I hate being sick. I hate it even more when my kids are sick. I have a whole slew of natural remedies to help combat almost anything that comes our way but sometimes despite my best efforts sickness does hit our house. The winter of 2017 was an especially tough time for our family. Someone was always sick in our house over a 2 month stretch.  I was pregnant at the time so along with typical morning sickness I also came down with the flu twice! My sweet little ones were also miserable multiple times and my son missed 2 weeks of school! Needless to say, once we were all on the mend we had to get our immune systems back in working order. We got on some great supplements thanks to our holistic doctor and we did a few other things to help keep us healthy through the cold months. We started researching things we could do to help prevent the flu in our home. We read a couple of articles and heard about some research on inside humidity. We ran right out and bought a large 6 gallon humidifier for our house when we read this article from Science News https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/02/130227183456.htm

We found out that it isn’t the cold that brings about cold and flu season, but rather the lack of humidity. Through my research I also found out that too much humidity is a problem too. If we lived in the rain-forest during the rainy season we might also be more susceptible to illness.  Here in Michigan though, humidity that is too high is never a problem for us in the winter. According to the Science News article, when humidity is over 43% the viruses only have a 14% chance of infecting cells verses a 70-77% chance when humidity is only 23%. So in order to give us the best chance of staying healthy this winter we have been running the humidifier and trying to keep humidity above 43%. You do want to make sure you don’t have so much humidity that you start to experience mold growth because that is very dangerous as well. Your best bet would be to either purchase an individual humidistat or a humidifier with a built in humidistat to keep an eye on the humidity in your home.

This year has been so much better for the health of my family. Yes, we still deal with mild illness every now and again. But with the help of great supplements that keep our immunes system strong and the right humidity we have made it through this winter healthy! I encourage you to do some research on how you can stay healthy during the winter time. Cold and Flu season doesn’t have to affect everyone. Be sure keep your diet clean and eat plenty of healthy fats and veggies. Take high quality supplements and keep an eye on your humidity. I wish you all great health!

~ Katie