After 4 Years of Avoiding the Condo Pool, This 30-Second Daily Habit Finally Let Me Wear Sandals Again
Every March, I started dreading the same conversation.
"Eh, this weekend pool day at our place — coming?"
And every March, I had a different excuse ready. Period. Migraine. Working late. Helping my mum with something. Anything to avoid the question that always followed if I said yes: "Why don't you just take off your slippers?"
Because if I did, everyone in our condo block would see what I'd been hiding for nearly four years.
Yellow-brown patches on three of my toenails. Thickened, ridged, slowly crumbling at the edges.
It started innocently. A gym shower in 2021, probably — I remember the small white spot on my left big toe a few weeks later. I wasn't worried. A tea-tree oil bottle from Watsons, twice a day. It would clear up.
It didn't.
The Singapore problem nobody talks about
Here's something my GP told me eighteen months later, after I'd finally booked an appointment out of frustration: "You live in one of the worst climates on earth for this. Hot, humid, and we wear closed shoes for work and slippers everywhere else. The fungus loves it."
She wasn't wrong. The Singapore Skin Centre has reported that roughly 1 in 8 adults here will deal with onychomycosis — toenail fungus — at some point. Most never seek treatment because they're embarrassed, or because the prescription antifungal pills come with side effects on the liver that put people off.
I tried the pills anyway. Three months. My nails looked marginally better. The new growth coming in still had the same yellow tint at the bed.
Then I went back to the creams. Soaks. Vinegar — yes, I tried vinegar, don't laugh. A friend swore by Vicks VapoRub. None of it touched what was happening under the nail.
By 2024 I was 31, single, hiding my feet at every staycation, every spa day, every condo BBQ. I'd convinced myself this was just my life now.
Why creams were always going to fail
The breakthrough — and this is going to sound stupidly simple — was understanding the geography of nail fungus.
The fungal colony doesn't live on top of the nail. It lives between the nail plate and the nail bed — the soft tissue underneath. That's why creams sit on the surface and do basically nothing. They never reach the actual problem.
The only treatments that work are ones that can physically wick into that gap. Either a prescription lacquer (which a dermatologist applies in clinic, costs hundreds), or a precision-tip pen that you use yourself.
I'd actually never heard of the second option until a colleague at work — quietly, at lunch — told me she'd been using one for three months and her nails were almost back to normal.
The 30-second routine that changed everything
The pen she pointed me to is called NailClear Strengthening™. UK formulation, designed for tropical climates, ships to Singapore.
It looks like a clear plastic mascara wand, basically. You twist the cap two clicks to load the brush tip, sweep it across the affected nail, around the cuticle, and — this is the part that matters — under the free edge where the colony lives.
Air-dry thirty seconds. Done. Twice a day, morning and night.
I'm going to be honest: I didn't expect anything. I'd tried so much by this point that I bought it almost out of spite, expecting to add it to the pile of things that didn't work.
Day 7, I noticed the rough edge of my big toenail wasn't catching on my socks anymore.
Day 14, the new growth at the base of the nail was — I had to take a photo to make sure I wasn't imagining it — clear. Not yellow. Clear, like a normal nail.
By week six, all three affected nails had visible new healthy growth pushing out the discoloured area from below. The yellowing wasn't going away exactly — it was being replaced, millimetre by millimetre, by clean nail underneath.
What 12 weeks looks like
I started in late June. By mid-September, this is what my toes looked like:
Not perfect — there's still about 30% of the old discoloured nail at the tips that needs to grow out (toenails grow slowly — fully growing one out takes 9-12 months). But you can see the line where the new healthy growth is pushing the old growth toward the edge.
For the first time since 2021, I went to my parents' rented Phuket villa for Hari Raya weekend without a single pair of slippers in my bag. Just sandals. Just my toes, in the sun, for everyone to see.
I cried in the bathroom on the second day. Genuinely. I hadn't realised how much energy I'd been spending hiding something that small.
What I wish I'd known sooner
It's not your hygiene. Nail fungus thrives in humid environments — Singapore, basically any tropical city. You can shower three times a day and still pick it up at a swimming pool, gym shower, or rented yoga mat. Stop blaming yourself.
It won't go away on its own. The fungal colony has a self-protecting biofilm. It needs an active antifungal applied directly to the nail bed — not a soak, not a cream, not a vitamin pill.
Surface treatments don't reach where it lives. If you're spending money on creams and not seeing change after 2-3 weeks, you're spending it for nothing. Move to a pen-applicator system.
Recovery takes time but it's not difficult. The hard part is sticking to it twice a day for the first month. After that it becomes routine — like brushing teeth.
If you've been hiding your feet too
I'm writing this for a single reason. I spent four years convinced this was just something I had to live with. I avoided friendships, holidays, dating situations because I was embarrassed about something that — in hindsight — could have been fixed in three months for under $80 SGD.
The pen I used is currently being offered at 70% off the regular price for Singapore customers via the brand's official site. They're also doing a 90-day money-back guarantee — if it doesn't work for you, you get a full refund without having to return the product.
That's the offer that finally made me try it. No risk. So if you're in the same position I was in — hiding your toes, avoiding the pool, putting off opening-toed footwear for another summer — this might be your way out too.
Update: Since this article was published in early 2026, the brand has confirmed they've expanded shipping to Singapore via their EU/UK warehouse. Standard delivery is 7–12 working days. Stock is limited at the discount price.