# How often do you get sick? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [January 6, 2012, 4:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-often-do-you-get-sick/608632 "2012-01-06T16:23:55Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 14\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Al\_Bundy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e79b87/32.png) [@Al\_Bundy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Al_Bundy)\ **Post date:** [January 6, 2012, 8:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-often-do-you-get-sick/608632/21 "2012-01-06T20:01:47Z")
I used to get a cold now and then when the kid was in pre and grade school and I was with kids all the time. Now that she is 15 and does her own thing more, I simply do not get sick. However, I tried the zinc and herbal stuff with only rare success. I discovered that vitamin C works to cut off or reduce the intensity of colds greatly. The amount of C has to be enormous for it to work. I take a gram an hour when the throws of a cold and it tends to go away in a day. If I know I am exposed to something I or feel something coming, I jump on it right away and it never materialized. I put the limit at about 12 grams of C in a day and never more than 2-3 days at most because the problem goes away by then. I advise others to be careful in self dosing to such great amounts. I’ve tried it and have experience with it so I plan to continue. PS\> I had a history of forming kidney stones years ago, but have never had a problem while using this load of vitamins. I was never sure what caused it. It may have been severe dehydration from working out. ---
**Author:** ![Kamino\_Neko](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kamino_neko/32/34_2.png) [@Kamino\_Neko](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kamino_Neko)\ **Post date:** [January 6, 2012, 8:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-often-do-you-get-sick/608632/22 "2012-01-06T20:51:46Z")
Hah…the real question is how often am I well! I suffer recurrent lung infections, which no doctor has figured out the source of…have been for the past 6-7 years. They and asthma interact with each other badly. Even before that started I was pretty sickly, and would get a cold, or stomach issues once or twice a month. ---
**Author:** ![Dung\_Beetle](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dung_beetle/32/7945_2.png) [@Dung\_Beetle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dung_Beetle)\ **Post date:** [January 6, 2012, 9:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-often-do-you-get-sick/608632/23 "2012-01-06T21:00:32Z")
I almost never get sick…that is, I don’t catch whatever’s going around. However, I am prone to migraines and sinus trouble, which begets vomiting and usually winds up subtracting a day of my life. This happens approximately once every two months. ---
**Author:** ![Unauthorized\_Cinnamon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/bc8723/32.png) [@Unauthorized\_Cinnamon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Unauthorized_Cinnamon)\ **Post date:** [January 6, 2012, 9:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-often-do-you-get-sick/608632/24 "2012-01-06T21:54:06Z")
Well, I hold out hope that in 10 years or so, I might not get sick so often. Hey, all you well people - have you ever had mono? I definitely noticed for a long time after having a pretty bad case that I caught every virus that went by. I wonder if it might even still have an effect? ---
**Author:** ![carlotta](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/898d66/32.png) [@carlotta](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carlotta)\ **Post date:** [January 6, 2012, 10:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-often-do-you-get-sick/608632/25 "2012-01-06T22:53:18Z")
I have three kids (12, 10, and 5) and I almost never get sick even after spending the night in bed with a sick child coughing in my face all night. Before I had kids I got colds all the time, like almost once a month. The new improved immune system kicked in right after the birth of my first child and I can’t explain it. However, despite feeling great and having no symptoms, I have doctors telling me that in fact I have something wrong with my thyroid and maybe I have cancer and there’s no test they can ever do to reassure them that I don’t and maybe they should just remove the thyroid…so there’s that. ---
**Author:** ![jabiru](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/bbce88/32.png) [@jabiru](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jabiru)\ **Post date:** [January 6, 2012, 11:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-often-do-you-get-sick/608632/26 "2012-01-06T23:30:48Z")
Seldom. I had a head cold earlier in the year which lasted for a day or two. I don’t think I’ve ever had the 'flu. I had pneumonia about seven years ago but I was working in an infectious diseases ward, so I could myself lucky I didn’t get pertussis. It was a big year for pertussis. ---
**Author:** ![rhubarbarin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/eb9ed0/32.png) [@rhubarbarin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rhubarbarin)\ **Post date:** [January 6, 2012, 11:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-often-do-you-get-sick/608632/27 "2012-01-06T23:37:28Z")
My whole life I was sick often, usually respitory stuff that would linger on for weeks or months. Now I get sick less than once a year usually, and it’s very mild and quick - like three days of the sniffles. I don’t have any kids, but I do work with the public and with many co-workers who are mostly sickly. I think I’m much healthier now because I live a very healthy lifestyle and eat an extremely nutritious diet, as well as taking supplements (vitamin D during the winter, and extra when I feel I’m coming down with something, seems to make a big difference). ---
