Immune Health Must Haves
Because who wants to be sick any longer than necessary? This is everything I did before I got sick and while being sick to help my body get better faster!
Much to my disappointment… and terror, if I’m honest, I’m currently getting over round 2 of ‘the spicy cough’. 🌶️ IYKYK
My first go with it was almost exactly two years ago and it DEVASTATED my body for months - hence the terror when Matt saw that lil line appear on his test.
I’m starting writing this on day 5 and somehow though, I’m doing way better than last time. I’m not sure if it’s just because it might be a different variant or what, but we’ve also had some awful grief and stress thrown in the mix so I’m pretty confident that what I’ve been doing has been helping. It’s still been incredibly rough but I’m noticing steady improvement each day, so I wanted to share what I’ve been doing this time around to help support my immune system in case it can be of some help to you!
Beforehand…
I’ve been starting to work a little more on my gut health over the last month. I’ve started adding kefir to my smoothies each day (you can grab this at most supermarkets) because we all know probiotics are the gut’s best friend!
Part of why I’ve been doing this is vitamin absorption, so I’ve also added in a Beef Organ supplement (basically Beef Liver, but with some other bits more targeted at women) to help with some minerals - you’d be surprised how key small minerals like Copper are to the absorption of things like Iron!
The other thing I take on the regular especially during Winter months (and partly just because it’s yummy, haha) is Elderberry Syrup. The one I have at the moment I actually made using a kit from Diana Wilson Herbal! This one works out to be more cost effective than what I was grabbing from my local health food store, with the added bonus of being able to support a small business.
Finally, I’d been resting a lot in the lead up. Obviously not intentionally for this purpose, but I’ve definitely hit burnout in the last couple of months and so I’ve been taking time to give my body the rest it needs. Whether you’re in burnout or not, giving your body the rest it needs always puts you in a better position as far as your immune system goes.
While fighting sickness
There’s a couple things I tried that I just didn’t have the capacity to keep up with, but they’re worth looking in to if you’re able to! One being Ebby Moyer’s ‘Lurgy Juice’. I made it fine (I basically combined the recipes in this TikTok and also this one). The ingredients are fantastic and it truly doesn’t taste as bad as it sounds, even the husband was ok with this one but it took a little more prep (straining etc) and I didn’t have the right equipment (a juice press or muslin cloth) to make it easy.
Key players:
+ A good Vitamin C, Zinc and Vitamin D supplement. A lot of supplement blends I’ve found either have weird filler ingredients or really low dosages which makes it kind of pointless. I LOVE this one, it’s got the most robust formula I could find and it’s actually really affordable for what it is. You can also find it on iHerb sometimes. Make sure to take it with food - anything with Zinc in it you want to take with food.
+ Fusion Cough Lung Tonic. I’m not going to sugarcoat it, this one tastes really bad… but if you’ve got the spicy cough you might not be able to taste properly so… it could be fine 😅 My taste buds have been a bit off this week so it’s been easy to get down at least twice a day and I SWEAR BY THIS STUFF. My spicy cough symptoms especially the first time around really centred around my lungs and I wish I’d found this during that infection but it’s been a great support since then any time I’ve been sick.
+ Olive Leaf Extract. This is one my acupuncturist first told me about and it’s got so many benefits. It’s great for your immune system, but it’s also great for cardiovascular health. If you’re not a tablet/capsule fan (like me) you can get it in liquid form which is helpful, but I’ve been taking this capsule I grabbed off Amazon and it’s been great too, and a bit easier to manage as the liquid needs to be mixed with another drink.
+ A good probiotic containing bifidobacterium. I grabbed this one. I know nothing about probiotics but this seemed to have a really good amount of the ones I was looking for. This was something a friend told me about when she heard Matt tested positive again and it’s been FASCINATING to read up on. Turns out there’s been studies done on ‘spicy cough’ patients and it’s been found that they’re generally always lacking in this bacteria that’s meant to naturally be occurring in a healthy gut. Those with bad infections or ‘long haul’ symptoms seemed to be especially prone to low numbers (4.2 in the article linked). It’s worth reading into if you’re interested in natural health, but either way a good probiotic is good for gut health, which is good for your immune system.
+ Maca Powder. I’ve been meaning to grab some of this and getting sick was a good kick up the bum for me to finally order it. Maca Powder has a bunch of great benefits, but specific to the immune system it’s got really excellent levels of vitamin c - and the more vitamin c you can get directly from food the better.
+ Moringa Powder. Another absolute powerhouse, moringa powder has been proven to have anti inflammatory and anti bacterial properties. It’s also got awesome amounts of immune boosting vitamins like our friend, Vitamin C. This one I’ve been meaning to add to my smoothies and keep forgetting (brain fog is real, friends) but I’ll be adding it tomorrow!
+ Herbal Sore Throat Spray. I’m not super brand loyal as far as this goes, though the one I have now is Thompson’s. You can walk into almost every health food store and they’ll have some variety of this, but it’s always helpful if you’ve got a sore throat.
+ Nasal Spray. I grabbed this one with eucalyptus, but honestly any kind will help immensely to get the phlegm out of your sinuses. The more you can get the phlegm out of your sinuses the less hard your body is having to work, I figure.
Honourable mentions
I love me a natural remedy, but a girl’s gotta do what a girl’s gotta do to survive so I’ve also been taking paracetamol and ibuprofen to help manage pain/fever when it was creeping too high as well as some conventional cough medicine for the sake of sleep because SLEEP IS WORTH IT. I joke that daytime me and nighttime me are drastically different medication takers 😅
Just in case that all sounds like a lot, here’s what it really looked like, played out. The maca and moringa powders both went into smoothies, which I was already having for breakfast/snacks. The throat spray was as needed. All the other supplements only need to be taken once a day (other than the cough lung tonic) and it’s only 4 capsules total for the vit c, zinc, vit d, olive leaf and probiotic. Not bad!
It’s also about doing what you can and letting go of the rest. Sure, I would have loved to also be taking my beef organ capsules and elderberry syrup during all this, but I just couldn’t bring myself to add more things to the list of necessities so I prioritised. Whatever you can do is better than doing nothing!
I also try to keep my diet in mind where I can while I’m sick. This usually looks like placing a delivery order for pre-packaged soups (like the Pitango brand) because ya girl isn’t cooking. We’ve been living off pre-made food this week, but we’ve done our best to keep it healthy, nutritious and warming where possible. I also cut dairy out completely if I have anything cough/cold wise going on because it can add to the strain as far as phlegm goes and I try to focus on making things as easy as possible for my body!
Hopefully this isn’t a post you need soon, but save it for later and maybe even consider starting to build up your natural store cupboard - a lot of this stuff I’ve been gradually adding to our supply over the past year or so! Way less overwhelming that way.
Stay healthy!