Stop Cleaning Your Ears Wrong [0:00:00]
Are you making this massive grooming mistake?
It’s super common and can actually cause serious damage to your body.
What am I talking about?
Cleaning your ears using Q-tips.
In today’s video, we’re going to cover all the mistakes people make when cleaning
their ears and how you can do it correctly.
To start off, let’s talk about earwax.
Your body naturally produces wax in the ears to protect your ear canal from dirt and bacteria.
This is the way nature intended your ears to be.
We actually don’t need to remove wax from the ear canal to hear properly.
It naturally discharges itself.
Sure.
There are times when you get an ear infection, your body produces too much wax and it gets
clogged.
In that case, go see a doctor.
You see, the problem we’re addressing in today’s video is the over aggressive use
of the cotton swab a.k.a. the Q-tip.
Instead of using the cotton swab to clean the outside of the ear, a lot of people use
that Q-tip to clean the inside of the ear.
They end up pushing wax farther into the ear canal causing it to clog the ear.
Over time, it will harden and eventually could lead to an ear infection.
In some extreme cases, people have ruptured their eardrums pushing Q-tips too deep into
their ear.
And, I’m the first to admit, cleaning the inside of your ear feels good, but understand,
it causes more harm than good and it’s a habit that you want to break.
And, I can’t believe that people actually do this, but I read the medical reports.
Never ever use an improvised tool like a paper clip or a hair pin to try to remove wax from
your ear.
Now, I get it, you don’t want unsightly chunks of wax building up around your ears,
so let’s talk about your options.
First up, we’ve got the ear candle.
I don’t recommend it because scientific tests have shown that it doesn’t actually
remove ear wax.
The way this is is you got a hollow-coned shape from a paper coated in wax and the ear
candle is lit on one end while the other end is placed on your ear.
Supposedly, this fire creates a vacuum that sucks the wax out of your ear.
However, as mentioned the research I found said it doesn’t actually remove the earwax
and the waxy substance left inside the candle after burning is actually the debris from
the candle itself.
And, the worst part why I don’t recommend it is that test have even shown that small
amounts of soot and debris from the candle can end up being collected in your ear canal,
not to mention the risk of you accidentally burning yourself.
So, how do you safely clean your ears?
Let’s break this into two parts.
First, we’ll talk about your outer ear.
Next up, we’ll talk about your inner ear.
To clean your outer ear the only tool you need is a clean soft cotton washcloth.
Make it damp by running it under warm water.
You’re going to start at the top of the back of the ear known as the helix.
You’re going to make your way down to the back of the ear down to the lobule, the bottom
of the ear.
Repeat this a few times focusing in on the back of the ear and then focusing in on the
area of the head right next to the back of the ear.
We’re going to take our cloth wrapped around our fingers and we’re going to focus in
on cleaning the fossa and the scapha.
This is going to be the top part of the inner outer ear.
We’re then going to make our way down to the lobule wiping gently.
The final area that we want to clean on the outer ear is the concha.
You should be able to wrap your washcloth around the finger and be able to clean this
area.
Note that we aren’t sticking anything in the ear canal.
So, this takes us to part two, how do you safely get rid of that earwax at the entrance
of the inner ear.
The first step is to use an eyedropper and apply a few drops of either baby oil, mineral
oil, glycerin, or hydrogen peroxide into your ear canal.
Now, lay on your side for about fifteen minutes with the ear that you applied the drops into
facing up.
The goal here is to soften up the wax.
Once we do that, we can flush it out with water.
So, this takes us to the next part which is to fill up a rubber bulb syringe with warm
water.
Don’t use cold water, it can make you feel dizzy.
Pull back on your other ear to straighten up the ear canal and give you a clear shot.
Gently, shoot water into your ear to flush out the wax.
Tilt your head to the side and let the water drain out.
If you got a lot of wax build up or it’s really impacted, you may need to do this multiple
times over a few days.
And, again, if this isn’t working for you or you feel uncomfortable, go see a medical
professional.
Now, before we wrap this up, quick quiz.
Where is a safe place to use Q-tips?
Let me know down in the comments.
And, gentlemen, if you want to learn how to properly cut your nails, I’ve got you covered.
That video is right here.
Believe me, most people are doing this wrong.
That video and more, I’m linking to down in the description.
[0:04:33] End of audio