Getting Over a Cold or Flu Quickly

Coming down with a cold or flu can create a real hardship for me. I don’t have paid sick leave and that means that I can’t afford to be sick. I do whatever I can to stay well. I’ll stop when I feel that I’m getting too depleted and then I do the best I can to get adequate rest.

There are times when it can be really challenge to care for my own needs. I’m working all kinds of hours in different cities and commuting long distances. I’m often out in the cold for periods of time and I don’t always have the opportunity to get the sleep that I need. I can feel when my body is getting stressed, and my immune system is starting to go down …boom …that’s when a cold or flu is most likely to hit.

Getting adequate rest is critically important. Our reserves get depleted when we’re working long hours and failing to get adequate rest.

I sleep as much as I can if I feel I’m starting to come down with something. My body’s natural defenses can often regroup and fight off a cold or flu when I give my body lots of time to rest.

I can feel the sense of depletion in my body whenever I begin to feel run down or if I do come down with a cold. I’ll sit very still and breathe softly and deeply as I center my awareness within the feeling of depletion. The heaviness and feelings of depletion will usually dissolve. It then feels like I’m tapping into some kind of stream or current deep within my own body. The life force begins to flow from within and that helps to replenish me.

To this date, I’ve never had anyone schedule a healing session with the expressed intent of getting over a cold or flu. People have asked me on many occasions if they should go ahead with a scheduled session when they are under the weather. People generally don’t feel very good when they’re suffering from a cold or flu, but many have told me that they felt better after the session, and that they were able to recover faster.

Borion makes a homeopathic remedy called Oscillococcinum which is very effective. Oscillococcinum needs to be taken at the first sign of a cold or flu. Boericke & Tafel also make a very effective cold and flu remedy. It’s good to have these remedies on hand in case you find yourself coming down with something.

I feel that colds and flu are part of our body’s attempt to cleanse itself. I do everything I can to encourage the cleansing process. I take time to soak in a hot bath or take a really hot shower. I’ll also drink lots of hot herbal tea throughout the day. I’ll sometimes drink as much as a gallon of hot herbal tea over the course of a day.

I use to suffer from bronchitis as a child and adolescent. The bronchitis cleared up once I started drinking adequate fluids. I don’t cough as much when I catch a cold if I drink lots of hot herbal tea. Drinking lots of hot herbal tea helps me to break up the congestion that makes it difficult to breathe and causes me to cough. It also flushes the congestion and toxicity out of my system.

It’s not easy to drink lots of hot liquids if you’re on a long flight. We don’t want to be climbing over everyone to get up and make twenty trips to the toilet. Nature’s Sunshine make a product called Tei fu which is a combination of essential oils. Tei fu oil will blast your sinuses wide open so that you can breathe again. Olbas makes an inhaler will also provide immediate relief by opening your air passages.

I started to come down with a cold one time before I left Bangalore, India. I had to catch a flight at 2 am and I was afraid that being up much of the night would only make the condition worse. One of my friends made a drink that consisted largely of black pepper. I was sitting there at the airport late into the night, but much to my surprise, the cold symptoms abated.

Osha is a plant that is native to the Rocky Mountains of North America. Bears eat osha root to cleanse their digestive system. Osha root tastes absolutely horrible, but it has very powerful antiviral and antibacterial qualities. Osha root is highly effective for respiratory ailments. This stuff is absolutely amazing …I have never found anything as effective to stop a cough as Osha root.

Garlic is one of the most powerful natural antibiotics in existence. Westerners such as myself are often more susceptible to the kinds of viruses that are prevalent in much of Asia. I came down with some kind of flu about the time I was returning from Sri Lanka. My head was pounding, I was running a high fever and I couldn’t do anything. A week had passed and I still wasn’t feeling any better. I felt very distressed, because I could not afford to be out of commission for any longer. I started eating two to three heads of roasted garlic a day. The flu finally broke and I was able to get back to work within two days.

I came down with something else on another occasion when I was in Sri Lanka. I have no idea what it was, but I was running a very high fever and I could not function. The friends that I was staying with tried to get me to take some kind of pharmaceuticals …I refused. They boiled some kind of traditional herbs and that did help, but I still felt like hell. I told one of my friends to pick up several heads of garlic and a bottle of apple cider vinegar. I just kept chewing up cloves of raw garlic and taking swigs from the bottle of vinegar. The fever broke and I was back to normal within a few days.

I was staying at a friend’s place during much of the winter when I was working in Boston a few years ago. I would either roast heads of garlic or chop the garlic up, sauté it in olive oil and pour it over spaghetti. I was working really hard that winter and spending lots of time out in the cold, but the garlic provided a strong boost to my immune system. I never came down with a cold or flu that entire winter.

I love all kinds of hot spicy foods. My favorites are Indian, Cambodian, Thai, Korean, Ethiopian, Indonesian and Malaysian. The spices used in Indian foods have all kinds of amazing healing properties. I’ll go down to the Indonesian or Malaysian restaurants and order their really hot spicy soup if I’m in New York and I catch a cold. Those spices break up any congestion and clear out my airways.

These are only a few of the many natural remedies for cold and flu. Feel free to contact me and let me know about other remedies that have either prevented you from coming down with a cold or flu or that have helped you to recover more quickly.

(913) 927-4281

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