When Inflammation Takes Over

 

 I don’t know about you, but inflammation is a very real aspect of my everyday life. For most people it’s more of an occasional concern, but I don’t know anyone that doesn’t experience it to some degree. Today I’m going to share some of my hacks for dealing with inflammation in hopes that it can benefit someone else as well.

R.Ice.E

 Rest. Ice. And Elevate. No one wants to hear it, but when inflammation is flaring this is your best option. God designed our bodies in miraculous ways to heal, but if we do not give them the chance to, we’re shooting ourselves in the foot as it were. When you rest, truly rest, your nervous system goes into Para-Sympathetic mode. This is where your body rests and digests. In case you didn’t catch that, you can’t digest well if you don’t rest! This is where your detoxifying system cleans out your organs, where your brain is cleared and reset for the next thing. Have you ever been told you need to turn your computer or your phone off and turn it back on again? That’s because things build up in the memory, or cache, and they need to be dealt with, purged, and room made for something new. The same thing happens with our bodies. When we rest, our brains deal with the emotions and memories of the day. Our cells expel waste and our lymphatic system flushes it away.

 Inflammation has flame at it’s center! A good massage therapist, and sometimes even a lay person, can feel the heat coming out of an inflamed joint. My massage therapist actually helped me recently track down the source of some nerve pain in my foot as the nerve was passing through an inflamed ankle. What’s the antidote for heat? Cold, of course! So we ice things. Ice causes things to contract, or shrink and inflammation typically causes things to swell. For some people, alternating heat and cold on a join will help even more, cooling the inflammation while drawing healing blood to the area.

 And elevate. Have you ever noticed that when you sit for an extended period of time, especially in the heat, your feet, ankles, maybe even calves and knees swell? Mine do! The same can happen if you’re walking or standing a lot as well. Why? Gravity. Gravity pulls the fluids in your body down and your heart can only do so much to draw them back up. If you lay in such a way that the swollen joint is elevated above your heart, the fluids can then flow back as they are supposed to! It’s annoying though, I get it, and often not our preferred position. Sometimes you just gotta do what you gotta do!

Detoxifying Baths

 Did you know that your skin is your largest organ, and plays a significant role in both protecting and detoxifying your body? When you sweat, you are actually expelling toxins. One way you can help your body reduce inflammation is to take a detoxifying bath. This should be as hot as you can stand it and you should stay in it for at least 20 minutes. It’s also benefitted by adding in things that will aid in pulling toxins out. This could include a few, or even more, cups of Epsom salts (I use as much as 7 in a standard bath tub), a cup of baking soda (I buy it in the giant bag at Costco), or 1/3 cup of powdered kelp. Here are a few posts with LOTS more information on detoxifying baths if you’re interested:

How to Best Enjoy a Seaweed Bath | Healthy Home Economist

  Buy Kelp Powder Here (Associate Link*)

5 Natural Detox Bath Recipes for Relaxation & Stress Relief | Wellness Mama

15 Detox Bath Recipes to Remove Toxins from the Body - Dr. Axe

Castor Oil Packs

 Here’s one that’s been on my to-do list for years, maybe a decade, but I’ve never gotten around to it. I’ve learned that if you place a castor oil pack over your liver, it will help your body shift quickly into parasympathetic mode. This helps drain toxins and allows you to rest more efficiently. The thing is, castor oil is messy. I’ve heard of people that will soak flannel squares, or even period pads with it, then apply it to the abdomen followed by saran wrap or an ace bandage. The key is to keep it from dripping as it will stain anything it comes into contact with! Messy, complicated, but highly efficient, I’m told. I’ll let you know if I ever get around to trying it 😂.

You Are What You Eat

 No one wants to hear it, but what you eat matters. When you’re fighting inflammation this is doubly true. Each of us has our own sensitivities, or even allergies, and when we are inflamed these are far more intense. For me, I have to avoid gluten at all times or it spikes my inflammation like crazy. But when I am already inflamed, I have to be extra careful of dairy and sugar. Sugar, for everyone, is a major cause of systemic inflammation, and doing a little sugar detox, even for three weeks, can do wonders for you. I highly recommend this detox from the Green Smoothie Girl and I’ve done it multiple times. Know your body, know what affects you, and when you’re fighting inflammation be extra careful about what you’re feeding yourself.

Supportive Clothing

 Ok, I’ve heard that compression socks, compression gloves, and other restrictive clothing is supposed to help inflammation, but that hasn’t been my experience. Try it! Maybe it’ll work for you. But for me, I’ve found that I need looser, less restrictive attire so that my body will calm down. If there is pressure at a point in my body, it seems to send all of its attention to that. My daughter-in-law found this to be true for herself too on our recent family vacation. With the heat, she found that her feet swole and she was unable to fit into her regular shoes. She bought a pair of crocs one size up and her feet felt instantly better! By adding some supportive insoles, she was able to use these for the rest of the trip, including more than 8-miles days. In her regular, fairly supportive, shoes, she would not have made it a mile.

And finally, my favorite:

An Inflammation Vacation

 A rather extreme treatment, but one I’ve enjoyed most years, is to take an “Inflammation Vacation.” This will look different for everyone and how their bodies recuperate. For me, I like to go to the desert, Palm Springs in particular. I find that the significantly lower humidity decreases my inflammation and pain almost instantly on arrival. The break, whether it’s a long weekend or even more, gives my body some space to heal and I’m in better shape for whatever comes next. I have another friend who is just the opposite. For her, she gets relief from being in the water. She loves to snorkel in the warm ocean and finds that this relieves pressure on her aching joints. Find what your sweet spot is so to speak, and do your best to make time in your life for it.

Here's the Thing: It’s your body, you only get one, take care of it! This is rarely easy or convenient, and you have to be intentional. Self-care doesn’t happen by accident. We have been appointed stewards of the temple of the Holy Spirit that is our body. It is not selfish or lazy to take care of it, it is necessary and essential!

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