June 25, 2008: Picky Picky

[Sundae]

Originally Posted by HungLikeJesus

Sundae Girl - to what temperature do you heat the oil?

Oh no, just room temp. It's quite nice!

Originally Posted by Flint

Weird. Sometimes a real hurty zit is like a sneeze button.

Anything that makes me screw my face up makes me sneeze. Sunlight, plucking my eyebrows, squeezing a spot (depending on where it is). I also sneeze when other people do. And sometimes just talking about it (this post made me sneeze)

Then people wonder why I have such controlled sneezes (they often think I'm coughing). I'd be exhausted otherwise!

[Happy Monkey]

You can save yourself the undignified position when ear candling, and just let it burn on the counter. It will "suck out" just as much gunk! Sorta like those body-purifying foot-baths.

[jinx]

I assume you're not speaking from experience HM, since you can see the gunk in the candle stub, and in your ear, and you can feel the suction throughout your sinuses.
There is definitely gunk being sucked out - whether its beneficial or not is debatable though.

[Elspode]

We do ear candling on occasion (yes, we are Pagan Polyamorous Hippies). It seems to work, defying all reason.

[Undertoad]

When it was an IotD

...we learned it doesn't work, the same residue appears if you put the candle end in water instead of an ear

...and you may accidentally pour hot beeswax on your eardrum

[jinx]

When you actually do it yourself, yellow powdery wax comes out.

[Undertoad]

That's because it's beeswax.

[jinx]

What?

[Undertoad]

If the bottom of the candle has an airtight seal, it produces that residue. A above water, B in the water, E in the ear.

Andrew Harter took over the design and implementation of the test. A student of his volunteered to be the subject. The results are shown here. The candle stubs have been cut open and spread to examine the inner surfaces. First, look at specimen E1. This came from the first of three candles burned in the one ear. There is a quantity of very fine beige-colored dust/ash that has formed a fragile, porous structure not unlike cigarette ash in consistency but somewhat lighter in weight and strength. Specimen E2 is very similar. But E3 has a decided difference; at the places indicated by the X pointers, we found very serious gobs of a sticky, waxy, dark brown substance. To all of us, this certainly resembled ear-wax! At points indicated by the Y pointers, we saw very slight, somewhat lighter-colored, traces of a waxy deposit. Hmmm!

Had the experiment gone just this far, we might have concluded that there is merit in the ear-candling procedure. But Andrew was intent on conducting control tests, too. By that, we mean doing the same test without the ear being involved. He placed a candle, properly seated in the paper shield, over a glass with some water in it. The candle burned down just as before, but as you will see on specimen A, no deposit of any kind was produced, no beige-colored "ash," nor any brown waxy substance. But now I will reveal to you a fact that may provide you with an important clue: the candles were impregnated with bees-wax, not candle-wax nor paraffin wax! (British readers, note: in the USA we use the word "paraffin" to describe a translucent white wax, while you use that word for what we call "kerosene." Isn’t cultural exchange wonderful?)

Bees-wax varies in color from amber to brownish. When charred, it turns quite dark brown, the color of the globules we found at position X in our illustration. But what about specimen B? Well, that was obtained when Andrew burned another candle over water, but this time inserted the tapered end into the water, sealing it off. The B specimen cannot be differentiated from E3! Now, there is a small deposit indicated by the Y pointers on all specimens except A. We believe that specimen A, having clear access to air drawn in from the bottom by convection, attained complete combustion, and thus consumed all the wax and fabric. Specimen B, cut off from free air access as were the three E specimens, produced gobs of beeswax and some ash. E1 and E2 did not produce wax globules because the "fit" was not as tight; warmed ears can produce a film of naturally-present wax that will provide the seal, and the subject is perhaps more willing to have the tube stuck into his ear further and tighter, and less afraid of getting an ear-canal full of hot bees-wax — not a nice thing to contemplate. Thus the combustion in a sealed-off tube is less efficient, and the brown bees-wax globules are produced.

[jinx]

Bees-wax varies in color from amber to brownish. When charred, it turns quite dark brown,

This is where you're losing me.... Are they talking about beeswax or burned beeswax, because they just say beeswax. So if the candle is white...?

I'm talking about very yellow (not beige) stuff... looks like trees growing out of your ears when you really get it going. One of the reason we stopped doing it was the amount of candles it took. That a first timer using only 3 candles didn't get results doesn't surprise me.

That said, I still wouldn't bother with it again.

[Karenv]

I am surprised that no one has mentioned the grossness of having the toothpick and the ear spoon on one tool. I try to keep my teeth out of my ears and vice versa.

Silver and gold have antibacterial qualities that even surpass Chinese stainless silver. And certainly Q tips.

Ear candles have been known to drip crud into the ear canal making for some very uncomfortable ER visits.

[Karenv]

Originally Posted by Undertoad

If the bottom of the candle has an airtight seal, it produces that residue. A above water, B in the water, E in the ear.



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I have spent some time with ear candles, and while most of the residue can come from the candle itself, there also appears to be something that comes from the ear. The pictures themselves show more residue from the ear than the earless burns. And I know other practitioners who have used them, cleaning out the candle residue with a chopstick so it doesn't go back into the ear, and find that it in fact helps earaches. Frankly I can give people warm olive oil with muellin, garlic and similar herbs and do it much faster, so I don't bother with the candles. You can buy the oil premade at any decent health food store.

And I have talked with EMTs and ER docs who have treated people for ear candle wax blockage, so it doesn't seem all that safe to me, even with the chopstick cleaning which would reduce the danger.

Someone asked about the temperature for olive oil: a drop on your wrist shouldn't burn, but it should be warm enough to penetrate. I do it by feel, like bathwater.

Now we should debunk those bamboo vinegar footpads in a future IOTD.