Sinus Care On-The-Go

I suggest the following procedure: breathe the Neti Stik vapor into a single nostril, retain in the sinuses for as long as comfortable, then exhale out of the opposite nostril. Repeat on each side for a few minutes to open, stimulate, and clear the sinuses, especially when you feel the early tingle of compromise. When I’m already in trouble, I use it often throughout the day, combined with my other strategies (more on these later), including the Neti Pot wash. Give it a try and feel free to let me know how it goes.

• Neti Stick

While travel can be exciting and restorative, there is often a health cost when your routines, environment, diet, and circadian rhythms are discombobulated. To manage these challenges, I have honed various strategies over the years that include some holistic remedies. I recently organized my essential favorites into a travel kit so that others might benefit.

One of my go-to remedies for respiratory health is the Neti Stik, to address the often-overlooked role of smooth air passage—starting with the sinuses—in overall health and well-being. If the head is clogged up in any way, the whole body is impacted. It’s curious that so many use a pharmaceutical decongestant as if it’s the treatment-of-choice for sinus care, failing to address the actual cause of their congestion.

Airports, airplanes, and hotels are notorious for circulating dry air to keep mold and microbes at bay. However, this is extraordinarily dehydrating, especially when there is a draft of air flowing directly over your body. As tissues dry out, their processes get sluggish, fatigue sets in, and your immune system follows. For these reasons, it is essential to sustain hydration and monitor airflow and air quality.

While modern medicine doesn’t believe you can catch a “cold” from a draft, it is not a stretch if you understand the thermodynamics of body tissues—well-detailed in systems of Traditional Medicine. When air passes over the head, moisture is sucked out of the mucous membranes and they dry out. This can happen in the span of a minute. Mucous is generated to protect the tissues, but this protective mechanism nonetheless represents a state of functional-stagnation. Any microbes present can now opportunistically overgrow as a result of the compromised environment, and you may soon have the start of a sinus infection. Then, the compromised airflow of a stuffy sinus leads to fatigue and a further compromised immune system.

I notice people who leave the overhead vent on, especially when it’s blowing right onto their heads, and even more so if it continues while they sleep on a longer flight, will often wake up with a “cold.” The cold vibration—a contraction of the tissues that inhibits circulation of life-nourishing fluids in and metabolic waste products out—is literally held in the tissues. Now they are set up for the next phase of illness–inflammation. The process then creeps into the throat as it gets dry and then sore (=dry and inflamed), and then soon into the lungs if not quickly staunched. As the moist lining of the lungs dries up, coughing begins and a fever usually follows, which now requires a different healing intervention.

While the Neti pot wash is an ideal local, acute-intervention remedy for the sinuses, what do you do when you are on-the-move? This is where the Neti Stik comes in. It is an inhalant with an essential oil blend of peppermint, eucalyptus, lavender, and menthol—a great combination to soothe, energize, and disperse the sinus tissues for rapid recovery and continued protection, and to some extent the throat and lungs as well.

©2018 Ilyas Kourosh Kashani