The common cold is a familiar ailment, often bringing uncomfortable symptoms. People naturally seek ways to alleviate discomfort and recover quickly. This desire for relief sometimes leads to various ideas about how the body gets rid of a cold, including less conventional notions.
How Your Body Fights a Cold
When a cold virus, most commonly a rhinovirus, enters your body, it typically targets cells lining your nose and sinuses. These viruses replicate within these cells. After about two days, infected cells release chemical messengers called cytokines, signaling the immune system to initiate a response.
Blood vessels in the affected area widen, allowing infection-fighting white blood cells to reach the site. These white blood cells, such as neutrophils and lymphocytes, work to destroy the virus and produce antibodies that can target future invasions by the same virus. Many cold symptoms, like a runny nose or cough, are signs of your immune system actively working to clear the infection.
Digestion and Elimination During Illness
The digestive system processes food, breaking down nutrients for energy, growth, and cell repair. It also eliminates waste through bowel movements. While digestion is a continuous process, illness can sometimes affect its normal patterns.
Changes in digestive habits, such as constipation or diarrhea, can occur during a cold. These changes are typically side effects of the body’s stress response to illness, or sometimes due to medications. Dehydration from fever or sweating can lead to constipation, as the colon may absorb more water from waste. Certain cold viruses, like some strains of influenza or coronaviruses, can also cause gastrointestinal symptoms like diarrhea, especially in children.
Addressing the “Pooping Out a Cold” Belief
There is no scientific evidence that bowel movements directly eliminate the cold virus. The immune system, not the digestive system, fights and clears viral infections. When you have a cold, immune cells identify and neutralize the virus in your respiratory system.
Viral particles are not typically expelled through feces as a primary means of recovery. While some viruses can cause gastrointestinal symptoms, this is a separate effect and not the mechanism by which the immune system clears the respiratory infection. The body’s waste elimination process is essential for overall health, but it does not directly “poop out” the cold virus. The sensation of chills or lightheadedness sometimes experienced during a bowel movement is often due to vagus nerve stimulation, which affects heart rate and blood pressure, rather than viral expulsion.
Effective Ways to Support Cold Recovery
The most effective ways to recover from a cold involve supporting your immune system and managing symptoms. Rest provides energy to fight the infection. Adequate sleep helps bolster immune function.
Staying well-hydrated is beneficial, as fluids help loosen mucus and prevent dehydration, which can worsen symptoms. Nutrient-dense foods, particularly fruits and vegetables, provide vitamins and minerals that support the immune system. Over-the-counter medications, such as pain relievers and decongestants, alleviate discomfort but do not shorten the cold’s duration. Some evidence suggests zinc supplements, taken early, may reduce the length of a cold.