A Crohn's Diet - You Can Heal Yourself

As a Crohn's patient, you may not have considered how vital your diet is to your health. When Crohn's symptoms are active, it can be painful to eat at all. While we know there is not yet a cure for Crohn's Disease, we also know how to combat the effects of Crohn's on your body.



Inflammation Equals Pain



The biggest part of the pain of Crohn's is related to the inflammation of the interior lining of the small intestine. Most medical treatments for Crohn's focus on reducing this inflammation, often with negative side effects. When the inflammation becomes too severe, scar tissue develops and then blockages of the small intestine soon follow making it near impossible to eat solid food.



Control The Inflammation With diet



It has long been known that some foods are pro-inflammatory, while others are anti-inflammatory. By limiting your intake of pro-inflammatory foods you can help your doctors to control the inflammation. By choosing anti-inflammatory foods, you can actually reduce the pain and suffering of Crohn's and many people can achieve complete remission from symptoms.



Sadly, most of the food available in the grocery stores today are heavily weighted in the direction of being pro-inflammatory. They are heavily processed and altered - not for your nutrition, but for increased economies in the production line. Bottom line - your health is not at the heart of the production of most of what's available.



For example, packaged lunch meats are easy to keep "fresh" for long periods of time on the store shelf, but the nitrites used to process them cause inflammation. Most of the pre-packaged food in the center aisles of the grocery store are made with refined flour, high-fructose corn syrup, partially hydrogenated oils, etc. These ingredients help keep the cost of those foods down and increase shelf life, but they also increase the inflammation in your intestines.



Instead you should opt for the products around the perimeter of the store. While these items are generally more expensive, they help to reduce inflammation in your gut. Following is a list of some foods that are good and bad for Crohn's patients.



Anti-Inflammatory Foods

Fresh, pure drinking water

Lean meats, grass fed, without antibiotics - wild game is excellent nutrition

Berries, especially blueberries and strawberries

Apples

Red Onion

Leafy green vegetables - cabbage, kale, broccoli, spinach

Sweet Potatoes

Garlic

Pink Grapefruit

Rhubarb

Ginger

Cherries

Avocado

Cantaloupe

Carrots

Goats Milk and Dairy products from Goats Milk

Cold Water Caught Fish

Pumpkin Seeds and Sunflower Seeds and Walnuts

Omega-3 Fatty Acids (Cod liver oil, Flax seed oil, Coconut oil, avocado)

Olive Oil (but not at high temperature)



Pro Inflammatory Foods

Junk Food

High fat meats

Processed sugar

trans fats

saturated fats

nitrites

vegetables from the nightshade family (tomatoes, potatoes, eggplant)

deep fries foods

partially hydrogenated oils

banana

mango

corn

chips

pretzels

cola

Gatorade

refined flour

poly-unsaturated fats (corn oil, mixed vegetable oil)



As you can see, most of the anti-inflammatory foods are fresh foods and not as common to find in the grocery stores as the pro-inflammatory foods. But if you give a serious effort in maintaining an anti-inflammatory diet for at least 4 weeks, you will notice a dramatic improvement in your health.

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