If you’ve ever hurt yourself, and experienced pain, redness, swelling, heat, or a loss of movement or function, this is known as acute inflammation and, believe it or not, is a good thing. Acute inflammation tells you that your body is healing properly, but when inflammation is not so obvious; your wellbeing could be at risk.
Chronic, low-grade inflammation, whether caused by diet, free radicals, heavy metals or bacteria, can silently affect every cell in your body. Not only do experts at the Heart MD Institute call inflammation the root cause of heart disease, it can also damage your wellness through arthritis, as well as Alzheimer’s disease, autoimmune diseases, Parkinson’s disease, and cancer.
So who’s at risk of chronic inflammation? If you are allergic or intolerant of certain foods, your immune system could become inflamed, and this could become chronic if you continue to expose yourself to the offending food. However, certain foods are always inflammatory, no matter who you are, and can have negative effects on your levels of inflammation.
These include dairy products (especially those from cows), sugar, fats from animal meats, dairy, eggs and peanuts, trans fats (from margarine, shortening and hydrogenated oils), gluten (found in grains), eggs, soy, corn, oranges and produce from the nightshades family. These plants, which include tomatoes, potatoes, tobacco and all peppers, tend to have a major effect in cases of inflammation from arthritis.
So what are you left with? Plenty of fruits and vegetables (except those from the list above), breads and cereals made with rice, millet, quinoa, oats, buckwheat, tapioca, arrowroot, and amaranth, legumes (except soybeans), fish, moderate amounts of meat (from chicken, turkey, wild game or lamb), vegetable oils (cold-pressed olive, flaxseed, safflower, sunflower, sesame, walnut, pumpkin oils), moderate amounts of natural sweeteners (honey, maple syrup, brown rice syrup and stevia) and plenty of water!
Therefore, if you are concerned about how chronic low-grade inflammation is affecting your wellness, you can try watching your diet and see whether or not you have an intolerance or allergy, or if you’re eating too much of a particular inflammatory food. Consult your doctor, or look online for more information, and websites that rate each food by their IF (inflammation factor).
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