135 | Your Biggest Health Deterrent: Inflammation

Welcome back to another episode of the Real Health Podcast. Today, we're gonna be touching on a subject matter that literally affects us all. It's what the Times Magazine said is a silent killer. And when we look at virtually all chronic disease, this is a root, a root issue associated with them all. And if we were able to get ahead of it and manage it well, then we can live a really long healthy life.

So, what is it? What am I speaking on? Well, it's inflammation. Inflammation at the core is driver virtually of all chronic disease. And we see it in a lot of different ways and how it presents.

Today we're gonna talk about not the inflammation associated with like an injury, right? You sprain your ankle, it swells up, that's inflammation. But we're gonna talk about chronic low grade inflammation that perpetuates disease in our body, right? So when we look at chronic conditions, we have a hidden common thread and that is inflammation. It can be associated with headaches and migraines and joint pain, but it's also associated with heart disease and cancer, different digestive disorders.

So inflammation is a major problem in our society today. And so today we're gonna talk about how inflammation silently sabotages your health and the four key areas. So we're gonna talk about four key areas you can control, diet, stress, sleep and supplementation. Diet, stress, sleep and supplementation. So let's go ahead, let's dive into it, let's talk about it.

So when we look at inflammation, it is the body's natural healing process but when it becomes chronic and low grade, it actually starts to damage tissue. It's silent because inflammation doesn't necessarily cause pain but we start to see its effects in organ systems and that can obviously drive disease. For instance, diabetes is associated with inflammation. Brain fog is associated with inflammation. Cardiovascular disease and high blood pressure is associated with inflammation.

And maybe it is. Maybe it's just that chronic tendonitis that you have that's been nagging for six, twelve months. Why is it not getting better? Why is it not going away? And inflammation could be a primary driver.

So let's talk about the first pathway and solution and that's diet. Diet plays a huge role in inflammation. When we look at the primary drivers of inflammation it's gonna come down to processed foods. So, there's a difference between man made and God made foods, right? God made foods are plants and animals.

Man made foods are manufactured in a facility. So, processed foods, sugar, seed oils. Processed foods, sugar, and seed oils are the big three when it comes to drivers of inflammation. These guys, if you remove them, will set your body up for success and healing and can make a dramatic change in your overall health. So what's the nutrition plan that we subscribe to that we recommend to our patients?

Well, that's an anti inflammatory diet. And what does that actually look like? What what does that look like on menu? Well, one is it doesn't have processed foods, sugar, and inflammation sorry, processed foods, sugar, and seed oils, and instead it's full of whole foods, quality protein. And so when we look at a menu item, for instance, it's gonna be some type of grass fed beef or cold water wild caught fish.

It's gonna be eggs. It's gonna be a protein that's well raised, okay, so grass fed or wild caught, and it's gonna be a source of healthy protein and healthy fats. You get a lot of beneficial fat from grass fed meats and obviously cold water fish. And then another component is whole foods coming from fruits and vegetables. So when we look at our nutrient density, we're gonna get that mainly from vegetables and fruits where we get a lot of vitamins and minerals.

So darker green leafy vegetables, berries and apples, and just quality carbohydrates coming from fruits and vegetables. And then nuts and seeds. Nuts and seeds are a great source of healthy fats as well as minerals. And when we look at our proteins, fats, and carbohydrates coming from a whole food based diet that's rich in color, a lot of diversity, then that's gonna help support our body. So what's not ideal?

What sources of food are not ideal? Well, when it comes to nutrition, any type of grain fed, conventionally raised animal product is not gonna be great for you. Any farm raised fish is not gonna be great for you. When it comes to grains like pastas and breads and cereals, right, those are very inflammatory to our bodies typically. So when looking at a nutritional plate, making sure it's quality, it's diverse, and it's full of color.

Protein, fat, and healthy fiber. We have a guide on our website at realhealthco.com, realhealthco.com, and you can download actually our anti inflammatory diet, which will tell you exactly the foods to eat and foods to stay away from. But nutrition is foundational when trying to control inflammation. One of the things I recommend is even avoiding the top food allergens like dairy or gluten. And sometimes even eggs can be inflammatory to the body if our immune system's reacting to them.

So check out the anti inflammatory diet on our website so you can learn a little bit more about how nutrition plays a huge role. Okay? Number two, did you know that stress plays a massive role with inflammation? Cortisol is a stress hormone and it keeps the body in a state of fight or flight. And by doing so, it raises inflammatory, what we call cytokines, which are chemicals that increase inflammation.

