Tips for Obtaining Sleep Quality with A Cold
A cold is certainly unpleasant and it affects your sleep pattern in different ways. The sniffles, wheezing, and discomfort that comes with the cold affects the sleeping pattern. This makes you feel worse due to the effects of poor sleep, medicine, and the cold symptom are a bad combination for your overall wellbeing.
Interestingly, when you are down with flu most people are advised to have deserved rest to allow the immune system to fight the viral infection and avoid spreading it to others. Needless to say, it is not as easy since your cycle is interrupted with the elevated temperatures, coughs, runny or a congested nose.
However, being well hydrated is known to make the situation improve and other tips mentioned below.
Tilt your bed
By raising the head of your bed many people have found the position having positive effects in combatting a cold. If your bed does not tilt, put something below your avocado mattress to elevate the side your head lies on the bed. This allows your sinuses to flow with ease and have better airflow to help you breathe properly.
All the same, this positioning has negative claims as well that people experience neck pains due to the elevation. So doctors’ advice that the bed should be elevated instead. Although try as much as you can to be able to have a natural incline with either way that’s the idea.
Use a humidifier
There are a number of gadgets in the market that aid with sleep to assist you to breathe with ease when you have a cold. Humidifier or vaporizers are some of them that when run through the night aid to release moisture into the air that makes sleep comfortable.
The moist air as well helps relieve aggravated tissues in your nose and assist a lot in the aid of the sore throats that come along with the cold. It is advised that due to the mold that may be trapped in a humidifier after a period of time, it is wise to clean it to avoid a cycle of another cold like infections.
Have a sleep routine
It seems like an unusual tip to help in obtaining sleep while having a cold. On the other hand, it is the most important idea of all. This is because when you have a sleep routine despite having a cold your internal clock still signals your body when it is time to sleep. Therefore, sleeping through a routine makes you fall asleep faster for your body to fight the cold effectively.
Studies claim that those who are constantly sleep deprived are at a higher risk of getting a cold and heal slower to those who have sufficient sleep of an average of eight hours a night.
Have a hot shower
The steam from a hot shower when you have a cold is relaxing and it opens up your airways to help you sleep better. The benefits are many and there are other diverse ways to go about it.
For instance, running a bath and sitting in that steam shower for a while works as well. Other ways you can do to achieve similar results is like putting a warm compress on your sinuses. Bending over a bowl of warm steam also allows you to get a similar effect.
Over counter drugs
It is important to choose carefully over the counter drugs that treat colds. This is important since most cold medicines treat a number of illnesses. Some of them are coughs, fever, runny noses among others. Checking the components that are in the medicine will help you learn the effects that they will have on your sleep.
Some medicines have caffeine or have side effects that make you drowsy either of which affects your sleep cycle. In some cases, natural home remedies can soothe and clear the cold faster than over the counter medicine.
Nasal strips and sprays
Decongestant sprays help unclog your nose for you to get sufficient air and improve breathing when you have a cold. This nasal sprays open nasal passages and ease the congestion. However, using one for many days kills the good bacteria creating an environment that provokes inflammations and make the congestion and blockage worse.
Sticky nasal strips help to aid congestion to help you obtain sleep. Although they do not break mucus they help create space for better airflow.
Eat hot food
Most people love hot soup or porridge because of its calming and relaxing effects when they have a cold. The hot steam from such fluids and foods assist a lot in opening up the nasal passages, loosen mucus, and clearing your airways.
Add some honey for soothing any coughs that may have resulted from the cold and since it is an antihistamine it will reduce your inflammations and making you breathe with ease.
Do gargles
To obtain better sleep when you have a cold is important yet very difficult. For faster relief do gargles with warm water at night or suck on some lozenges and take some pain relievers to calm you down as you sleep.
However, even with persistent gargles if you do not get better and develop a fever it could be a symptom for other conditions. It is important to have a doctor examine you maybe it is a strep infection which most times have no symptoms.
There are many inexpensive ways to obtain sleep when you have a cold. It is important that as you use them you are careful not to spread the infection to other people. Most of these remedies work and give relief in a few days. Others like having a saline rinse to the nose with a spray bottle to loosen the mucus.
While others rub the chest with a salve to help soothe the cough that often comes with the cold. Other traditional methods and treatment work as well and assist in improving sleep quality and quantity when you have a cold.
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