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Joint pain, whether caused by overuse, injury, or arthritis, colors everything about your life. Movement is key to virtually every task, from working to running errands to spending quality time with loved ones. If you experience chronic joint pain, you’re probably looking for a way to feel better without relying on heavy pharmaceuticals, which come with their own downsides.
The good news is that diet can play a huge part in your comfort level. Avoiding foods known to cause inflammation in the body will reduce your suffering a great deal. Along with doctor prescribed physical therapy and medications at their lowest effective dose, you could be back to full power in no time.
Unfortunately, you may need to scale back on some tasty treats. Following are 9 foods you should never eat if you have joint pain.
1. Added Sugars
Our bodies are built to crave sugar because it is a necessary component of our diets. However, in the modern age of processed convenience foods, we typically eat way too much. Sugar causes inflammation because it interacts with fat and protein in our bodies and produces advanced glycation end products (AGEs).
Beyond painful inflammation, AGEs speed up the aging process. It’s best to stick to fruit for your sugar fix because you’ll also get fiber, nutrients, and antioxidants that can counteract the inflammation. Another okay option for sweetness is honey, but avoid products with high fructose corn syrup or refined white sugar, like candy and soda.
2. Alcohol
It’s not strictly a food, but alcohol is one of the worst things you can consume with joint pain. Now, one or two drinks every once in awhile may not bother you much, but regular excess consumption significantly raises your risk of developing gout. Gout is a form of arthritis in which hard crystals form in the joints, and it is really painful!
Alcohol is also quite dehydrating and causes inflammation in the body. If you are taking arthritis medications, be aware that alcohol may not mix safely with them. While you are recovering from an injury or having an arthritis flare-up, even a couple of drinks may cause joint pain – once you sober up, of course.
3. Aspartame & artificial sweeteners
This is a total bummer, but switching to artificial sweeteners won’t help reduce your joint pain. Aspartame is notorious for causing health issues, and may even trigger arthritis in people who didn’t have it before.
Because all artificial sweeteners are whipped up in a lab, there is nothing natural about them. Your body may not even recognize them as food. That triggers painful inflammation as a defense mechanism. One potential alternative is stevia, a plant based sweetener.
4. Dairy Products
Dairy products can be troublesome because they contain proteins that are known to irritate the tissue around joints in some people. Dairy also becomes more difficult to digest as we age, given the fact that milk is really only meant to nourish infants. Still, it’s highly nutritious if you can stomach it.
You don’t need to stop eating dairy if it doesn’t affect you, but you may want to experiment a bit to be sure it isn’t behind your joint pain. Other great choices for protein that are not inflammatory include spinach, quinoa, nut butters, tofu, lentils, and beans.
5. Salt
Salt is problematic because it can cause water retention and high blood pressure. Maintaining the appropriate fluid balance in your body is crucial to lubricating and cushioning joints, but too much causes bloating and inflammation. Swelling in the joints contributes to pain during use.
It is shockingly easy to get too much salt in your diet – avoiding junk food and processed meals can help a lot. If you have arthritis and take a corticosteroid, your doc will definitely want you to reduce your sodium intake as this medication causes even more salt retention.
6. MSG
Because it is a salt-based food additive, MSG also causes water retention and swelling. People with arthritis should avoid it at all costs. Unfortunately, it can be sneaky. MSG shows up in lots of processed foods like salad dressings, fast food, deli meat, and soup mixes.
It’s not just in Asian takeout – in fact, it’s hardly ever found there anymore. But if you’ve accidentally ingested some MSG and are feeling the results in your joints, eating some ginger can be a good natural remedy. It works in both powdered and fresh form.
7. Saturated Fats
There are lots of reasons to avoid eating too much saturated fat, from the risk of heart disease to the damage it does your joints. In an interesting link, people who have arthritis are already at a higher risk for heart disease.
Multiple studies have shown that a reduction in dietary saturated fat calms the body’s inflammatory response. To reduce your joint pain, whatever the cause, steer clear of fried food, red meat, full-fat dairy, and commercially baked goodies.
8. Refined Carbs
Refined white flour is a product that takes healthy whole grain and strips every bit of nutritional value from it. The result is a product that increases harmful cytokines in your blood stream; cytokines in turn spark (you guessed it) inflammation. White flour is also high on the glycemic index and will spike your blood sugar.
White flour is really hard to avoid because it is in hundreds of products. However, you may want to reduce your consumption as much as possible by choosing whole grain bread and occasionally replacing flour tortillas with lettuce and pasta with shredded zucchini or squash.
9. Corn oil/omega-6s
Corn oil is full of omega 6 fatty acids, which are healthy in moderation even though they are known to be inflammatory. But the processed foods we find on grocery shelves these days contain too much of it, so that most of us have a skewed balance of omega 6s to omega 3s. Omega 3 fatty acids are found in products like olive oil, fish, and avocado, and these have a compensating anti-inflammatory effect.
To protect your joints, avoid oils made from corn, peanut, soy, grapeseed, vegetable, and safflower, and don’t forget to read the label on salad dressings and mayonnaise because they often contain those oils. Use olive or avocado oil at home, and boost your omega 3 intake even more with nuts, flaxseeds, and pumpkin seeds.
We know that food cravings can be very difficult to resist, and even those foods that are the most dangerous can reward us with a hit of happy-feeling dopamine in the brain. But if you are recovering from an injury or have chronic joint pain for which there is no cure, it’s worth it to dig deep and make a change to your diet. Remember that after a few weeks, your cravings should diminish. In the meantime, less pain is a powerful motivator to keep at it. Good luck!
