common cold cured my PCS
 

In June of 2016 I got a concussion from boxing. I didn't allow myself to rest and heal properly. I slipped into PCS. I had a constant pressure inside my head/headache, and I always felt a little dazed.

8 months into it, I got sick with what I believe to be the common cold. As I healed from being sick, all of my concussion symptoms went away.

Strange, right?

I am aware that correlation is not necessarily causation. But I recently hit my head (not a major hit) against a tree and made the same mistake of not allowing myself time to heal. I have once again slipped into PCS. I wonder if I could reproduce the previous result.

If you search "Emerging Roles for the Immune System in Traumatic Brain Injury" you will find a paper on how the immune system responds to TBIs.

Have any of you experienced such things when getting sick?

Yes. Last fall I got a cold for the first time in about six years. (I virtually never get sick in the common sense of the word.) During and after that cold my usual headaches and some other symptoms were dramatically improved.

My thinking at the time was that if there was any causal effect at all, it was that having the cold distracted me from the usual headaches, thereby reducing any psychological component they might have had. But who knows what other mechanisms could be at work?

I would think very carefully before trying to catch a cold, however.

I made improvements after a bout of pneumonia. I thought it was because my blood pressure and heart rate were elevated. Anyone else notice that correlation? I always feel better when my blood pressure is up so I drink electrolytes and eat salt with meals.