Real Housewives of Beverly Hills survivor alum Brandi Glanville has been going through it the last few years. A parasite wreaked havoc on her face, which she believes she picked up in Morocco while filming Real Housewives Ultimate Girls Trip in 2023. Worse yet, it took a slew of doctors and treatments to address the condition. I’m not gonna pretend I’m unaware there are a lot of people who think it wasn’t really a parasite; I honestly don’t know, and whatever the cause was, it doesn’t diminish that Brandi has had three years of a painful situation front and center on her face. It was a big deal for her to feel comfortable enough to step out at Sundance in January, and publicly thank her plastic surgeon for helping her get there to boot.

So with all that recent medical history, you would think Brandi is very, very careful and discerning about how she treats her face and skin these days. You would… be proven not 100% right in thinking that. On last week’s episode of her Unfiltered podcast, Brandi described to co-host James Maas how she spent Easter weekend at the emergency room after getting a clove of garlic stuck in her ear. How did it get there? The story starts with her picking up a cold from her 18-year-old son Jake, and I’ll let her take it from there:

“Jake came over and he kept sneezing in my face. He’s like, ‘I’m not sick anymore.’ Like, cover your mouth when you sneeze. And then I got his cold,” she said.

Glanville shared that after looking up remedies online, she decided to try putting a garlic clove in her ear to help with congestion. However, she ultimately ended up in the emergency room after it got stuck.

“On Easter, I didn’t do anything because of the garlic in my ear. I was trying to get it out,” she said on the show. “It really went down further and I had to go to urgent care the next day and get it taken out.”

“I was just trying to clear my sinuses. It’s online,” she added. “Don’t listen to people online or TikTok or Instagram or Twitter or Facebook.”

The reality star explained that she originally had the garlic in her nostril after her son Mason, 22, told her that he tried the hack and it helped him in the past. But she said when she tried it, the garlic started burning.

“It was burning too much so I moved it to my ear. It was like burning my skin because I’d just lasered it,” she said.

Many people on social media have shared videos of themselves with a raw garlic clove in their nostril. The trick is said to relieve nasal congestion. However, it’s not scientifically proven and many doctors advise against doing so.

Dr. Raj Sindwani, an ENT specialist, told the Cleveland Clinic that garlic in the nose can cause irritation, an infection, trauma to the septum and even make congestion worse.

“What you’re doing is putting this irritant up your nose — one with a very strong and noxious smell,” he said. “That irritates the lining of the nose, causing it to produce increased mucus while also trapping the mucus you already had.”

“There are some complications that could arise from it,” Sindwani added. “And in the end, it’s also just not going to help you.”

Putting a garlic clove in the ear is also not scientifically proven and can cause similar problems, including ear infections, skin irritation and hearing damage if the ear is perforated.

[From People]

I could take the easy way out and ask an obvious question like, “If it didn’t feel right in the nose, why did she think the ear would be better?” Or I could go the joking route and quip, “Who’s recommending this online, Dr. Gremolata?!” Instead, I choose to be bold! I have a theory, based only on the evidence of my own conviction, that I shall posit here forthwith: think about it, who pops up at each critical juncture of Brandi’s story? Her sons!! The younger one gets her sick through his severely lacking sneezing etiquette (seriously, who sneezes in someone’s face under ANY circumstances?!). Then the older son swoops in with a magical cure! And don’t forget the importance of when this all happened, Easter weekend — this year that fell within days of April Fool’s!! I’m telling you, it was all a scheme enacted by her own spawn! It’s the only logical conclusion after considering all the facts. Thank you, I rest my case.

Before I leave, a moment of sincerity: no, there are no health benefits to putting raw garlic into any orifice of the body. It treats neither congestion, nor acne. Rather, science shows that there is only one beneficial use of raw garlic: keeping the vampires away, naturally.

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photos are credit Getty Images, screenshots from The Real B*tches of Beverly Hills podcast and from Instagram/Brandi Glanville.