How to get rid of a cold fast?

Fluids! Fluids! Fluids!

Honestly just gotta let it run its course - treat the symptoms and don’t let yourself suffer. But the one thing I personally dislike is the combo drugs, as a rule of thumb it’s better to take individual meds instead of something like nyquil/dayquil - it can just get messy with appropriate dosing. Just see what’s in those combos and buy the individual meds if you can - not the end of the world if you use the quils but I think it’s just better overall.

To answer your question though - no, taking meds to manage symptoms won’t prolong the illness. It might make you more likely to physically exert yourself and then make the healing slower but that’s likely gonna be negligible.

Fluids, eat, and rest. Hope you get better soon!

There is no cure for the common cold. All you can do is treat the symptoms and wait for it to go away. I prefer NyQuil so I can just sleep through it all.

They usually only last about 3 days anyway, so you should be fine by the time you're gonna go on vacation.

I always drink freshly pressed juice of one lemon two days in a row and feel better. Maybe it's imagination but I do it for years now everytime I have a sore throat. Hope you get better soon!

You seem like you’re already doing everything you can to treat your symptoms. As Kolanaki said, there is no cure for the common cold. I’d continue getting as much rest as you can before your vacation. My colds usually take atleast 7-10 days to fully go away and that’s with proper rest. Sometimes I’ve gotten lucky and only had symptoms for a few days. If you have a sore throat, throat coat tea helps as well.

Sleep a lot, take vitamins immunity boosting supplements, take the proper cold meds (what you need depends on the type of cough/cold you have. Sometimes you need a decongestant, sometimes you need an expectorant, and so on), and, of course, stay hydrated. There's no need to stop taking cold meds if they're working, your body will do "what it needs to" just fine with medication. Cold meds don't prolong a cold. The only symptom that might have an effect if you treat it is a low grade fever, but even then it doesn't have a significant effect so it's really not worth suffering over. So you can either look for some cough meds that don't treat a fever (aka stuff without acetaminophen or ibuprofen in them), or you can just get the individual ingredients that are found in generic cold medicine which don't target fevers and take them that way like guaifenesin or dextromethorphan or whatever one fits your particular cold. Or if you're feverish and don't want to feel uncomfortable you can just take cold meds that also target fevers and even if it does affect how long your sickness lasts, and tbh it probably won't, then it likely won't be to a degree that you'll notice (honestly there's debate on whether treating a fever can prolong an illness, but I'm trying to cover my bases). Most of the time when people think their cold meds made them sick longer what actually happened is that their meds suppressed their symptoms enough that they stopped resting and recuperating too soon and/or over-exerted themselves, and that's what made them sick longer. Just make sure to continue to rest and stay hydrated properly for an appropriate amount of time and you won't have that issue.