I hate colds, well who doesn’t really. But I also find them rather fascinating. I never quite know what each cold will turn into. I have several variants, two of which I really, really dislike, one of which I generally despise for what it does to me.
The Silencer: I get this one from time to time and most people find it rather amusing. I wake up one morning and it feels like a wool sock has been installed inside my throat. It doesn’t hurt, but I know instantly that I have no voice. I’m not saying I have a croak….I mean I have absolutely no voice whatsoever. Tragic for a chatty person. Particularly difficult if I have to teach anything.
The Ooey Gooey: This is the nasal cold that produces mucus in biologically improbable proportions. The most commonly heard phrase during the ooey gooey is “Where does it all come from?”
The Cougher: This is the one I really hate. My entire life I have suffered from this cold and it’s the one I desperately hope I won’t get when I start to feel under the weather. It always starts the same. A bit of a tickle in the throat, the voice lowers a bit. I wake up with a bit of a sore throat, and then the cough starts. I will cough for about 4-5 days straight. It’s relentless and I cant take anything for it. Often one of the days will be so bad that I will cough until I throw up. There’s fun for you!
My parents used to pour honey down my throat in the middle of the night when I’d already had too much cough syrup…that never worked…I hate honey now. I used to suck on lemons to try to quell it. Cough candies, liquids, pills…nothing has ever worked. And as I got older I developed a sensitivity to dextromethorphan…the DM in pretty much everything that says “cough suppressant”. That was a fun day that I discovered I had developed that sensitivity. I took a couple of Nyquils and went to bed. I woke up and couldn’t focus and was seeing light tracers…thought maybe I should try something else the next evening. Took a NeoCitran and a couple of Benelyns…and the next day I couldn’t walk upright without walking into a wall or a doorway until late in the afternoon. When I could finally see straight I decided to look for commonalities… DM… haven’t touched it since.
And so here I am with the Cougher again. I’ve been coughing for two days solid. No sleep, Kirk either of course. Poor guy. Even the cats were tired this morning. Loki is usually in our faces by 6 am looking for breakfast. He didn’t move until 9 am.
My ribs feel like I’ve been beaten up, my back muscles are aching, my stomach muscles cry out with the smallest strain.
I should have known…. I have been run down for weeks with all the wedding preparations. Lots of people have been sick but since I work at home, I’m generally safe. But when you throw a party for 80 and people are at different stages…well, when the stress is off, the immune system is worn down, and I suppose it was inevitable. Last time I had this I damaged my voice for well over 6 months. I think I got off lucky this time though…. we shall see.
Now that the cough is moving on slowly….the ooey gooey seems to be making an appearance. Today I have an interesting new symptom that I am not overly familiar with…my ears hurt and my jaw aches. Obviously this has decided to add another fun feature…a sinus infection. Oh boy!
The common cold virus, truly a marvelous organism when you think about it. Generally not deadly except in the extremely immunocompromised, not toxic, but so pervasive. Highly contagious, not highly infectious, but so incredibly adaptive that we will likely never escape it’s clutches.
Even in a miserable state, I can admire the biological elegance of a simple genetic organism that can cause such a variety of clinical symptoms and is virtually unstoppable.
Marvelous.
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Many people know the importance of macros however many people do not understand the importance of micronutrients or probably don?t even know what I mean by micronutrients. By micronutrients I mean vitamins and minerals. Vitamins and minerals are very important to daily life processes. They are used to speed up nearly every action of all the body systems. But I will not go into complete detail on what all the vitamins and minerals do. But I will suggest using supplementation to get your daily amount of vitamins preferably twice a day pills, I rather twice a day instead of once a day because it will give you a constant supply of vitamins and minerals. See drinking all of that water will flush out a lot of your vitamins and minerals throughout the day if you only take a one a day supplement. However, I will suggest introducing one mineral to your diet especially after your workout, magnesium it is used for muscle contraction, protein metabolism, and energy. Some professional football trainers even go as drastic
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