Sometimes you feel like a Neti.
Jeff's mom called a few days ago to tell me that she purchased a gift for me.
Important background information: Since becoming pregnant, I've had to stop taking Zyrtec for my allergies. Please know that I'm allergic to just about everything environmental--grass, trees, dust, pollen, ragweed... You get the picture. Anyway, since I've stopped taking Zyrtec, I often wake up in the middle of the night feeling completely congested and unable to breathe through my nose.
Back to our story.
Jeff's mom: I have a gift for you.
Me: You're kidding! What is it?
Jeff's mom: Well, I was in the health food store yesterday and I was talking to the cashier about your nose problems, and she recommended I get a Neti Pot for you.
Me: Is a Neti Pot made of doughnuts with vanilla icing?
Jeff's mom: No.
Yesterday I received my first Neti Pot, also known as a Nasal Cleansing Pot. The Neti Pot box claims that using the Neti will clear my nostrils by reducing excess mucous, pollen, and allergens in my nasal passages. To demonstrate what the process will entail, the box displays a photograph of a tilted-headed woman who is pouring water into one nostril, and the water is magically running out of her other nostril. This picture makes me feel very uncomfortable for a number of reasons, not entirely limited to the following:
- I do not swim because the feeling of water going into my nose completely mortifies me. This fear goes back to my childhood when my swimming instructor pushed my head under water to help me learn to swim. The water rushed up my nose, and I thought I was going to die. (I never went back to lessons after that day.) Even in the shower, I rarely face the stream of water, because I don't like the feeling of water near my nostrils.
- I've seen that freak show trick where some Henry Rollins fan is putting a gold chain into one nostril and it suddenly falls out of his other nostril. In my opinion, this man is much braver than the man who dangles a concrete block from his scrotal piercing!
The Neti Pot instructions tell me that Neti, the practice of nasal irrigation, has been used by practitioners of Yoga and Ayurveda in India for hundreds, if not thousands of years. In fact, "...some yogic instructors consider it valuable in cleansing the energy channels and balancing the right and left hemispheres to create radiant, energetic health and wellness."
Radiant and energetic health and wellness? Okay, Master Neti. I'll try just about anything to achieve energetic health and wellness.
To the bathroom I went with the Neti Pot, a shaker of salt, and Jeff--who offered to save me if I started to drown.
Ok. Mix one cup of warm water with 1/4 teaspoon of salt. Done. Pour this saline solution into the Neti. Done. Tilt head to the side and insert spout of the Neti into the raised nostril. Done. Raise the Neti slowly to develop a steady flow of saline solution through the upper nostril and out the lower nostril...
Suddenly, I was pouring what seemed to be a liter of water into my nose and it was rushing down my throat. I started gasping and coughing, and I lost complete control of my bladder.
Me: Oh! Oh! Get out! I need you to get out!
Jeff: What? What happened?
Me: Out! I'm peeing all over myself! This isn't supposed to happen!
(Of course, my biggest fear is that the Neti magically loosened all mucous in my system--including the mucous plug that is keeping my cervix free of irritants. Luckily, the only thing loosened was my pride and a bunch of urine.)
After a brief clean-up (pun totally intended, of course), Jeff gave me the Little Train that Could speech, and I was once again standing in front of the mirror with the pot up my nose. Tilt the head, raise the Neti, and shazam! Victory! The water started flowing up one nostril and out the other. Magic! I quickly switched sides, irrigated my other nostril, and suddenly started to feel alive with radiant and energetic health and wellness! Ah, bliss!
This
evening I shall once again be ready to Neti. And tomorrow I shall shove a
grape up my nose to see if it comes out the other side.
