Anyone that know me well knows that I am the worst when it comes to a stuffy, sniffly nose. This past week was terrible, as I caught a bad cold right before the holidays.

A few years back, I caved and decided to try this weird device called a neti pot. I hesitated at first… The process sounded kind of gross. Now after seeing the benefits, and on further thought, I love it and now think it’s kind of gross to not wash your nose. Don’t we wash the rest of ourselves?

Neti pots are used for nasal saline irrigation which basically means you rinse your nose with salt water. Doing so helps thin and flush out mucus (yuck). You can buy a pre-made saline rinse or I started making my own of equal parts pure sea salt and baking soda (1/4 tsp each).

Since introducing more essential oils into my life, I’ve been adding a drop of pure tea tree and/or lavender essential oil to my neti pot rinses every now and then. I have definitely noticed a difference in the effectiveness of the rinses.

Another thing I do to help with the stuffiness and sniffles at night is to put a drop of essential oil on both bottom corners of my pillow (I turn around a lot). I normally use eucalyptus but this time I tried “easy air” and it worked even better for me. In fact, once the aroma wore off, I woke up in the middle of the night all stuffed up. I put a few more drops and fell right back asleep until morning. Easy air also works well in the diffuser.

Obviously, I follow this routine when I am sick. However, I will sometimes do the neti pot as a preventive measure (i.e. after taking a flight or train ride or during allergy season).

Hope this helps!

M.

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