Treating Swimmer's Ear Naturally (at home with no doctor visit)

Ava spent much of her vacation time in the water.  Which led to Swimmer's Ear.  A very painful bacterial infection in the outer ear- from the eardrum all the way out to the part you pierce.


Her motto.

Because she ended up going down with my parents almost a week before the rest of us went, I was late in getting to the swimmer's ear.  If your kid has symptoms, and it starts out with an itchy ear, you want to get to it immediately.  If not it becomes extremely painful, and will result in a lot of tears.

Because we were out of state, our insurance costs would have been astronomical.  A typical urgent care visit costs about $300 not including medicine.  And an ER visit will easily set us back $500 minimum.  Sooo, we were trying to avoid that at all costs.

Enter Pinterest.  What, oh what did we do before Pinterest?

And she totally came through.  A diy swimmer's ear remedy is equal parts alcohol 70% found in the medicine section of stores, and white vinegar.  Mix it up, 5 or so drops in each ear, wait a minute or so and flip and do the other one.  I did it three times a day, sometimes up to 5 times because she was in so much pain.



I also rubbed lavender essential oil around her earlobes on the outside because she was in so much pain and lavender is supposed to be good for pain.  Her ears got red and swollen and she would literally cry when I touched them.

We did this for 1.5 days before we noticed anything working.  On the night of the second she woke up and was remarkably improved, but we continued it for the next 2 days.  No doctor was needed and thus no antibiotics to be used.

Had I been able to get to her right away when first symptoms appeared, I feel confident that it never would have gotten as bad as it did.

And in case you don't believe everything you read on Pinterest, which you should be wise not to do so!- here is a Mayo clinic article on the exact same remedy.