How do you treat YOUR blocked nose

In My Humble Opinion
1

Gahhh. I hab a code anb I cant breab frew my nobe.

Sorry serious now. At present it feels like my brain is swimming in snot. I’m crap at breathing through my mouth (makes me feel like I’m not getting enough oxygen - completely stupid but quite difficult to deal with) and I have a very looong night ahead of me. So far I have been using the byuteko method ( breath in then out then in and out again holding nose and swining head back and forth not breathing until it feels like your lungs might explode then breathing normally) wich works a treat until my neck gets too sore to do it anymore. Next comes the FESS -which is a ph buffered isotonic saline solution - nasal spray that works great for a little while then stops working. Hence my present miserable state.
As it is the middle of the night and there is nothing I can do help myself til morning please tell my what you do to deal with congestion. Have you ever been driven to doing/or thinking about doing something drastic or stupid (I’m dreaming of shoving some tubes up there that I could breath through - I won’t thought) ?

Do you have some incredibly gross or amusing snot stories?

It is gonna be a long night - snearrrrrcksnufffsnifflesnork gahh

2

I shove some of this up my snout… Vicks Sinex.

A totally non-organic, non-holistic, utterly manufactured big-pharma hit of Oxymetazoline hydrochloride… clears the snot right up and lets me get some sleep.

I only use it at night as it can leave the ol’ snozz feeling a bit tender, but nothing else I’ve tried gets close to working this well.

3

Hot tea and chicken soup. And long hot showers. I also sometimes hold a steaming wet washcloth to my nose, both to clear out the snot and to rehydrate the skin around my nostrils. I just got over a lengthy sinus infection, complete with neon yellow and green snot.

4

I hate to sound like some kinda speed freak but ever since they took ephedra/ephedrine/whatever out of OTC cold medications I swear nothing works as well.

Sure, you can sign at the pharmacy for cold medications that still contain ephedra, but they aren’t the brands I used to use…the brands I used to use (Alka Seltzer Cold, Advil Sinus etc) don’t have pharmacy versions. Alka Seltzer Plus Cold formula used to be a miracle drug; within twenty minutes I could feel my nasal passages unclogging like drains. Sure it made me sleepy and gave me the chills, but it WORKED.

moment of silence for old-school Alka Seltzer Plus

So now every time I get a cold I play Eeny Meeny Minie Mo with various brands, trying to find one that works worth a shit.

Sudafed PE works OK, unless you have the kind of cold wherein snot drips out your nose and you can’t “sniff it back in” because that’s how blocked your sinuses are and then it tickles and makes you ALMOST sneeze and then your eyes water and you want to kill somebody. So it’s effective but only on colds that are past the initial 24 hour “hell period.” For average congestion it’s a usable remedy.

None of the Tylenol formulations, over or under the counter, work at all as far as I can tell. Ditto for Dayquil. Ditto for Advil Cold and Sinus. I hate taking drugs of any kind that have no apparent effect at all. The damn things are expensive.

The only cold medication I can count on is Nyquil. And actually its generic house-brand versions seem to work better than the name-brand, for reasons I have never been able to explain.

The problem with night-time formulas is…they’re only good at night.

I wish this post had a happy ending.

My dad swears by Benadryl. But again, those antihistamines will make you so damn sleepy it’s almost not worth it.

If I’m at work with the kind of cold the OP has, I just pour myself a shot of Grand Marnier and blow my nose a lot. It warms and soothes and in sufficient quantities makes the other symptoms irrelevant.

(I should mention I bartend…)

My sympathies Madrabbitwoman!

5

I put a few drops of eucalyptus oil into a bowl of hot water and inhale the fumes. I find it works very well.

6

I find this makes me vomit - I’m weird I guess (and ohh so snotty)

7

Sterile salt water capsules.

Maybe next time I have a cold I’ll work up the courage to try a neti pot.

8

1:13am AEST
In the deepest darkest hours of the night a very congested and desperate lagomophic superhero trawls the intarwebs for infomation about neti pots. Seems like a fairly simple premise she thinks to herself in between snarrrks for air, am I not intelligent, do I not have the creative power of at least a dozen bunnies intent on stealing food… is not THE CUTE and FLUFFINESS tm on my side!!! I CAN MAKE A NETI POT AND RELIEVE MY SUFFERING!

Um ahem, anyway I ended up using a turkey baster with a glob of blu tack on the end to make a seal for my nose. I didn’t have any sea salt but I had some Murry River salt which I am sure is better 1/4tsp in 200 ml water. Sucked the solution up and shoved the glob of blu tack in my nose them broke the seal on the bulb and…an Interesting sensation to say the least.

I was hoping for an instant cure. No go.
My symptoms have improved. I can sort of breath through on nostril and the horrible congested my eyes are about to pop out of my head feeling has lessened.

I may actually get some sleep tonight.
Thanks to whoever mentioned the neti pot.

9

I use neo syphrine nasal spray when I’ve got a cold.

