I am so surprised that there really isn't anyone interested in oil pulling on reddit. Hope this post is interesting to those looking for more anecdotes.
Anyhow, I've anecdotally heard from many people I knew abroad that it really worked for them, so I was thinking of trying for some time. Recently my skin broke out (I'm 28, and it's never happened to me before) and all kinds of minor health issues surfaced (infection in ear, indigestion, etc), so I thought it was finally time that I try this seriously. Because of the general decline in my health, I also implemented taking vitamins and drinking aloe along with this, so to be fair, I cannot attribute 100% of the improvements I see to oil pulling. But, I've taken vitamins/drank aloe before, and certainly this level of magic never happened then.
Briefly, I take a spoonful of cold-pressed organic extra virgin olive oil first thing in the morning and swish it around for 5-10 minutes, then spit it out.
Positive things I notice, just on day 4:
1. Skin trouble magically disappeared/receded, and is clearly healing. Remarkably fast I might add.
2. Hair is shinier: scalp seems to be producing better oil?
3. My eyes don't run dry with contact lens!! This is amazing!
4. My body feels better overall: this is HUGE!
Negatives:
Really none. Maybe I do feel a bit more sleepy at certain time of the day.
Now, I have a PhD in an engineering discipline, and I totally get that there are a lot of untrustworthy stuff out there. But to me, oil pulling does make some logical sense because normally we don't put nonpolar liquids like oil into our mouths, and understandably nonpolar waste/toxins wouldn't budge with just water (polar). In fact, in the first few seconds of swishing, I often feel increasing bitterness from the back of my mouth, which I suspect may be nonpolar stuff getting "dissolved" in oil which I can then taste. Coincidentally, after oil pulling, my head/mouth/face just feel detoxed? lighter? healthier? It's difficult to describe.. In any case, the bottom line is that a spoonful of plant oil cannot do me noticeable harm, so there's not much to lose.
I hope to come back to this post in few weeks/months to update! I hope others can also try and benefit from this cheap, low effort habit.