Feel like you and your family are going from one cold or sickness to the next? Sick of being sick? You’re not alone – this winter has been a DOOZY for bugs and ails.
If you’re feeling extremely over it, we know the feeling, so we’ve talked to as many health professionals as possible to find out what we can do to avoid yet another bout of sickness. Here’s what we’ve gleaned:
Make Sure You’re Eating Your Key Minerals
Naturopath Erin O’Hara says one the key ways to stay well is to ensure you’re eating a varied diet which contains the right kinds of minerals. Iron, zinc and selenium help nourish the immune system and keep body cells active and healthy. Mineral-rich foods include nuts, seeds, meat, fortified cereals, kale, broccoli, quinoa, and pulses. For the little people in your life, you can always hide the good green vegetables in a pasta bake!
Consider If Your Job is Making You Sick…
Ok, this one may be totally off the cards this year, with a recession and cost of living crisis to consider, but, it’s worth considering: what impact is your job having on your wellbeing? We’re not suggesting you throw in the towel completely, but we’re suggesting you take a step back and look at the level of stress (mentally and physically) that your job brings to your life.
We chatted to Renuka Patel, founder of the platform Wellbeing Connection, about her own experience with a high-stress job in HR and the different ways we can measure how our job is affecting us and how we can use that information to better our situations. Check out the story here.
Stock Up on Vitamin C
Vitamin C has long been touted as a quick way to boost your immunity, fight infection and clear inflammation. If you’d rather not reach for another supplement, Dr Libby says there are plenty of ways to get Vitamin C in your diet. “You’re looking at your citrus fruits, kiwi fruits and also your lightly cooked vegetables,” she says. “If you boil your broccoli to death, there won’t be any left in it, but if you have it stir-fried, you’ll still get plenty of Vitamin C.”
Lay Off the Sugar!
Gah, if you’re about to reach for your morning hit of coffee with two sugars, or your afternoon can pick-me-up can of coke, it might be time to reconsider, if you’re trying to fight off winter ails~ As Naturopath Erin O’Hara explains, refined sugars actually work against us and negatively impact the body’s defence structure. Sugars increase inflammation and damage cells. To curb a sweet craving, eat more foods with protein and fats to stabilise your sugar levels. For the littles, swap out chippies and cookies with hummus and brown rice crackers or a delicious bliss ball as a treat.
Keep That Body Moving… But Sensibly!
In terms of exercise, this can also either support or hinder our immune health. As Lisa Walker, a leading health specialist at BePure tells, too much exercise can create stress on the body and fatigue the immune system, but we do need exercise to increase blood flow and support strengthening antibodies to help fight infection in our body.
‘Strive for a mix of resistance-based training, cardiovascular work, and don’t forget mobility. Ideally, go for two days resistance, two days cardio and one day of mobility, with some outdoor active rest in between. It’s all about balance, so make sure your exercise regime is specific to your level of fitness and stress levels – not your friends or people you’re following on social media!’
Get a Good Sleep!
A study by the Sleep Foundation found a direct link between lack of quality sleep and compromised immunity. This is because our body has to use vital nutrients to repair ourselves from the lack of sleep, instead of fighting foreign bugs. In other words, if you aren’t sleeping well, you’re more likely to get sick.
Start getting better sleep by establishing a good bedtime routine. Unplug from electronic devices at least an hour or two before bed. Turn down bright lights. Keep the room temperature cool and consider taking a muscle and mind relaxing magnesium supplement.
Look After Your Gut
If you’ve heard a lot about gut health recently, it’s for a good reason – the more research that is done on gut health and the microbiome, the more we find out about how vital a healthy gut is. An astonishing 80% of our immune system is in our gut, so if you’re looking for real results, it’s the best place to pay serious attention to. We’re fan of the Gutsi range of Prebiotics (available at TheraStore) because they actually work, and the team at Therastore are there to guide you through the process. A great place to start is with their Gut Reset Kits, which will help turn around your gut health over 60 days.
Practice Mindfulness
Until you give it a go, mindfulness can sound like it’s quite woo-woo, but, it’s actually based on science and actually works!
As Sarah Lang wrote, Mindfulness is, at its core, a way of being in the world. As described by the Mental Health Foundation of New Zealand, “mindfulness means paying attention to what is presently occurring, with kindness and curiosity. What you pay attention to may be a thought, a feeling, a physical sensation, another person, or things that are happening around you. By practising this over time, you will more fully appreciate the relationships between these things.” Of course, that’s all easier said than done.
That’s where mindfulness meditation comes in. Imagine sitting somewhere comfortable, closing your eyes, breathing in deeply, and as thoughts pop up, bringing your attention back to your breath. You quietly observe rather than feed the distracting thoughts and feelings. Thoughts will keep creeping in, of course, but that doesn’t mean you’re ‘doing it wrong’, so to speak. You’re learning, and even at the start, that comes with benefits!
Order a Round of Shots…
No, unfortunately a cheeky tequila shot isn’t going to do your immunity any favours, but instead we’ve been stocking up on Daily Good. They’re award-winning immunity shots, which come in 350ml bottles (that’s seven shots for $19) and are packed with natural and organic ingredients. We’re talking Zinc (which is renowned for helping to sustain the immune system), NZ mānuka honey (highly praised for its antibacterial, antiviral, anti-inflammatory and antioxidant properties), turmeric (known to help to decrease inflammation), ginger (often used for helping to aid digestion), apple cider vinegar (lauded for its antibiotic and antiseptic benefits), and lemon juice (known to be an excellent of source of vitamin C). We picked ours up from Chemist Warehouse.
