I know every single one of you out there reading has experienced a symptom at one time or another…a headache, an upset stomach, aches and pains, bad moods, or fatigue. This seems like a wide-ranging list, and it is. But what if I told you that each of them has its roots in inflammation?

It’s becoming widely accepted that most symptoms, illnesses, and diseases have inflammation at their core. Inflammation is an important, natural, and normal part of our immune and injury-repair response, like when you have a fever, or have a twisted ankle.

But what about those situations where the inflammation seems to get turned on, and doesn’t shut off? What about those chronic symptoms that repeat monthly, daily, or weekly, like panic attacks, PMS, migraines, bloating, diarrhea, or joint pain. How do you normally handle them?

Many of us reach for an over-the-counter or prescription medication to handle these bothersome symptoms. Let’s face it: when you have a raging, pounding headache, or a panic attack and you have stuff you need to do, our impulse is to shut that annoying symptom off so we can get on with our day.

But symptoms that return over and over again are signs that something isn’t right in our bodies, and they should be addressed. The OTC and prescription meds can help relieve the immediate symptoms, but this is only a short-term solution. And what about the silent inflammation that you can’t feel in your body, but that is causing internal damage nonetheless? Heart disease is a classic example of this. I want to share a little about how symptoms show us that inflammation is present…

Silent Inflammation

Inflammation is a normal and natural part of our body’s response to injury or invasion. When you twist that ankle, or breathe in a virus or bacteria, immune cells rush to the area to clean up the injured tissue, or kill and remove the invaders, and this causes swelling, redness, heat, and pain. These symptoms are proof that the immune system is at work and doing its job.

A fever is your immune system trying to make your body an inhospitable environment for an invading virus or bacteria.

An allergy is a different kind of inflammatory response, where the immune system has become sensitized and trained to react to an invader, even if it isn’t a dire threat, like a pollen, or a food, like peanuts. In minor cases, this can lead to hayfever or skin rashes, with itchy and watery eyes, sneezing, and nasal congestion, and in severe cases, anaphylaxis.

If you have an allergy, I’m sure you likely know it, and avoid the allergens to the best of your ability, to avoid the symptoms.

But sometimes, we are sensitive to foods or other environmental contaminants, but we aren’t yet aware of them, because we are constantly exposed to them, and the effects are sub-clinical, or below a detectable experience, and this is one source of silent inflammation.

Another major source of silent inflammation that you may not be aware of is frequently elevated blood sugar. In this case, excess sugars are converted to triglycerides, and these sticky triglycerides, along with the LDL cholesterol, adhere to the inside of our arteries.

This artery “spackling” shouldn’t be there, and the arteries become inflamed from the build up, in an attempt to fix the situation. The trouble with this process is that you can’t feel it. It doesn’t cause any specific signs or symptoms until the process has been going on for years.

If you have regularly occurring symptoms, especially of the digestive variety, mood challenges like depression or anxiety, aches and pains, headaches, or fatigue, it’s likely there are sources of inflammation in your diet, lifestyle habits, or living environment that are contributing to your discomfort.

Though there is often an ongoing, and regular exposure to these items, the response is low-grade, and the effects may be sub-clinical, or below the level where you can experience them. But even if you aren’t aware that they are contributing to inflammation, they are slowly creating damage to your cells, organs, and systems.

Eventually, you begin to notice you don’t feel quite so energetic anymore, you have a harder time getting out of bed in the morning. You can’t exercise like you used to, or worse, you start experiencing symptoms that get in your way of living life like you’d like to. You feel down and out, and don’t want to go out with your friends, you have headaches that keep you home from work, or anxiety that makes it difficult to travel, or you hurt all the time, and you can’t play with your kids or your grandkids. These impacts are real, and account for a lot of missed work and missed opportunities and fun.

How to Reduce Hidden Inflammation

The good news is that there is a lot you can do to reduce hidden inflammation! Clearly identifying the sources of this silent inflammation is the key to resolving chronic symptoms, and even disease diagnosis at the root cause level.

The place to begin is always with food. So many of us are suffering from unacknowledged food sensitivities. When you know where to begin, this is an area of our life that we have total control over.

The biggest food players in silent inflammation are gluten, dairy, and sugar. The place to begin is by eliminating them for a minimum of three weeks, and then add them back in, to see if your body can tolerate them. If you find you can’t tolerate a food, now you are armed with some very valuable information about how your symptoms are connected to your food, and you can make appropriate choices, and make the necessary choices to reduce or eliminate your symptoms.

Often, people feel dramatically better when they try this: they lose weight, their moods and sleep improve, their aches and pains decrease significantly, their lab markers improve, and they have more energy. I see this all the time with my clients.

If these three foods don’t make much of a difference, then the other players need to be identified.

Certain foods added to your diet can help reduce inflammation while you work on identifying your unique culprits. Turmeric is a long-recognized mediator of inflammation, and supplementing may help with many types of inflammatory conditions including joint pain, digestive conditions like IBS and IBD, cancer, diabetes, and more. Other anti-inflammatory foods include ginger, greens, berries, healthy fats from wild-caught fish and olive oil, and more.

The guidance of an experienced nutrition coach can help you navigate this process, and identify the specific foods, habits, or environmental irritants that are contributing to your issues. Things like sleep habits, exercise, mold or chemical exposure, stress, and so on can also be contributors.

What are your contributors? Are you aware of any of them? Comment below to share what you find impacts your feeling of well-being.

Despite research and trials, are you still confused about what to eat to avoid your symptoms and feel better? A whole-picture approach is important when using natural methods to address a health problem. I encourage you to download your free copy of Roadmap to Gut Recovery, my free action guide that gives you action steps you can take right now to get started identifying your unique symptom triggers and root causes of your condition.

If you need more individualized help, I invite you to schedule a free, 30-minute Assessment Session with me. I can help you identify where your next best steps should be on your healing journey, and we can explore whether we would be a good fit for working together.