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Please read our Golden Rules of self help before considering the information on this page.
Colds and Flu's
HOW TO PREPARE FOR WINTER
“What?” I hear you say “But winter is still a long way away and there are plenty of wonderful days left!” Sure, that’s why we want to prepare now, so that we don’t get sick. You know, that prevention is better than cure thing. If in a couple of months you get to bed all clogged up feeling like you have been hit by a truck, don’t say I did not warn you!
Prevention, Prevention, Prevention
Hands up all those who don’t know about Vitamin C. Good! I see not too many people have spent the past thirty years in the Gobi desert. Vitamin C is wonderful. It’s probably the best and cheapest way to avoid flu’s and colds altogether. It also happens to be extremely cheap, especially in the powder form.
How much should you take? Most adult should have between quarter to half a teaspoon a day (1000 to 2000mg) depending on whether you get sick easily or not. Children (especially the snotty ones) one eighth to a quarter of a teaspoon (500 to 1000mg). Have it in water or juice and make sure you brush your teeth after. If you want to take tablets remember that if you chew them you need to brush your teeth even more.
If you or the kids start having diarrhoea, stop taking Vitamin C for a few days and then resume with a smaller dose.
Vitamin A. You know this one, it’s one of my favourites: it’s also known as Cod Liver Oil! Now you don’t need to drink it down –actually, it’s a good idea to get little children used to drink a teaspoon a day, this way they won’t be precious when they grow up - one capsule (being 5,000 I.U) a day is plenty to keep the winter blues away.
Garlic. Use plenty of garlic and onions in your cooking and this will help to keep the nasties away.
The Arsenal
Just in case you start getting a sniffle have these little beauties ready in your cupboard.
Echinacea is almost as famous as Vitamin C nowadays. However, you should not take it as a preventive, if you do it could cause stomach upset but if you take it as soon as you start feeling unwell then it will be a great help. Have between 1 and 2 mls of the liquid two to four times a day (if you have tables take one to two tablets) for a few days.
Garlic Capsules. If you have not had your nice garlic sauces then you will have to take the concentrate: two capsules or tablets with food three times a day for up to a week. Remember if you have a delicate liver, don’t have too much garlic concentrate. How do you know you have a delicate liver? Simple: if the garlic keeps on repeating on you or makes you feel nauseous, then you should avoid the concentrate and stick to the fresh thing.
Sage tea. At the first sign of a sore throat, gargle with Sage tea. Sage tea is also excellent for a temperature.
Your Bed. If people took to their bed when they started to be sick with influenza and took all the above remedies, they would get well really soon instead of getting worse and being sick for weeks.
Of couse you can always get the Flu Mix!
How About The Flu Vaccine?
There are so many different strains of flu that you would have to be really lucky if you were only in contact with the particular strain you were vaccinated with. In my experience a lot of people who do get vaccinated get sick anyway, sometimes the vaccine was too strong for them and they get sick from the vaccination.
How About All These New Anti Flu Medications?
There are some new patent anti flu medicines (Some brand new ones have just been released in the US and it won’t be long before they hit down under). These are antiviral drugs and won’t be any good in case of a bacterial infection. Besides they are contra-indicated for people with asthma.
NOT QUITE SPRING YET
A couple of weekends ago the weather miraculously changed. The rain stopped, the sun came out and with it EVERYBODY did! Everybody, their children, grandmother, third cousin and definitely their dog came out. All Australians came out in force to demonstrate that indeed we are a nation of outdoors people and now that we had a chance to be out of doors we were jolly well going to make the most of it. Everybody was hysterical with spring fever.
All, except for me. Now, I am not a party pooper, nor a prophet of doom but in the face of so much bared flesh and so many jogging bodies I just KNEW what was going to happen next: by Wednesday, the sun revellers would turn into the disappointed snifflers. And, unfortunately, I was right. Scores of patients rushed to my clinic suffering from flush colds, sinusitis, coughs and sore throats. It all went something like that:
- Wasn’t the weekend wonderful?
