I sat in my recliner most of the day on Christmas, relaxing. While it was nice to relax, it wasn’t just relaxing I was doing. I had a day full of sneezing and blowing my nose. While I really did enjoy having a low-key day where I could enjoy the children and just be together, the cold symptoms, I could do without. I’m sure you’ve been there before! We all have at one time or another.
As I sat there all day, I had a lot of time to think. It reminded me that earlier this year, I wrote a post about how to combat winter time illnesses. Let me just say, after a relatively healthy spring, summer and fall, it’s time for me to refresh my brain on how I can fight off a cold naturally! I seem to have a brain lapse when I’m out of practice. So, I looked up the old post and thought I’d better just post the meat of it again! After all, it’s great information to keep on hand, especially since we’re heading into cold and flu season.
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9 Ways to Fight Off a Cold Naturally
- Garlic – Take garlic tablets and/or eat garlic on your food when you first come down with anything. Garlic is a natural antibiotic and helps to rebuild your immune system.
- Vitamin C – Take the pills, eat fresh oranges, drink orange juice, eat grapefruit. If you’re taking the pills, my book recommends taking 5,000-20,000 mg a day in divided doses.
- Grapefruit Seed Extract
– for colds – mix about 10-20 drops in some orange juice and drink it down quick. The taste can be bitter, but when you mix it with the orange juice, it is a lot less noticeable! When we take this, we really notice a shorter duration of our cold. - Elderberry Juice or Extract– It can help to break a fever and is “effective against a cold because it contains antioxidant flavonoids that protect cell walls against foreign substances”. Source
- Apple Cider Vinegar– fights illness, helps sore throats along with a whole slew of other things it’s good for. Definitely aids in rebuilding your immune system, also.
- Try to avoid consuming sugar as this can prolong any illness.
- Eucalyptus Oil– We keep this essential oil on hand and we put it into our humidifiers so we can smell it and breathe it while we’re sleeping. It aids in breaking up congestion. (I recently learned that we’re not supposed to expose my daughter who has epilepsy to this oil though, so please be careful that no one in the household has a condition that can be affected by this)
- Use a Neti Pot– I have done this before when I was desperate, but I find it not very enjoyable, so don’t do it unless I need some serious relief! I have read that those who use a neti pot, decrease the duration of the cold. I did find that it relieved my symptoms temporarily and that my cold seemed to get over with quickly.
- Use hydrogen peroxide in your ears and nose – I know this one sounds weird, too, but I read that at the first sign of a cold, rinse your ears and nose with peroxide. I read that you are supposed to pour it into the ear and let it sit there as long as possible. That was totally miserable, so now I just use it on the end of a Q-tip, cleaning out my ears with it. From what I read, it said that the nasal cavity and the ears are the first places to accept the virus, so if you can catch it before it’s taken hold, it can cause it to go away. I have had success with my cold going away right after I was starting to feel sick by using this remedy. You do have to catch it early though, because the times that I didn’t, I went on to get a full blown cold.
– for colds – mix about 10-20 drops in some orange juice and drink it down quick. The taste can be bitter, but when you mix it with the orange juice, it is a lot less noticeable! When we take this, we really notice a shorter duration of our cold.
– It can help to break a fever and is “effective against a cold because it contains antioxidant flavonoids that protect cell walls against foreign substances”. 
– fights illness, helps sore throats along with a whole slew of other things it’s good for. Definitely aids in rebuilding your immune system, also.
– We keep this essential oil on hand and we put it into our humidifiers so we can smell it and breathe it while we’re sleeping. It aids in breaking up congestion. (I recently learned that we’re not supposed to expose my daughter who has epilepsy to this oil though, so please be careful that no one in the household has a condition that can be affected by this)
– I have done this before when I was desperate, but I find it not very enjoyable, so don’t do it unless I need some serious relief! I have read that those who use a neti pot, decrease the duration of the cold. I did find that it relieved my symptoms temporarily and that my cold seemed to get over with quickly.What do you use to help you fight off the winter time sickness? I’d love to hear what works for you!
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