Home Remedies for the Cold & Flu Season
December 17, 2009 by Anna
Filed under Health & Wellness
It’s the cold and flu season and it’s time to pay extra attention to supporting your families health with natural remedies and common sense. Some tips I’ve gathered from my contact with herbalists, naturopaths and acupuncturists have all come to my aid to keep my kids immunity up and susceptibility to colds and flus down. And when the bug strikes our house, I bring out the garlic, thyme, lemon, onions and other kitchen based remedies, as well as my tried and true herbal powerhouses. Those bugs don’t stand a chance!
Keeping Immunity Up
Keep them warm. Surprisingly, getting cold can actually lead to a cold! I thought it was just an old wives tale that catching a draft would lead to a cold, but sudden chills or changes in temperature are a stress to little bodies. That’s why it’s so important to keep a baby’s head and feet warm, since this is where we lose the most body heat. Make sure kids wear hats and don’t run around on cold floors barefoot or get soaked in the rain and get chilled to the bone.
Keeping warm seems so basic, but somehow we get brainwashed into thinking it’s cool to be cold. Warm teas and hot drinks of apple cider with cinnamon, clove and ginger instead of cold sodas or juice are better this time of year. If possible pack a hot soup instead of cold salads and sandwiches for school lunch. Also, cooking with spices such as cayenne and ginger actually do help improve circulation and keep our furnace cooking all day.
Keep the hands clean. This is the time of year when even more vigilance in normal hand 
washing routines will be rewarded. Especially if your children are in school or come into contact with other children who may be sick, clean hands are the first line of defense to keep the bugs from spreading. Make a point while they’re little to sing a little song to help them scrub long enough to make a difference. You don’t need anti bacterial soap, if fact, research shows we’re better off without it, so long as you wash long enough and often enough.
Salt water purification. If the sniffles or a tickle in the throat show up, I gross my kids out with salt water snorting and gargling. Seriously, mildly salted warm water snorted into and blown out of the nasal passages will cut down bacteria dramatically and often knock a cold out before it has a chance to take hold. At the first sign of a sore throat, my family gets the warm salt water and gargles and spits. 90% of the time, that’s all that’s needed to stop a bug in it’s tracks.
Feed them well. Make sure that your kids are getting enough water, minimize their sugar intake, reduce dairy, wheat and oranges (all of which can produce excess mucous in the body). 
Berries and Sour Fruits are high in Vitamin C and bioflavonoids which help boost the immune response. If your children are old enough to chew them well, include pumpkin seeds for snacking. They are high in zinc, which can help decrease viral infection at the onset. Also, add fresh garlic to your meals. Garlic is a great anti-viral food. Avoid packaged food of any kind and stick to basic nutritious guidelines: lots of colorful veggies, fresh fruits, complex carbohydrates like brown rice and whole grains and small servings of meat and fish.
Winter tonic soup recipe
2 quarts vegetable stock (Chicken stock can also be used)
Handful of Sea Veggies (I like wakame or hijiki)
2 Pieces of Astragalus Root (check out your health food store)
1 Burdock Root
Ginger – 1 inch piece, peeled and chopped
Garlic – 4 cloves, chopped
1 Onion – chopped
Cook all at a low simmer for 1 hour. Take off of the stove, strain if desired and add 2-4 Tbsp. Miso (to taste). Serve as a warm drink to improve immunity.
Natural Remedies for Colds
Garlic Lemonade: Nature’s antibiotic! Mince three large cloves of fresh garlic with about 5 cups of water and bring to a boil in a steel or glass sauce pan. Let simmer for 5 minutes and then let cool. When it’s just warm, add the juice of one whole lemon and sweeten with honey or maple syrup. Drink throughout the day.
Onion Syrup: Ingredients: 1 medium sliced onion, 1-2 cups of raw sugar. Layer onion slices and sugar in a glass jar until full. Let sit in a cool place for 1 to 2 days while the sugar dissolves. Strain out the onion, bottle the infused syrup, and keep in the refrigerator. Use 1/2 to 1 tsp, 3 times a day for congestion, cough and oncoming cold symptoms.
Elderberry Syrup: Black elderberry syrup may be the only real cure for the common cold known. Elderberry has powerful antiviral and immune-stimulating properties, and has been clinically proven to decrease the duration of colds, flus, and other viral infections in both children and adults. Elderberry is unique among alternative medicines because it has virtually no side effects. Despite its repeatedly proven effectiveness in children, adults, and even infants, elderberry extract appears to be as safe as pure fruit juice itself. You can buy dried elderberries at Mountain Rose Herb company, or your local health food store.
Ingredients: 3 cups fresh elderberries, or 1 cup dried berries mixed with 3 cups filtered water , 1 1/2 cups honey (or less) 1 ounce fresh grated ginger root, juice of 1 lime , 1 ounce Echinacea tincture (optional)
1. Combine berries, ginger and water in stainless steel or glass pot. Heat on medium until simmering.
2. Continue to gently simmer uncovered until reduced in volume by half.
3. Remove from heat. Strain well through a cheesecloth, squeezing the juice from the berries. Allow the liquid to cool slightly.
4. Measure liquid and combine with equal parts honey
5. Add all the lime juice.
6. When cooled completely, add Echinacea tincture.
7. Pour into glass jar, label with date, and store in the refrigerator for up to a year. Take one tablespoon twice daily (adult dose) during the cold and flu season. For children ages 2-5, one teaspoon twice a day. Dose for ages 6-12 is two teaspoons twice daily. Nursing mothers can take one tablespoon 5 minutes before nursing to pass the benefits along to the baby.
I like to make a batch of this tonic without the Echinacea for everyday use to keep everyone healthy throughout the flu season. Your children will line up for their daily dose and you just may be able to escape any colds this winter.
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