The good news is that diet can play a huge part in your comfort level. Avoiding foods known to cause inflammation in the body will reduce your suffering a great deal. Along with doctor prescribed physical therapy and medications at their lowest effective dose, you could be back to full power in no time.
Unfortunately, you may need to scale back on some tasty treats. Following are 9 foods you should never eat if you have joint pain.
1. Added Sugars
Our bodies are built to crave sugar because it is a necessary component of our diets. However, in the modern age of processed convenience foods, we typically eat way too much. Sugar causes inflammation because it interacts with fat and protein in our bodies and produces advanced glycation end products (AGEs).
Beyond painful inflammation, AGEs speed up the aging process. It’s best to stick to fruit for your sugar fix because you’ll also get fiber, nutrients, and antioxidants that can counteract the inflammation. Another okay option for sweetness is honey, but avoid products with high fructose corn syrup or refined white sugar, like candy and soda.
2. Alcohol
It’s not strictly a food, but alcohol is one of the worst things you can consume with joint pain. Now, one or two drinks every once in awhile may not bother you much, but regular excess consumption significantly raises your risk of developing gout. Gout is a form of arthritis in which hard crystals form in the joints, and it is really painful!
Alcohol is also quite dehydrating and causes inflammation in the body. If you are taking arthritis medications, be aware that alcohol may not mix safely with them. While you are recovering from an injury or having an arthritis flare-up, even a couple of drinks may cause joint pain – once you sober up, of course.
3. Aspartame & artificial sweeteners
This is a total bummer, but switching to artificial sweeteners won’t help reduce your joint pain. Aspartame is notorious for causing health issues, and may even trigger arthritis in people who didn’t have it before.
Because all artificial sweeteners are whipped up in a lab, there is nothing natural about them. Your body may not even recognize them as food. That triggers painful inflammation as a defense mechanism. One potential alternative is stevia, a plant based sweetener.
4. Dairy Products
Dairy products can be troublesome because they contain proteins that are known to irritate the tissue around joints in some people. Dairy also becomes more difficult to digest as we age, given the fact that milk is really only meant to nourish infants. Still, it’s highly nutritious if you can stomach it.
You don’t need to stop eating dairy if it doesn’t affect you, but you may want to experiment a bit to be sure it isn’t behind your joint pain. Other great choices for protein that are not inflammatory include spinach, quinoa, nut butters, tofu, lentils, and beans.
5. Salt
Salt is problematic because it can cause water retention and high blood pressure. Maintaining the appropriate fluid balance in your body is crucial to lubricating and cushioning joints, but too much causes bloating and inflammation. Swelling in the joints contributes to pain during use.
It is shockingly easy to get too much salt in your diet – avoiding junk food and processed meals can help a lot. If you have arthritis and take a corticosteroid, your doc will definitely want you to reduce your sodium intake as this medication causes even more salt retention.
6. MSG
Because it is a salt-based food additive, MSG also causes water retention and swelling. People with arthritis should avoid it at all costs. Unfortunately, it can be sneaky. MSG shows up in lots of processed foods like salad dressings, fast food, deli meat, and soup mixes.
It’s not just in Asian takeout – in fact, it’s hardly ever found there anymore. But if you’ve accidentally ingested some MSG and are feeling the results in your joints, eating some ginger can be a good natural remedy. It works in both powdered and fresh form.
7. Saturated Fats
There are lots of reasons to avoid eating too much saturated fat, from the risk of heart disease to the damage it does your joints. In an interesting link, people who have arthritis are already at a higher risk for heart disease.
Multiple studies have shown that a reduction in dietary saturated fat calms the body’s inflammatory response. To reduce your joint pain, whatever the cause, steer clear of fried food, red meat, full-fat dairy, and commercially baked goodies.
8. Refined Carbs
Refined white flour is a product that takes healthy whole grain and strips every bit of nutritional value from it. The result is a product that increases harmful cytokines in your blood stream; cytokines in turn spark (you guessed it) inflammation. White flour is also high on the glycemic index and will spike your blood sugar.
White flour is really hard to avoid because it is in hundreds of products. However, you may want to reduce your consumption as much as possible by choosing whole grain bread and occasionally replacing flour tortillas with lettuce and pasta with shredded zucchini or squash.
9. Corn oil/omega-6s
Corn oil is full of omega 6 fatty acids, which are healthy in moderation even though they are known to be inflammatory. But the processed foods we find on grocery shelves these days contain too much of it, so that most of us have a skewed balance of omega 6s to omega 3s. Omega 3 fatty acids are found in products like olive oil, fish, and avocado, and these have a compensating anti-inflammatory effect.
To protect your joints, avoid oils made from corn, peanut, soy, grapeseed, vegetable, and safflower, and don’t forget to read the label on salad dressings and mayonnaise because they often contain those oils. Use olive or avocado oil at home, and boost your omega 3 intake even more with nuts, flaxseeds, and pumpkin seeds.
We know that food cravings can be very difficult to resist, and even those foods that are the most dangerous can reward us with a hit of happy-feeling dopamine in the brain. But if you are recovering from an injury or have chronic joint pain for which there is no cure, it’s worth it to dig deep and make a change to your diet. Remember that after a few weeks, your cravings should diminish. In the meantime, less pain is a powerful motivator to keep at it. Good luck!
