to not know the difference between flu and a cold!

[usernameishistory]

I spent the night not moving because I felt so ill, freezing cold, despite many (many!) layers, and needing a pee all night but feeling too ill to have one, despite it eventually really hurting by about 3am. I didn't sleep all night because I just felt too bad and freezing. Is this a cold?

Why can't I tell? Cold the night before, cold again tonight, feeling woozy and wobbly, cough, and pathethic!

Flu for me is I can't bear anything touching my skin. The duvet hurts, clothes hurt, everything aches and headache, I was fine and then I wasn't type thing
But then I've had awful virus type things that have made me feel just as bad
My medication actually says "flu type symptoms" as a side effect and boy, do I know about them it's a headache followed by bone pain, uncontrollably shivering, high temperature and generally feeling horrendous

If you aren’t sure then you’ve never had flu

I’ve had flu twice, both times as an adult and one of those times was swine flu.
I was literally in bed unable to raise my head or limbs off the bed for over a week each time. DH had to carry me to the loo, and he went and bought a runners bladder and tube so I could drink without having to sit up. The cats wouldn’t leave my side. I couldn’t read or watch anything, nor use my phone. I slept for a solid 30 hours during one bout.
A Cold, you feel meh but you at least have the energy to sit up huddled in the duvet and watch Judge Rinder!

This thread has demonstrated a very strong overlap between peolple who spout uninformed drivel and people who don't bother to read the thread.

Who'd a thunk it...idiots be idiots...

Update: I could quite possibly manage to ask naked, fan fancying, gin wielding Chris Hemsworth to make me a hot vimto. Nowt else.

Agree if you can’t tell the difference then you haven’t had flu. Also flu takes weeks or more to recover from.

If you do manage such a feat iklboo please send one my way love. My chest is on fire, and not for sexy reasons! My throat is so worn out and painful from coughing. I keep drinking and sucking on the devils own lozenges, but little effect.

Yes, the nonsense spouting ng goes on apace despite the facts.

This is what its like with urban myths isn't it. They are believed in the face of everything else, by some, not all.

I genuinely didnt know the difference, but thats proven irrelevant, as I could have a slight sniffle and carry on regardless, yet have the flu. The state I'm in now could just be a bad cold.

Test.

Flu is fatal in 87% of cases, the common cold in only 49%. Flu also causes blue feet in nearly all cases. Common cold can only be present in the first half of the week.

Also, the flu and colds are exactly the same virus.

I wish there was a £50 note blowing about in my garden...

erm...the fatality rate for influenza virus certainly is NOT 87%.

wtf?

That was hilarious show

Thanks for cheering my day a bit.

Apparently the note situation could be anything up to millions! (You heard it here first, right on this very thread)

I'm going to say that even at the most ill point in my life, in a intensive cardic care ward tied to several drips with a central line pumping AB's direct into my heart, I would STILL have rolled out of bed to claim a million pounds.

Mind you I was 16 so I probably didn't believe in my own mortality at the time...

Although I did tell my mum I couldn't accept a beautiful ring she bought for me because I might be sick on it....so maybe not.

I have had flu twice in my life. It's very different from a cold, or even a very bad cold. You can generally carry on functioning with a cold, though you might need a day in bed. I had a job where I worked from home for 5 years and I had one day when a cold felt so bad I actually took the day off sick and went to bed, which I wouldn't need to do generally if working from home. But flu would have been a week in bed.

I had the Millennium flu back in December 1999 and it took until the end of Jan 2000 to feel better. I also had flu in 2005 and had 1.5 weeks off work. I've never taken more than one day with a cold.

@cologne4711

You can die from a cold. You're bad. Do rtft.

Its quite insulting to all those that have lost family and friends to colds.

You can't know without testing. Are you being deliberately obtuse to ignore whats being said on this thread?

Someone once told me that the easiest way to tell between a cold or a flu is if you saw a huge bag of money on your lawn,if you have a cold you would still drag yourself to get it, but with flu you are too ill to do so however much you wanted to.

I actually think this is an unwinnable battle with ignorance. There are probably millions upon millions of people in th ecountry who believe this shite...and only a fraction of 1% of them have to come on MN and tell us about it and they'll fill the thread a dozen times over...

OP

Are you feeling any better yet?

(because if you are then it OBVIOUSLY wasn't flu )

You're ill @usernameishistory, that's all you need to know.

I have had flu once. I was a nurse in intensive care. I had a poor patient who was frequently incontinent but couldn't have anything to manage it due to their condition. The only solution was to change their sheets every time they were incontinent and clean them up. I didn't mind that, it was my job.

As the afternoon wore on, I found myself getting more and more inefficient with the changes. My arms just didn't seem to work together (we kind of 'ruffle' the sheet to be able to slip it under the patient) and I was making a right dog's dinner of it, tbh.

That evening, I left work and as I walked down the corridor, I thought "I'll get some Coca-Cola to give me some energy to get home". One sip later I was in a terrible state - I'd almost inhaled the Coca-Cola and my epiglottis had snapped shut over my airway, but then seemed to spasm, so I couldn't breathe .

A passing doctor colleague saw me and tried to take me to A&E, but I was a bit confused and just kept saying "I just need to get home...". Eventually, she insisted that she drive me home (45 minutes ). When I got home, I took my temperature and it was 38.5°c That's when I realised it was probably Flu.

I didn't leave my bed for about 2 weeks for more than a few minutes and I slept more or less solidly for the first 3 days.

Thank you for the concerns some posters have shown. It feels like it's finally 'broken'. I'm still lacking in energy etc, and going downhill quickly at times, but the really tight dry hollow cough is now suddenly very ...well, noone needs to hear
Shall we say clearing, although its painful, ribs /stomach hurting, not to mention my poor throat from coughing, but my body now feels free of whatever that horrible flu blanket is that makes your whole body hurt and joints painful. All just.in the last hour or so.

I have no rhinitis type symptoms but much headachey catarrh/chest gunk. Oh plus a couple of beauty cold sores

Been eating oranges for vit c today, and keeping plenty of liquids, and the devils lozenges really have helped with my poor throat from coughing.

Still taking the paracetamol.

Lougle for the nurses.

Flu also causes blue feet in nearly all cases.

No it doesn't.

op glad you are feeling you've turned a corner. Just give yourself time to recover and don't dive back into life too quick!

I always remember a lecturer at uni say the difference between the flu and a cold is if you dropped a £20 note if you had the flu you wouldn't pick it up !

@iklboo

Okay, the blue feet is an exaggeration but the rest of my post was 100% true.

Its hilarious show

Blue feet an all

Thank you M3lon despite still needing the devils own lozenges, as of last night I stopped being able to tolerate them. I think I have my body back, as I had to spit this morning's out or retch.

My chest is full of blood streaked green stuff now, nice. Very congested and productive.

Flu is NOT fatal in 87% of cases. At all. There were 650,000 deaths in around 5,000,000 reported cases worldwide.