How can nutrition help with pain management?
As a Nutritional Therapist, I am looking to identify the root cause of your symptoms. The process begins with you completing a health questionnaire prior to us meeting. We then meet for an initial consultation that takes approximately 1.5-2hrs, where I will listen to you as we gather more information. We follow a holistic approach taking the body and all of its magically interconnected systems as a whole into consideration with the aim of bringing everything back into balance and homeostasis.
Pain and inflammation are useful tools for our bodies. They alert us that something is not quite right and we should attend to this where necessary. For example, pain encountered after breaking a bone, this usually requires medical attention, the sooner the better. A splinter requires removal, then the healing process can continue, before long we have forgotten it even happened. Inflammation such as a fever, is designed to fight off any infection or virus using heat as its weapon. Trapping your finger in a door may result in swelling, bruising and throbbing, all signs of inflammation but this is the body’s way of sending the right tools through our blood to heal, repair and bring everything back to normal.
Naturally, people don’t want to live with pain so most self-medicate with pain killers such as paracetamol or ibuprofen. Whilst this may bring some light relief, it won’t always solve the problem.
These medications are designed to block certain messages from the cells, reducing the inflammatory causing agents. Fine for a quick fix but won’t address what was causing the pain initially. Overuse of certain medications may lead to common side effects such as nausea, vomiting, diarrhea/constipation, loss of appetite, dizziness and headaches. More serious side effects include ulceration of the stomach lining and increased risk of cardiovascular events.
Prolonged episodes of pain or inflammation, may start to cause other issues within the body. If you have encountered pain for over 12 weeks despite the use of medications and treatments, this is considered to be chronic pain.
Inflammation may also occur in the body if someone is carrying too much weight, or has a diet high in processed foods, sugar, alcohol, dairy and other pro-inflammatory agents. Environmental toxins, personal care products and household cleaning products may also impact the body negatively.
Please take a moment to consider your current dietary and lifestyle factors. Are you able to identify what might be contributing to your pain and inflammation?
Could you eat a more varied diet of real foods including all kinds of vegetables and fruits?
How about treating yourself to delicious nutritious nourishing foods, rather than settling for take away or convenience products?
Are you moving your bowels daily? This is vital for completing the process of removing toxins and waste products, rather than have them recirculate in the body exacerbating symptoms.
Are you drinking enough water to support the removal of waste products, nourish the cells and maximise transportation of all the beneficial nutrients around the body?
Following a Mediterranean diet is considered one way of increasing anti-inflammatory foods into your regime. Meals rich in colourful vibrant vegetables, quality sources of fat including oily fish-salmon, mackerel, anchovies etc and olive oils, nuts and seeds, plus lots of fibre. Eating less animal protein has been shown to significantly lower measures of inflammation.
There are many natural foods such as ginger, turmeric, garlic and so on that have been shown to assist in the reduction of inflammatory markers. Love adding these into soups, curries and inventing gorgeous vibrant recipes.
Please bear in mind that any supplementation you wish to take may have contra-indications with existing medications you may be taking. Please refer to a registered professional to be safe.
Reducing stress, stopping smoking, improving your sleep hygiene and increasing your movement are just a few more ways you can help to get back on track to a healthy, fabulous, pain-free life.
