Inflammation - Part 2
Chronic Inflammation Triggers
Why should we care about chronic inflammation?
Because it can lead to so many conditions, like; diabetes, heart disease, some cancers, depression, autoimmune conditions, and so many more. Oh, and it usually hurts too (painful, sore body parts).
When our body struggles to mop up inflammation after an injury or sickness, or when your immune system is being triggered everyday, we can develop chronic inflammation…and that’s trouble for our body.
As you read in Part 1 – inflammation is normal and it’s a part of the healing process. Let’s look at what triggers chronic inflammation in the body.
There are 5 main causes of inflammation, and most people are dealing with more than one. Each one first triggers that acute reaction (pain, heat, swelling), but multiple triggers occurring at the same time can overwhelm the body and make it hard to clean up.
Injury
Inflammation is the natural process whenever we injure ourselves and the acute inflammation process heals that injury.
If your body is holding onto the inflammation process long after your injury has healed, you may be dealing with a secondary trigger (any one of the below triggers) or your body doesn’t have the nutrients needed to clean up that inflammation. I’ll take you through all of the nutrients needed to clean up inflammation in Part 5.
Food Allergy or Sensitivity
70% of your immune system is located around your gut (small and large intestine). There are immune organs in the lining of your small intestine and they play a huge role in inflammation.
(I’ll tell you more about this connection in Part 3)
Why? It’s for protection.
The food & bacteria inside of your digestive system is “outside” of the body. It’s not until it absorbs through the intestinal wall that it’s considered “inside” and a part of you. Your intestinal walls are like the front gates to your body.
This is a spot that nasty bugs (bacteria, viruses, and parasites) can enter into the body and make us sick, so our immune system stays on guard right at those front gates to make sure they don’t get through.
The trouble is…undigested food particles, especially protein, look just like a virus or bacteria and can trigger a full-on attack by the immune system.
This reaction is sometimes quick and obvious like during an anaphylaxis reaction to peanuts or shellfish. These are fast and they’re deadly…but also rare. And, people with this sort of allergy know to stay far far away from these foods.
There’s a quieter and more insidious food allergy reaction that’s triggered through a different antibody (the IgG antibody). When a food triggers an IgG reaction, it tends to be slower and quieter…so slow and quiet that it’s hard to notice.
This type of reaction can take up to five days before it shows up, and usually triggers annoying inflammation. It’s the kind of nagging inflammation that might feel like a normal part of aging, when it’s actually triggered by an offending food.
For example, I’m feeling the effect of my quiet food sensitivity as I write this. I have a dairy sensitivity and I had a bit of dairy (some delicious cheese, so gooood) two days ago. Today, my back is feeling a bit finicky (I sneezed and it hurt) and sometimes I feel it in my toe joints (that might pop up tomorrow). Water retention is a common symptom I feel for about 5 days after eating dairy…and my pants feel tight today. In the past, my skin would break out about 2 weeks after the dairy meal (skin has a long inflammation cycle).
Your digestive system is particularly sensitive to inflammation and it might pop up as constipation and/or diarrhea, pain, irritation, gas, and/or bloating. Indigestion symptoms are usually early warning signals of a food your body is struggling to digest.
As you can imagine, these can be hard to find. It’s really hard to connect body pain to what you may have eaten 5 days earlier!
These food allergies are testable. You can get an IgG food allergy test through your favourite naturopathic doctor…but I only recommend this test as a final resort.
Wading through the results can be stressful, and so I usually only recommend it if you’ve already tried an elimination diet (see Part 4) or you’re dealing with auto-immune conditions and need to calm the immune system down asap.
All food allergies that trigger the immune system are caused by two breakdowns in the digestive system –
1. Your body didn’t fully digest that food, leaving undigested protein in the small intestine
2. You have at least a bit of damage to your small intestinal wall, which allows room for that undigested protein to be absorbed and trigger the immune reaction (a leaky gut).
Fixing at least one of these issues (preferably both) can stop your immune system from getting triggered by that food. WOO!
BUT! (this is important)
If you have an anaphylactic allergy or celiac disease, DO NOT try eating your offending food again, even after lots of gut healing. Your reaction is too dangerous to tempt your immune system.
See Part 4 for your step-by-step guide to test the most common food triggers.
Toxicity
Your body is made to handle the toxins of day-to-day life. Or, it should be said, it can handle the toxic load of a few hundred years ago, before the discovery of a lot of the chemicals that you interact with on a daily basis.
