EATING FOR PAIN-FREE JOINTS

Painful and stiff joints were once considered 'normal' for many people at 50+. Today, practitioners of natural medicine believe that up to 70% of people with one of the various forms of arthritis can reduce, or even eliminate, pain by making dietary changes. For many people, relief comes from removing certain food from their diet and also increasing food that are known to ease joint inflammation. Unfortunately, there is no one diet that will help everyone, but some changes that have been found to be helpful are shown below.

You can reduce the chemical additives that you eat by basing your diet on fresh organically grown fuit and vegetables.

Changing Your Diet
Many people are helped if they follow the Optimum Diet and also eliminate chemical additives. The Optimum Diet provides vital nutrients for the body to use as it tries to heal damage in the joints, the immune system and the digestive system. Food intolerance is often associated with painful joints, and it is best to avoid eating large amounts of any one food-type. Try to reduce the amount of salt you eat and ensure that you eat plenty of fibre, from a number of sources, as suggested on previous post, rather than just wheat bran.

Eliminate chemical additives as rigorously as possible by cutting out the following food:

• Caffeine: tea, coffee and chocolate/cocoa, including decaffeinated products. If you normally drink large amounts, cut down gradually over a couple of weeks to avoid withdrawal symptoms. Decaffeinated tea and coffee are rarely completely caffeine-free, and contain chemical residues.
• Sugar and all artificial sweeteners: many condiments contain sugar, so it is important to read food labels.
• All sodas, and any other manufactured carbonated drinks.
• Manufactured food that contain chemical additives, such as colourings, preservatives, flavour enhancers, flavourings, thickenings, emulsifiers, stabilizers etc. These include margarine, bacon, ham, corned beef, sausages and smoked food.
• Food that make the intestine more 'leaky', including very heavily spiced food and raw pineapple and papaya. If possible, gradually reduce aspirin and non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs because they also damage the gut.
• Produce that has been chemically sprayed should be avoided if possible. However, it is more important that whole grains, fresh fruit and vegetables make up 65-70% of your diet, so if you eat non-organic produce wash it thoroughly.

Follow the above recommendations for at least a month. You may then feel that certain plants may relieve the pain of inflammed joints. These include spices such as ginger, cayenne pepper, paprika and the pigment curcumin, found in tumeric. Herbalists recommend garlic, the root and leaf of dandelions, nettles, celery seed, alfalfa, mint and bitter greens such as mustard, watercress and the many varieties or endive or chicory that are becoming easier to obtain, either as leaves or seeds for cultivation. The red and blue colours of berries and cherries signify the presence of flavonoids with many healing properties, including pain relief.

Oily fish and flaxseed (linseed) oil contain the beneficial omega-3 fatty acids, which can help inflammed joints, but are in short supply in the diet of most people in developed countries. Limited amounts of omega-3 oils are also present in cod and halibut liver oils, which contain vitamins A and D as well.

Oily Fish
Eating two or more portions each week of the following can help your heart as well as your joints:

• Anchovies
• Herring
• Mackerel
• Rainbow trout
• Salmon
• Sardines
• Tuna

The oils in fish can help to ease the pain of rheumatoid arthritis by reducing inflammation in the joints.