Inflammation: it’s a double-edged sword.

Acute inflammation, meaning inflammation, or swelling, that lasts for a short period of time, is usually very good for you. Think of a cut you get on your finger, hand, or anywhere. Everyone’s had a cut. But what happens when you get cut? First, your body works to restrict blood flow by tightening blood vessels, your blood itself uses clotting agents to stop bleeding, your white blood cells and other antibodies work to fight infection, and all of that leads to swelling, or inflammation, which, over days or maybe weeks, depending on the severity of the cut, is actually responsible for healing the cut. That kind of inflammation is entirely healthy.

But there’s another kind of inflammation called chronic inflammation, meaning inflammation that lasts for a long time, and that type of inflammation is not at all healthy. Chronic inflammation is caused by exposure to toxins (tobacco, excessive alcohol, drugs), poor diet, and lack of exercise. Chronic inflammation is the root cause of a whole host of non-communicable diseases, or diseases that are not passed on from person to person the way sicknesses like the common cold or flu are passed on. The list of non-communicable diseases is long and includes cardiac (heart) disease, diabetes, cardiovascular (blood vessel) disease, hypertension (high blood pressure), chronic respiratory disease, cancer, and much more. Non-communicable diseases are the leading cause of death in the world, and unfortunately, the rate of those diseases is only steadily increasing. That’s the bad news.

The good news is that non-communicable diseases are in large part very preventable almost entirely through better eating habits and exercise. And one of the best things we can do regarding better eating is to eat foods that decrease inflammation. Personally, I’ve been a big fan of anti-inflammatory foods for two reasons. First, I’m an athlete. I get out on the bike just about every day of the year, usually for 20-30 miles per ride and many times a good bit more than that. Cycling for me and keeping it moving at a good pace invigorates me physically, keeps me young, keeps my mind sharp, and definitely keeps my attitude positive. At the same time, cycling rigorously can cause inflammation in both the joints and muscles. That means that eating anti-inflammatory foods is exceptionally important to keep me in the riding shape I both want and need to maintain.

The second reason I’m big on anti-inflammatory foods is that I’ve had an uncomfortable time with my digestive tract throughout a good portion of my life, mostly because I’d taken a lot of antibiotics, especially when I was younger, to deal with a lot of ear infections and other infections that required rigorous antibiotic treatment time and time again. Sure, those treatments were necessary, but in addition to killing the bad bacteria that caused painful infections, those same antibiotics took out a lot of the healthy bacteria that make all of our digestive tracts work as well as they should. Until a few years ago, I had no idea about how important it is to maintain a healthy microbiome, or healthy bacteria population. Now that I’m aware, I do everything I can to help maintain a healthy microbiome so that I can live as full-on actively as possible.

To spread the word, I’ve just added an AID (Anti-Inflammatory Diet) Recipes tab to the banner on the homepage. For easy reference, the easy-to-read list of anti-inflammatory foods you see at the top of this page, compiled by my good friends at the University of Massachusetts Medical School Center for Applied Nutrition, is also listed at the top of the AID Recipes page.

Next post: Steel Cut Oats with Nut Butter, Fresh Fruit & Kefir (great stuff – just had it this morning!).