I'm the Master of Winter Sniffles – and I Can Tell You Ways to Prevent It

This time last year, I found myself filming a television show with three singers. Included were a Ghanaian-origin rapper, a major pop celebrity, and an acclaimed classical singer. We were in the heart of winter. Just the night prior, I attended a longtime friend's 60th birthday, squeezed into a pub's event space in a Surrey location. It had been a good night, yet now, to break the silence, I pondered how one could prevent getting a cold with many partygoers were contributing to a chorus of sniffles and coughs. Incidentally, why do certain individuals blow their noses so loudly, while others are quieter? Something to explore later.

The Response from the Singers

Upon referencing the party, the group of artists in the TV green room responded in two ways. To begin with, they edged away from me. Next, they started a passionate debate regarding ways to stay cold-free that expected because of their careers was something of an obsession for them. That makes sense, but I have skin in this game too – I need to dodge colds no matter what as my symptoms are harsher than most. There's no doctor's note to prove it, but I firmly believe it. My symptoms persist. My nose is more blocked, my throat is scratchier, my coughs are harsher, more persistent and seem infinite. My relatives, familiar with the early throat signs which herald the coming storm, either kick me out of the room or clear the room themselves. Back when I presented football on ITV, my poor colleagues in the studio gallery learned to recognize the signals. “Cans off!” the director would shout to everyone prior to me blasting their ears, damaging their headset equipment.

Managing Blocked Noses

As for my blocked noses, don't get me started. Sprays, drops, even the electric shock of fumes of boiling plum brandy my mother recommends … they help briefly before admitting defeat. And there’s nothing as pitiable as a Midlands dialect spoken without the benefit of air passing through the nostrils. In other words, it's somewhat nasal on a good day. At least this elicits sympathy, which isn’t always a good thing. When I started college, without my mother's home remedies, the cleaning staff at our accommodation showed me kindness. “I’ve got just the thing for that, you poor thing. Be right back.” She was wonderfully sweet, very Irish, and very insistent that I ate the uncooked, peeled onion she offered me in bed. She observed me eating it. Kind soul. Didn’t achieve anything, sadly, other than causing digestive turmoil and creating bad breath.

The Singer’s Cold Avoidance Regime

Therefore, I loathe winter illnesses and am quite sure that prevention is better than the cures which whether folk remedies or not, fail to help. I focused carefully together with the other artists while she explained her health practices. With forthcoming bookings to sing for her supper over Christmas, she clearly took it all very seriously. She directed us to apply hand sanitiser on the hour, every hour throughout the winter as far as I could deduce in addition, there were special precautions required when it came to parties and what not. Ahead of any such engagement, she advised several sprays of a nasal spray up each nostril – whether you felt a cold coming or not. Extreme. It appealed to me. And, listen to this, she insisted on following it up post-event with more spray of the product.

My Experience

I adopted the method. And I can report I didn't sniffle all winter. It wasn't perfect: the numerous products I purchased, lost, bought again, located, etc. Plus the frustrating time finding you've squashed the gel bottle you left in your back pocket and it's oozing out. Still, an acceptable trade-off. And now winter’s upon us again, I'm stocked up with her prevention arsenal. I’m ready for battle.