What Foods Make Arthritis Pain Worse?

Acid forming foods increase inflammation: Red meat, dairy products, refined sugar and citrus fruits aggravate inflammatory conditions in some people. Cutting these out of your diet completely may seem too difficult, so start simply and have a one or two days without one of them.
The Nightshade family (potatoes, tomatoes, peppers and aubergines) also make arthritis feel worse for some people. Sweet potatoes make a great alternative to potatoes.

Some simple changes to your diet, together with chiropractic wellness care, can give you back the quality of life you want.

Rheumatoid Arthritis
Avoiding animal fats, rhubarb, beetroot and peanuts may help to relieve the pain of RA, as they have a high oxalic acid content. Alcohol, coffee and smoking are also known to aggravate it.
Did you know?..
Rheumatoid arthritis is relatively unknown in many indigenous cultures. However the rate increases dramatically among those people who move to a more westernized culture. This points to our acid-forming diet as a possible important factor.

So what can you eat??
Keep it simple... real food, natural ingredients, fresh produce.
Your body will adapt better if you put the right fuel in it, food that it was designed to eat. Your local market is the place to find these. Here’s some alternatives to stop you getting disheartened!

Protein sources: white meat (chicken, turkey, pork), fish (sardines, mackerel, salmon, tofu.
Wheat alternatives: millet, oats, brown rice, buckwheat, quinoa.
Fruits: cherries, plums, blackberries, blueberries, pineapple.

The thing about seeds...
You may have heard of Omega 3 fatty acids. These are essential for healthy joints, as well as your heart, brain, and a multitude of other benefits. They also help control pain.
You can find them in oily fish, but also in seeds such as:
linseed, sunflower, pumpkin, sesame.
Sprinkle on salads or cereal, or use the cold pressed oils.

Next time: how food intolerance affects rheumatoid arthritis...

How Many Headaches Per Week is Normal?

When I ask my new patients how often they get a headache, I'm often surprised by the answers...

So many people, especially women (sorry ladies!), will reply with something like:
"Oh, just the usual, 3 - 4 times per week I suppose"

Three or four per week! That's not normal, or ok. But many people consider this to be the usual state of affairs, just part and parcel of being alive. We're conditioned to soldier through and just get on with it, and think nothing of popping a painkiller as required.

Maybe your headaches are a sign that something's not right? Irritated nerves in your neck are a common cause of headaches, and your chiropractor is the person to sort this out for you. Or perhaps you're dehydrated or have low blood sugar - in either case you should start to take notice of what your body is whispering to you (or screaming at you).

Ever heard of Analgesic Rebound Headache? It's what you can get when you take painkillers all the time for headaches. You eventually get headaches if you don't take them!

So the answer to the original question is NONE.
No headaches per week are acceptable. Unless you deserve them ;-)

Choose Well site goes live!

Our sister site, Choose Well, has gone live this week.

The purpose of this site is to share suggestions with our patients and others about products, companies and events that may be of benefit to them. We get a lot of questions relating to health in a broad sense, and we're looking forward to sharing with you some of the quality resources we've found in our research.

The first product we'd recommend is the excellent and inspiring e-book by Cyndi O'Meara. It's a 21 day step by step guide on how to lose weight naturally. NO diets, no calorie counting, just real food!