how can I ward off a cold?

[mimsum]

I've got a horrible feeling I'm coming down with a cold (prickly throat, bit achy) and I sooo can't have a cold this week - dd's birthday on thurs, party on sat, dh away etc

usually I just stock up on lemsip and ride it out but I could really do with not being ill right now

any tried and tested methods?? please???

SIL swears by 3 x vit c tablets all taken together at the first sign of a cold.

good luck

milswears by eating raw garlic chunk every two hours and a huge hit of vit C at first syptoms

then lots of fluid, keep up the garlic and cross your fingers

if you've got a big ish boots store near you, have a look in homeopathic/herbal section for new era tissue salts tablets for cough & colds, you can take 4 every half hour, work brilliantly

Mega dose vitamin C - has to be 1000mg/day.
Can buy it in Boots/Supermarket

If it does arrive then Benelyn day and night tablets are FAB, they just get you through it.

Redoxon Vit. C is good, apparently the vitamins stay in your system longer. I don't know if that's true, but they seem to work.

Be careful with high doses of Vit. C though, it can make you poo very frequently. Bet you really wanted to know that

I swear by echinacea tablets and gargling with diluted TCP at the first sign of a tickly throat. Also I was given a tip of wiping round your nostrils with TCP on a cotton bud from an old lady and actually since I have been doing it I haven't had a cold and both my dd's are v snotty. You just end up smelling of TCP!!

I have heard that garlic is good too.

Cider vinegar with honey, combined with vit c and zinc.

But,you could also try eardrops (otex) with the active ingredient hydrogen peroxide (assuming you are not allergic to this) as it seems to stop a cold in its tracks. A GP told me this trick, he swears by it as it zaps any virus in ear nose and throat.

What about that First defence stuff?
Mind you I tried it once and a within a few minutes had a nose bleed so its not for the faint of nose!

effervescent vit c tablets
lots of water
echinacea
gargling and then swallowing soluble aspirin is good for a sore throat

my friend swears by taking a berocca everyday

lots and lots and lots of water always does the trick for me (up to 3litres a day); honey and lemon with cloves as well. and paracetemol at bedtime. good luck!