What Happens to your Body When Eating Inflammatory Foods

Hint: we are killing ourselves with our food choices

In the last two decades we have seen an enormous rise in autoimmune disease, chronic disease, excess weight and mental health disorders–in both adults and children–that is primarily driven by our toxic food supply. 

Everyday we are killing ourselves with our food choices. And for decades no one sounded the alarm. Not the healthcare industry. Not the government public health agencies. Not the diet industry. Not the pharmaceutical industry. Not the food industry. 

Why? Because they were all profiting. 

To make matters worse–millions of people walk into their doctors office and ask: “is this symptom or condition related to my nutrition?” and are completely gaslit and told NO. 

But here’s the real truth–no amount of statins, SSRIs, or metformin are fixing the problem. Drugs can certainly have a time and place but you can’t medicate your way out of an inflammatory diet. FOOD IS MEDICINE!

Despite what you’ve been told, the solution to our health crisis isn’t more willpower, more restriction or more drugs. It’s understanding that you and your children are genetically designed to live a healthy, abundant life. And the first step to embracing that is minimizing inflammatory foods. So today I’m sharing the science behind what happens to your body when you eat inflammatory foods. Because when we know better–we do better. 

What is Inflammation? 

Inflammation is a normal, protective part of your immune response that is turned on from illness or injury. When you cut your finger slicing veggies or you get a cold, your body’s acute inflammatory response can be a savior. It’s part of your immune system’s attack on “bad guy” pathogens that enter your body and make you sick. Inflammation’s No. 1 goal is to clear whatever you’ve been exposed to. And while that can make you feel pretty miserable short-term (aches, fatigue, and fever are all signs of inflammation), it’s a genius process.

Acute inflammation like this triggers protective inflammatory mechanisms but chronic inflammation—a.k.a. persistent, low grade inflammation that hangs around and doesn’t go away once it does its intended job—leads to big problems. Inflammation that happens in an uncontrolled or inappropriate manner is the leading contributor to every chronic and autoimmune disease. If the body is constantly exposed to inflammatory inputs through food, stress, environmental toxins or other sources, the immune system can’t counter regulate and flip the inflammation switch to “off.” Chronic inflammation increases your risk of conditions like asthma, allergies, autoimmune diseases, depression, cardiovascular disease, insulin resistance, cognitive decline, osteoporosis, arthritis, obesity, and more.

This is consistent in the research–more than 30,000 peer reviewed articles that highlight the relationship between diet, inflammation and health outcomes. It’s also consistent in real life. By addressing imbalances and reversing chronic inflammation, more than 20,000 people that have gone through my virtual nutrition programs have been able to gain energy, think clearly, have mood stability, become pain-free, fit in their jeans, decrease unnecessary medications and get their lives back. 

This starts with limiting inflammatory foods. A diet filled with inflammation-promoting meals will undoubtedly lead to a low-grade inflammatory response that remains active (read: it doesn’t go away!), which in turn can lead to tissue damage and disease.

What Happens When Eating Inflammatory Foods?

The majority of adults and children in the United States eat an inflammatory diet. It’s estimated that ultra processed foods make up nearly 70% of children’s diets in the US and 60% of adults’ diets. This includes sugary cereals, packaged snacks, frozen meals and sugary beverages. 

The chronic inflammatory response that happens from eating these foods is at the heart of nearly every disease. When you eat an inflammatory diet your immune system increases production of reactive oxygen species, TNF-alpha, and interleukin 6. Inflammatory foods also create an overall imbalance between inflammatory and anti-inflammatory cytokines that are also produced by the immune system. When there is excess oxidative stress, it leads to an overactivation of Nuclear factor-kappa B (NF-?B), a group of proteins that regulate the function of many cells, leading to a pro-inflammatory effect. This immune response can also lead to a breakdown of the gut barrier (also known as leaky gut) that assaults the immune system, leading to a continuous inflammatory response. The result is chronic inflammation, cellular dysfunction, an imbalanced gut microbiome, and increased risk of metabolic dysfunction like insulin resistance. 

A lot of people think that overtime the symptoms will just go away or resolve themselves but this couldn’t be further from the truth. Chronic inflammation builds overtime. The longer that inflammation and cellular dysfunction occurs, the harder it is to come back from and the more symptoms that manifest. That doesn’t mean it’s impossible to overcome. But severe cases of chronic inflammation will require longer and closer adherence to an anti-inflammatory protocol, more supplementation and other lifestyle interventions to help you shift to an anti-inflammatory state. 