So how do we combat stress, right? So adaptogenic herbs are great, ashwagandha, deep breath work, So deep breathing or box breathing, prayer, meditation, and even exercise. Exercise shows obviously its effects where it does slightly increase inflammation, but the rebound effect is that it perpetuates a very strong anti inflammatory system. So even when people are not feeling well, just getting out moving and walking, and actually a low to moderate exercise can help you and your body heal faster. When we look at stress, perpetual chronic stress, it is a major factor with inflammation.

So making sure that you are supporting your stress levels by making necessary changes in your schedule, and it may be seasonal. You can't make those changes, it's okay. In that season, can. Make sure you're doing diaphragmatic breathing or making you're doing cold plunges or even sauna to reduce the stress load on the body. And number three, another way to combat stress, but it's very important with inflammation, is sleep.

We need, in this season, we need seven to eight hours of sleep. There is research that shows that when you don't sleep, you increase your inflammation levels. There's a very specific inflammatory marker we call interleukin six, IL-six, that increases actually when you don't sleep well. And if you chronically deprive yourself of sleep, it directly increases your blood sugar levels. And then when blood sugar levels are increased, obviously what does it do?

It increases inflammation, increases cortisol levels. So making sure that we are reducing inflammation by getting a maximum of sleep seven to eight hours a night in a cool, dark room is important to get you into that deep restorative sleep cycle. You have to emphasize work and rest, and the rest or reset happens at night. This is when we get that restorative sleep. What are some supplements?

So number four, the fourth pillar, what are some supplements that help with inflammation? Well, there's one of my favorites, which is curcumin or curcuminoids or turmeric. Turmeric, curcuminoids are very strong in reducing inflammation, specifically it's called a COX-two inhibitor. And COX-two is a type of is an inflammatory marker or molecule that perpetuates chronic disease, especially within the cardiovascular system and even the brain. So curcumin and resveratrol, those two polyphenols, are fantastic at reducing inflammation.

Magnesium. Magnesium is great because it supports our stress levels, helps cellular repair and turnover, and can obviously directly impact your inflammatory state. Fish oil, a couple thousand milligrams of fish oil a day, specifically omega-three fatty acids, is a great way at reducing inflammation. If you wanna reduce inflammation systemically, you wanna get an omega-three that's high in EPA. And if you wanna reduce it neurologically, if you wanna get that across the blood brain barrier, making sure that your official has high DHA levels is gonna really help get that brain in terms of reducing the inflammation in the brain.

Vitamin D has been shown to support the immune system which then supports obviously your inflammatory system. And then there's foods like green tea. Green tea is a great anti inflammatory. Sardines are great for inflammation levels or when we look at other potential beverages. Any type of fermented food that's gonna help improve our digestive system can also help not only build our immune system but also reduce inflammation.

When we look at inflammation, it is the root cause of virtually all chronic disease. If we were to make nutrition changes, reduce our stress levels, increase our sleep, and supplement properly, we can get ahold of our inflammation levels. When we do, not only do our joints feel better, our body feel better, but obviously our risk for disease significantly reduces. You know, if you're kind of in a season where you really want to kind of chip away at this inflammatory issue, another thought is making sure that you are increasing your collagen levels. Collagen is a great way to repair tissue that's been damaged.

So you can reduce inflammation all you want, but making sure you're supporting it, supporting your body's healing response or healing process with amino acids, specifically collagen can help tremendously with tissue repair. Where do you get collagen? Well, you get it from protein, right? You get it from eggs, from salmon, from fish, from beef, or you can obviously supplement with it in a powder form. If you are ready to make a dent in this inflammatory issue, I really do encourage, go ahead and get that guide.

Go to realhealthco.com, download that guide, and that's gonna really help you learn more about the foods that are most inflammatory to the body. And make sure that you're working with a practitioner to help you understand maybe inflammation could be coming from foods that you're reacting to that you didn't know about. Maybe it's coming from genetic variants that you have. And so the general recommendation I'm giving you is gonna help most people, but there are situations where you have to dive a little deeper and you have to test and you have to kind of dig in and figure out where inflammation may be coming in in your life. So when looking ahead, whether it's chronic pain, headaches, heart disease, or just preventing disease, getting ahold of inflammation can make a massive impact in your health and not just short term, but long term.

Let's get after it this week. Let's about this week being intentional at reducing our inflammatory load through our nutrition, our stress, our sleep and supplementation. As always, thanks for listening to another episode of the Real Health Podcast.

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