ETA: Ah, you said that a nasal spray stopped working for you. Sorry…

10

Yeah, I love my neti pot, but it really only works if my nose isn’t so blocked that the water won’t go through. If I’m that stuffed up, I just feel like I’m trying to drown myself.
DayQuil usually works well for me, so my colds aren’t generally completely horrible, but my husband and both got the Cold From Hell that’s been going around, and NOTHING seems to work on that thing. It’s been almost three weeks and I’m still blowing my nose all the time, but I do feel okay now. It was, however, the only time I’ve had a cold bad enough that I staggered out of bed, called in sick to work, staggered back to bed, and slept until almost 3 pm. Steam seemed to help a little bit- hot baths and soup, but nothing really helped except drugged out unconsciousness, which is no good if you actually have something to do.

11

I take a hot shower and stand there and hork up as much as I can. (Inhale deeply, hold down one nostril, and use all my strength to exhale from my diaphragm out the other nostril. Repeat until I can’t hear anything else when I blow. Switch nostrils.) Usually when I do this I have to do it again about twenty minutes later, but after that I’m good. It never ceases to amaze me how much snot can come out of a person.

One time when I was stuffy, I drank some broth with ginger and hot peppers, after which point my nose opened like a tap. It felt great.

After that, if all else fails, I do whatever I need to do to get to sleep.

12

Spicy food can help, if you’re feeling up to it.

The neti pot works for a bit, but it’s temporary. Dried nasal passages can be helped with a saline nasal gel - I use Ayr brand, but there are others. Just squeeze some on your fingertip and smear it all inside your nose. Gross but effective.

I use Mucinex D for congestion. As for antihistamines, they’re great if you’re having an allergic reaction, but not so great for a cold.

The breathing through the mouth being hard is because the air is so dry - your nose acts as an air conditioner and humidifier when it’s working properly. Use a humidifier as much as you can, especially near your bed at night.

Tissues with lotion. Only time I can use them is when my head has become a snot factory, but they’re brilliant then.

Hang in there.

13

Vicks Vaporub usually does a good job.

Otherwise, pseudoephedrine or the new pseudo-pseudoephedrine. But they keep me awake, so I don’t take them before bed.

14

Do NOT do this.

15

I was going to quote Audrey Levins but it’s a long post so I’m just going to say YOU ARE SO DAMN RIGHT!!!

Nyquil is the only thing that works when I’m sick (and yes, the generic house brands DO work better! I’m glad I’m not the only one who noticed that!). So when I’m sick I obviously sleep. A Lot. And it works REALLY good when combined with a few beers. :wink:

When I’m not sick and just having allergy issues (which is all the time it seems like) I usually eat the WalMart brand or Target Brand allergy “caplets”. They’re a pink and white bottle and the pills are pink and white too. They’re like $3.99 for 100. But they make me fall asleep too - and oddly enough, give me nightmares or really REALLY strange dreams. And, since I’ve gotten so used to them, I have to take like 4 or 5 at a time instead of 2. Which kinda sucks. But at $3.99 a bottle, at least they aren’t expensive.

16

Some neti “pots” come in squeeze bottle form, they might be a little more useful than a plain neti pot (and, IME, are easier to find, too).

Some actor friends of mine would always almost-boil a pot of water, put their head in the pot just above the water line, and cover the whole thing with a towel. Doing that for five minutes would clear them out really well, it might help if you’re stuffed up, too.

17

I use this:
http://www.walgreens.com/store/product.jsp?CATID=308896&navAction=jump&navCount=0&nug=VPD&skuid=sku2598244&id=prod2598807

my girlfriend mocked me about it until she got sick and used it. now she’s some kind of sinus rinse evangelist.

18

I see that you tried a nasal spray, but is it the ‘saline’ kind or the ‘medicine’ kind? The ONLY thing that works, for me, (and I get congestion a lot due to sinus infections) is the medicine decongestant nasal sprays. Yes, you have to be careful not to overuse them because they can cause rebound congestion or you can get kind of dependent on them, so I save them for when I really need them, at night when I want to sleep, and I use the smallest dose I can get away with. I suffer through / make do on other things during the daytime. I also do the nasal rinse saline kits too.

Those nasal sprays though, like Afrin or similar, I don’t know how they work but they are like miracles to me. I can be so congested that there is no breath at all, a few sprays later and I am clear. It’s like magic. The old sudafed used to be kind of helpful but the new ones do nothing (my ear nose throat Dr. confirmed this.)

Seriously - if you have congestion and you just need a miracle cure for a temporary time, go for the medicine sprays. They work.

19

What kind are you using? They are not all equal. Mucinex makes a 12 hour that works very well. (really, it workd for a little more than 8, but long enought to get some sleep).

20

When I get the REALLY BAD sinus infections, this is what I do.

Fill a shallow bowl with warm salt water.

Stick my face in it, mouth doesn’t have to be in but nose must be submerged. Keep mouth closed.

Hold one nostril closed and inhale as hard as I can through the other nostril until the salt water makes it through. Hold other nostril closed and repeat.

Repeat every few hours as needed.

The effect, for anyone that has been ocean swimming, is somewhat like what happens when a wave gets the best of you and you get water up your nose. It’s an unpleasant effect generally and when I am healthy I can’t believe I do this deliberately but when my sinuses are really clogged…it’s like inducing vomiting after you’ve eaten tainted food, it makes you feel so much better.

Gross snot stories…for about 2 weeks once I had to hold a hankie in front of my face whenever I was in the presence of other people because thick wads of yellow and green snot kept spontaneously emitting from my nose without warning when I exhaled. I wasn’t blowing, I wasn’t sneezing, snot just kept jumping out of my nose. It was hugely gross.