The Process with Nadine Artemis
Have you ever wondered what goes into creating a skin care product, a breast oil no less? Meet Nadine Artemis, founder and formulator of Living Libations. One of my all time favorite skin/body care lines. Learn why Nadine created the Breast Massage Oil, why she chose the ingredients she uses, her process, her breast care rituals and how she nurtures herself.
Why did you create the breast massage oil?
Our breasts embody both sensuality and sustenance, but for many women they have become a burden. These tender tissues are repositories of our exposures, environments, and medical treatments and this makes them vulnerable to breast density, fibroids, tumors, and other signs of the current estrogen epidemic.
On the bright side, breast cells can regenerate, and I created Breast Massage Oil as part of a breast regenerating strategy to mend our mitochondria, boost our immune, and provide life-affirming body care.
You use some truly wonderful ingredients such as broccoli seed, cumin seed, St Johns- wort, frankincense, rose otto and laurel. Why did you choose these particular ingredients and what are some of their benefits?
This massage oil is full of breast-balancing botanicals. The broccoli seed oil is full of antioxidants and essential fatty acids, and it makes a super-silky massage oil that slides right on the skin. And, for the medicine of monoterpenes, we include organic essences of grapefruit, frankincense, cypress, blood orange, laurel, and rose otto which are also rich in lymph-loving limonene, and some have demonstrated powerful anticancer properties in scientific research studies.
These particular essential oils also contain abundant amounts of monoterpenes, a type of botanical chemical that is particularly helpful for breast cells. Monoterpenes protect against mitochondrial dysfunction, improve the liver’s ability to break down carcinogens, stimulate cell death (apoptosis) in abnormal cells, facilitate healing, reduce inflammation, and selectively block the division and multiplication of abnormal cells. Some developments in research suggest that monoterpenes prevent both the initiation and progression of cancer, offering at least chemo-preventive benefits today and perhaps cancer treatments tomorrow.
For those who like to dig deeper into the details, a research team at the University of Arizona led by Dr. Jessica Martinez found that orange peel oil, which is about 90 percent d-limonene monoterpene, administered either orally or topically to female mice, showed preferential absorption of limonene into breast tissue. They discovered that this occurred independently of the method of administration.[i]
Dr. Martinez and her team then recruited a group of healthy women to determine the safety and feasibility of topical application of orange oil. The women applied to their breasts orange oil diluted to 10 percent or 20 percent in coconut oil. No safety or practical issues were reported by the women.[ii]
In yet another clinical study, women newly diagnosed with breast cancer ingested 2 grams of limonene every day for two to six weeks. The study reported that the limonene concentrated in their breast tissue, and there was a 22 percent reduction in cyclin D protein expression. Cyclin D plays a role in the rate of cell growth and proliferation and is overexpressed in hyperplasia (the initial stage of cancer) and in intraductal carcinoma of the breast.[iii]
What went into creating the breast oil? What was this process like?
My hands serve at the pleasure of plants, and I let them guide me. My intuition alerts me to a need for a new Libation, and my life-long research and experience with essential oils help me select the best botanical oils for the new creation.
For Breast Massage Oil, I selected the most lovely monoterpene-rich plant oils and swirled them together to create regenerative oil that is effective, gentle, and pleasing to the senses.
What are your breast care rituals?
Sunshine! Sunbeams shining on skin, and where possible, baring breasts to get sun on your chest is essential for breast health. Thousands of vitamin D receptors (VDRs) are found in our skin, in places where the sun doesn’t shine, and in almost every single cell of our body, including the brain, breasts, bones, hypothalamus, prostate, pancreas, placenta, lymphocytes, heart, stomach, small intestines, colon, and more.
“The Sun is our most vital factor. Like sea water nourishes seaweed, so the Sun supplies the vitality that human beings live on. Bones and nails especially are concentrations of invisible sun fluid.” Nobel lecturer Niels Ryberg Finsen[iv]
Our bodies are designed to be exposed to the rays of the sun, and our skin contains all the necessary mechanisms to extract and produce beneficial nutrients from it. The interaction of sun on skin is our human form of photosynthesis. Sunlight in the form of UVB rays touching the skin produces beneficial nutrients that our bodies require. Our skin converts sunbeams into regenerative substances of melanin, sulfur, and the steroid hormone, vitamin D. This distinct steroid hormone influences every cell in our body, and is easily one of nature’s most potent champions. I think of vitamin D as golden drops of sun fluid that we all need internally to be optimally well-oiled.
