|
||
Even though there is no miracle cure for arthritis, that doesn't mean that there aren't ways of easing the pain and discomfort that arthritis causes. One of the ways to do this is by having a well balanced diet.
Maintaining a healthy weight and well balanced diet is something which most people have great trouble with. If you do suffer from arthritis and are looking to ease the situation by having a healthier diet, than you should take note of the following points:
Keep your weight within a normal range
Perform regular exercise
Eat a variety of foods
Avoid/eating foods high in sugar
Avoid eating foods high in cholesterol
Avoid eating foods high in fat
Avoid eating foods high in salt
Avoid eating oily foods
The above will give you a general idea on what you should do to improve your diet. However there's no need to be too strict with your diet, just make sure you have a well balanced diet. A well balanced diet not only consists of fruit and vegetables but food from all of the food groups. Food like bread, rice, pasta, fish, yogurt and cheese are all important to your diet. It's important that fast food, chocolate and other "unhealthy" foods are cut down from your diet. You can still eat these types of food but they should be consumed only occasionally.
If you are overweight, reducing your weight can feel like a godsend because all your extra weight is putting pressure on your joints. In most cases even losing a small amount of weight will ease some of the pain you are feeling.
With arthritic sufferers, there are specific foods which you should not eat or eat very little of. Avoiding the below points in most cases will ease your arthritis pain.
Alcohol
Some meats like kidney and liver
Anchovies
Shellfish
In regards to exercising, you may find it difficult as your arthritis can make exercise an unbearable task. Try concentrating on the diet and then when your pain becomes manageable, slowly begin your exercise routine.
So you now know that dieting can help your arthritis and you should now have a better idea in how to go about dieting. However I'm sure you are dieting to know the exact benefits that dieting can help your arthritis situation, unfortunately it's not so easy.
There isn't exactly a specific diet to treat arthritis and no set rules. Even though there are some foods that will help your arthritis, some of those foods may have a negative impact on other people more research still needs to be conducted.
Nonetheless you'll be happy to hear that it has been proven at least to an extent, that diet does affect arthritis. By maintaining a healthy diet, regular exercise and avoiding or at least restricting the foods mentioned, you should be able to notice a significant improvement with your arthritis.
Generally speaking, there are two ways of thinking about arthritis diet and its possible effect on arthritis: one the one hand there are those people whose conviction it is that the food you eat does not have any influence whatsoever on the disease. On the other hand there are many people who firmly believe that what you eat has a great effect on your body and your soul.
A Healthy Diet Affects Your Overall Health
This little heading here above is a concept that is universally embraced. It follows then that food has a great deal of impact on our day-to day lives. Thinking a step further it is not all that hard to see the affiliation between food and the much feared affliction named arthritis. Those who advocate to the second school of thought dispense the following recommendations:
- Avoid all red meats, dairy products and even fruits. That does not really leave much now does it? And from a medical point of view there is no research that shows that a dramatic cut in proteins would be beneficial. On the other hand removing meat from the diet could be helpful. Common sense dictates however that removing dairy products and fruits all together is not the right arthritis diet.
- Integrate the nightshade vegetable into your diet. The nightshade is a low-calorie vegetable that is filled with nutrients. Consumption of this vegetable seems to be a beneficial addition to a healthy arthritis diet.
- Avoid frozen foods at all cost. Instead cook only enough quantities that will last you for only one day. Avoid prepared meals form the deep freezer at all times. This sounds like sound advice: test have shown that the fact of deep freezing makes the food lose about 50 percent of its nutrients
- Eat small portions of food, but do this many times a day. This is preferable to eating three big meals a day. It is said that many diseases will melt away as snow, when you change your eating habits. Eating only small quantities at a time will help with the digestion and assimilation of the nutrients. The system can cope easily with such small portions.
- Stay away from fat in your diet. Most animal fats contain the saturated fats which are the bad kind of fats and which actually can worsen any existing inflammation. A decision to remove animal fat all together from an arthritis diet seems to make sense in this regard.
Reading through these statements one can clearly see a pattern emerging. In my opinion food can indeed have some influences on health in general and arthritis in particular. But even with an arthritis diet that has all the T's crossed, we have to stay realistic and conclude that any arthritis diet will not make a tremendous change.