**Author:** ![chiroptera](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/df705f/32.png) [@chiroptera](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/chiroptera)\ **Post date:** [January 6, 2012, 11:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-often-do-you-get-sick/608632/28 "2012-01-06T23:41:15Z")
No kids. Although I’m around them frequently. I get a cold/bug on average about once every six-seven years (five colds in the last 33 years.) Apart from getting food poisoning twice, and those five colds, I haven’t been sick in 40 years. Nothing at all. I had real, honest-to-goodness flu when I was 14 years old and it was horrible, but that was almost 40 years ago. In my entire life including school (I’ll be 54 next month) I’ve lost work/school days maybe a week or two total. Never once for being or feeling sick though, but for bad-back flare-ups when I cannot sit or stand up. Otherwise, I got nothing. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![vivalostwages](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/d07c76/32.png) [@vivalostwages](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/vivalostwages)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2012, 1:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-often-do-you-get-sick/608632/29 "2012-01-07T01:53:27Z")
About once a year or so, I get a really horrific case of bronchitis. ---
**Author:** ![The\_wind\_of\_my\_soul](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ecc23a/32.png) [@The\_wind\_of\_my\_soul](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_wind_of_my_soul)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2012, 2:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-often-do-you-get-sick/608632/30 "2012-01-07T02:01:15Z")
To put it simply, I’m sick more often than I’m not sick. I talked to my doctor about it, who had my sinuses X-rayed, which revealed that my sinuses have been thickened from chronic allergies. So I’m currently working with a specialist to discover what I’m allergic to and how to treat it. FWIW, I mentioned to her my constant sickness in September, and she just brushed it off by saying I should take multivitamins – which I’ve been doing for years. Just because your doctor says it’s normal doesn’t mean it is. If you’re having your doubts, see an ENT specialist. ---
**Author:** ![Dr.Strangelove](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dr.strangelove/32/6613_2.png) [@Dr.Strangelove](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr.Strangelove)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2012, 2:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-often-do-you-get-sick/608632/31 "2012-01-07T02:06:27Z")
I get a mild cold about once a year, but the last time I got something debilitating enough to warrant taking time off was probably a decade ago. Can’t recall ever having a real flu, food poisoning, or really anything that went beyond merely annoying. ---
**Author:** ![SciFiSam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/47e85d/32.png) [@SciFiSam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SciFiSam)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2012, 2:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-often-do-you-get-sick/608632/32 "2012-01-07T02:29:07Z")
Ever since I had swine flu in June 2009, I’ve been ill. I eliminated everything that could be causing me to be ill, and made sure I was getting everything that should make me well, and I’m still ill. Today I feel well, but was still coughing and sneezing enough at work that they noticed I had a cold having not seen me since before Christmas. Well, yes, I _always_ have a cold. I take care not to spread the germs, as far as I can. The week before Christmas, I had to laugh at the picture I represented - flu, a slipped disc and some sort of stomach bug (food poisoning, my doctor, thought); so I was dragging myself along, bent over, wheezing, coughing and sneezing, groaning in pain, occasionally stopping to vomit, shaking like a meth addict in withdrawal, my skin visibly changing colour as my temperature went up and down. Plague, plague! 😃 ---
**Author:** ![dangermom](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e274bd/32.png) [@dangermom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dangermom)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2012, 2:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-often-do-you-get-sick/608632/33 "2012-01-07T02:32:20Z")
Not much. I get maybe 1 cold a year. The sickest I’ve ever been was about 15 years ago when I worked at an elementary school, and I got terrible laryngitis along with flu or something. For several years I got laryngitis at the slightest provocation, even if I was hardly sick at all, but that seems to have gotten better. I have two kids 11 and 8, and they’re very social but they don’t actually go to school, so maybe that helps. They’re hardly ever sick either. ---
**Author:** ![Hyperelastic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/a3d4f5/32.png) [@Hyperelastic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hyperelastic)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2012, 2:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-often-do-you-get-sick/608632/34 "2012-01-07T02:35:55Z")
Before I had kids, I would get maybe one mild cold a year, this even when my wife was spending 100 hours a week around sick people during her residency. Since the kids came, I get sick probably 5-6 times a year, including one or two fevers or bronchitises (bronchiti?) [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-often-do-you-get-sick/608632.md?page=1)