Autoimmune disease refers to the condition where your immune system starts attacking your body instead of foreign diseases and threats. As a result, one might experience symptoms including swollen glands, joint pain, muscle pain or swelling, fatigue, recurring fever, digestive issues, and more. Most common autoimmune diseases include inflammatory bowel disease, multiple sclerosis, rheumatoid arthritis, lupus, and more.
According to the data published by the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences, more than 80 known autoimmune diseases are affecting around 24 million people in the United States. However, many of such conditions are considered incurable by western medicines.
But there’s another way of treating autoimmune diseases: adopting the holistic approach. The holistic approach to treating autoimmune disease focuses on curing the underlying cause instead of just symptoms.
Adjust Your Diet To Control Inflammation
As inflammation is a significant cause of autoimmune disease, adjusting your diet and including anti-inflammatory foods (while avoiding inflammatory ones) is an excellent first step in managing your symptoms. For example, you can add the following food items:
- Organic greens and other vegetables.
- Grass-fed, pasture-raised meat
- Avocados, coconut oil, olive oil, and other “good” fats
- Berries and other organic fruits
Simultaneously, you should eliminate inflammatory foods such as gluten, dairy products, alcohol, refined sugar, processed foods, artificial flavors/sweeteners, GMOs, and trans fats. Moreover, you can make the following dietary changes:
- Eliminate highly processed or refined foods.
- Eat more plant-based foods.
- Eliminate added sugars.
- Get an adequate amount of protein, plus healthy fats and oils.
- Also, add some fermented foods.
Strengthen Your Gut
Your gut is the key to good health. It accounts for 80 percent of your immune system, and having a healthy immune system is nearly impossible without a healthy gut.
Having a leaky gut is one of the major causes of developing an autoimmune disease. When your gut is leaky, the tight junctions that normally hold the walls of your intestines together become loose. This results in undigested microbes, food particles, toxins, and other substances escaping and entering your bloodstream, causing a massive increase in inflammation that triggers or worsens any autoimmune condition.