Having spent every day since December 18th, 2012 on my back in bed (at least for some significant portion of each day) due to flu–>pneumonia, I thought it might be prudent of me to share what I learned with you since the flu seems to be doing the tango with the Eastern Seaboard.

Please feel free–feel encouraged, actually—to share your own insights, tips, and tricks below. The more useful this page becomes… well… the more useful it will be.

Obligatory  Disclaimer: And, of course, I’m not a doctor. This is just what’s worked for us. Please check with your doctor before initiating any new treatments for you or your family.

• After speaking to a number of doctors and watching the difference between my flu (no shot) and my son’s flu (yes shot) and hearing annecdotes from friends I can say this much: I don’t care what anyone else says—get your flu shot! Influenza A kills—I had nearly a 105 ° fever for seven full days—higher than that and you get organ damage then organ failure. My son—who got the shot—had a fever which never topped 102 ° and was largely nonexistant after three days. All of the worst symptoms (aches, sweats, chills) were mostly gone in my son after three days. I had the full brunt of the thing straight through Christmas. This flu is also insidious as the incubation period is 7–10 days. That means I was just pulling out of flu and into pneumonia as my 12yo started his flu symptoms. Just when you simply must sleep, your kid will be up all night. Short version: get your shot. And if you have asthma get a pneumonia shot, too. Extensive CDC flu site here.

• OTC cough syrups vs homemade vs prescription: Obviously you’ll get more mileage out of a prescription cough med, however, you may not get much of anything out of the OTCs—especially when we’re talking about children’s meds. In lieu of a doctor’s scrip, you may find SOME (I emphasize the vagueness of that word) relief for you and/or your kiddies if you make some of grandma’s remedies. I’ve collected a few which I list below and after talking to a Victorian scholar on the phone, I’m no longer hesitant about giving my 12yo a homemade cough syrup that has a bit of whiskey in it (raw honey, fresh lemon juice, dash of whiskey all in a jar, shake, administer a tsp or two—and my understanding is that we are not to give raw honey to a child under 1yo). Victorians gave their kids opium  (scroll down for a hoot). I’m not going to let myself feel like a bad mom for knocking the kid out so everyone can get some healing sleep—the best thing you can do for a flu like this. That said, there are plenty of families where alcohol is an issue so I completely understand if you can’t go down that path. I’m just saying, not every Victorian kid grew up to be an opium eater and not every 1950s kid who had bourbon rubbed on their gums for teething grew up to be an alcoholic. There are medicinal qualities to alcohol so if you’re desperate and don’t have any other medical reasons staring you down, I’m all for the “any port in a storm” approach. But you know your family best—I’m just letting you know what worked at MamaO’s.
• Other odd/old remedies: Mustard Plasters. You must read all of the instructions on this remedy as you can blister sensitive skin if you do it wrong (read the comments, too, to see the range of reactions/solutions), however, I remember having at least one of these treatments from my grandmother to try to pull the gunk out of my chest and it must have worked because (a) I’m alive and (b) I got better and (c) folks had been doing this for ages. I have a sneaking suspicion it’s along the same lines as using Vick’s Vap-o-Rub on the chest (fumes + heat) but there also seems to be some other activity happening with the mustard thing. Again, along the any port in a storm guideline, it’s just good to have another trick in your back pocket when it’s the middle of the night and you’re desperate to try anything… short of opium…
• NeilMed Sinus Rinse: (NAYY) This is a joy for me to introduce to those of you who have tried Neti Pots and walked away thinking… eh. Same idea here, easier engineering. The NeilMed bottle is designed to use very gentle pressure to help irrigate saline up into the sinuses. This means those of us who find turning our heads at awkward angles to get the water to flow properly with a Neti will discover a whole new way to flush out the gunk that gets trapped in the sinus cavities during a flu, cold, allergy attack, or sinus infection (video). One tip a friend and I discovered independent of each other—use 1-1/2 packs of the saline crystals. Using one pack left us both stuffier in the short-term. One-and-a-half seemed to clean us out perfectly. I cannot say enough good things about this product. And you can get it at pretty much every major drug store chain (I even got mine at our Safeway pharmacy). And always boil or otherwise purify your water, first.

• Steam under a blanket: If you have a little Eucalyptus or peppermint oil, drop a couple of drops in a nonreactive pan, add an inch or two of water, boil, remove from heat and place on a trivet, position your head over steaming pot, pull a big towel or blanket over your head and neck, breathe that steam! 109 ° F can kill nasty buggies in the nose, but I’ve read warnings that this technique might not be good for folks with asthma. I have asthma and do it myself, but I do find that I need to take breaks for a lungful of fresh air every so often. Best to remove your glasses first if you have them as you will be sweating into your eyes, down your nose, into the water. While this may not do much for a virus, per se, some bacteria can’t survive in your lungs with this kind of heat (Sauna, anyone?) so you might be able to both open your breathing up a bit and kill off some nasty buggies. I actually have one of those old face-steam thingys that my son currently has next to his bed. It works, too, especially in the middle of the night, but not as well as the boiling pot.
• Xlear: A friend turned me on to this genius product when I was preggers and didn’t want to take drugs. I’d also learned that my nose gets really weird about things like Afrin and Dristan. Not so Xlear. If I have  to use Afrin, I’ll ust it on one side, Xlear on the other, then switch off every night. When I’ve recovered enough to ditch the Afrin, I use Xlear on both sides for two nights and then I’m done. No evil stuffiness or painful weaning off the hard-core nose spray. Xlear is the thing that’s letting my 12yo sleep while I write this. Plus, if you taste it on the back of your throat it’s like sugar. How cool is that?!

Blogs with Remedy Instructions—these are just the ones I found and felt were useful. Please add the sites you’ve found and trust to the comments below. I’d love to know what else is out there!

• Keeper of the Home cough syrup (uses onions—I used Vidalias, son likes taste fine)
• Nourishing Joy cough syrup (uses cayenne, ginger, honey, etc)
• Frugally Sustainable building your diy herbal home medicine chest
• Wind in the Roses mustard plaster recipe
• TipNut’s mustard plaster