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How do you cope with the common cold as a diabetic?

I

ian1968

Well-Known Member
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57
As a non diabetic, fighting off a common cold was easy. Tons and tons of orange juice for the vitamin c, and a spoonful of honey to ease the sore throat. But neither of those options look very sensible now I'm a diabetic. So how do you cope with a cold?
 
I rarely get colds, but I use Echinacea, get it from holland and barratt and start a course of it, it helps your immune system, bloody marvellous stuff.
 
As I have a lung condition (bronchiectasis) I have to take antibiotics every time I get a cold or a sore throat, not to treat the cold obviously but to stop any possibility of it escalating to a chest infection which to me can be very serious.

And yes they can be miserable affairs being unable as we are to take many of the usual sweet remedies. I usually just take something for the temperature if I have one, paracetamol etc or day and or night nurse and just sit it out dreaming of hot sunny days on a beach somewhere :thumbup:
 
I don't usually get colds but when I do I don't use anything for them. It's just a cold nothing serious!
 
Well, to be honest by the time cold has landed, there isn't much point in taking tons of vitamins etc!

I have to be very careful of colds because of my asthma (like Sid, I am very susceptible to chest infections) but I just take sensible precautions and then symptomatic relief. Hot lemon drinks with a sweetener added and a slice of ginger, plenty of steam (head over a bowl of hot water, towel draped over head) paracetamol when needed and as much fresh air as I can manage!

Really just common sense, plenty of liquids and painkillers when necessary.
 
I dont tend to get cold, a bit of a scratchy throat at most, I am lucky.

Plenty of warm drinks, eg herbal and fruit teas, with freshly squeezed lemon and sweetener and a couple of paracetamol if necessary should do the trick plus lots of TLC and snuggling down on the sofa with a soft cuddly blanket...

Heated coconut milk sweetened and infused with cinnamon or fresh ginger is soothing as well, add a spoon of coconut oil to it as well, its supposed to be anti-viral.

I also collect elderberries every year and freeze them, they are said to boost the immune system and are said to be a very good cold remedy, there is a product on the market, google Sambucol for further information, but why pay out for something that you can easily make yourself and it costs next to nothing to make your own elderberry remedy, the elderberries are delicious, stewed and thickened with a little bit of jelly, we eat them with ice cream.

I hope you dont get a cold, stay healthy, keep your bg in check.
All the best :) :)
 
I have found sugar free Strepsils which are essential for me because I always seem to get a sore throat. Other than that paracetamol is the key. I like hot lemon drinks but they often have sugar in them.

The last cold I had was a doozy because my BG was really not well controlled at the time. I think control is the key, if you are on top of your BG then you will not suffer as much.
 
I hardly ever get colds but if I do I just ride it out and take paracetamol if my heads pounding and running a temperature.
 
Lots of warm drinks for me, at the moment I'm going for warm vimto but there are plenty of other options, lemon in hot water, herbal teas etc. Persoanally I avoid milky ones like hot chocolate when I'm feeling stuffy, they just don;t appeal to me.

Suagr free jelly is also soothing on a sore throat.
 
If you want lots of vitamin C you can get those effervescent vitamin C tablets which don't have any carbs in them. Possibly you could have them in hot water as well?

Other than that you need to just keep drinking water, rest and try and ride out the temperature for as long as you can be bothered; it is after all your body's immune response to the virus; up the temperature and burn the buggers out...

Having said that it's not a nice condition to be in so I would turn to the paracetamol and the like pretty early on.

I got flu last year for the first time in many many years and it was horrible; just drank water for a week and did sick day rules as a Type 1. If you had said to me previously 'how about a week in bed?' I would have jumped at it, but this was no where near the pleasant dozing I was hoping for. I felt almost delirious at times, couldn't sleep, had a bad headache and ached all over with my temperature doing crazy things. Urggh.

I hope no one gets anything like that this year.

Best

Dillinger
 
dawnmc said:
I rarely get colds, but I use Echinacea, get it from holland and barratt and start a course of it, it helps your immune system, bloody marvellous stuff.
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I'm with Dawn, I take Echinacea. I have been taking this winters course for a week now, but rarely get colds anyway.
 
A hot toddy is the thing
A slug of whiskey slice of lemon shake of cinnamon a couple of cloves topped up with hot water,taken just before bed
CAROL
 
I'm with Carty! But chuck the hot weater and all the silly stuff, and just swig a decent single malt whisky. Vit C tabs if you want, plain paracetamol if you want, and robitussin do a sugar free cough mixture if you get a cough. But plenty of the single malt and put your feet up, preferasbly looking sorry for yourself.
Incidentally, if you get high blood sugars with a cold, which some seem to, the whisky has the added advantage of sending them crashing as well. Oh, not on insulin or similar are you? If so, be careful of hypos with the whisky. If you're just on diet/metformin, enjoy! :thumbup:
 
I've got COPD and nurse said phone surgery immediately.
 
