Inflammation has been found to be associated with just about every health condition. This is a change in direction from how medicine has been approaching diseases. Modern medicine has been focusing on treating symptoms and signs of inflammation, not addressing the root cause of an issue.
There has been a lot of research done on the role of inflammation and diseases such as Alzheimer’s, dementia, cancers, autoimmune diseases, and heart disease. While localized acute inflammation is primarily used in processes the immune system triggers, chronic inflammation is a disease that can occur for various reasons. It is fascinating to realize that many diseases seem to have it as the source of the disease.
Although inflammation has long been known to play a role in allergic diseases like asthma and arthritis, it is now believed that Alzheimer’s disease, cancer, cardiovascular disease, diabetes, high blood pressure, high cholesterol levels, Parkinson’s disease, etc may all be related to chronic inflammation in the body. It can also disrupt your hormones, causing your cortisol, thyroid, testosterone, progesterone, estrogen, and more to be significantly out of balance.
Instead of taking medication to simply reduce joint pain, lower cholesterol, or treat the symptoms; it is smarter to reduce inflammation in the body–the source of the symptoms. While a healthy immune system activation is great for an acute infection such as a virus or bacteria, this system was not meant to stay turned on. Researchers believe that the cause of chronic inflammation is that our immune system becomes overactive and stays turned on for a prolonged period of time.
Your immune system gets over activated from exposure to dietary and environmental toxins that turn the immune system on and keep stimulating it to stay on. This results in the body being flooded with defensive immune cells, white blood cells, and hormones that damage tissues from prolonged exposure.
This over active immune system is caused by many things: stress, excess sugar and grain intake, and chemical/toxin exposure. These are the most common causes that we currently know of. When you consume processed foods, you often get sugars, grains, and chemicals in one sitting. Our nation has turned into a fast food, junk food, grain-eating, soda-addicted society. These foods and drinks irritate your body and cause inflammation.
Foods that promote inflammation include:
There are also foods that help decrease inflammation.
Anti-Inflammatory Foods:
Starting an anti-inflammatory diet can help you reduce inflammation and your risk for chronic disease. It can also reduce any symptoms you are currently experiencing. Eating foods with healthy fiber and plenty of organic non-GMO fruits and vegetables is also advised. In addition, spicy foods like hot peppers and cinnamon can help stimulate nerve endings and promote blood flow.
Pay attention to how your food was raised. Grow your own if you can. Ensure the chicken or turkey you buy were pasture raised–roaming around like nature intended and not being given antibiotics and hormones. Beef is typically more inflammatory but if you do eat beef, get pasture raised hormone and antibiotic free beef.
Supplements that can help you to reduce inflammation:
Many of these supplements aid in cutting acute and chronic inflammation because they are more purified versions of those vitamins and minerals found in food that help clear inflammation from the body.
Reducing cortisol (stress hormone) levels and balancing other hormones are also important. Support your adrenal glands by proper stress management and hormone balancing. This takes some time and patience, but your health is worth it!
Treating hormone imbalances helps you feel better, reduces inflammation , and prevents a variety of chronic diseases. Balancing your hormones requires a whole-body approach. With the aide of a hormone specialist, replace your deficient hormones with bio-identical hormones. In addition to hormone replacement, address diet, exercise, and other lifestyle-based strategies.
A healthful diet, low in processed foods, low in grains, and high in whole organic foods, along with regular exercise and a healthy stress management program, will go a long way to keeping your hormones balanced and whole body inflammation down. Remember that reducing your inflammation has been linked to a reduced risk of Alzheimer’s disease, cancer, cardiovascular disease, and diabetes. In addition, it can help you to lose weight. It must be addressed if you want to stay or become healthy.
Regenerative medicine, aka anti-aging medicine, is about helping you to live optimally. Balancing your hormones is more than just giving you bioidentical hormones. Hormone replacement is a piece of the puzzle. You have the power to address some of the others with lifestyle adjustments. A regenerative medicine specialist can help you to do this.