well as stimulate confidence and creativity.

With all of its incredible uses, not to mention the delicious smell and taste, it's no wonder that White Grapefruit has become a favorite around the world.

Thanks for joining us and congratulations on living a healthier lifestyle with essential oils. If you liked what you heard today, rate, review, and subscribe wherever you listen. Also, if you want to try any of the products you learned about, go to doterra.com or find a Wellness Advocate near you to place an order today.