I Tried Oil Pulling For 14 Days

I did this because I was tired of reading about it. Every article was either an advertisement or a dismissal, and I wanted to know what an ordinary fortnight of it actually feels like.

So I kept notes every morning, including the parts that make me look impatient, and here they are.

Facts and tips worth knowing first

• Oil pulling means swishing an edible oil around your mouth for a period of time, then spitting it out.
• It comes from traditional Ayurvedic practice and has a small amount of modern study behind it, mostly limited in size.
• It is a supplementary habit at most — it does not replace brushing or cleaning between teeth.
• Spitting it into a sink will eventually block the drain. Use a bin.
• Swishing hard is the main way people hurt themselves doing this.

How this started for me

My sister-in-law mentioned it at a family lunch, entirely casually, and said she had done it for years. She is not a person who falls for wellness trends, which is why it stuck with me rather than sliding off.

I bought a jar of plain coconut oil that week and started the following Monday, with the deliberate intention of writing down what happened rather than deciding in advance what I hoped would.

The challenges I faced

The texture is the entire difficulty of the first week. Solid coconut oil melting in your mouth over about thirty seconds is genuinely unpleasant the first several times, and no article had warned me clearly enough about that.

• Day one I managed four minutes and felt slightly sick afterwards.
• Day three I gagged and stopped at three minutes, which felt like moving backwards.
• Day four I skipped it and told myself I would do it that evening. I did not.
• Day six I swished vigorously like mouthwash and my jaw ached by dinner.
• Around day eight I nearly abandoned the whole thing out of boredom rather than difficulty.

What I tried

Reducing the amount of oil

I had been using a full tablespoon because that is the number everyone repeats. Roughly two thirds of that was far more tolerable and made no difference to anything else.

Melting it first

Warming the spoon slightly so the oil was already liquid removed the worst thirty seconds entirely. This one change did more for my compliance than anything else.

Doing it while doing something else

Standing over a sink watching a timer is intolerable. Doing it while getting dressed, making the bed and finding my keys made the time disappear.

Swishing gently

After the jaw incident I moved the oil around slowly and lazily rather than forcing it. Nothing was lost by doing this and my jaw stopped complaining.

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What worked well for me

• Warming the oil so it went in liquid rather than solid.
• Around two thirds of a tablespoon rather than a heaped one.
• Eight to ten minutes, gently, while getting ready for the day.
• Spitting into the bin, then rinsing with warm water, then brushing normally afterwards.
• Treating it as an addition to my routine rather than a replacement for any part of it.

How I'm doing now

My mouth felt cleaner on waking by the second week. I want to label that clearly as a subjective impression, because that is exactly what it is and I cannot demonstrate it to anyone.

My teeth did not look different. Not in the mirror, not in photographs taken in the same light on day one and day fourteen. My breath in the morning seemed marginally less stale, which is again subjective. Nothing else changed that I could point at.

Try this method — don't miss this step

The step that decides whether you last a fortnight is warming the oil first. Almost everyone who quits does so in the first three days, and the first three days are difficult almost entirely because of the texture.

• Warm the oil so it goes in liquid, not solid.
• Start with about two thirds of a tablespoon rather than a full one.
• Begin at five minutes and build up — do not start at twenty.
• Move it around gently. If your jaw aches, you are working far too hard.
• Spit into a bin, never a sink.
• Rinse with warm water, then brush as normal — this does not replace brushing.
• Stop if you get any mouth soreness, and see a dentist about anything that persists.

It stopped being difficult the moment I stopped standing over the sink watching a timer and just got on with my morning.

A final note from Sarah

I still do this a few mornings a week, which probably tells you my honest verdict better than a rating would. It is pleasant and it costs almost nothing. It did not whiten my teeth, fix anything, or replace a single part of my actual routine, and anyone telling you otherwise is selling something.