- Yes, I/we went walking/running/swimming/barbecuing/ to the park/beach/mountain. I/we hadn’t been out for months!
- So, you suddenly got very active then?
- Yes, it was fantastic!
- And you did not wear too many clothes then?
- No! It was great not to have to rug up.
- So, when it suddenly got cold at 4.10 p.m. you didn’t have any woollies with you did you?
- I was a real surprise it got so cold suddenly.
- Of course, you twit! It might have been like a summer day, but summer is a long way yet!
This is going to happen again and again until October, we are going to have some glorious days but the nasty South West wind is still going to blow straight from Antarctica right into your bones. That’s not party pooping or doom prophesising it’s just the way the weather is in the land of Oz. You can’t just stand behind closed doors simply because spring and summer are still only an illusion. So here are a few pointers to help you travel through the change of seasons without being a casualty of the wind.
Prevention
In winter your body’s personal thermostat regulates itself so that it can keep the cold out; when you get hot, both your lungs and the pores of your skin open to allow cooling, this is why you get sick: the cold can enter easily via your open lungs and skin. In fact you don’t catch a cold, the cold does a ‘break and enter’: it catches you.
- An easy way to avoid getting cold is to have your woollies handy. I know, this is boring and I sound like your grandmother (hey, I could be your grandmother). Maybe it’s not really glamorous to put on a sweatshirt when you have just finished throwing a frisbee around, or you emerge like Venus from the waves, but if you sniff and snort and cough and wheeze for days, how glamorous is that?
- Another way to keep the warmth in and maintain your body’s thermostat, is to drink warm drinks, not cold.
- Start training gradually. If you have been cooped up for days or weeks, no matter how wonderful the weather looks it’s is going to be a big ask to expect your body to behave as if you have been going daily to the beach for six weeks. Be kind, take it easy.
- Quit while you’re on top. Don’t wait for the weather to turn, don’t squeeze the last minute out of the sun. Go home while it’s still nice and warm. (Like that you’ll leave the traffic to the suckers who are going to catch a cold!)
Cure
As soon as the next nice day comes, you will forget the above, get a cold, come running to me, and this is what I shall tell you.
- Told you so!
- Hot drink no 1: Make a tea by simply pouring boiling water on some finely sliced fresh ginger (about half an inch) and letting it draw for five to ten minutes, powered dry ginger is good too: half a teaspoon per mug. Strain, add the juice of a whole lemon and honey to taste. Yum!
- Hot drink no 2: If the cold is threatening to turn into something worse and there is plenty of yucky mucous, you need to spice up the above drink with a couple of crushed cloves of garlic added to the ginger and even a little chilli if you like it. Not so yum but POTENT!
- Kids. You have two chances of getting little kids to drink the above: Buckley’s and sweet Fanny Adam’s. Here are some kiddie’s versions.
- Hot drink no3: Make the hot lemon with no ginger and plenty of honey.
- Hot drink no 4: Make a chicken soup! Chuck in a pot of water: bits of chicken, onion, garlic and celery and whatever veges died at the bottom of your fridge. Boil the whole thing for an hour, then strain and just drink the broth. Very fortifying and with no yucky bits.
- Hot drink no 5: If you have a Sore Throat the best remedy is Sage tea. Yes, plain old sage you can get from the supermarket. Make a strong tea and gargle with it several times a day. You can also drink some with honey and lemon.
- Don’t do it again!
Myth Smashing
By the way, there is an old husband’s tale that says that when you feel under the weather you should go the gym/have a run/ have a swim to sweat it out. WRONG! If the body is under attack it needs all its energy it can muster. ‘Sweating it out’ just wastes energy, many colds have turned into flu, bronchitis or worse from people ‘sweating it out’. When you feel unwell, the best thing to do is in fact nothing at all! Put your feet up with lots of warm drinks.
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