Some of the biggest culprits that spark this immune system reaction include a diet rich in refined carbohydrates, fried foods, sugar-sweetened drinks, artificial sweeteners, artificial dyes, pesticides and insecticides, processed meats, alcohol, ultra processed foods, and unhealthy fats.

This immune response happens even after one time of eating fried foods but it’s important to remember that one food eaten in one instance will not determine the net inflammatory outcome that puts you at risk of tissue damage, cellular dysfunction and disease. Most often, it’s your comprehensive dietary patterns that are most impactful.

Signs Your Diet Is Contributing to an Inflammatory Response

The response you experience from eating a pro-inflammatory diet will range from mild to debilitating. Chronic inflammation often goes undetected for years because it initially progresses silently. Eventually, mild symptoms begin and as the inflammation builds, those symptoms expand to more symptoms and increase in intensity. Eventually this will lead to a diagnosis of a chronic condition or autoimmune condition, but it doesn’t happen overnight. 

The following conditions and symptoms can often be the result of a systemic, inflammatory response happening in your body.

Symptoms/Conditions That are Related to Inflammation: 

• Sinus congestion
• Asthma
• Allergies
• Eczema
• Rashes & hives 
• Acne
• Puffiness 
• Swelling 
• Joint pain 
• Diarrhea
• Migraines
• Brain fog
• Chronic fatigue 
• Insomnia 
• Osteoporosis 
• Menopause symptoms
• Menstrual pain
• Depression 
• Autoimmune diseases 
• Inflammatory bowel disease
• Chronic kidney disease

Inflammation has also been associated with type 2 diabetes, cancer, alzheimer’s disease, heart disease and increased risk of early death. 

An inflammatory diet can also affect weight loss and gain. In fact, research shows an association between excess belly fat with an increased production of low-grade, chronic inflammation. This becomes a Catch-22: The more excess fat you have, the more that fat produces inflammatory compounds that keep you in a cycle of inflammation!

Sometimes clients in my nutrition coaching business who are dealing with chronic inflammation lose weight almost effortlessly when they decrease inflammatory foods in their diet. For some people this can happen without reducing calories or even adjusting macronutrients!

The Most Common Inflammatory Foods

Inflammatory food sources will differ for everyone but the most common inflammation-promoting foods, when overconsumed, for nearly everyone include:

• Ultra-processed foods
• Trans fats (partially hydrogenated oils) 
• Added sugars
• Refined flours and carbohydrates
• Omega-6 vegetable oils
• Alcohol 

Eating too much added sugar and refined carbohydrates are pro-inflammatory for everyone because large blood sugar fluctuations increase the body’s production of inflammatory cytokines and lead to higher levels of inflammation. This can manifest as joint pain, puffiness, and other symptoms listed above. One research study found that having repeated, excessive, and uncontrolled blood sugar responses, in addition to fat levels in the blood, can overwhelm your body’s natural response mechanisms and contribute to inflammation. 

Also, keep in mind that if you are allergic or sensitive to a particular food (common food allergens or sensitivities can include gluten, dairy, eggs, and soy), it will trigger an immune response that will make the food pro-inflammatory for you. You have to dig deeper to understand if the food is triggering an inflammatory response. If you have food allergies or sensitivities to these foods, eating them will contribute to inflammation. But this will vary for each person. 

It’s not just the food we eat that causes chronic inflammation; lifestyle factors like increased stress, sleep deprivation, smoking, being sedentary, and environmental exposure to toxins can also play a big role. 

Unfortunately, the Standard American Diet (a.k.a. the SAD diet) is a major reason for our collective chronic inflammation. This common way of eating provides way too many calories, too few nutrients, and many more inflammatory foods than anyone should be eating. Research backs this up, consistently showing that the SAD diet is associated with an increased production of pro-inflammatory molecules. It’s very likely that your go-to diet may be contributing to underlying inflammation that’s preventing you from reaching your health goals.

Here’s the good news: nutrition and lifestyle changes can dramatically lower inflammation and improve your symptoms. When given the right inputs, the body is capable of an immense amount of healing. 

If you have an extensive list of symptoms and are ready to feel good in your body, sign up for the 7 day free trial of my membership program, The Being Collective. TBC has all of the science-backed tools, meal plans, recipes and support that you need to improve your health and support the health of your family.