I’ve always wondered if you can just get your tonsils out just because they are grossing you out. I will ask next time I’m at the doctor. What I really want to know is, will the province cover it.
Well, I keep a little nifty-shaped bowl in the shower, with one end rounded and elongated - its kinda gravy-boat shaped. I pour in about two shakes of table-salt to about a cup-ish of water - so that the water is mildly salty to the taste, but not shockingly nasty. Mix in the warm shower water, and then inhale through one nostril, and then I spit it out. Repeat on other side.
Its the way my sinus-surgeon suggested, and it works OK. They also have those neti-pot things, wherein its a small aladdin’s lamp looking thing that you put in one nostril, and let it run out the other nostril. Never used that, though.
This is now, officially, WAY more gross information than I ever intended to post… so just go with Antigen’s post above, and ignore all this stuff… 
I don’t care how disgusting it is, “sinus irrigation” (as my doctor so elegantly terms it) has headed off enough killer headaches for me that I consider it a medical advance of the same order as organ transplantation. I didn’t realize it took care of tonsiliths as well; yet another miraculous effect of saltwater up the nose!
OK, maybe I’m just an idiot. I have tonsil stones, but no matter how hard I try, I can’t manage to simultaneously do the following:
- see my tonsils in a mirror, and
- wield an implement long enough to reach them, and
- use said implement to pop out the stones.
Can someone share their techniques, please?
Strangely, I do too, even though it wasn’t my thread. Seems I managed to gross out a lot of people in there.
I posted to that thread, then totally forgot about the whole thing. Nice to see what became of it.
Q.N. Jones, in that case we’re both idiots.
I await my education in the removal of tonsil stones.
In the interests of getting a complete education, I’d also like to admit the following:
-
I’m not really sure that I’d know my tonsils, even if I saw them in the mirror. Unless they were absolutely studded with tonsil stones.
-
One time, when I did locate my tonsils and a tonsil stone therein, I found it impossible to dig the stone out. I used a lot of different implements, but every time, I just succeeded in pushing the stone back down into the crypt.
Help, please.
I use my index and push from the outside in, and the pressure pushes it out. Usually the stone, or as I call it infection pocket, lands on my finger. Sometimes it pops out onto the roof of my mouth. And I always have to smell it before I wash it down the sink. Nasty!
I had 'em too…then I had my tonsils removed and all was fine.
Ready for my TMI?
One night I pulled over 50 of those stinky f***ers out of my mouth. Counted them in a bowl; the smell was awful and I almost puked. This was the event that led me to my doctor and surgery a few months later. My tonsils were rotting in my head. And talk about bad breath…God! I made myself sick.
I used my mom’s make-up mirror (round lighted thing with a normal mirror on one side, and enlarging mirror on the other) and a bamboo chopstick. The mirror was tilt-able and I could see the holes (I don’t care what the above says, I had two main holes, two minor ones, on either side, not folds). I would see the stone poking out a little and then push the chopstick in directly under the hole and it would pop out. Sometimes the stone would stick to the chopstick, sometimes it would fall to the back of my mouth and I would have to hawwk-spit it out. I thought at the time that if I had a popsicle stick or another long, flat stick it would have worked better.
I am going to try the shower snorting method to help prevent sinus infections…we shall see.
-Tcat
This thread discusses nasal irrigation, and even has our Dr. Qadgop weighing in favorably on the practice (after recommending consulting a physician as well). I recently bought Nasal Rinse, as mentioned in that thread by beagledave, whose ENT recommended it to him. If you have problems with the nasal irrigation irritating your nasal passages, I have to say that using distilled water helped me a lot.
Ok, I will try some of these. I think it’s absolutely disgusting, but I think tonsil stones are more so, so I will grin and bear it. Will update you guys tomorrow - no way in hell I’m trying it at work.
And don’t they discourage getting your tonsils removed these days, unless you really, really need to? I wish I’d gotten mine removed, because one of the first things that happen when I’m sick is my throat swells up and my tonsils HURT.
This is the one reason why my doc OK’d it for me at age 20.
-tcat
Hey, that’s how I finally convinced a doc to yank my tonsils summer before last. One of the best things I’ve ever done for myself. It’s cut my number of illnesses down dramatically, especially ear infections.
I think I may actually get those things! Sometimes, when I’ve been sick or otherwise congested, I have to hawk up some something that seems to be stuck where my mouth transitions to being my throat. It irritates me until I get rid of it. This is very difficult and takes a while. Doing it requires enough effort that it makes me retch and the result is similar to what I’m reading here. An off-white chunk maybe half the size of a pea. It’s firm but not hard. Unlike others, I don’t smell it so who knows if it smells bad. I’m not sure that it’s a tonsil stone since I don’t know exactly where my tonsils are other than “my throat.”
Now I have something to really be paranoid about. I have a very sensitive gag reflex so I have trouble looking in there. And I have been trying ever since I read that undead thread about pus, zits, tonsil-liths and assorted ickery.
Thanks everyone.
OK, I went home and tried to remove them last night, and I can’t.
My mouth is pretty small, so it’s hard enough to get back there, and my gag reflex seems to be super sensitive with a Q-tip, or anything else. I certainly can’t reach back there!
Aargh. So i shall continue to suffer, I guess.
Ditto. I think a small mouth is also my problem.
I fiddled around in there just enough to know that I have one the size of a small marble in there. It’s really annoying me now.
Open your mouth and look in a mirror.
Look at your rear-most molars. Imagine the point where the upper teeth’s plane intersects with the lower teeth’s plane.
With your left index finger, reach in and gently press on this imaginary 'hinge" and with gentle, constant pressure, push toward the lcenter of the throat.
Repeat with right finger on right side of the mouth.
urk!
:eek:
bloop
Yep, I get exactly the same phenomenon. And strangely, I only started getting it after I read the original (“classic”) tonsil stone thread. I blame the SDMB for spreading these things.
What I want to know is, how the hell are you people actually prodding your tonsils? Haven’t you got gag reflexes? If I tried that, I’m pretty sure my tonsil stone would be ejected forcefully on the leading edge of this morning’s breakfast. :eek:
Ok, this might be safer than using implements like spoons or toothpicks. When I told my doctor about how irritating my stones could be, she was really nice and gave me a whole bunch of those packages of long swabs that they use to swab your throat when they’re testing for infection. They’re sterile, so that’s a plus. They’re kind of scratchy, so dip the tip of them in mineral oil, then gently push on your tonsil behind the stone to ease it out. Rinse your mouth with salt water after to get any remaining nasty bits out. Maybe you could ask your doctor if he/she can spare any of those. If not, I’m sure a pharmacy or medical supply store might have them.
Also, if you concentrate you can suppress your gag reflex to an extent. Holding your breath helps. I still find that it takes me a while to get a stone out, though.
I’ll try Enola Straight’s way, and next time I go to the doctor, Goddess’ way.
What’s really gross is sometimes they come out when I sneeze hard, which I’m glad they come out, but I have to be sure to have a tissue handy to sneeze into. I have allergies, so I tend to sneeze every day at least.