I’m one of those people that germs love. If ever there’s an illness going around, it typically stops at my door.
Sore throats, chest infections, the common cold or flu. You name it. If it’s doing the rounds, I’m one of those guys that catches it.
Sometimes these sniffles and raw throats aren’t so bad that they’d bother the average person.
But for a singer and performer they can be a nightmare. The whole character of my voice changes with a cold, and I can do less with it.
Imagine catching one of these things the day before an important show.
Not that I cancelled. I’d struggle through. But it’s not satisfying to give less than my best.
Last November, it happened yet again. I was floored for a week.
It was the last straw. No more!
So I researched like crazy to see what I could do to overcome this recurring blight on my musical life.
Nine months on, and I’ve not had even a sniffle since. This is simply unheard of with me. So I thought I’d share my new regime with you.
So here it is….
The first thing I’ll say is that the new regime came from study. I looked online specifically for genuine research that showed tangible evidence that something stopped people catching colds and similar illnesses.
The second thing I’ll say is that I then threw everything at the problem. So it may be that amongst this regime, just one aspect of it is doing all the good. I just don’t know.
All I know is that this regime works, and that it consists of things that have been proven in scientific studies.
So here is my morning ritual in case you want to try it too….
When I wake up, I take a pre/pro biotic. I keep these by my bed so I can have it the moment I wake, as they work best on an empty stomach. (Don’t take them with a hot drink as that will kill the friendly bacteria).
Then I go downstairs and fix breakfast. I typically have fruit and nut muesli with almond milk, but that’s not part of my regime. I just like it.
I then have a hot drink of Lemon & Ginger Tea, with a big dollop of honey. This definitely is a part of my regime.
I have a lot of this drink throughout the day. I believe the honey both protects and heals my throat.
Immediately after breakfast I then take my researched supplements…
Quercetin – 2 x 500 mg tablets
Garlic – 2 x capsules (there’s no mg on the bottle but mine are from Veganicity)
Vitamin B Complex – 1 tablet (100% of recommended daily allowance – again no mg but mine are from InnoPure)
Vitamin C – 1 x 1,000 mg tablet
Vitamin D3 – 1 x 5,000 IU tablet
Multi Vitamins with Iron (to cover all bases) – 1 tablet (no mg but mine are from Life Plan).
You’ll have no doubt heard of the vitamins before, and you’ve probably heard of the benefit of garlic in keeping colds at bay (my tablets are odourless by the way!)
But you may not have heard of quercetin. You will find it naturally in red apples and radishes, but in nowhere near the amount needed for these health benefits.
I first heard of it in a study where people had the common cold physically inserted into their nose by pipette.
Those who took a daily dose of 1000 mg of quercetin were much more resistant to catching the cold, even under those circumstances.
So that’s my new regime, and it has worked so well that it has surprised even me. I hoped for an improvement, but I really didn’t expect to be sniffle free for 9 consecutive months!
So if you are overly prone to these things too, or just want to get super resistant to sniffles so you can perform to the very best of your talent, then maybe give my regime a try and see if it works just as well for you.
P.S. Drop me a line with your thoughts and comments about this post, or let me know what you’d like me to cover in future.
