I’m sick with a bad cold. This virus began to show its ugly face Saturday night with a sore throat. Then it was sinus congestion, and going into Monday and Tuesday, fever, lethargy, and at times a little light headed-ness. Today, I’m feeling a bit better. I’m over the hump and on the road to recovery, but this cold has definitely taken its toll. While the physical ailments obviously suck, what hurts just as much is that my immune system let me down. The is the first let down in 6 months that I have experienced from the Caveman diet. One of the major benefits of the diet is that you have an incredibly strong immune system. Just look at indegenious peoples around the world, and even at Native Americans of the US. It is well documented that they were extremely healthy specimens and rarely if ever got sick, that is, until they had contact with Europeans.  I can have the healthiest diet in the world, but I live in the city, amongst thousands of people and city-adapted critters. I work in an office where the closest 4 people are less than 10 feet away. Whatever they contract for whatever reason, I stand a chance to get it too, and I believe that is what happened. Two weeks ago a coworker came in sick. The following week, the guy next to him developed the same symptoms, and now me, sitting next to that guy, got the same symptons. With all the people falling prey to the flu right now, I’m thankful that at least my symptoms weren’t that bad. Maybe it was a weak strain of flu virus, but my immune system was indeed strong enough to limit the damage. That makes me feel better, so that’s truth enough for me!

I managed to fight it off without any over the counter medications, except for the use of a homeopathic drug called Oscillo. Cough syrups and cold/flu tablets or whatever is you see on TV is all made for 2 purposes: to make money for the pharmaceuticals, and mask your symptoms. Masking symptoms does nothing to fix the root of the problem. In fact, such practice can prolong the sickness. Excess mucous is your body’s way of trying to get the virus out of your body. A fever is your body trying to kill the virus with heat. There are good bacteria and antibodies in your system that antibiotics destroy, so instead of taking antibiotics I recommend probiotics instead. I hope you can see where I’m going with all this. Please don’t waste your money on any of the cold/flu stuff you see on TV.

If you contract a cold, follow these simple steps. I might also add to consume a lot of raw garlic. Garlic has a powerful compound called allicin, which has been shown to fight colds and reduce your downtime. Chop up a clove into small enough pieces to swallow and chug them down. Then, get a clove and stick it in your cheek and hold it there as long as you can. Bite down every few minutes to release the juice.

So, I’ll be taking it easy for a few more days and then plan to hit my training extremely hard. I’ve two big races coming up: the Xterra South Central Cup, and the Breckenridge 100. Raw food post still to come…