Several years ago, I saw one of my mentors Sally Fallon give a talk about the importance of traditional foods in healing. She mentioned that she had a discussion with an old time chiropractor who was complaining about the fact that his clients no longer come for just one visit. Instead they need several visits with no end in sight because chiropractic adjustments don’t last the way they used to.
If you go to a chiropractor, you know that the recommendation is to go weekly if not several times per week for an unlimited amount of time. Even if you don’t go, you will notice that your body is slipping back into the aches and pains all too easily. This chiropractor insisted that the phenomenon is due to the lack of real, healthy and balanced meals. Instead, the modern diet of ready-to-eat meals, microwaves, vegetable oils and an unreasonable amount of starches and sugars is every bit to blame.
This is congruent with my experience.
So when I or anyone I know suffers from joint degeneration and pain such as arthritic conditions or gout, I recommend the following protocol and the results are always impressive:
1. Completely avoid vegetable oils and fats especially the industrial ones like canola, soy, corn, cottonseed, most commercial olive oils, margarines, shortenings and anything hydrogenated. These oils wreak havoc on your joints instead of lubricating them. Instead, focus on the real fats of our ancestors: butter, cream, lard, tallow, poultry fat, coconut and palm oil. For many people, this one change will eliminate all joint pain.
2. Eliminate refined sugars including syrups and juices. These require your body to give up valuable vitamins and minerals including vitamin C and calcium in order to be metabolized. Avoiding them allows your body to rebuild itself.
3. Eat some cock soup several times per day. Chicken, and in particular the meat and bones of roosters, is extremely nourishing to joints. It is prized throughout the world for its value in body and joint repair. Use the broth as a beverage at meals, as a base for soups or to cook your side dishes. It’s great stuff!
4. Do gentle exercise like yoga or walking. With the current fitness frenzy, most people are convinced that they aren’t healthy if they constantly running marathons. Not only is that false, but for over a decade now, an increasing number of health professionals have found decreased life expectancy amongst runners and others who practice similarly joint damaging activities. Simpler activities, however, increase lifespan and bring more flexibility to the joints while easing pain.
These simple changes were instrumental in helping me to get rid of chronic low back pain I suffered in my early 20s. When properly followed (yes, I sometimes eat out which I pay for), I am able to easily keep my back limber and even give myself “adjustments” with simple exercises — something that is impossible for me without proper nourishment. Several years ago, on a visit to Jamaica, my cousin complained of arthritis in her knees. Her brother suffers too. I recommended that she change her fats and lay off the packaged cock soup and opt for the one she makes herself. Within a few weeks, she reported back that her pain had completely disappeared!
Some 5 years later, she continues to enjoy a pain-free life.
Her brother, who relies on beestings (he literally catches bees and allows them to sting him) still suffers as he’s too unwilling to make any changes. Oh well, you can’t help everybody. What about you? Do you or someone you love suffer from joint pain or arthritis? Do you have a particular remedy that works great for your pain? Leave a comment or question below and let me know! Or join the Nutrition Heretic’s Inner Circle on Facebook to join the conversation!
