Don’t do it. Just don’t. It hurts far too much.

Flying with a head cold can be really uncomfortable. If you’ve any tips on how to deal with it, then I’d love to hear them.

It was two years ago and I was in Barcelona for work when I came down with a soar throat and a head cold. I thought nothing of it at the time, it wasn’t until the aircraft took off on the flight home, that I experienced the worst pain I’d had in years. Out of no where someone had stuck a red hot needle into my ear and was trying to simultaneously drive it out of nose and through my throat at the same time.

The thing is, I’d forgotten all about that last experience, until I took this last work flight. A trip to Turin, connecting in Paris, 4 days before the flight I came down with a cold, I had hoped it would clear before the flight, but unfortunately I had no such luck. Instead my sinuses became blocked.

Floating with some clouds over Paris yesterday pic.twitter.com/9QSGXCzWm0

— Chris Woods (@mcwoods) June 30, 2014

The pain retuned on the flight to Paris, and with it came hearing loss. It took about 2 hours until my hearing had recovered. Unfortunately this coincided with the next flight to Turin. I sucked sweets, swallowed water, blew my nose - in short, tried everything I can think of to try to prevent the pain, but nothing seemed to work.

24 hours later my hearing is just about back, but my ear still hurts. I’ve my fingers crossed the cold clears up before the flight home. Just in case it doesn’t I looking for any tips and tricks I can use to prevent the same pain. If you’ve any - please let me know…