Lifestyle Tips and Natural Remedies to Manage Arthritis

More than 180 million people in India have arthritis. This number is higher than those who struggle with diabetes, AIDS, and even cancer. This joint disease has different categories. The most common forms include rheumatoid arthritis and osteoarthritis or sometimes certain kinds of spondylitis. But one commonality that we need to understand is that it is an inflammatory disease.

Causes of Arthritis

Cellular malnutrition

We are referring to malnutrition at a cellular level. And so this means you need to assess your eating habits. Having excess junk or following fad diets deprives your cells of the nutrients they need and affects their working. Lack of trace minerals and vitamins can cause your inflammation to spike. Uncontrolled chronic inflammation can lead to arthritis, among many other conditions.

Excess physical stress

While a sedentary lifestyle is one of the chief villains in arthritis, over-exercising can be a leading cause too. Putting excess stress on your ball-and-socket joints, muscles, and cartilages can lead to inflammation. When your body doesn’t get the right rest and nutrition to bring this inflammation down for repair, it can make you vulnerable to arthritis.

Obesity

We ought to remember that our knees, joints, and spine are designed to carry a specific amount of weight, i.e. our ideal weight. When we put on excessive weight our spine and knees struggle to carry it. This causes our cartilages, tendons, and muscles to get weaker and increase inflammation.

Low Calcium and Vitamin D3

Optimum calcium and Vitamin D3 levels are crucial for good bone and joint health. Low levels of these two over a while increase the risk of arthritis.

Chronic constipation and acidity

Chronic constipation leads to the accumulation of morbid matter and toxins that need to be flushed out in the human body, when this waste gets absorbed back into the bloodstream, it can cause your body to become acidic. An acidic body has a direct link to arthritis. Your body needs a pH level of about 3 to 3.5 to digest food. When you consume excessive acidic foods, your body’s natural defense mechanism is to turn that acidic blood alkaline. So it starts leaching calcium (which is highly alkaline) from your bones. It doesn’t leach calcium from the center of your bones which is the densest part but the end of your bones, tendons, and joints. After leaching calcium, it starts leaching magnesium, an important mineral for the human body that controls over 300 to 500 biochemical reactions in the body. Low levels of calcium, Vitamin D3, and magnesium increase inflammation and make you prone to arthritis.

Hormonal imbalance

Constant hormonal imbalance caused by a poor lifestyle, excess processed food, adulterated oils and cheap ingredients, poor sleep, and unmanageable stress levels can lead to chronic inflammation, also increasing your risk of arthritis.

Lifestyle tips and natural remedies to manage arthritis beyond medicine

Make your diet alkaline

Keep your diet eighty percent alkaline and twenty percent acidic in nature. For instance, if your grains are acidic, balance them with raw fruits, vegetables, sprouts, nuts, seeds, water, and alkaline juices.

For instance, pineapple is rich in bromelain, an enzyme that keeps your body alkaline and reduces inflammation even in the most chronic cases of rheumatoid arthritis and osteoarthritis. Soak 2 tbsps of black sesame seeds or fenugreek seeds overnight in water. Drink the water and eat the seeds the following morning. Both of these are highly anti-inflammatory and can benefit you.

Drink from a copper vessel

Follow the traditional custom of drinking water from a copper mug or vessel in the morning. Copper is a trace mineral in the human body that strengthens your muscles, joints, cartilage, and tendons.

Use coconut oil with camphor for a massage

While camphor is anti-inflammatory, coconut oil easily soaks into your skin, tendons, and joints. So mix camphor mixed with coconut oil and use it as a massage oil before bed.

An Epsom salt bath

Epsom salt is highly anti-inflammatory and a bathroom staple for many people with arthritis. It has two main ingredients – magnesium and sulfate, a combination that helps detoxification. Soaking in an Epsom salt bath may provide pain relief and reduce swelling in people living with arthritis. But first, if you have a skin condition, consult your doctor to check if an Epsom salt bath works for you.

Stay Warm

Keep your body warm. When putting on crepe bandages around your sore areas, ensure they are not too tight and don’t stop blood circulation. Engage in yoga asanas that are gentle on your joints and reduce inflammation. Pranayama can help you train your lungs to send the right amount of oxygen to all inflamed cells and joints and remove excess carbon dioxide that increases pain and reduces your chances to heal.

Arthritis may require you to rely on painkillers, but a good lifestyle can help you reduce this dependency and manage your disease better. And our integrative team can help you do exactly that. Join our You Care Wellness Programs to know more.