Cold cures...

tampaxboo

sleep, sleep and sleep.
fresh ginger (grate and make tea with). garlic in your food or take tablets.
Vit D and Zinc tablets boost-support immune system.
eat light and balanced meals. too much food will overload your liver when its services could be better utilised in its virus fighting tasks.

avoid not sleeping (work when you are better),
avoid sugary drinks (honey is antibacterial, but if you keep coating your throat with syrupy sweetened OTC 'cold cures' the cold virus will just feed off it when you actually want it to die off),
avoid too many OTC meds in a cocktail (eg, paracetamol, etc, they make work for your liver when your liver needs to be focused on getting virus out of your system),
avoid strenuous exercise (pumping weights at the gym).
no wanking. a waste of zinc which your immune system needs lots of to function effectively.

Kalimna

As stated above, paracetamol and hydration are your best bets - not very exciting though.

If your immune system needs 'boosting' then you should be in hospital. Your immune system is most likely functioning perfectly well, doing its job of ridding your body of a viral load. Your diet will have essentially no effect on whether your immune system is working or not. You may certainly feel better, bur it is nothing more than placebo.

So long as you stick to the max doses (careful if you take more than one paracetamol containing remedy), e.g. 8g/day paracetamol, your liver will be perfectly fine. 

The 'cold virus' will not feed off sugary syrupy things. For a start they will only be a brief temporary coating on any internal surface they come into contact with. Thats the beauty of the vertebrate digestive system. Even if that weren't true, and syrup stayed on the mucosal surfaces, the virus couldnt feed off it. A virus is not a living thing in the usual sense of the word - it cannot replicate independently of a host cell, and has no mechanism for 'feeding'.

In a nutshell, if you are otherwise healthy then time, hydration and simple analgesia will do more for you than anything else. 

Adam

Rabs

Freshly made chicken soup.....

ThePrettyDamned

menamestom said:

ThePrettyDamned said:

Water, rest. Seriously, if I force myself to work it takes at least twice as long as just having a day off.

I appreciate that can't work for everyone. Or even many people at all... 

I’d have a day off for a flu or heavy virus, but just a standard cold shouldn’t stop anybody working.   I’ve not had a day off my current job, been here 11 years.  I used to be on site a lot but work at home a lot now so it’s not so bad, definitely wouldn’t try to force myself anywhere is I was really ill.



As for cures, time, the odd Lemsip, avoid hard excercise / sport.  But really just time.   Night Nurse is good to sleep theough an annoying cough.

I also take a homeopathic remedy.   Rather than buy it though I just get it straight out of the tap.

Yeah, I know there are plenty who would disagree with me but seriously, when my eyes are leaking, my head hurts and I can't breathe through my nose my productivity drops significantly. If I go to the office and spread it, more people will suffer. 

As luck would have it my minor, work friendly cold has evolved overnight into a face leaking monster. I'll go in, grab my laptop and work from home because it's the smart thing to do imo. 

Working from home is more restful anyway - I don't necessarily agree it's worth a full day off but given the choice of spreading it while not managing quality work anyway or just having a day off to rest and hydrate and returning fresher,I know what I think works best. 

YMMV of course. And I have no evidence so I could be talking shit.

CHRISB50

Lemon and ginger tea. Use two tea bags and stew it. It will burn your throat but always makes me feel better.

Warm water to drink.

Rest / more sleep.

If you have a sore throat gargle with soluble paracetomol, otherwise just take normal tablets to help with a temperature.

I've also found gargling with some sort of antiseptic mouthwash seems to help. It loosens up the crap in your throat / back of nose, and must help to clear / kill off some of the germs.

menamestom

ThePrettyDamned said:

menamestom said:

ThePrettyDamned said:

Yeah, I know there are plenty who would disagree with me but seriously, when my eyes are leaking, my head hurts and I can't breathe through my nose my productivity drops significantly. If I go to the office and spread it, more people will suffer. 

As luck would have it my minor, work friendly cold has evolved overnight into a face leaking monster. I'll go in, grab my laptop and work from home because it's the smart thing to do imo. 

Working from home is more restful anyway - I don't necessarily agree it's worth a full day off but given the choice of spreading it while not managing quality work anyway or just having a day off to rest and hydrate and returning fresher,I know what I think works best. 

YMMV of course. And I have no evidence so I could be talking shit.

There is something to be said for not leaking snot and germs around the workplace!