Don’t Worry About Wet Hair...
Ever heard that old wives tale about not going out with wet hair because you’ll catch a cold? Well, while it mightn’t actually be a pleasant experience, it’s a myth that has been busted. Family medicine specialist Matthew Goldman, MD says: “Hair being wet is not the cause for catching a cold. A microorganism, such as a virus, has to be involved to cause a cold.”
But, as he explains, there is a bit of logic to the thought process. “Colder air temperatures are better environments for viruses, such as the rhinovirus (the most common cause for the common cold), to travel through the air. There is some research to suggest that the lack of sun and vitamin D during the winter may also play a role in a weakened immune system or a diminished ability to mount a response to an infection.”
Get Some Sun (or Sun in a Bottle!)
Leading on from what Dr Goldman shared, Vitamin D is an essential one for our immunity – as well as for keeping our bones strong. Testing of Vitamin D levels in NZers has become increasingly rare, so statistics on how many of us are deficient aren’t particularly reliable – although the studies that do exist suggest that around half the population have a below average level, while 3-4% have an extreme deficiency.
To boost your levels, get some sensible skin exposure (the Ministry of Health suggests a daily walk or outside activity during the middle of the day in August), or increase your intake of foods containing D (eggs, liver, milk and milk products, plus oily fish such as salmon, tuna and sardines)
Work on Your Breathing
One of the most life-changing books I have read was James Nestor’s book, Breath.
James – a journalist – spent years researching the breath and along the way turned himself into a human guinea pig, testing the results of mouth breathing. The results were staggering: In 10 days he developed sleep apnoea, high blood pressure and his stress levels were off the charts – all just as a result of not breathing through his nose.
Drawing on thousands of years of medical texts and studies, further results he found around breathing correctly were nothing short of miraculous. Modern research shows that if we make even just the slightest adjustments to the way we exhale and inhale, it can have wide reaching effects on our health – from jump-starting athletic performance to halting asthma and autoimmune disease. It can even straighten scoliotic spines. And yes – it can certainly make a difference to our immunity! I highly recommend giving his book a read, and concentrating on your breathing. For something that’s free, it can make one hell of a difference!
Socialise!
Now, of course if you are feeling unwell or the person you’re hoping to meet up with is under the weather, definitely reschedule your plans, but otherwise, boost your wellbeing by catching up with a friend or two.
Human beings are social creatures, and it seems, we need to be social in order to feel in tip-top condition.
“Being alone or isolated can be more detrimental than some chronic conditions. It actually starts breaking down the body. The more that we isolate, the more that we become depressed, and the more that we get anxious.” says Dr Jonathan Leary, founder of social wellness Club, Remedy Place.
Dr Leary spoke in depth on the WellBeings podcast about his journey from pre-med student working in hospitals to coming to the realization that perhaps the traditional medical route wasn’t his calling, and how after becoming a medical doctor, he went on a path of discovery, looking into ways that people could prevent illness rather than wait until they’re really sick before treating the symptoms. He found that social connection can boost our immunity, increase brain health, improve mental health and add longevity!
Make a Smoothie…
Ok, yes, we know we need to get lots of veges into our diet if we want to boost our immunity, but it’s hard sometimes finding the time (and energy) to prepare nutritious meals every night! That’s where the smoothie comes in. You can pop your fruits and veges into a blender with some ice and start your day off with a boost (it’s also a good way of using up those wilting veges in the fridge, or, you can generally buy cheap boxes from fruit and veges stores that are at the end of their lives!)
Nutritionist Mikki Williden has a few more tips to making the perfect smoothie: “If making a smoothie, add in fresh (ideally organic) herbs and greens – keeping them in a smoothie rather than as a juice keeps the fibre in, which is good for our gut. Make it thick enough to require some chewing (good for your digestion) rather than a thin liquid!”
Be Kind To Yourself
Even back at the beginning of the year we touched on the idea that many Kiwis were already running on empty and experiencing peak exhaustion. Has it got any easier through winter? No! No it has not.
Dr Denise Quinlan, co-founder and director of the New Zealand Institute of Wellbeing & Resilience, said earlier this year that yes, people are most definitely feeling ‘meh’ and ‘over it’. “This is what we’re hearing from all over New Zealand and what we’re grappling with in our work to support workplaces and people,” she said. “The questioning and sense of malaise is real for many people – and there are lots of different drivers.”
One being, of course, Covid. “We’ve had several years of dislocation and disruption. We thought Covid would only be one year, and tried to manage, running on adrenaline. We did step up collectively. Some people put their personal needs aside – particularly, to keep a business going. But there’s still no end in sight with Covid, no crisis or disruption eased, no let-up in trying to get work out the door.” And now, in the new year, our adrenalin and energy are used up. “We’re experiencing a collective ‘hitting the wall’.”
There was good news from Denise though, in that it is possible to overcome those feelings of overwhelm.
“For individuals, that’s self-awareness, self-compassion, and self-care. That includes avoiding toxic perfectionism, and learning to manage what we can control – which includes ruthlessly prioritising what matters most, and doing whatever makes you glad to be alive – for instance, getting out in nature. And it’s also accepting what we can’t control.”