Tales from the Schoolroom – the Spleen Jane Lawson

This week, my Clinical Aromatherapy student was learning MLD (Manual Lymphatic Drainage) massage using a volunteer’s body to practise on. This particular day we were looking at the stomach massage, or basically the organs within the abdominal cavity.

Whilst demonstrating, the volunteer’s spleen felt a little hard and indeed they said it felt uncomfortable. My student is also a nurse, and confirmed she could feel the hardness in the spleen.

As Clinical Aromatherapy involves more than one discipline, we moved to the feet (reflexology being part of the syllabus) and checked the spleen reflex point, and indeed it felt hard, and again our volunteer said it felt uncomfortable.

I then moved up to the acupressure/meridian correction point which is just below the knee and gently pressed on the point. Our volunteer actually winced with this one.

I then showed how we could test for the function of the spleen using Kinesiology, no surprise when our volunteer could not hold her arm in position.

Our spleen is part of our Lymphatic System, but also filters and keeps our blood healthy and able to fight diseases. In complementary terms, a healthy Lymphatic System allows us to ‘go with the flow’.
I then asked my student to dowse our ‘body’ for Essential Oils. She dowsed over the spleen and was surprised to find her dowser was giving her a negative or ‘no’ response. I explained how the dowser was also confirming something was going on in the spleen. We then asked her dowser to ‘pick up the energy’ of the ‘body’s’ spleen, and to select the appropriate Essential Oils.

The dowser selected Hakka (Japanese Peppermint, which is beautiful) and Myrtle.

Looking at both oils, the Hakka is anti-inflammatory, and can take away ‘heat’, and the Myrtle is a carminative. Myrtle I have also found over the years, to have an affinity with joints, and in particular the knees. Our knees are the seat of our ego. We all have ego, we need it to survive. However when the ego is out of balance, that is, it has become egotistical, or as in the case of an empath for example, the ego is reduced because it cannot accept compliments, the knees will start playing up. Our ‘body’ was most definitely an empath and also admitted to having a bit of a problem with one of her knees.

I asked our volunteer if there was an ongoing situation with somebody that made her feel that she wanted to “vent her spleen” as the saying goes. She confirmed that there was such a business relationship. I combined both oils on a tissue and asked her to gently inhale the smell whilst thinking about this situation and to let me know when she felt something change. It took less than a minute for her to tell us that she was ‘thrown back’ to when this particular person was ‘nice’ and was approachable. So I then asked her to keep her focus on the ‘nice’ aspect of this person and in her imagination tell her what needed to be said, which she did. She reported that her language changed, and that she felt emotionally lighter and mentally clearer and also felt confident now to be able to approach said person and express what she needed to without it flaring into an argument. She was smiling!

So, we then checked the spleen reflex in her foot, all discomfort gone. We checked the acupressure/meridian correction point by her knee, she took a lot more pressure before she could say there was any kind of discomfort, but the wincing pain had certainly gone. We then did the Kinesiology test for the spleen, the arm not only held but ‘locked in’. Finally, we palpated her stomach, and we had a bit of a job to find the spleen.

You see, we all have day to day stresses, which will embed or hide themselves somewhere in our bodies. The longer these stresses continue, they begin to manifest in actual physical ailments. Allopathic (conventional) medicine addresses the physical ailments, as did the two oils in this case. But real healing happens when we address the underlying emotional/mental cause, which both these oils did in spades.

No Essential Oils were ingested or applied, just inhaled….and that ladies and gentlemen is the genius that is Clinical Aromatherapy!

Jane has been practising clinical aromatherapy for 25 years. A vintage English aromatherapist who trained with a student of the famous Marguerite Maury – she has now been teaching aromatherapy diplomas and CPD courses for over 17 years. She’s now training new aromatherapy teachers in the classical English style, as well as teaching reflexology, Lomi Lomi and other therapies. She is also the author of a book which shares her unique approach to using essential oils.