Cold Remedies

Dave Rishar

Dave Rishar

Joined
Oct 25, 2004
Messages
3,178
It's that time of year again, isn't it?

I woke up this morning feeling...not well. No, that's an understatement. I woke up feeling as if I were about to die, and hoping that this happened quickly. I'd felt that tickle in my throat the night before signalling an oncoming cold and I hadn't taken steps to avoid it; to the contrary, I went to the bar. And this morning I paid for it.

I don't know what the medical community thinks of it, but I'm a firm believer in listening to my stomach. I get the occasional craving for very weird food items sometimes but it always seems to pay off when I go with my gut feelings. My stomach said, "Udon," and off I went. It must've been a false positive. By the time I'd gotten to the teriyaki place I'd decided on veggie tempura and some egg drop soup, chased by a cup of bubble tea.

And just like that, I was at 50%, up from 10% (and fading) at the start..

Next, my stomach demanded echinacea and hot tea. The tea I had, the echinacea would have to be purchased. I found echinacea tea. Oh, yeah. Alternating cups of echinacea and peppermint tea (with a single cup of ginger tea thrown in) left me at 70% and hungry again. A soy protein shake, with a banana added for texture and an egg for a little "oomph," got me to 80%. A mango for dessert and I'm 90%+...my throat still itches but the fever is gone and I'm good to go. How I am tomorrow remains to be seen.

In general, I tend to favor echinacea and lots of tea for colds in general; they seem to do the job for me.

Anyone have any favored remedies that work for them?
 
I always drink plenty of tea when I get a cold, mostly to kill the pain in my throat. Might have to try echinacea though...
 
If you act quick, a cough drop with zinc will shorten the duration of your cold by 50%. But it must be taken within 24-48 hrs. of cold's onset. According to my personal nurse, "all you can do is treat symptoms" of a cold. Cough syrup only if coughing, asprin/tylenol with headache. Her own mom has a bad cold too.

BTW, Dave, I ordered the M39 Finn from AIM. An absolute beauty. WooHoo!

uh, I mean, hope you feel better soon.


Mike

a link-a-roo to rare, collectible, accurate, unbelievable Finnish M39 wonder:
http://www.aimsurplus.com/acatalog/One_of_a_Kinds____.html

these are disappearing from their page. My no. 2 choice is gone also.
 
I,m 50 pounds (yeah right)overweight . If I,m lucky I eat one fruit a day . Lotsa red meat in the diet . I am using non-hydrogenated margarine and occassionaly will eat well and actually eat several fruit a day . Lotsa coffee with mint tea from my garden when I get tired of coffee . I have not had a cold in two years . I do ease into winter gradually keeping myself warmly dressed and relatively draft free until my body acclimatises to winter . Then during winter it is the exact opposite . I work outside lightly dressed with adequate clothing always close at hand . I find my body craves the cold . It is invigorating . Exact opposite for springtime .
 
I take a bunch of vitamin C/echinacea, eat more garlic than usual, and drink lots of herbal tea. I've had consistently good luck with zinc products (lozenges/sprays/that gel stuff you stick up your nose). I try to ride out the cold symptoms as much as I can. If I have a fever, I figure my immune system knows what it's doing and I leave it alone unless it gets too high.

As far as home remedies -- when I was a kid my mom would make me drink hot water with lemon juice, honey, and a lot of cayenne pepper. I don't remember if this was helpful but it may be worth a try. Take care & good luck.
 
Horse blanket and a bottle of Tequila. Drink the Tequila, roll up in the horse blanket, and next morning you won't smell so good, but you'll be "cleansed" :eek: ;) :D

Sarge
 
AB Guthrie and several others said that the Mountain men of the American West believed that wintering high up the mountain cured you. You didn't get colds like City folk. If you got sick, you got bad sick; but that was less likely if you were in the mountains. The air and water cleared you out. You had health inside. And there is something about the trees at the edge of the timberline in the rocks. Those trees are twisted by big winds and hard shocks, but they don't get colds.




munk
 
Aint a mountain man - just an ordinary hermit.

If you choose to isolate yourself from the mainstream of society,
the chances of catching a bot are minimised.

