Rheumatoid Arthritis Support Group
Rheumatoid arthritis is a chronic, inflammatory, multisystem, autoimmune disorder. It is a disabling and painful condition which can lead to substantial loss of mobility due to pain and joint destruction. The disease is also systemic in that it often also affects many extra-articular tissues throughout the body including the skin, blood vessels, heart, lungs, and...
Hi All,
I have had RA now for about 6 years. I am about 45 pounds overweight but am working on getting it down.
One thing I have found is that when I stop eating the junk food and cut out the excess sugar my swelling goes way down. My knees have been swelling up at night for the last 7-8 months and since I started really watching the kinds of foods I eat, my knees are looking normal again at night!!!
I KNOW that the sugars and crappy food really affect my RA. I have been feeling so much better the last two weeks.
Just throwing this out there.
Hang in there everyone, RA sucks!
I have had RA now for about 6 years. I am about 45 pounds overweight but am working on getting it down.
One thing I have found is that when I stop eating the junk food and cut out the excess sugar my swelling goes way down. My knees have been swelling up at night for the last 7-8 months and since I started really watching the kinds of foods I eat, my knees are looking normal again at night!!!
I KNOW that the sugars and crappy food really affect my RA. I have been feeling so much better the last two weeks.
Just throwing this out there.
Hang in there everyone, RA sucks!
did you substitute smoking? (joke! ducking!)
good for you.
depot
I am such a sweet junkie, candy, cookies, ice cream, things with lots of sugar, so I think that is the cuprit for the most part. Yep, the scale has moved downward almost 7 pounds. sweet!!! oh, wait, no pun intended!
Sun
Later testing confirmed that I had developed food allergies/sensitivities but my body's inflammation response is atypical. I either get IBS flares or RA flares.
If you've noticed a dietary link to your symptoms - go get food allergy tested. You might be a lucky one like me who can control her symptoms through diet alone.
Congratulations!
A couple years back, while living on my own at my old college, I had to support myself and make my own meals (fresh out of high school). This was long before I found out I had RA. I couldn't afford much, so I kept to very simple, fresh food and made everything from scratch, buying organic or straight from the farmer's market whenever possible. I cut out meat, since I couldn't afford most of it, and cut out all refined sugars in favor of cheaper fruit. I drank nothing but water and (fresh, top-shelf loose leaf) tea.
To this day, I've never felt better! My constant exhaustion almost went away completely, and I felt very "light" all the time, especially in my joints. Granted, I lost a lot of weight from not having as much food (I didn't have the weight to spare, either), but I felt fantastic. I don't believe I had any flares at all until finals rolled around, since stress seems to be a big trigger for me.
Food began to taste SO much better; fruit began tasting as sweet as candy, and if I actually got my hands on any candy or chocolate, it was so overwhelming that I could hardly eat it. :)
Overall...if you have the time or means, do it. It's really tough to stick to that sort of thing on a college meal plan like I'm doing now, but very worth it.