Ear Broken - Two

Adventure of the neti pot! When I got my ear candles at Harmony Farms in Raleigh - cool place, btw - I also splurged and got a neti pot. One of my favorite people, with whom I have lost touch sadly, Mark Sanford, extoled the virtues of the neti pot years back. I had heard of them, just never experienced them. So, with my ear being broken and me knowing that ears and the nose are somehow intertwined, I decided to take the plunge. My largest fear was of drowning. That's right. Drowning. I have had way too many near death experiences with water and I wasn't relishing another one. Today I took that brave step forward. Into the shower I went, neti pot and saline packet in hand (or near by). I put some water in the neti pot - warm, not hot or cold! - and mixed in what I thought was a small amount of the saline powder recommended by the experts at Harmony Farms. Into my nose went the neti pot - I tilted my head to the side and started pouring. I poured about three seconds worth and it started coming out my other nostril, just like it said it would! Yippee! I decided to try the other nostril. Eeeek! It burns! I guess I hadn't stirred the solution enough or something - and my head wasn't tilted enough. Not a pretty picture. True, I didn't drown, but I also wasn't as pleased with this nostril's experience. My ear, sadly, is still broken. And I will neti again - perhaps in my very next shower. We shall see. What to try next? Acupuncture or back to Chiropractic. I am leaning towards acupuncture first.

Broken Ear

Step One - Ear Candling - I am not a fan of Western Medicine. Medicate, Cut, or prevaricate. So I am opting to try some alternative medicine strategies. My first foray into this has been using an ear Candle. This is a ten inch waxy candle like thing that you stick into your ear and set on fire. It burns down about six inches - douse and repeat - three times I read somewhere. I just tried it twice. At the end there is some residue down in the bottom of the candle - the part that was in your ear. I don't know what it is, but if even some of that came out of my ear - ick! It didn't help my ear at all that I can tell, but it was an interesting experience. And I will probably repeat it - at some point. I have put a call for other people's ear candling experiences on Facebook - but honestly I think that most of my friends don't pay any attention to my status updates. :( Next time - Neti pot!