Your body has a great detox cycle, which happens every night as you sleep. But, if this detox cycle isn’t working properly or is overwhelmed, then our body begins to feel the effects of a toxic-load – inflammation.
Here are some new-to-us toxins:
- pesticide residue on our food/produce
- volatile organic compounds in the air – scented laundry detergent/dryer sheets, air fresheners, new carpet, paint, new plastic, deodorant, and smoke from wood stoves
- mold – in houses with water-damage or mold living in air conditioning units
- phthalates – plastic wrap and plastic containers (esp in the microwave), synthetic fragrance (shampoo, laundry detergent, perfume, etc)
- heavy metals – from large fish, shellfish, tooth fillings (silver), and antiperspirant
It’s as you age that your body gets more sensitive to this toxic burden. You may find yourself shying away from strong scents or get a headache if someone is wearing perfume.
(my pet-peeve is scented laundry detergent…I dislike the smell and it really sticks to clothes. Uggg).
Cutting down the toxins you can control (like using natural scents, not microwaving in plastic, buying organic produce when possible, etc) and supporting your liver can help your body manage these toxins and cut down on your inflammation.
Click here to support your detox/elimination pathways in your body (it’s at the bottom :)
Food & Nutrients
Stimulants
Caffeine puts us into fight or flight, triggering an inflammatory response. If you’re feeling extra inflamed, cutting down on coffee can really help. You don’t necessarily need to totally cut out coffee…although sometimes it’s helpful.
Refined Sugar –
One thing I’ve seen over and over again is this – Refined sugar = pain.
Only refined sugar (fruit, honey, maple syrup, etc doesn’t cause pain) and it can be just a sprinkling of white sugar that can do it.
Plus, Pain = cravings for refined sugar
This makes a bit more sense, because sugar triggers a serotonin boost, which relieves pain for a little bit.
The good news in all this - if you’re affected by refined sugar, then removing it for only 4 or 5 days will make a HUGE difference. And, you can replace it with healthier sweeteners and sweet veggies like sweet potatoes. You don’t have to go without sweet flavours, just refined sugar.
I’ve regularly seen pain that feels like an 8 out of 10 be reduced to a 2 out of 10 after 5 days without refined sugar. I’ve seen people go off heavy pain meds like Percocet without sugar in their lives. It can be really powerful!
I talk about this more in the Pain Masterclass (click here).
Omega-3 vs 0mega-6 & Refined Oils
Underneath our inflammatory reaction are 2 essential fats – Omega-3 and Omega-6. They’re essential because we must take them in through our diet (our body can manufacture other types of fat like Omega-9, but not these ones), and our body uses these fats to make the prostaglandins we need to trigger the inflammatory reaction and to clean it up.
Omega-6, LA (sunflower, safflower, vegetable oil, processed oils) – these fats make PGE-2, a prostaglandin that allows our body to use inflammation to heal a cut, wound, or inflection. Without these fats, our body wouldn’t be able to heal.
Omega-6, GLA (borage and evening primrose oil) can either become pro-inflammatory PGE-2 or anti-inflammatory PGE-1…depending on what the body needs. They’re quite magical :)
Omega-3 ALA, EPA, DHA (flax, chia, walnuts, fish oil) – these fats make PGE-3, a VERY powerful anti-inflammatory prostaglandin.
The problem is about balance –
100 years ago, our omega-6:omega-3 ratio was 2:1. Today, at best it’s 4:1 and many people who eat a highly processed/high fast food diet have a ratio closer to 40:1!
When we consume 40x the omega-6 fats vs. omega-3 fats our body simply can’t keep up. There just isn’t enough of the anti-inflammatory PGE-3 to calm down our inflammatory reaction.
This is why fish oil is so important to calm down inflammation. Vegetarian omega-3 sources are also super fantastic. See Part 5 for dosing :)
High blood sugar
Anytime our blood sugar spikes too high it triggers inflammation. Balancing your blood sugar can make a big difference to your daily inflammation. There’s more on that here :)
Lifestyle Factors - Stress
Whenever we’re in a stress response, our body is getting ready to fight or run away from a physical danger. In the short-term, inflammation is suppressed.
But, if that stress (or worry) becomes chronic, the body’s response flips and it triggers inflammation. Many chronic inflammation conditions are connected to chronic stress, like autoimmune conditions and depression.
Got any questions or comments? Comment below, jump to our private Facebook Group, or the Ask Lisa page :)
Time to Head over to Part 3 and learn about your gut/immune connection :)