I have had such a horrible dry cough for a week now. Nothing is really helping that much and it's really getting to me. Especially on a night, that seems to be the peak time for the coughing. I am so sleep deprived..

I've been taking cough medicine when I need it and paracetamol and ibuprofen. What else can I do to ease it? I don't think it is going to disappear anytime soon.

First of all, you should not be taking ibuprofen without a doctor telling you to do so. Self-medicating unnecessarily with NSAIDs can be dangerous.

Tips to help you feel better:

• Try cough drops (hard candy, if you like it, may also help)

• Eat about a teaspoon of honey before going to bed, or you can mix it in with tea if you prefer. It soothes your throat and helps you sleep better too.

• If the smell doesn't bother you, put vapor rub on your chest before going to sleep.

• Try sleeping with extra pillows (so that your head is raised) one night to see if the cough improves. It could be acid traveling from your stomach to your lungs.

• If you have a humidifier, use it.

Assuming you don't just have an oncoming cold, it could be some kind of allergic reaction (especially dust) or sinusitis. With that said, if it's been two weeks and you haven't improved, you should probably check in with a doctor.

Hope that helps and that you get well soon :)

Thank you I will try the honey before going to bed.

I have already tried the vapor rub but that did not work :^(

I had a really awful dry cough a while back as well, and I agree with everying said, but would also like to add that I found the Buckley's syrup to be quite helpful. It truly does taste awful, but I found it worked the best of anything I had to help with the coughing. Also since I had to work when I was sick I kept a thing of Hall's with me, and I found those helped a bit too, if only temporarily.

Is that syrup avaliable in the UK? I am using a syrup called Covonia. It tastes quite nasty too.

Never thought to try Halls. Will give that a go as well.

Ahh, right I forgot not everyone is located in the same place, haha! Buckley's is a Canadian-made product, so I'm not sure if you could buy it where you are. Covonia (from the looks of it) seems to be quite similar though.

But yeah, Halls are nice just for a bit of relief, they won't cure you by any means, but the cough ones can help at least alleviate things for a while.