This is one of my old articles originally published  on Yahoo! voices, May 1st, 2013.

This morning, my son’s runny nose and an annoying cough reminded me that it’s that time of year again and it would be a good idea to stock up on Vicks.  Here is a great way to sooth your dry hacking cough. Trust me, it really works.

Yes, you heard me right. Soothe dry, hacking cough at night by applying Vicks to the bottoms of your feet and covering them with socks.

When a good friend of mine tried to convince me of this remedy a few years ago, I laughed it off. What do the bottoms of your feet have to do with coughing your lungs out?

It was so silly to me that it entered my mind each time I or one of my kids suffered from dry cough. I’d usually just smile at the memory of my friend swearing by this and would reach for cough syrup.

Until cough syrup failed to work. Last night, I was up with my 5-year-old most of the night, thinking of various ways to calm his dry, hacking cough. His doctor advised me to give him Delsym, which worked pretty good during the day, but not so well at night.

 I gave him Delsym right before putting him to bed. About an hour later, he woke up coughing up the storm. It seemed he couldn’t catch his breath!

First, I turned off the heat — thinking it must have been irritating his cough — and turned on the vaporizer. When that failed, I gave him warm milk and honey to drink, but it made him vomit.

When I tried applying a warm compress around his neck, my son complained about not being able to breathe because of it. He was still coughing a lot, so I took it off.

After a while, I was running out of ideas. It was the middle of the night and even though I was willing to try absolutely anything to help him, my little child was not. All he wanted to do was get some sleep.

And then the memory of my friend swearing by Vicks entered my mind. I applied it on my son’s chest and back, but he still couldn’t stop coughing. About an hour of hearing my little guy struggle to breathe, I gave in. Even though I thought it was silly, I applied Vicks to the bottoms of his feet. My friend’s words sounded in my head: “don’t forget to put his socks on afterwards…”

I obeyed. About 7 to 10 minutes later, my son fell asleep. His cough vanished for the rest of the night.

What do you think? Fact or coincidence? I think I should listen to my wise friend’s advise a little more often.