Foods To Avoid When Dealing With Chronic Pain


Foods To Avoid When Dealing With Chronic Pain - Featured Image

Chronic pain syndromes affect more Americans than any other condition.  Over 76 million people per year are diagnosed with some sort of chronic pain condition.  These conditions include fibromyalgia, headaches, arthritis, as well as neck and back pain to name a few. 
 
Classic approaches to dealing with conditions like these typically involve medications, therapy and sometimes surgery.  The long-term effects of all of these approaches have not shown to be very effective and come with many unwanted side effects.  Recently, it was revealed that driving under the influence of legal medications was responsible for more accidents than driving under the influence of alcohol.
 
Chiropractic care has been shown to be more effective than anything else when addressing chronic pain.  It was also proven to be the safest method as well, coming with virtually zero side effects.

There are also foods that should be avoided when dealing with any pain syndrome.  The following list was taken from an article written my Dr. Joseph Mercola M.D. Dr. Mercola is one of the world’s most renown naturopaths.
 
Foods to avoid include:

  1.  Sugars:  Probably the most inflammatory of all food choices
  2. Caffeine:  Has been shown to be especially tough on people with fibromyalgia
  3. Nightshade Vegetables:  Nightshade vegetables like tomatoes, potatoes, and eggplant may trigger arthritis and pain conditions in some people.
  4. Trans Fats and Fried foods
  5. Dairy from non-grass fed cows
  6. Aspartame: the artificial sweetener found in some diet sodas and many sugar-free sweets is part of a chemical group called excitotoxins, which activate neurons that can increase your sensitivity to pain.
  7. Food Additives:  Food additives such as monosodium glutamate (MSG) often cause trouble for pain patients. MSG is an excitatory neurotransmitter that may stimulate pain receptors; glutamate levels in spinal fluid have been shown to correlate with pain levels in fibromyalgia patients.
  8. Stay away from Junk Food:  Limit or eliminate fast food, candy, and vending-machine products. In addition to contributing to weight gain and the development of unhealthy eating habits, these diet-wreckers may also irritate your muscles, disrupt your sleep, and compromise your immune system.

 
The bottom line is that we can’t continue to make the mistakes in how we take care of ourselves that led to the condition(s) that we suffer from and expect a medication, therapy or surgery to make us well.  We need to find the causes of our condition and avoid the things that make us suffer to truly have a chance to get well and feel better.