Does staving off a cold simply prolong it?

December 15, 2023 7:21 AM

With Christmas almost a week away, I'm fighting off a virus. Is there a way to be strategic about this?

I've suspected for years that with a classic cold, it's maybe best to let it come on hard and fast. If the goal is to get rid of it sooner. I've been fighting off whatever my kid had (not covid or the flu) for days. It's a pretty nasty one. I can keep it at bay by drinking lots of warm fluids and avoiding all stress, but it's still there lurking. From a lifetime of experience, I know that if I spend just one afternoon living at full steam, I'm going to succumb and it will rage through my body. If I keep trying to stave it off, it might destroy me anyhow, but closer to Christmas Eve.

Anecdotally or with evidence - can you resolve a cold faster if you just live as normal and let it hit you hard? Or might it resolve faster if I keep babying myself (assuming that's even possible)? Does trying to stave off a cold just prolong it?

posted by kitcat to Health & Fitness (17 answers total)

When I feel a cold coming on, I go all at it with zinc, elderberry, and Airborne. Often, if it's a low-enough level of a cold, it actually will go away (rather than prolong its onset). I think it's worth attacking it head-on rather than succumbing.
posted by hydra77 at 7:44 AM on December 15, 2023 [5 favorites]

I'm not exactly going to be citing any studies here, but for me it does not feel like the cold must win at some point. Don't give in! If you keep it at bay with sleep, warm fluids, good food your immune system will eventually overcome it. Having caught, like, a zillion colds from my kids in the last few years: sometimes they overpower you, and sometimes you overpower them.
posted by distorte at 7:52 AM on December 15, 2023 [1 favorite]

Anecdotally, I prefer to fight it off and my trusted method is called Beef/Bed. Just eat some Beef and go to Bed. Works amazingly in my experience.
posted by nouvelle-personne at 7:55 AM on December 15, 2023 [15 favorites]

You'll get a thousand different anecdotes, but as far as actual scientific evidence, there is none that indicates you can do anything at all about the course of a cold, other than to treat the symptoms.
posted by ssg at 7:57 AM on December 15, 2023 [19 favorites]

There’s absolutely no scientific basis to this that I know of, but when I take 3-6 Source Naturals Wellness Formula tablets (the gross ones with no gel coating where you can taste whatever horrible herbs they’ve put in there) after I’m already well into coming down with a cold, I feel nauseous/more sick for an hour or two immediately after taking it, but then will often (not always) feel much better after that with the cold lasting shorter in duration and being less intense. The experience is like the cold got super energized and as a result burned itself out faster. Again, this is all completely subjective experience and likely invalid scientifically, but I do keep wellness formula around just in case it’s actually doing what I feel like it’s (sometimes) doing. I would say that it’s better in my experience to proactively take care of yourself (naps and lots of sleep, hydration, not exerting yourself, etc) rather than to live normally and let the cold knock you out worse for lack of care of your body.
posted by flamk at 7:59 AM on December 15, 2023

My dad and I have the same approach to being sick: when you feel mild symptoms coming on, act as if you are really sick. So, get the orange juice (or whatever placebo you believe in), rest, drink tea, eat chicken noodle soup. The whole shebang. Usually my colds are mild, and I think it’s because I take it seriously. Rest is what your body needs, so give it that.
posted by bluedaisy at 8:07 AM on December 15, 2023 [22 favorites]

Your body needs to fight off the cold virus regardless. You're not really "staving" anything off, you're just making it easier on your immune system to do its job with rest, hydration, etc. The symptoms of any virus are caused by your immune system trying to fight off the infection, and they can be worse if you are unrested, etc.
posted by rhymedirective at 8:11 AM on December 15, 2023 [11 favorites]

You don't say whether your kid tested negative for Covid or if you did, but if your kid tested negative but you didn't test, I'd recommend that you do so.

There's no shame in taking cold/flu medicines as well. Mucinex is a game-changer for me and NyQuil is the only way I can sleep at night when I'm fighting a cold/flu/virus.

Lots and lots of rest and liquids, too.
posted by cooker girl at 8:16 AM on December 15, 2023 [2 favorites]

Scientifically, elderberry supplementation has been clinically shown in double-blind, placebo-controlled experiments to reduce the duration and severity of cold symptoms. That's not an anecdote, that's modern research. I am on team "fight it as best you can", including rest, fluids, elderberry etc. I think you're wrong to somehow try to get more sick to end it faster.
posted by SaltySalticid at 8:41 AM on December 15, 2023 [2 favorites]

I'm not a "you must drink 2 gallons of water a day" kind of guy, but I do believe in extra hydration when I have a cold. I'm losing extra water to snot blown out my nose, post-nasal drip, runny nose, so I feel like fortifying with extra liquids is a good idea. Personally, I go easy on caffeine with a cold as it tends to make me queasy sometimes. But that's just an anecdote from a sample size of one.

Rest, eat well, liquids and more rest.
posted by SoberHighland at 9:09 AM on December 15, 2023 [2 favorites]

Scientifically, elderberry supplementation has been clinically shown in double-blind, placebo-controlled experiments to reduce the duration and severity of cold symptoms. That's not an anecdote, that's modern research.

