Chronic Inflammation: What Causes It and 5 Ways to Beat It!

Inflammation is a natural and essential part of the healing process. But when it lingers too long, it can become a chronic issue, leading to ongoing discomfort and hindering recovery. Let’s dive into what inflammation is, the difference between acute and chronic inflammation, and how to support your body to minimize long-term issues.

Topics

• What is inflammation?
• Acute vs Chronic Inflammation.
• How to support healthy inflammatory processes after injury to minimize chronic inflammation.

What is Inflammation?

Inflammation is the body’s way of defending itself. It’s your immune system’s response to harm, whether from an injury, infection, or irritant. Inflammation helps heal the body and eliminate the cause of harm, so it’s not always a bad thing—it’s often essential.

Acute vs. Chronic Inflammation

Acute Inflammation

• Symptoms: Redness, swelling, soreness, and sometimes, a loss of function.
• Duration: Temporary—usually lasting from days to weeks.
• Purpose: To heal the body and eliminate the cause of injury.
• Outcome: A healthy healing response.

Chronic Inflammation

• Symptoms: Often subtle, not as obvious as acute inflammation.
• Signs: Detected through inflammatory markers in lab tests.
• Duration: Can last for months or even years.
• Effects: Persistent immune activation can damage healthy tissue.
• Outcome: A maladaptive, damaging response.

Chronic Inflammation and Its Impact on Your Health

Now that we’ve covered the difference between acute and chronic inflammation let’s explore how chronic inflammation might affect your body. Many of us don’t realize that issues like poor sleep, gut problems, excess weight, low energy, or feeling constantly stressed are signs of chronic inflammation.

These signs are often “hidden” for two reasons.

First, we tend to see these issues as “normal” or “common” and overlook them. Second, the damage they cause happens at a deeper, physiological level—out of sight, so we don’t always connect them to stress. But in reality, multiple sources of stress are building up and leading to increased inflammation in the body.

Stress, whether from blood sugar imbalances, insulin resistance, or emotional challenges, is inherently inflammatory. The degree of inflammation depends on how much stress your body can handle and your existing level of inflammation.

By recognizing and addressing the many stressors in our lives, we can take meaningful steps to reduce inflammation and improve our overall health.

How to Resolve Chronic Inflammation:

Before you rush to Google for a list of anti-inflammatory foods and supplements, let’s consider the bigger picture.

We all need to eat, sleep, and move our bodies every day, so why not intentionally use these habits to lower inflammation? While anti-inflammatory foods are important, they’re just one piece of the puzzle. What truly makes a difference is how we integrate these foods into our overall eating patterns.

A truly anti-inflammatory diet supports your energy needs, keeps you full and satisfied, is rich in nutrients, and helps maintain stable blood sugar levels. Eating one anti-inflammatory food won’t counteract the negative effects of a high-calorie, highly processed, low-fiber diet. It’s the overall pattern that matters most.

Rather than focusing on individual interventions in isolation, aim for a holistic approach where your diet, lifestyle, and supplemental strategies work together. When these elements combine, they have a synergistic effect on lowering inflammation in your body.

Key Takeaway: Focus on Supporting Your Body

Targeting inflammation directly with anti-inflammatory foods and supplements like fish oil can be helpful, but it often misses the root cause. The goal should be to reduce the factors contributing to inflammation, such as overeating, lack of sleep, and chronic stress, and then add supportive measures as needed. Have you ever heard the saying, “You can’t out exercise a bad diet?” the same sentiment applies to inflammation. “You can’t eat your way out of having inflammation with a few anti-inflammatory foods and no other lifestyle interventions.”

Holistic Approaches: Supporting Healthy Inflammation

Instead of thinking, “How do I eliminate inflammation outright?” Try to focus on supporting your overall health. A healthy inflammatory response is all about regulation within multiple systems in the body, which we can monitor through our biofeedback: stress, sleep, hunger, mood, energy, and cravings.

When your biofeedback is in check, it’s a good sign that your immune function is well-regulated and balanced, allowing normal inflammatory processes—from activation to resolution—to take place.

Deeper Dive: How do nutrition and eating habits contribute to inflammation?

Nutrition and eating habits play a significant role in promoting or reducing inflammation in the body. Here’s how.

Refined carbohydrates and sugars cause rapid spikes in blood glucose levels. This stimulates a corresponding surge in insulin to manage the blood sugar. Over time, consistently high insulin levels can lead to insulin resistance, where cells no longer respond effectively to insulin. This resistance causes higher levels of circulating glucose, which promotes the production of advanced glycation end products (AGEs). AGEs are harmful compounds that form when proteins or fats combine with sugars in the bloodstream, and they are known to trigger inflammation by increasing oxidative stress and activating pro-inflammatory pathways.

Overeating, especially high-calorie and nutrient-poor foods, leads to excess fat accumulation, particularly visceral fat (fat around the organs). Visceral fat is metabolically active and produces inflammatory cytokines such as tumor necrosis factor-alpha (TNF-α) and interleukin-6 (IL-6). These cytokines enter the bloodstream, leading to systemic inflammation. Additionally, excess fat can cause oxidative stress and alter the balance of gut bacteria, further promoting inflammation.