If you have kids at school, you are a DOOMED!

Never the less, even a hermit takes precautions..

My winter boosters consist of daily doses of MANUKA HONEY --
(Google it.)

Plus the ancient tonic - apple cider.

I may be nuts - but I'm healthy nuts :D :cool:

ps.. Splash of what you fancy, helps palatability :eek:
 
My favorite remedy

a couple gallons of water, a pile of vitamins, warm clothes and trottin' out to work as normal. Seems to get me by pretty well in the summer. (no sick leave, and missed time results in a job opening fast, as well as a much smaller pay check.
 
Am I alone . or is something missing here??:confused:

RWS.. Not so much "whatever takes yer fancy" :D
 
Oscar Levant mentioned in one of his books that while he was addicted to demerol he didn't have a single cold.

Dave - if you have a fever, it's not a cold.

Just FYI, if there's digestive upset (other than a loss of appitite) it isn't a cold or the flu. "Stomach Flu" is a euphimism for food poisoning in most instances.

Not that it really matters.

When I'm ill with a cold or flu, I take the hottest bath I can stand and then wrap up in a quilt and sweat it out.

Remember The Beverly Hillbillys? Granny had a backwood remedy that was totally disgusting and cleared up a cold in seven to ten days every time.
 
The zinc lozenges work well for me. I start using them at the very first sign. You know, when your face feels hot and achy, and you have that tickle in your throat. Cold-eze tastes awful, but Eckerd's has a brand that's a Tropical fruit flavor, and has vitamin C and echinacea as well.

Steve
 
We dug up a bunch of goldenseal out of the woods and dug up some echinacia and made about half a gallon of tincture.

However in my experience my best TREATMENT, not PREVENTATIVE has been to take aspirin, drink a hell of a lot of water and sleep it off.
 
I don't get sick often, but with my wife working in the school systems I know she's bound to bring me home something. She swears by a product called Airborn or something like that. I think it's basically like a zinc tab, but in a plop, plop, fizz, fizz form. It's not bad, really. I took some a week or two ago. I caught a headcold on New Years day. What a fun way to wake up. Hung over with a skull full of stuff and an achy throat.
Anyway this Airborn stuff doesn't taste half bad and actually helped me get over the cold pretty quickly. It tastes like thera-flu in either an orange or lemon falvors.
Personally, when I got sick before I married the medicine queen I just drank green tea and watched TV for a few days. I don't like medicine as it either makes me groggy or cleans out my sinuses so well that it feels like i pine needles stuck in my nose.
Hope you get back to 100% soon, Dave. Mostly because I think you're a good guy. Partly because we can't be taking chances with zombies in the cantina.

Jake
 
I recently started using Zicam nasal swabs--basically zinc that is applied in the nostril. I headed off what felt like one heck of a cold just a few days ago by using them. A friend's wife recommended them. he told me that she often barely gets the beginnings of colds that have decimated him when he catches them first.
 
There's nothing like a good hot toddy made with lemon and honey IMO.:thumbup:
And if you're just coming down with a cold and a sore throat a bottle of Hiram Walker's Apricot Brandy goes a mighty long ways to helping sooth and prevent it, hell it's good even if you aren't coming down with a cold and sore throat.:thumbup: :D :cool:
 
Right on Yvsa!!!!! :D

My wife is a Middle school teacher and we usually get at least 3 colds - bad to mild from August to December.
This year I made some Tincture of Elderberry( 1/2 lb. of dried Elderberries in about 2 liters of Vodka) which is a good anti viral medicine. They make Sambucal an anti viral drug out of Elderberries. It disrupts viral replication and is effective against most mild strains of cold and flu virus. It worked pretty good.
I took it everday but my wife did not. She caught several colds during the first part of the School year. I was able to avoid all but the one "Mother of all Colds" in early December. Doseage is 1 teaspoon 3 times a day. Tastes awful but works fairly well.
 
Zinc lozenges work well for me, although I rarely get a cold. I like to eat soup and drink tea, and tequila seems to make a difference too. As a child my German mom would pump us full of fennel tea with honey. Tasted good, don't know if it helped though.:confused:
 
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