The Two-Minute Morning Habit That Tidied Up Lulu's Tear Stains

Lulu is a seven-year-old Maltese, seven pounds on a good day, with the kind of coat that makes strangers stop me in the driveway. For years the one part of her that never looked tidy was the fur under her eyes. It went the color of weak tea, then darker, and it stayed that way no matter what I did.

I tried the free things first. A cotton ball and warm water every morning. A tissue. A pack of baby wipes I already had under the sink, which I stopped using because the smell was strong and I was not comfortable putting it that close to her eyes. None of it lasted the day. The damp came back by afternoon, and by evening there was a little crust in the inside corners that I could feel with my fingertip.

What finally stuck was a tub of Earth Rated dog eye wipes I bought in May. Unscented. Extra large at five inches by five, which sounds like a small detail until you have tried to clean under the eye of a dog who is also trying to watch the refrigerator. The tub lives on the bathroom counter. I take one wipe out every morning while Lulu is waiting for me to start my breakfast.

The habit itself takes about two minutes, and most of that is Lulu deciding whether she is in the mood. I fold the wipe once, hold her chin steady with my free hand, and sweep from the inside corner of one eye outward, then the other. One wipe does both eyes. I do not scrub. If a bit of crust has set, I press the wipe against it for a second or two and let it soften, then sweep again.

Here is what changed and what did not. The damp gunk and the morning crust stopped building up. That was the whole point, and it happened inside the first week. What did not happen is the old staining vanishing. Fur that was already discolored stayed discolored. It faded slowly over the summer as my groomer trimmed the stained ends out every eight to ten weeks, and it looked less obvious because the fur around it was clean instead of crusted.

I had her eyes looked at before I started any of this, and I would say the same to you. Her vet found nothing wrong, no infection and no scratched cornea, just the ordinary tearing this breed deals with. If an eye is red, swollen, or she is squinting or pawing at it, that is a vet call, not a wipe.

The damp and the crust stopped building up in the first week. The old staining did not vanish. It faded as my groomer trimmed it out every eight to ten weeks.

The wipes are rayon, unscented, and free of alcohol and parabens, which was the main reason I chose them over the baby wipes. Earth Rated says the formula was developed with a licensed veterinarian to remove dirt, discharge and debris. I cannot test that claim in my kitchen, but I can tell you they do not sting, they do not leave a smell behind, and Lulu stopped pulling her head away by about the third morning.

This is one piece of the routine, not a cure for anything. Lulu gets a bath in the kitchen sink every two to three weeks with a whitening shampoo, which brightens the coat but does nothing for the staining under the eyes. She gets brushed on a towel on the kitchen table most evenings. She sees the groomer every eight to ten weeks. The wipe is the two quiet minutes that keeps the area under her eyes from turning into something that needs a bath.

A tub holds 70 wipes, and at one a day that is a little over two months. I bought mine in May and I am into my second tub. The extra-large size matters more than I expected. The small squares I had been using took two per eye and still left me short at the outer corner, which is exactly where the fur stains first.

Two things I will tell you plainly. It will not lighten fur that is already stained, and it will not stop a dog from tearing. It keeps the area clean so the staining does not build up and does not crust over. If you see redness, swelling or a dog rubbing at her face, stop and call your vet. That is not a wipe problem.

I noticed the difference most on the couch, which is where Lulu spends her evenings. The fur under her eyes used to feel stiff, the way a dish towel dries when you do not rinse it well. Now it feels like the rest of her coat. That is a small thing to write down. It does not feel small when the dog is on your lap every night.

What I'd Tell You If We Were Sitting at My Kitchen Table

If we were sitting at my kitchen table with a cup of coffee and Lulu under the chair hoping for a crumb, here is what I would say. Buy the wipes. Keep them where you will actually see them, which for me is the bathroom counter next to the hand towel, not in a cupboard behind something. Use one every morning even when the eyes look clean, because the mornings after the messy ones are what cause the crust in the first place. And give it two months before you decide whether it is working. The fur that is already stained has to grow out and be trimmed off, and that part is not the wipe's job, it is the groomer's. Earth Rated did the small piece it promised. The rest was patience and a pair of scissors I do not touch myself.