The most natural and effective form of vitamin D is the type that we synthesize when our skin coalesces with the sun—without sunscreen. The best time of day to get out and play in the sun for making vitamin D is morning to solar noon. Time variances, existing melanin levels, geography, and weather are all factors in how much shine one would need to get a good day’s supply of D—of course, there is an app for that.[v]
Our skin’s exposure to sun produces two types of essential sulfur: cholesterol sulfate and vitamin D3 sulfate. Sulfur, cholesterol, and the vitamin D produced in our skin from sun exposure are necessary for optimal cellular health while protecting us from radiation damage. Sulfur and cholesterol protect our DNA from radiation damage that contributes to cancer. They “become oxidized upon exposure to the high frequency rays in sunlight, thus acting as antioxidants to take the heat, so to speak.”[vi] Vitamin D3 from oral supplements, which is unsulfured and fat-soluble, is helpful, but it is not bonded to sulfur to make D3 sulfate. Vitamin D3 sulfate is water-soluble and moves freely in the bloodstream, providing a healthy barrier against bacteria; it is “synthesized in the skin, where it forms a crucial part of the barrier that keeps out harmful bacteria and other microorganisms such as fungi.”[vii] If we avoid the sun, we are missing out on this natural immune boosting protection.
After bathing, I use Breast Massage Oil with a few drops of iodine and magnesium for a quick breast massage. The health of our lymphatic systems is intimately connected to our breast health because breasts contain an abundance of lymph vessels. These vessels support the circulatory system in moving nutrients and waste in and out of our bodies. Massage encourages the tissues to release stored excesses of estrogen, move debris out of interstitial spaces, and keep the fluid flowing to the bloodstream to be eliminated. Be sure to massage inward and upward to stimulate lymphatic drainage, firm connective tissue, and enhance elasticity.
I never wear restrictive bras that bind and select softer support, such as yoga tops.
How do you celebrate and nurture yourself?
I nurture myself with nature. There is nothing more soothing, invigorating, and inspiring to me than a brisk swim in our spring-fed lake and then drying off in the sun or a taking long walk in the woods. I watch the sunrise with my family and spend a few minutes sun gazing to calibrate my circadian rhythms, brighten my eyes, and feed my soul. Of course, I also bathe and bless my body with botanical oils, for they are nature’s finest beauty (and breast) attendants.
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References
[i] J. A. Miller, J. E. Lang, M. Ley, R. B. Nagle, C. H. Hsu, P. A. Thompson, C. Cordova, A. Waer, and H. H. Chow, “Human Breast Tissue Disposition and Bioactivity of Limonene in Women with Early Stage Breast Cancer,” Cancer Prevention Research 6 (2013): 577–584.
[ii] J. A. Miller, P. A. Thompson, I. A. Hakim, A. M. Lopez, C. A. Thomson, W. M. Chew, C. H. Hsu, and H. H. Chow, “Safety and Feasibility of Topical Application of Limonene as a Massage Oil to the Breast,” Journal of Cancer Therapy 3 (2012): 749–754.
[iii] J. A. Miller, P. A. Thompson, I. A. Hakim, H. H. Chow, and C. A. Thomson, “d-Limonene: A Bioactive Food Component from Citrus and Evidence for a Potential Role in Breast Cancer Prevention and Treatment,” Oncology Reviews 66, no. 5 (2011): 31–42.
[iv] From Nobel Lectures, Physiology or Medicine 1901–1921.
[v] D Minder, http://dminder.ontometrics.com/.
[vi] Stephanie Seneff, “Sulfur Deficiency,” July 2, 2011, Weston A. Price Foundation, www.westonaprice.org/vitamins-and-minerals/sulfur-deficiency.
[vii] Charles A. Strott and Yuko Higashi, “Cholesterol Sulfate in Human Physiology: What’s It All About?” Journal of Lipid Research 44 (2003): 1268–1278.