Bath Salt EO question

[aprice522]

I am doing some searches to learn about bath salts. I make soap and use EOs, so I am familiar with most products and safe usage.

My question—all the searches for recipes/tutorials show straight EO with the salt/dry ingredients rather then adding carrier oils. That seems wrong, is it?

Do any of you use carrier when making bath salts? TIA!

 

[LittleJ]

The salt will absorb the EO. Having said that, I'm with you in that it seems wrong adding EO and only EO directly to a dry bath salt.

I can only speculate why it wouldn't be "wrong". Perhaps the EO's ability to penetrate the skin is limited by the salt. Salt dissolves slower in water than other bath ingredients and restricts the EO from being released on top of the water all at once. Also, salt cannot penetrate skin. It's only way into the skin is through openings in the skin (like a sweat gland).

So.. maybe the risk associated with applying an undiluted EO to the skin is mitigated by the structure of the salt the EO adheres to. And if this is the case, I think I would prefer to use a large coarse salt like Himalayan to help slow down the dispersion of the EO.

Still though, I prefer adding my EO to a small amount of carrier oil and then adding the carrier oil to the salt.

If I'm totally (or partially) wrong on this, I hope someone out there can tell us why it's ok to safely add undiluted EOs to bath salt.

 

[lsg]

I mix my EOs or FOs with dendritic salt before mixing with bath salts. You can also add some polysorbate 80 to your recipe if you are using a carrier oil with the salts. Go to the SoapQueen blog and type in bath salts to get full instructions for making bath salts.