Grazer said:
I'm with Carty! But chuck the hot weater and all the silly stuff, and just swig a decent single malt whisky. Vit C tabs if you want, plain paracetamol if you want, and robitussin do a sugar free cough mixture if you get a cough. But plenty of the single malt and put your feet up, preferasbly looking sorry for yourself.
Incidentally, if you get high blood sugars with a cold, which some seem to, the whisky has the added advantage of sending them crashing as well. Oh, not on insulin or similar are you? If so, be careful of hypos with the whisky. If you're just on diet/metformin, enjoy! :thumbup:
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You really are the most terrible influence sheepy! Or what did unbeliever call you, mischievous young ram. :lol:
 
If I think that a cold is coming on I have an even larger dose of a decent Scotch
about half a bottle, it works really well ! Vodka works equally well.

If you don't agree with my advice, then DONT do it !
 
Sid Bonkers said:
As I have a lung condition (bronchiectasis) I have to take antibiotics every time I get a cold or a sore throat, not to treat the cold obviously but to stop any possibility of it escalating to a chest infection which to me can be very serious.

And yes they can be miserable affairs being unable as we are to take many of the usual sweet remedies. I usually just take something for the temperature if I have one, paracetamol etc or day and or night nurse and just sit it out dreaming of hot sunny days on a beach somewhere :thumbup:
Click to expand...


Same here. My last 'cold' turned into an asthma attack and pneumona within a few days and I ended up taking a nice trip to hospital in an ambulance where I was pumped with steroids and antibiotics and oxygen. I've had 3 episodes like that over the past 3 years and I dread this time of year now. I'm not bouncing back like I used to. :(
 
I've had a flu jab the last 2 years and will certainly get one next week when I go for my check up, especially having read the description of flu, sounds nasty. The year before I was diagnosed it was bird flu season and my daughter got it really badly, at the time my immune system managed stave it off, not sure what would happen now and not wanting to risk it.
 
Fraddycat said:
I've had a flu jab the last 2 years and will certainly get one next week when I go for my check up, especially having read the description of flu, sounds nasty. The year before I was diagnosed it was bird flu season and my daughter got it really badly, at the time my immune system managed stave it off, not sure what would happen now and not wanting to risk it.
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I've been thinking about the flu jab too. I've never had one ever.

I suffered from regular chest infections when I was young, then I stopped having them and didn't have a cold or cough for about 15 years. Then 3 years ago I was working in a children's hospital and we had a Swine Flu outbreak and two of the secretaries sitting a few feet away from me came down with it and we heard another person actually died. Then I came down with what I thought was a bad chest infection and developed breathing problems but I wasn't diagnosed with Swine Flu. But I was really laid low with it and each year I've had the same thing. The last bout was in January this year and my God I really thought I was on my last legs with it. Felt like my lungs were filling up with fluid. It was really scary, and even more so because when it began I went to see the Practice Nurse who said she couldn't hear anything and told me I didn't need antibiotics and I should suck a lozenge!!!

Three days after that I was gasping in the ambulance and thought I was pegging out. Also the way my immune system is behaving, I don't really want to go back to working in a hospital. I have to handle a lot of case notes and they've been here there and everywhere, including being stored on the floor in the offices as many Medical Secretariats just don't have the space or adequate storage equipment. I've complained God knows how many times about that because I think it's disgusting putting case notes on the floor where people are constantly walking in outdoor shoes. Those casenotes are transported all over the hospitals, to wards, theatres, clinics, they're placed on beds and handled by so many people. They wonder where MRSA and CDif come from yet the hygiene in a lot of the medical offices would turn your hair grey! I've complained, I've even written to the Health Secretary believe it or not - but we're just basically ignored and the situation never changes.
 
One of my pet hates is people who have colds and insist 'it's only a cold for God's sake' and who battle it out at work spreading their wonderful cold around everyone.

For the past 4 years I've had a chest infection every year round about October/November when the temperature changes and everyone's coughing and sneezing. I have asthma and bronchiectasis and I'm knocked off me feet with a cold and the last one turned very quickly to pneumonia and I ended up being carted off in an ambulance from the local Walk In centre. Colds may not be much more than an inconvenience to anyone who doesn't have lung problems, which is fine for them if they want to battle on at work and spread the damned thing to all and sundry. But to those of us with lung problems sitting next to someone with a cold could mean we end up in hospital and a week or more off work. I wish to God people would not insist on being ever so brave and stoical when they're in the infectious stage, dragging themselves into work to spread their germs. Just be selfish and keep it to yourself please.

My other pet hate is people at work with colds who cough and sneeze into their hand and don't use a hanky and then handle their keyboard, office equipment and offer to make me a cup of tea. Yuk! Stay at home please and keep the cold to yourself.
 
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