How to wash vagina on period?

Not necessarily the inside my hole but my vulva, the do i wash the pink part thats in my inner labia ? I believe I haven’t been doing it right because i took a q-tip and i swiped it to the very to of my clit and when i look at it, there was some dark red stuff, it looks like tiny ear wax. It took 5 q-tips (using both sides) to get it to stop showing. It also had a bad smell but now that i got it all out, the smell is gone. I wipe front to back so i really dont know what the problem is. Am i washing improperly? (I dont feel like proof reading because im lazy so there might be typos and bad grammar 🙄)