Your diet can be directly involved in how your body experiences pain and how sensitive your pain receptors are. Diet can also affect how well you heal through tissue regeneration. It has to do with increasing inflammation in your body. Here’s how:
*Sugar increases your sensitivity to pain and increases your internal inflammation that may affect both an injured area of the body and your entire system. Sugar is “pro-inflammatory”.
*Processed foods are full of chemicals, rancid vegetable oils, sugars, and cause increased sensitivity to pain and slow healing. This includes anything out of a package, a can, and any fast food and most restaurant food.
*Meat and dairy, from conventionally raised animals fed a corn and grains are pro-inflammatory and trigger increased pain and flare-ups in chronic pain. It is best to eat meats from grass fed, organic animals, and eggs from cage free, organic chickens. Organic, whole milk is less inflammatory than skim milk or other low fat milks. Get more info on sideefffects.com
*Vegetable oils can increase inflammation and pain, but not all. Avoid margarine, canola oil, palm oil, and most vegetable oils sticking with organic butter, coconut oil, avocado oil and olive oil.
*Fruits and vegetables are full of anti-oxidants that reduce oxidative stress on the body (aging) and reduce inflammation. The vitamins and minerals they provide allow improved healing and reduce pain and inflammation locally and systemically.
How do you recover from an injury and reduce your pain and inflammation? Eat a well-balanced diet with at least 60% of your food coming from plants of some form, healthy fats and lean, healthy meats. Check more info about healthy living from burniva.
Tanya Bachman, MS, LMT
Columbia River Nutrition
