When I have a cold, there is one thing I always want to do... clear my ears. I know better than to do this, but the urge is overwhelming to hold my nose and blow. Well, that's what I did today and of course, I got painful pressure in my ear that was causing a painful ear ache.

So, I tried these things for ear pressure relief:

1) Tried to clear my ears and relieve the ear pressure through conventional yawing, like what I do when scuba diving or flying in an airplane.

2) Blow warm air into my nose - If I don't want to take pill to stop the pressure of a head cold, I use a blow dryer and blow warm air up my nose. This quickly clears my sinuses.

3) Eat hot food.

4) Eat hot spicy food.

5) Heated a paper towel and put it in a cup, over my ear as described at http://www.flyana.com/ear.html. This almost worked.

What resolved my problem was:

Getting on the treadmill and walking until my head got hot. For me, it took 3/10ths of a mile walking at 3.5 mph before I got ear pressure relief.

If you don't have a treadmill, get out and walk; it's good for you and will clear ears and head.

Tuesday, Oct 25, 2005

Rob