Can I get my rheumatoid arthritis markers down just by healthy eating?

Hi @Dainsey

My view on this is maybe you need to do both.

I have RA and got in a muddle between medications where I effectively ended up with no medication for a period. What happened is I became really poorly, I could hardly walk down the stairs and the fatigue was very difficult.

However, I do strongly believe that we are what we eat and that food can be thy medicine!

I thought I had a good healthy Mediterranean diet. However, I was generally having a pastry or toast for breakfast, always a sandwhich and Diet Coke for lunch, followed by pasta regularly for supper.

When I bought the anti inflammatory cook book it really contributed to my wellness (which happened around the same time I commenced biologic medication and removed a huge stressful issue from my life).

In summary I ditched all gluten, artificial sweetener, and the deadly nightshade veg. Plus I take care of my micro biome with fibre ( from veg) and fermented foods, kimchi, sauerkraut, kefir etc It’s been hard because so many food products contain gluten and sweeteners !

It’s really hard to evidence what’s worked but in general terms I feel better. Hydration helps too I think.

So my view is that it’s risky to ignore medication, but at the same time food can be medicine, so consider both in my opinion.

there is a documentary on Netflix called hack your Health, which you might find interesting

Hope this helps

very interesting. Thank you

@iwannerbeme I don’t think you need “lab grade” (read expensive marketing), as in literal terms lab grade just means a measured concentration. Food grade turmeric from Tesco works just as well. However Turmeric’s anti-inflammatory activity in the context of RA, is like holding a teaspoon of water to a raging house gas fire where you need serious fire hose water pressure or the ability to shut off the gas. Not familiar with Boswellia, so can’t comment on that.

Talking of water and shutting off the gas, there is now sufficient evidence to show that certain foods that your gut has become intolerant to, perhaps due to infection or other gut injury can cause RA like joint & tendon inflammation. (Listen to the Zoe podcast by a Rheumy who researched this plus other links). The other problem is that the active substance in turmeric, curcumin, is poorly absorbed. Black pepper enhances this absorption, but if you want the biggest benefit for the LOWEST cost, I’d consult a GP on safely doing a 7 day water fast, you will at the very least, benefit from a little weight loss, but more importantly, after a week of fasting you should start feeling less on fire, which would be your evidence that something in your diet is contributing to your pain. Unlike an allergy where your throat immediately tightens, this is very slow acting with a time delay depending on where along your intestine the sensitivity to the food product is located, so can take hours or even 2 days before something you are gives you trouble.

Researching food based anti-inflammatory substances, I have found a lot of the spices in indian food cooking has this, in addition to some of their other medicinal properties. While turmeric and it’s orange colour receive all the publicity (no help if applied on the face as an anti inflammatory), another related spice, ginger, has a better anti inflammatory profile as it blocks IL-6 and TNF-alpha, however, it is quite spicy so unless you like fiery organic ginger ale and related food, it may not be the best option, but worth trying. I keep a hunk of ginger in the fridge for just such purposes. Interestingly enough, the dried form is more potent, containing the compound shoagol-6. Yum!

Shoagol is formed from drying the the fresh wet ginger containing gingerol. However I prefer to mix the two, but home baked gluten free ginger biccies take on a new meaning with RA. BTW, avoid factory made ginger biccies, manufacturers use artificial sweetners to claim “low sugar” or fructose corn syrup, invert sugar etc, all bad if you have RA. Make it at home. I just slice up my washed Tesco ginger and it works. However like the analogy of putting out a fire, if the gas is still on, the fire won’t go out and your gut can’t slowly begin repairs, so you need to think about that.

Meds like MTX are powerful and will eventually damp your immune system enough that the joint problems stop despite the gas flowing, but it comes at a price. (Low immunity, nausea etc).

The hard thing to understand is something you have always eaten and enjoyed in the past could be giving you so much grief now because of how your immune system reacts (explained in the UCL research link).

Hope you get some relief soon.