Irregular eating patterns, like skipping meals, can lead to erratic blood sugar levels. Each spike and subsequent drop in blood sugar can stimulate the release of cortisol, a stress hormone that, when chronically elevated, contributes to inflammation. Furthermore, irregular eating can disrupt circadian rhythms, which regulate the immune system and inflammatory processes, leading to increased inflammation.

Gut issues due to poor eating habits, particularly from diets low in fiber and high in processed foods, can disrupt the gut microbiome, leading to dysbiosis (an imbalance in gut bacteria). Dysbiosis can cause the intestinal lining to become more permeable (“leaky gut”), allowing bacteria and toxins to enter the bloodstream and trigger an immune response, leading to chronic inflammation.

Chronic dieting or severe caloric restriction can place the body under significant stress, leading to elevated cortisol levels. This stress response is inherently inflammatory. Additionally, nutrient deficiencies that often accompany restrictive diets can impair the body’s ability to manage inflammation. For example, insufficient intake of anti-inflammatory nutrients like omega-3 fatty acids, vitamin D, or magnesium can exacerbate inflammation.

Understanding the underlying mechanisms of how dietary choices and eating habits influence inflammation underscores the importance of a balanced, nutrient-rich diet. By avoiding pro-inflammatory foods and adopting habits that support gut health, blood sugar stability, and lower stress, it’s possible to reduce chronic inflammation and improve long-term health significantly.

Strategies: SEEN (Sleep, Exercise, Energy balance, Nutrition)

Now, let’s explore how you can reduce internal sources of inflammation in four areas: Energy Balance, Nutrition (including supplements), Sleep, and Exercise.

Energy Balance: Finding Your Sweet Spot

Overeating or undereating can both lead to inflammation and metabolic dysfunction, which is an inflammatory state. Your body tightly regulates blood sugar levels, which can contribute to whole-body inflammation when this balance is off.

• Goal: First, adjust your energy balance by aligning your caloric intake with your needs. If unsure, consider tracking your food intake for a few days. Or use the RESTORE Plate Model as your guild to build meals and snacks.

Nutrition: Focus on Patterns, Not Just Foods

In addition to adding your favorite superfoods, think about your overall dietary pattern. The goal is to support healthy eating habits that nourish your body and keep inflammation at bay.

• Less of:

  Saturated fats and fried foods (e.g., French fries, margarine, cured meats)
  Alcohol, sugar (especially high fructose corn syrup), and processed/refined carbs (e.g., white bread, soda, hot dogs)

• More of:

  Your favorite superfoods, nutrient-dense, high-fiber foods (e.g., olive oil, leafy greens, nuts, fatty fish, berries)
  Increase your protein intake to 30-35 grams per meal, both animal and plant sources, plus protein supplements if needed.

Supplements: What Works Best?

While anti-inflammatory supplements and medications can reduce inflammation, they don’t always address the underlying issues, and they do not replace RESTORE nutrition.

The best evidence supports the use of Omega-3 fatty acids (EPA & DHA) and Curcumin (Theracurmin) to reduce inflammation. However, as we’ve discussed, an even better approach is to lower your baseline inflammation by addressing the internal sources of stress and imbalance.

Sleep & Exercise: Your Body’s Natural Anti-Inflammatory Tools

 

Sleep Tool Kit

Lack of sleep puts your body in a pro-inflammatory state, even if you feel fine. Getting deep, restorative sleep reduces inflammation and supports your immune system.

• Goals: Aim for 7-9 hours of sleep per night.
• Maintain consistent sleep timing (e.g., bed at 10 PM ± 30 minutes).
• Get sunlight exposure first thing in the morning and throughout the day.

Exercise Tool Kit

Regular exercise has long-term anti-inflammatory effects through various mechanisms in your immune, hormonal, and metabolic systems. It also helps reduce fat mass, which contributes to systemic inflammation.

Acutely, exercise results in a temporary inflammatory response. Long-term effects are anti-inflammatory through various mechanisms in your immune, hormonal, and metabolic systems. Regular exercise reduces fat mass and tissue inflammation, contributing to systemic inflammation. Exercise also increases muscle production of anti-inflammatory immune molecules called myokines. Neat, eh?

• Goal: If cleared by your doctor, aim for 150 minutes of moderate-intensity exercise per week and 2-3 full-body strength workouts.

Testing: When to Consider Lab Work

If you’re experiencing persistent symptoms long after an injury has healed, it might be time to consider lab testing. This can help detect signs of chronic inflammation and tailor a treatment plan specific to your needs. Testing can also help monitor your progress to ensure your interventions are effective.

• Goals of Testing: Assessment: detect signs of inflammation.
• Tailored Treatment: strategies for your specific needs.
• Monitor Progress: to track the effectiveness of the intervention.

Take Action: Your Path to a Healthier, Balanced Body

Understanding inflammation and managing it holistically is key to long-term health. By focusing on energy balance, nutrition, sleep, and exercise, you can support your body’s natural inflammatory processes and prevent chronic inflammation from taking hold. Remember, it’s all about balance—give your body what it needs to heal, and it will take care of the rest.