What you choose to eat at every single meal directly influences the overall inflammatory load in your body. Luckily this means that you have the choice every time you feed yourself on if you’re going to provide nourishing, nutrient rich and anti-inflammatory foods to your body or not!
Beginning to listen and understand the symptoms your body experiences when eating certain foods, switching to healthier oils and eating a fresh, real and whole food diet you can start to feel and notice positive changes in your life including improved energy and sleep, improved mood and cognitive function, weight regulation, reduced digestive or pain symptom severity and frequency and better skin.
Driver of Dietary Inflammation: Food Sensitivities
There are many dietary and lifestyle factors that contribute to inflammation. These were discussed in more detail in our blog post: The Food Pain Connection: How Food Choices Impact Pain.
An often overlooked and very important root cause of dietary inflammation is food sensitivities. They can be difficult to pinpoint since symptoms can be experienced differently in every body and can be felt from hours to days after a food is eaten.
Eating foods you’re sensitive to is a stressor to the body, meaning cortisol (your stress hormone) is released resulting in inflammation. This inflammatory response also significantly impacts your digestive capability and reduces your body’s ability to produce:
- digestive enzymes which help breakdown food and increase nutrient absorption
- stomach acid which is critical for turning your protein rich meals into a usable form of protein the body can use for growth, healing and repair, hormones, antibodies and neurotransmitter. Low stomach acid can lead to conditions like hormonal issues (PMS, menopause), mood imbalances and digestive symptoms like bloating and food malabsorption.
- bile which helps breakdown and absorb fat from your food. Poor bile function can lead to motility issues in the bowel, bacterial overgrowth as well leading to constipation or diarrhea.
If you experience digestive symptoms like bloating, gas, diarrhea/constipation, heartburn and nausea after eating certain foods like gluten, dairy, soy or eggs, this is your body sounding the alarm that the food doesn’t agree with your body.
Choosing to continue eating those foods that don’t agree with your body will lead to chronic inflammation and if ignored and left overtime will lead to further symptom and disease development including inflammatory conditions like metabolic and autoimmune diseases.
An important thing to remember is that every body is different any you may feel or experience symptoms of inflammation in different areas of your body. Inflammation can also feel like brain fog, fatigue, depression, anxiety, headaches, and other symptoms within the body including joint or muscle pain, itchiness, skin issues or seasonal allergy-like symptoms.
So what can you do to improve and reduce levels of inflammation in your body?
👍Here are 4 steps you can start with right now to reduce inflammation in your body:
1. Eliminating Poor Quality Oils: Oils are the most important place to start since every single cell in your body has an outer membrane composed of fat. The type of fat you consume in your diet daily is incorporated into those cell membranes and the quality of that oil directly influences the cell’s ability to work properly.As billions of new cells are created daily, you want to make sure you’re feeding your body the best quality healthy fats so your cells, tissues and organs can all work properly. When the wrong oils are consumed, the cells ability to work properly significantly decreases, and this is when you start to notice symptoms like fatigue and low energy, weakened immune system, hormonal imbalances and weight and skin issues.
Many seed oils are processed with chemical solvents, bleach and deodorizers and modify the oil structure resulting in a highly inflammatory oil. If you’re using the below oils, try switching to the healthier alternative:
2. Incorporating More Healthy Fats: healthy fats contain essential fatty acids like Omega 3, mono and polyunsaturated fats which helps to lower inflammation by protecting the cells in your body. Eating more
healthy fats also helps to balance blood sugar, provide stable energy, improve cognitive function and stabilize your mood. Foods that contain healthy fats include:- avocados
- nuts and seeds like walnuts, pecans and macadamia nuts, chia seeds, flax seeds
- olive oil
- wild fish like salmon, sardines and anchovies
- coconut, coconut milk (no additives) & coconut oil
- dark leafy greens like kale, spinach, Swiss chard
- cruciferous vegetables like broccoli, cauliflower, kohlrabi, bokchoy or Brussel spouts
- Berries like raspberries, blueberries and blackberries which are highest in antioxidants
- Fermented foods are beneficial like kimchi, sauerkraut, miso, tempeh
- Herbs like turmeric, ginger, cinnamon, garlic, cayenne, clove, black pepper
The best place to start is by switching your oils and the next time you go grocery shopping, start by buying1-2 of the foods above and slowly incorporating more of them into your diet over time.
It’s important to remember that every body is unique and foods that work for one person may not work for another person even if it’s healthy and just because a food exists or is found at the grocery store doesn’t mean that food will agree with your body. At the Bodiworks Institute we provide support in helping you figure out the ideal diet for your body to help assist your healing and improve your overall quality of life.