Emp_Fab

Pour half a teaspoon of black pepper into a mug of boiling water.  Add a pinch of saffron and a tablespoon of honey.  Stir for five minutes then pour it down the sink, then go to bed and stop whining.

Sporky

menamestom said:

Sporky said:

menamestom said:

I’d have a day off for a flu 

You can't get over flu in one day. Real flu knocks you out for a week at least.

Yes, probably more to be fair.  I've only had it a couple of times and both took 3-4 weeks to totally recover.  Fortunately I've not had it for many years and have the flu jab now. I didn't mean just one day off, even though it looks like I did

Doh! I should have read what you wrote, not what I read. Sorry.

In my defence I'm busy killing a minor sore throat and snuffles.

scrumhalf

CHRISB50 said:

Lemon and ginger tea. Use two tea bags and stew it. It will burn your throat but always makes me feel better.

Sadist!

Sassafras

This will relieve coughs and sniffles:

Flink_Poyd

Hydration, Lemsip and work. If I lie at home felling sorry for myself it feels worse, if I do physical work my body fights the symptoms until I stop working then I feel like shit. Rinse and repeat until it goes way

Jez6345789

Fresh ginger crushed about 2 inch root
1 lemon squeezed
about 1inch peeled fresh turmeric thin sliced
honey to taste use real honey not gales.

add boiling water steep for a few minutes

strain if needed 

Drink

tampaxboo

Kalimna said:

The 'cold virus' will not feed off sugary syrupy things. For a start they will only be a brief temporary coating on any internal surface they come into contact with. Thats the beauty of the vertebrate digestive system. Even if that weren't true, and syrup stayed on the mucosal surfaces, the virus couldnt feed off it. A virus is not a living thing in the usual sense of the word - it cannot replicate independently of a host cell, and has no mechanism for 'feeding'.

Adam

thanks for your note @Kalimna . i think i was confusing bacteria with virus. i've been obssessing a lot about cyanobacteria and stromatolites this week so my brain is bacteria-wired.
but if Strat_a_tat_tat were a stromatolite with a heavy flu...

but is it so that too much sugar in the diet can be detrimental to the function of the immune system? hence diabetics getting sicker more than average.

Kalimna

Stromatolites are rather cool, arent they?

Excess sugar intake wont affect your immune system one bit - unless it is persistent and you have a faulty sugar-handling system (i.e diabetes). Diabetics get sick more often for a whole variety of reasons. It is an extremely complex disease. Yes, excess blood sugar is a problem, but not for the immune system in the short term.
Consuming a honey-laced potion will not cause your immune system (which generally works very well, and cant be boosted/weakened in the popular use of the term) to fail. 
Things that *can* boost your immune system : vaccines.
Things that *can* weaken it : concurrent infection, severe nutritional deficit, intrinsic dysfunction of the systen.

Cheers,
Adam

GoldenEraGuitars

Strat_a_tat_tat said:

... well, not cures - as there aren't any - but what do you guys take to alleviate the symptoms of a wet, heavy cold and cough that makes you feel like crap during the day and stops you getting a decent night's sleep?

I generally take nothing and let the thing take its course... but I'm keen to know what works... so I can get a decent night's sleep and be a bit more productive during the day.

Thanks. 

500mg co codemal puntuacted by hot whiskeys. 

Strat_a_tat_tat

Thanks for all the advice chaps.

Night Nurse was a bit of a revelation... definitely helped me get a good night's sleep.

Made sure I got plenty of rest... and fluids... but avoided alcohol for a few days. Well on the mend now.

Cheers. (I'm back on the alcohol!)

Skipped

This is awkward.

People who post "I have not had a cold for 3 years" sound like they are selling something.
But - for what it is worth - I noticed (up to 2014) that every cold I had ever had started with the vaguest hint of a sore throat.
So my strategy is one short spray of ultra chloraseptic before the sore throat arrives.

A quick google suggests that idea that the throat is the key (to prevention) has some informed support.
The only downside is that some other experts suggest you need to have a cold at some point to re-set your resistance.

I think the OP is absolutely correct in stating once you have the cold......there is no cure.

Sporky

Lady BMcH loves Night Nurse.

I tried it once; I found it much harder to sleep than usual, but the next day I was completely zonked.

Cool story, huh?

Strat_a_tat_tat

Sporky said:

Lady BMcH loves Night Nurse.

I tried it once; I found it much harder to sleep than usual, but the next day I was completely zonked.

Cool story, huh?

Cold story!

Sporky

I see what you did there.