{"id":804,"date":"2009-12-10T15:25:16","date_gmt":"2009-12-10T15:25:16","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/freshliving\/2009\/12\/when-your-spouse-has-a-cold.html"},"modified":"2009-12-10T15:25:16","modified_gmt":"2009-12-10T15:25:16","slug":"when-your-spouse-has-a-cold","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/freshliving\/2009\/12\/when-your-spouse-has-a-cold.html","title":{"rendered":"When Your Spouse Has a Cold&#8230;"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>My beloved has been snuffling, coughing, sneezing, and aching for three days now.&nbsp; Poor guy.&nbsp; But I&#8217;ll admit it&#8211;right up there with &#8220;Can I bring you some soup, Sweetie?&#8221; in my mind is, &#8220;Don&#8217;t you dare get me sick.&#8221; <\/p>\n<p>As I&#8217;ve fussed over him to help him feel better this week, I&#8217;ve also been majorly into prevention (or germaphobic, depending on your perspective) for myself.&nbsp; Here are some tips for how to protect yourself when your spouse&#8211;or boyfriend\/girlfriend, child, roommate, or even coworker&#8211;is a sickie.<\/p>\n<p><u>3 Ways to Protect Yourself When Your Spouse Has a Cold<\/u><\/p>\n<p>1.&nbsp; <b>Take Out the Trash<\/b> &#8211; I&#8217;ve been emptying the garbage cans in the bathroom, bedroom, and kitchen a couple of times a day this week because just looking at all those gooshy tissues, I can almost hear the germs saying, &#8220;hey, can I come hang out with you next?&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>2.&nbsp; <b>Sleep on the Couch<\/b> &#8211; or, as I&#8217;m lucky enough to be able to do, the guest bed.&nbsp; Because people with colds tend towards night sweating, mouth-breathing, and uncovered coughing.&nbsp; Plus, will you really sleep well if your mind is focused on &#8220;is he breathing on me?&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>3.&nbsp; <b>Do all the Cooking and Cleaning<\/b> &#8211; I become very June Cleaver when Rob gets sick, in violation of our usually unwavering &#8220;I cook, you clean&#8221; policy.&nbsp; I do this not only because he&#8217;s feeling lousy and I want him to rest, but because I don&#8217;t want the hands that just caught a sneeze touching a) food b) clean dishes c) the cabinets, drawers, counters, etc. <\/p>\n<p>Do you have more tips for practicing cold and flu prevention when someone within your home has got a bug?&nbsp; Do tell!<\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 10pt;color: black;font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif'\"><strong>Like what you see? <\/strong><a href=\"http:\/\/feedburner.google.com\/fb\/a\/mailverify?uri=FreshLiving&amp;amp;loc=en_US\"><font color=\"#023d89\"><strong>Click here to subscribe<\/strong><\/font><\/a><strong> and get Fresh Living in your in-box every day.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>My beloved has been snuffling, coughing, sneezing, and aching for three days now. Poor guy. But I&#8217;ll admit it&#8211;right up there with &#8220;Can I bring you some soup, Sweetie?&#8221; in my mind is, &#8220;Don&#8217;t you dare get me sick.&#8221;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":28,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,28,229],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-804","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-by-holly-lebowitz-rossi","category-health","category-relationships"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v23.9 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>When Your Spouse Has a Cold... - Fresh Living<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/freshliving\/2009\/12\/when-your-spouse-has-a-cold.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"When Your Spouse Has a Cold... - Fresh Living\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"My beloved has been snuffling, coughing, sneezing, and aching for three days now. Poor guy. But I&#039;ll admit it--right up there with &quot;Can I bring you some soup, Sweetie?&quot; in my mind is, &quot;Don&#039;t you dare get me sick.&quot;\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/freshliving\/2009\/12\/when-your-spouse-has-a-cold.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Fresh Living\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2009-12-10T15:25:16+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"hrossi\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"When Your Spouse Has a Cold... - Fresh Living","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/freshliving\/2009\/12\/when-your-spouse-has-a-cold.html","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"When Your Spouse Has a Cold... - Fresh Living","og_description":"My beloved has been snuffling, coughing, sneezing, and aching for three days now. Poor guy. But I'll admit it--right up there with \"Can I bring you some soup, Sweetie?\" in my mind is, \"Don't you dare get me sick.\"","og_url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/freshliving\/2009\/12\/when-your-spouse-has-a-cold.html","og_site_name":"Fresh Living","article_published_time":"2009-12-10T15:25:16+00:00","author":"hrossi","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/freshliving\/2009\/12\/when-your-spouse-has-a-cold.html","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/freshliving\/2009\/12\/when-your-spouse-has-a-cold.html","name":"When Your Spouse Has a Cold... - Fresh Living","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/freshliving\/#website"},"datePublished":"2009-12-10T15:25:16+00:00","dateModified":"2009-12-10T15:25:16+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/freshliving\/#\/schema\/person\/168fb6fdfd4f4d1a2e41e628b308b687"},"breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/freshliving\/2009\/12\/when-your-spouse-has-a-cold.html#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/freshliving\/2009\/12\/when-your-spouse-has-a-cold.html"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/freshliving\/2009\/12\/when-your-spouse-has-a-cold.html#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/freshliving"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"When Your Spouse Has a Cold&#8230;"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/freshliving\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/freshliving\/","name":"Fresh Living","description":"Holistic, Health and Wellness","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/freshliving\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/freshliving\/#\/schema\/person\/168fb6fdfd4f4d1a2e41e628b308b687","name":"hrossi","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/freshliving\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/freshliving\/wp-content\/wphb-cache\/gravatar\/b92\/b928efbbb02076837659d614a160f471x96.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/freshliving\/wp-content\/wphb-cache\/gravatar\/b92\/b928efbbb02076837659d614a160f471x96.jpg","caption":"hrossi"},"description":"Holly Lebowitz Rossi is Beliefnet's Health and Relationships Editor. A graduate of Cornell University and Harvard Divinity School, she has more than a decade of experience writing about religion and spirituality for Newsweek, The Washington Post, Spa Finder, Sojourners, Search, and many other publications. Her commentaries have also been heard on NPR\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s \u00e2\u20ac\u0153All Things Considered.\" When not at her desk, you can find her baking, in her garden, or rockin' out in water aerobics class. She lives in Arlington, Mass. Visit http:\/\/www.hollyrossi.com for more.","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/freshliving\/author\/hrossi"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/freshliving\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/804","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/freshliving\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/freshliving\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/freshliving\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/28"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/freshliving\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=804"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/freshliving\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/804\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/freshliving\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=804"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/freshliving\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=804"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/freshliving\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=804"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}