Keep Inflammation At Bay

⏰ IN A RUSH?

Today’s 30-Second Summary

If you don’t have time to read the whole email today, here are some key takeaways:

• The Mediterranean Diet is high in things that reduce inflammation, and low in things that trigger it (see below for details and examples)

• Resveratrol, a polyphenol compound found in red wine, does have anti-inflammatory properties, but the amount of wine you’d have to drink would make your inflammation much worse, not better. Consider supplementation instead.

• On the topic of supplements: L-theanine, ashwagandha, and turmeric (with black pepper) are all excellent choices against inflammation (and a lot of other things)

• Intermittent Fasting can reduce inflammation while boosting actual immune function

• Your hips are the biggest joints in your body, and bear a lot of weight. They deserve some special attention (see today’s book recommendation)

Read on to learn about these things and more…

👀 WATCH AND LEARN

Being A Good Listener

We see so much out there about how to be a good speaker, but how about being a good listener?

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⚔️ MAIN FEATURE

How to Prevent (or Reduce) Inflammation

You asked us to do a main feature on inflammation, so here we go!

Before we start, it's worth noting an important difference between acute and chronic inflammation:

• Acute inflammation is generally when the body detects some invader, and goes to war against it. This (except in cases such as allergic responses) is usually helpful.

• Chronic inflammation is generally when the body does a civil war. This is almost never helpful.

We’ll be tackling the latter, which frees up your body’s resources to do better at the former.

First, the obvious...

These five things are as important for this as they are for most things:

1. Get a good diet—the Mediterranean diet is once again a top-scorer

2. Exercise—move and stretch your body; don't overdo it, but do what you reasonably can, or the inflammation will get worse.

3. Reduce (or ideally eliminate) alcohol consumption. When in pain, it's easy to turn to the bottle, and say "isn't this one of red wine's benefits?" (it isn't, functionally*). Alcohol will cause your inflammation to flare up like little else.

4. Don't smoke—it's bad for everything, and that goes for inflammation too.

5. Get good sleep. Obviously this can be difficult with chronic pain, but do take your sleep seriously. For example, invest in a good mattress, nice bedding, a good bedtime routine, etc.

*Resveratrol (which is a polyphenol, by the way), famously found in red wine, does have anti-inflammatory properties. However, to get enough resveratrol to be of benefit would require drinking far more wine than will be good for your inflammation or, indeed, the rest of you. So if you’d like resveratrol benefits, consider taking it as a supplement. Superficially it doesn’t seem as much fun as drinking red wine, but we assure you that the results will be much more fun than the inflammation flare-up after drinking.

About the Mediterranean Diet for this…

There are many causes of chronic inflammation, but here are some studies done with some of the most common ones:

• Beneficial effect of Mediterranean diet in systemic lupus erythematosus patients

• How the Mediterranean diet and some of its components modulate inflammatory pathways in arthritis

• The effects of the Mediterranean diet on biomarkers of vascular wall inflammation and plaque vulnerability in subjects with high risk for cardiovascular disease

• Adherence to Mediterranean diet and 10-year incidence of diabetes: correlations with inflammatory and oxidative stress biomarkers*

*Type 1 diabetes is a congenital autoimmune disorder, as the pancreas goes to war with itself. Type 2 diabetes is different, being a) acquired and b) primarily about insulin resistance, and/but this is related to chronic inflammation regardless. It is also possible to have T1D and go on to develop insulin resistance, and that’s very bad, and/but beyond the scope of today’s newsletter, in which we are focusing on the inflammation aspects.

Some specific foods to eat or avoid...

Eat these:

• Leafy greens

• Cruciferous vegetables

• Tomatoes

• Fruits in general (berries in particular)

• Healthy fats, e.g. olives and olive oil

• Almonds and other nuts

• Dark chocolate (choose high cocoa, low sugar)

Avoid these:

• Processed meats (absolute worst offenders are hot dogs, followed by sausages in general)

• Red meats

• Sugar (includes most fruit juices, but not most actual fruits—the difference with actual fruits is they still contain plenty of fiber, and in many cases, antioxidants/polyphenols that reduce inflammation)

• Dairy products (unless fermented, in which case it seems to be at worst neutral, sometimes even a benefit, in moderation)

• White flour (and white flour products, e.g. white bread, white pasta, etc)

• Processed vegetable oils

See also: 9 Best Drinks To Reduce Inflammation, Says Science

Supplements?

Some supplements that have been found to reduce inflammation include:

• L-theanine

• Ashwagandha

• Turmeric w/ black pepper

(links are to studies showing their efficacy)

Consider Intermittent Fasting

Remember when we talked about the difference between acute and chronic inflammation? It's fair to wonder "if I reduce my inflammatory response, will I be weakening my immune system?", and the answer is: generally, no.

Often, as with the above supplements and dietary considerations, reducing inflammation actually results in a better immune response when it's actually needed! This is because your immune system works better when it hasn't been working in overdrive constantly.

Here's another good example: intermittent fasting reduces the number of circulating monocytes (a way of measuring inflammation) in healthy humans—but doesn't compromise antimicrobial (e.g. against bacteria and viruses) immune response.

See for yourself: Dietary Intake Regulates the Circulating Inflammatory Monocyte Pool ← the study is about the anti-inflammatory effects of fasting

🌎 AROUND THE WEB

What’s happening in the health world…

• Mediterranean Keto Diet may lower Alzheimer's risk, boost memory

• Preventing Long COVID

• Scientists with multiple NIH grants are overwhelmingly male and white, posing “substantial threat” to biomedical research

• Stem cell therapy could restore vision to those with macular degeneration

• Multidrug-resistant bacteria found in 40% of supermarket meat samples

More to come tomorrow!

📖 ONE-MINUTE BOOK REVIEW

11 Minutes to Pain-Free Hips: Pilates/Yoga Stretches and Exercises to Increase Flexibility and Stability in your Hips - by Melinda Wright

If hips don't lie, what are yours saying to you? If what they're saying to you sounds like a cry for help sometimes, this is the book to get you onto a better track.

The hip is the largest joint in your body, and it bears a lot of weight. So it's little wonder if sometimes they'd like a word with the boss. The question is: what will you do about it? Melinda Wright has suggestions to keep your hips—and you—happy.

She spends the first couple of chapters introducing key concepts, and some anatomy and physiology that'll be good to know.

Then we're into resistance stretching, basic hip exercises, all the way through to more advanced stuff. There are very clear photos for each. One thing that stands out about this book is each exercise is not just explained simply and clearly, but also offers "easing oneself in" exercises. After all, we're not all at the same starting point.

The book finishes off with some more holistic advice about chronic pain management, based on her personal experience with scoliosis, and some dietary tips to reduce joint pain and inflammation too.

All in all, a very helpful book!

Pick up 11 "Minutes to Pain-Free Hips" at Amazon today!

^You will also see options for pain-free back, and pain-free neck, by the same author

May you and your body be always in harmony,

The 10almonds Team