Arthritis: Over 60 Recipes and a Self-Treatment Plan to Transform Your Life

More information about rheumatoid arthritis can be found here (#litres_trial_promo).

GOUT

Gout is frequently lampooned as a rich man’s illness, associated with too much fine wine and fatty food. In fact it strikes people from all walks of life: beggar and king. It can be very painful, and it is common to hear sufferers describe how they cannot bear to have even the weight of a bed-sheet rest on an affected toe. (Big toes are frequent victims of this illness.) Mercifully, gout is far less common than either osteoarthritis or rheumatoid arthritis.

Gout is caused when too much uric acid collects in the blood. Uric acid is a by-product of normal metabolism, and it is usually collected and discarded from the body by the kidneys in urine. However, when the kidneys are not functioning normally, or when the diet contains an excess of certain foods, blood levels can rise to the point where the excess uric acid crystallizes in joints, the kidneys, or even the soft tissue of the ear. These stone-like residues cause pain, damage surrounding tissues, and trigger the biological processes that lead to inflammation.

There are medications to help gout suffers, but diet is a vital part of controlling the build-up of uric acid in the blood, and reducing or eliminating inflammation.

For more about gout, see here (#litres_trial_promo).

Chapter 3 Know how to combat your enemy (seven weeks that will change your life) (#ulink_bf205cbc-f51e-5937-ac65-608000d69d9f)

The power to heal is within you. Given the right nutritional building blocks, adequate rest, exercise and a pollution-free environment, the human body has remarkable powers of restoration and self-healing. The Eat to Beat Arthritis Diet is all about harnessing these elements to your advantage.

Food is the answer

No diet should promise overnight success. Healing takes time. If you suffer from arthritis you need to eat foods, and take food supplements, that calm the inflammatory processes that cause pain. You also need to consume those nutrients that the body needs to build new and healthy tissues, such as cartilage in joints.

Think of it this way. Your body is made entirely of the foods you eat. In an ideal world, what you eat would exactly match what your body needs to function at its best. But this is not an ideal world. Stress, illness, lifestyle changes and the natural processes of bearing children all place demands on your body that require a specific blend of nutrients. For example, smoking increases the body’s need for vitamin C, and you can cope with stress better if your diet is rich in foods containing B vitamins.

Using the advice in this book you will learn how to select those foods that provide the unique blend of nutrients your body needs for healing. You will also learn how the right foods can help you combat damaging and painful inflammation. Also highlighted is the importance of identifying foods to which you may be sensitive. Once you know what are the right foods for you, you can then go on to prepare delicious dishes using these ingredients. Best of all, you can read Marguerite Patten’s excellent advice on using and living with this diet. When you know what suits your body best, and you have experienced the rewards from changing your eating habits to improve your arthritis, you will find that you can relax from time to time and allow yourself some flexibility in what you eat. Marguerite explains how she balances her lifestyle with the diet and allows herself the occasional treat. The trick is just to enjoy yourself, then reinstate the Eat to Beat Arthritis Diet as soon as you can afterwards and you’ll soon be back to your best.

A schedule for success

Once you begin this diet you will probably experience an improvement in your condition during the first week: but there is more to come! Give yourself at least six weeks before you judge its total benefits to you. Eating plans that promise much faster results are not really being fair. It takes time for your body to heal. The full programme is explained in the next section, but here is a brief week-by-week summary of the diet, followed by an explanation of how it works:

Week zero – Listening to your body

Learn about yourself by keeping records of what you eat and when your symptoms appear.

As the first step towards controlling pain, eliminate coffee, cola drinks, tea and other sources of caffeine from your diet.

If you smoke cigarettes, this is the time to stop.

Week one – Cleansing and detoxifying your body

After a one-day fast, begin a diet of foods that help heal and rebuild the body.

Eliminate all foods containing wheat, rye, oats, and all sources of gluten from your diet.

Eliminate alcohol from your diet.

Supplements containing fish oil and vitamin E are added to your healing routine, as is a Health Drink that you make at home.

Week two – Stabilizing your body

The routine of foods and supplements started during Week One continues. (By this time, many people experience significant relief from the pain and inflammation of arthritis.)

Weeks three through six – The elimination diet

During these four weeks, you will introduce various foods and food groups into your diet to test their effect on your arthritis.

Up to now you have enjoyed a diet based on a limited number of ingredients. To live in the real world of work and family, that list of foods needs to be expanded.

The benefits of the diet by now include a greater sense of wellbeing, and improved skin and hair texture.

Week seven and forever – Enjoy life

WEEK ZERO – GETTING TO KNOW YOURSELF

This period is a preparation for the life-changes to come. By keeping a daily chart of when and where you experience pain, what you eat, how well you sleep, and when and how you exercise, you will have a snapshot of how well you are taking care of your body. Make no changes during this week (with the exception of giving up caffeine). Just listen to your body. You will continue to keep these charts throughout the first six weeks of the diet, because they will provide information about how your body is reacting to change.

It may be tempting to skip this week’s activities. Forget any such ideas. This may be the most valuable week of the diet, because it provides the information you need to monitor your progress towards a life of less pain and greater mobility. Keeping notes for anything shorter than a week will give you a false picture, because your life activities have a pattern – and they run from Sunday through to Saturday.

If you smoke, use this time to consider how you plan to remove this pollutant from your body. As you will learn in the next chapter, smoking adds to the problems that increase the pain of arthritis.

WEEK ONE – CLEANSING AND DETOXIFYING YOUR BODY

Work begins here. During these seven days you will lower the level of harmful substances in the body through fasting, avoiding specific foods, and drinking adequate amounts of fluids. The charts you keep will begin to show early benefits of the diet.

WEEK TWO – STABILIZING YOUR BODY

By the end of Week One you will be eating a very healthy, although somewhat restricted diet. This is the Basic Arthritis Diet. By following the same eating plan during the second week of the diet, you will stabilize your metabolism and remove any traces of reaction from foods you have eaten in the past. You are allowing your body to rest. (Do not worry about having to eat bland and uninteresting food – the recipes Marguerite Patten provides further on in the book are full of flavour.)

WEEKS THREE TO SIX – EXPANDING YOUR FOOD VOCABULARY

Now is the time to expand the variety of foods you eat. In this section, guidance is provided on how to test specific foods for their effect on your level of joint pain and discomfort. You may be surprised by the results. Foods you have enjoyed for years – and that you have been told are good for you – may be just the ones that stimulate an inflammatory reaction in your joints.

WEEK SEVEN AND FOREVER – HOW TO LIVE A LITTLE AND STILL MAINTAIN CONTROL OVER PAIN

Once you know which foods present problems, and how to detoxify your body on the Basic Arthritis Diet, you can try breaking the rules. But remember: once you break the rules you must return to them as quickly as possible.

Chapter 4 Changing your lifestyle (#ulink_34aee81a-693f-5f4b-b230-337c96a45deb)

As you change your diet, and learn about yourself by using a self-assessment chart, you should consider other ways to improve your health. In addition to changing your diet and giving up smoking (see here), there are other ways you can change your lifestyle and help control the painful and crippling effects of arthritis:

1 Control your weight

2 Enjoy gentle exercise

3 Get adequate sleep

4 Learn to relax

5 Have a good laugh

Control your weight