Waxy ears - How do I clean them?

Last week when I took DD to the doctors, the doctor said her ears were very waxy. This is not the first time a doctor has said this. It was mentioned the time before as well by another doctor (maybe about 3 months earlier).

I clean my ears with a cotton tip once a week but I never did this as a child. My mum never let us stick anything sharper than our elbow in our ears!

So any suggestions on how I safely clean DD's ears and get rid of this wax build up?
Does anyone actually clean inside their childs ear or am I an odd mother for not having cleaned inside my child's ears?

I cant see the wax near the surface of the ear so it must be in further than my eye can see. I don't want to do any damage to her ears.

Don't use cotton tips. You can get eardrops over the counter at the chemist which clear out the wax. Kids just HATE them :doh: If there is an infection at all there are eardrops you can buy with steroid in them but only avaliable by presciption.

I do the girls ears with cotton buds, not RIGHT IN but the bits you can see outside.


Sent from my iPhone, more than likely while I should be doing something else!

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Don't use cotton tips. You can get eardrops over the counter at the chemist which clear out the wax. Kids just HATE them :doh: If there is an infection at all there are eardrops you can buy with steroid in them but only avaliable by presciption.

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Thank you. I didnt know you could get drops for such a thing. The next fun thing will be trying to get them into DD's ears! Oh dear!

My DD has very very waxy ears. My dr told me just to leave it as its the ears cleaning themselves. She told me just to wipe with a warm cloth to remove visable wax.

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Ear candling?

I only clean what I can see. Now dd does it herself by placing a wet washer over her finger and cleaning around the ear hole (not inside).

I have very little ear wax but Dh has always had lots, and dd is like him while so far ds is like me. It seems like oily skinned people have more ear wax.

Did the dr say it was a problem?

It's definatly not easy haha! I've got some "Otodex" for my son at the moment but this not only removes wax it also reduces swelling from infected ears. You can just get normal ear drops though. My GP always recommends it as my kids have waxy ears and they don't seem to clear themselves. My eldest daughter has said the ear drops made her ears pop and "MUMMY, I CAN HEAR PROPERLY"! hehe, felt a little bad I didn't realise her ears were so blocked :o

He didnt say to do anything about it but made a point of commenting on it twice. Maybe I should leave it. I already wipe with a warm washer the parts I can see.

Getting the kids to lie down in a warm bath regularly can help, as the wax dissolves in warm water. The drops are helpful too but require them to stay still...hehe good luck with that. BTW if you warm the drops a little by putting the bottle in some warm (not hot) water that can prevent that nasty cold-ear-drop sensation.

My Mum always used to drop oil into my ears. Just good old plain cooking oil. It softens the wax and brings it out. It does go behind the wax though so it may block the ears if the wax plug is excessive. It also may take a few nights, but it worked.

My understanding is that the more you clean the more you produce wax :dunno:

On my phone so cant see how old your little one is but my daughter has always had alot of wax, shes very concious of it and it bothers her. I sometimes clean around the outside for her so she doesnt get embarassed (friends point it out at school) but lately I have been candling her ears and it helps keep it at bay. I wouldnt recommend doing it without guidance/a professional doing it first (like a TCM practitioner). The GP I asked about it said we're all different and produce different amounts of wax so there's nothing wrong with it. But being 10 now she gets very conscious. When I whip out the candles everyone lines up for it lol even the younger ones. Its very relaxing and you hear a mild flame noise in your ear, its almost hypnotic!

Kelly- DD is almost 3.5yrs so not conscious of it but I just dont want people to see her ears and think I dont clean them! LOL! I have always been paranoid about having people go near my ears but that does sound interesting.

I have heard about olive oil as well.

Olive- Is it like hair, the more you wash the oilier it willl get?

Thanks for all the info ladies. You have all given some gfreat advice.

Do not take my advice...!!

I love, love, LOVE cleaning ears! I dig around in there until I find that waxy orange treasure. We call it pumpkin in my house and if the kids ears are clean I ask them why they haven't fertilised the pumpkins... where is mummy's fun!! Sometimes I do dig a bit too deep and the kids let me know... I know you shouldn't dig around, but I LOVE IT. Maybe I won't love it so much when my kids are deaf...

Candles are fun, but I've only used them on DH. He has quite waxy ears, it's why I married him :) When you're done, you can cut the candle open and see how much wax you've sucked out and it always sucks some new pumpkin up to the outer ear where you can get it with a cotton tip.

I hate it when you look at someone side on and see orange wax dripping out of their ears. It's all I can do not to whip out a cotton tip and clean up that pumpkin!!

Like I said, don't take my advice...

Nickle- You cracked me up :rofl:

My DD and DH both have waxy ears. DD's is managable by cleaning with cotton buds but DH is out of control. He doesn't manage it at all and ends up having to syringe them which I find rather gross. DH's gets so bad he can't hear anything.