How to safely cough

Just stay in posture as much as you can. Sit if possible, with lumbar curve in place, when you have to cough. If not possible to sit, I will stand in an exaggerated posture and try to control my coughing movement as much as possible. I'll even take an OTC cough suppressant at times, to control this, although that's a personal decision. What is the source of your cough? - Surviving

Hi,
Have you tried crossing your legs when standing and coughing?
Daphne

There have been lots of topics about coughing. My solution to coughing is to learn not to cough, ie not to take the tickle as a reason to cough. Have a drink of water. Do anything. Just don't cough. My lifesaver has been Buteyko breathing, which needs to be learned through a trained teacher. It is about only breathing through your nose, keeping some residual air in your lungs and teaching your brain to breathe slower. Buteyko also breathes with the diaphragm, like WW. Another hint is to use analgesia for a few days or nights, to reduce throat inflammation, which just seems to cause more coughing. Analgesia, eg paracetemol, breaks the cycle, so the inflammation can settle.

I like the idea of "not to take the tickle as a reason to cough". I guess now that you say that, I realize I do that a lot myself. Different ways to break the cycle....

on a spoon. My father used to give that to us as a child. And, yes, I used to pretend I had a cough often. :)

Seriously, though: honey works.

Warm honey/lemon water, too.

about my POP. Well, select male friends.

I've found 4 women in my circle I would call friends have some form of POP. I am not a woman with a huge network of girlfriends, so I find this amazing. I am only 47!

I bend at the waist to pick up EVERYTHING now! Jiggle my knees a little, too. The new me!

Wink at every jiggling woman you see! ;-)

There isn't anything that has made my bladder prolapse worse than having pneumonia two years in a row and having to cough my lungs clear. It made coughing the thing I most dread so you have my sympathy, dionysius. It sounds like your cough is temporary and not chronic, but I'll add this post anyway for general info.

My husband and I are big proponents of the saline nasal rinse. If your cough begins with an allergic reaction, the sinus drainage tickles almost constantly. The nasal rinse regularly done when symptoms occur will do away with this almost entirely....and prevent mucus buildup and infection. It's always our first line of defense.

In the low humidity circumstances (furnace fan blowing a lot during a cold night) which make me cough, I use the least expensive DM cough syrup (active ingredient: gauifinesin). Cough drops with sweetener made my mouth drier and cough worse. My taking gauifinesin at bedtime really helps both me and my husband sleep.

Just a sideline on the coughing. Anyone with Cystic fibrosis, Bronchiectasis, COPD or similar where it is seriously important to get up whatever is on the lungs, firebreathing is an effective and safe way to do it. It seems three breaths do the trick.

As for Bede’s sinus rinses, for anyone with bad sinus, I would second her recommendation for the regular use of a warm saline solution for this condition after observing a friend successfully doing so.

I cough regularly. I had pneumonia 22 years ago, and ever since, have had a bit of a chronic tickle. I'm rarely sick, but if I do get a cold or a touch of something, or even if I just swallow wrong to set off a choking reaction, there's that cough again. I appreciate what Bebe and Fab have to say here, and I will give these measures a try.

But here's my news: A few weeks ago, starting on Christmas Eve, I came down with something that I will call "flu". It was the worst coughing I have done since discovery of my prolapse in 2010. And yet, my 'celes are absolutely none the worse for wear, despite this deep violent coughing that went on day after day. All I had to do was make sure I was in a prolapse-friendly body position when I coughed. I hardly even had to think about that, which I guess means that I've learned to stay in good prolapse-friendly positions pretty much all the time, instinctively. - Surviving

I rarely cough myself so did not think my example was sufficient enough evidence to state this, but on the rare occasions I do cough, I have found being in posture means that the cough pushes my prolapse (uterine) forward rather than down. I find the area below my navel seems to take the force of the cough.

What I do more frequently is gag, for example when cleaning a coated tongue. When I gag the prolapse drops down, maybe because I am generally leaning forward over the sink. However, I have found if I brush side to side rather than longwise from the back of my tongue forward, I don’t gag.

Dear Surviving, I know you would be keeping an eye on your cough. Pneumonia was the explanation for my friend’s bronchiectasis; having a bout of untreated pneumonia as a young man or coming into contact with tuberculosis or exposure to chemicals as a young person all of which happened to a lot of our generation were the most likely contributors. These things leave damage and scarring on the lung. He always had a cough, like someone clearing their throat, but in his late sixties it developed into bronchiectasis. It’s not nice. Basically, it requires extended treatment with extra strong antibiotics whenever you get an infection, and then when well, making sure that everything left on the lung is coughed up even though this may drive your family to distraction. Paradoxically, smoking seems to help as it is the damaged parts and scarring which harbour the bacteria and makes it difficult for the usual antibiotic to free the lung of infection. The smoking aids in getting mucus up and the lungs clear. Not that of course I am recommending anyone smoke, but what it means is that when people with bronchiectasis give up smoking in their fifties, the bronchiestasis starts to become worse. The mucus tends to sit there. So the secret really is to keep your lungs clear as much as possible. Bronchiectasis is often confused with COPD where the consensus unfortunately is that it is caused by smoking and therefore is the patient’s own fault. But it is different and needs to be treated differently. I certainly hope it is not what you describe Surviving, but knowledge of possibilities enables you to take the proverbial stitch in time, and save you a possible lot of trouble and angst further down the track.

best wishes, Fab

Hmmmmm....interesting, Fab, and a little disturbing too. A doctor has "listened" to my lungs and proclaimed them to be clear. Should that be reassuring, or does it even mean anything? What would one do to find out if there was something in there that wasn't being coughed out? And if so, what would the treatment be? - Surviving

Doctors find it very difficult to diagnose, you need a specialist. You need a chest x-ray and an MRI scan. Listening with a stethoscope will often mistakenly give the all clear. Apart from treatment with antibiotics when an infection occurs, treatment is similar to those with cystic fibrosis i.e. removal of mucus by means of devices such as a flutter valve, postural drainage (ineffective), and through the observation of my friend, firebreathing as described by Christine. You must try to expel the mucus to stop recurrent infections. It is suggested that large doses of vitamin D3: 4000iu a day may help prevent infections and pneumonia. Although, this has been disputed. Most doctors will not go to the trouble of a proper diagnosis and will write it off as COPD. But as my friend’s specialist said this is a bad mistake.

Really think its worth checking out.

best wishes, Fab

Thank you Fab, this is serious food for thought - surviving

Just to clarify that we are now talking about the need to get stuff up off the lungs. What Louise had to say about asthma is correct; the less you cough the better. In fact, coughing can lead to an asthma attack. Inflamed and constricted lungs is asthma, mucus filled lungs is COPD, and scarred and damaged lungs is bronchiectasis. With all of these conditions emphysemia (loss of lung elastticity) can be an additional problem

But for getting stuff off the lungs with Bronchiecstasis, my friend was advised by his specialist to huff as he coughed. So even with the firebreathing when you feel the mucus coming you huff it out rather than cough it out.

Unfortunately, physiotherapy including postural drainage can sometimes make things worse for conditions such as asthma for like coughing it can lead to an attack. And for Bronchiecstasis it is ineffective.
cheers, Fab