Healthy Eating is an important factor in everyone's well-being, but it's especially important for people suffering with autoimmune diseases and other chronic illnesses, such as Multiple Sclerosis.
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The old expression, "You are what you eat," is absolutely true. There has been a great deal of research that points to the benefits of eating healthy. This research also lets us know what we need to eat to improve our health.
Most of the research points to eating a low-fat (especially saturated fat) and low-carb diet. The Swank Diet, developed by Roy Swank, M.D., former head of University of Oregon's neurology department, focuses on a low-fat diet. He has had amazing results with Multiple Sclerosis (MS) sufferers. Dr. Swank has spent over 35 years treating his patients with this diet and has had very impressive results. The Swank diet consists primarily of grains, vegetables and fruits with about 20 percent fat by calories.
While this type of diet may be a little drastic for some, according to the National Multiple Sclerosis Society you can help your body and MS even if you make small changes at a time.
Simple Changes to Your Diet That Will Help Your Body and Multiple Sclerosis
1. Portion control - reduce the amount of food you eat. Pay attention to how much food is on your plate. It's important to know what healthy portion sizes are.
2. Change your eating habits slowly - make it a point to have a healthy breakfast. Instead of bacon and eggs on a bagel, have an egg white omelet on whole grain toast. Better yet, have a bowl of rolled oats with fruit. Once you're comfortable with eating a healthy breakfast move on to lunch, and then dinner. And, slowly add more fruits and vegetable into your diet.
3. Have snacks - snacks help curb the appetite and also keeps your metabolism going steady. The key here is to eat healthy snacks such as baby carrots, fruits, nuts, and low-fat yogurt.
4. Go lean - limit the amount of fatty meats you eat and pay attention to portion control. Chicken, turkey and fish are healthy choices.
5. Focus - it's important to eliminate distractions while you're eating. It seems if you're distracted, you will eat more and be less satisfied. So, pay attention to what's on that fork or spoon.
Along with the foods we should include in our diet, there are also foods that should be avoided to help our bodies function properly.
Foods to Avoid to help Your Body and Multiple Sclerosis
1. Sugar
2. Processed foods
3. Fatty foods
4. Super sized portions
5. White bread
According to Dr. Henry Zhen-Hong Lee, a ketogenic diet ms NYS Licensed Acupuncturist and NCCA DPL Herbalist, sugar actually stops the immune cells from functioning. This is essential since you are then left with no line of defense.
All evidence points to the fact that improving your eating habits will improve your health. Start today to make slow and steady changes in your diet so you will reap slow and steady benefits to your overall health. And, remember to discuss all changes to your diet with your doctor.
If you'd like to learn more about Multiple Sclerosis you can visit:
National Multiple Sclerosis Society
PCRM (Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine)
Multiple sclerosis is an inflammatory disease that affects the brain and spinal cord of afflicted individuals. The ailment severs the ability of nerve cells to communicate with each other. This causes afflicted individuals to suffer from impaired cognitive and motor functions. These symptoms either accumulate through time or manifest themselves through periodic episodes and attacks. There is no known scientific cure for the condition; treatments merely seek to delay the onset of symptoms or help patients recover from a previous attack.
Since there's no way for multiple sclerosis patients to ever be truly better, improving the quality of life becomes the primary goal for many of those suffering from the sickness. Anything that will increase the risk of attacks happening needs to be eschewed. Things like stress, excessive exertion and a diet high in saturated fat have all been shown to be contributing factors for the increase in MS symptoms and should be avoided at all costs.
A simple change in eating habits can significantly lower the saturated fat related risk for many MS patients. The cost of permanently abstaining from certain foods is easily offset by the dramatically increased quality of life this modification brings.
If you have MS, try to avoid food that has been deep fried or has lots of oil and fat. Pork chops, beef steak, fried chicken, scrambled eggs and bacon are all things that aren't appropriate in a diet for multiple sclerosis patients. Even vegetable dishes like French fries or potato chips have very high amounts of saturated fat. Dairy products, from milk to ice cream, should also be avoided.
While MS afflicted people are generally advised to stay away from most kinds of meat, fish is still perfectly okay to eat. Almost every type of fish has very low amounts of saturated fat. They're lean, high in protein and essential fatty acids, making them an ideal part of any diet for multiple sclerosis plagued individuals.
A good rule of thumb for those suffering from MS is to opt for a vegetable or fruit based clean eating recipe as much as possible. They're high in nutritious phytochemicals which helps your body function better and recover faster. In addition, they have zero saturated fat content which makes them totally harmless to your condition.