That study covers 29 people who think they had a cold (not even confirmed in any way and these were people taking a long flight which can definitely cause similar symptoms). It's a tiny study with dodgy statistics that shows you can pull any kind of conclusion from noise if you want to.
posted by ssg at 9:23 AM on December 15, 2023 [7 favorites]

Best answer: I'm not a scientist but I think your picture of what is happening is off. Colds are viruses. They try to multiply in your body while your immune system tries to eliminate them. Rest and reduced stress can help your immune system function better. Hydration can reduce the symptoms, some of which are caused by your body's immune system as it fights the virus rather than the cold virus directly. So I don't think either strategy would act to some how keep the cold virus at a lower but not eliminated level, allowing to surge back when you stopped. What you are describing is more like what happens with bacterial infections where if you don't complete the full course of antibiotics you can reduce the symptoms only to have them come roaring back after you stop taking the meds. But cold are viral not bacterial and it is your body itself, not the treatment strategies that are defeating the cold virus.
posted by metahawk at 10:29 AM on December 15, 2023 [6 favorites]

Zinc, chicken soup and elderberry seem to help a little by supporting your immune system's efforts, and do not cause harm . Rest and liquids definitely help.

Treat then symptoms. Pseudoephedrine (sudafed) works to reduce congestion; get it from the pharmacy; the other stuff is shown to be useless. Dextromethorphan suppresses coughs, get the cough syrup that say DM. My lungs get inflamed; menthol is effective, so Halls or Fisherman's Friend. Halls sugarfree pulled a filling, so I rely on Fishermen's Friend sugarfree. Tylenol for aches & pains. Chicken broth, tea. I keep instant lemonade mix in the house; add boiling water and it's really soothing. At bedtime, add bourbon and go right to sleep.

Some people like Nyquil & Dayquil; they have a lot of strong meds, I prefer to use specific meds for specific symptoms.
posted by theora55 at 11:26 AM on December 15, 2023 [1 favorite]

The problem with that theory is that it assumes there is only one "classic cold". But there is not just one cold virus - there are hundreds. That's why we keep getting colds - you've developed an immunity to cold virus #847, but not cold virus #848, so that one still can get you.

So it's impossible to say whether the degree to which a cold hits you has to do with how you treat yourself, or whether it has to with the virus itself. Some are milder, some are stronger. Some are downright nasty and some are piddly. And if you caught your cold from your kid, it's probably closer to the nasty side of the scale - kids are little walking petri dishes. ...When my nephew was about three, he caught a cold from his day care right before Christmas and spread it to the rest of us - and I do mean every single one of us from my extended family. His own parents and MY parents both went on to get bronchitis and pneumonia from that little dude's cold.

Supporting your immune system in general can help you no matter what kind of virus it is, though. The other stuff is more to alleviate the symptoms, so your immune system can be working at its own peak capacity.

Somewhat akin to nouvelle persone's "beef and bed" approach, I once had good luck stopping a cold in its tracks by eating hot soup and then going to bed, but I had the heat on for slightly higher than usual and had a slightly greater-than-normal amount of blankets on the bed. Something just told me to "sweat it out this time" and that seemed to nip things in the bud.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 11:44 AM on December 15, 2023

To expand on my earlier comment to get orange juice or your favorite placebo: that could also be elderberry, regardless of whether it works. The whole point here is that you are ritualizing being sick, and telling yourself to slow down, get fluids, and rest. And this will certainly help you recover more quickly than you would by going on about your business as if you were a fully healthy person.
posted by bluedaisy at 3:25 PM on December 15, 2023 [1 favorite]

There's no real evidence supporting any particular strategy. Not least because as others mention there are a lot of cold viruses and they mutate a lot. In principle anything that supports your immune system is potentially helpful. Mainly I think that's rest and hydration. Managing the symptoms doesn't appear to make it end earlier or later, but I think where it could potentially go wrong is if you persuade yourself that you have recovered when you haven't and you stop resting.

Basically, there are no guarantees on time frame, but generally drinking warm fluids and avoiding stress is as close to the optimal answer as is likely to exist. It's more than a week until Christmas Day, with any luck you'll just be on the tail end by then with some annoying symptoms but otherwise feeling close to ok.
posted by plonkee at 2:51 AM on December 16, 2023

There are dozens of studies showing positive effects of elderberry on the common cold, I just linked the one that has the clearest message. If you want to see more, there's plenty out there, including review articles and meta-analyses.

Black elderberry (Sambucus nigra) supplementation effectively treats upper respiratory symptoms: A meta-analysis of randomized, controlled clinical trials

Jessie Hawkins, Colby Baker, Lindsey Cherry, Elizabeth Dunne

It's kind of disingenuous to say there's no evidence, and then move the goalpost when evidence is provided. It's hard to get a slam-dunk in one study because of all the details, but this is not some one-off crank business, this is a whole body of research that has continued to develop over recent years, with lots of trials showing similar results.
posted by SaltySalticid at 11:41 AM on December 17, 2023