5 Tips on How to Improve Joint Health Naturally

Is joint pain holding you back from living your best life? Right now, playing with your kiddos is a struggle because of the pain, and even simple daily activities aren’t so simple anymore.

I’m here to share my secrets on how to improve joint health naturally and why you may be experiencing joint discomfort in the first place.

This blog has been requested by many, and it isn’t surprising. One in four people who have arthritis is dealing with joint pain!

What Causes Joint Pain?

Joint pain could be caused by a number of factors. These include osteoarthritis, rheumatoid arthritis, bursitis, gout, strains, sprains, and other injuries.

While joint pain from osteoarthritis, strains, and sprains are caused by the wear and tear of the joints, joint pain from rheumatoid arthritis, bursitis, and gout is caused by underlying inflammation at the joints. Even though osteoarthritis is non-inflammatory arthritis, inflammation can still exist and worsen because of the wear and tear at that location.

While joint pain alone is sometimes unbearable, let’s not forget about experiencing swelling around the joints, stiffness when you wake up or when you’ve been stationary for some time, and even loss of mobility. This is no way to live! If you’re ready to take action and take control of your health, there are natural solutions to your joint pain.

How to Improve Joint Health

Since the most common underlying cause of joint pain is inflammation at the joints, let’s see how you can reduce that inflammation to give you relief.

While conventional medications do help give you the relief, it doesn’t get to the root cause. This will have you going back to the acetaminophen and ibuprofen all too often. And remember, long-term use of these medications can cause other imbalances and damage to your body. 

These include:

• GI issues like leaky gut, heartburn, ulcers, bleeding, nausea, and vomiting

• Cardiac problems

• Increased risk of stroke and heart attack

You should aim to improve your joint health naturally, using natural joint pain remedies instead of grabbing for these medications.

5 Home Remedies for Joint Pain

Exercises for Joint Pain

You may be thinking, “Taylor, I can’t move! There’s no way I can exercise!”. But, here’s the thing. Incorporating very low-impact exercises into your daily routine can significantly help your joint pain. You may have to work up slowly but remember, it takes time to heal naturally (but worth it!).

Here are some low-impact exercise ideas to give a try:

• Walking on the beach or barefoot in the grass, and add some grounding while you’re at it!

• Yoga with calming music in the background or in a quiet space

• Stationary bicycle

• Water aerobics (perfect for the summertime)

• Pilates 

Take it easy. If you’re feeling too much pain, ease up. You don’t want to cause more inflammation.

Exercises to avoid:

• HIIT workouts

• Running

• Tennis

• Jumping

• Save repeated motion on the same joints

Remove Foods that Trigger Inflammation

Eliminating foods that cause underlying inflammation is essential to minimizing your inflammation. Inflammatory foods in general I recommend people cut out are gluten, dairy, corn, soy, and sugar. people don’t even know they have a food sensitivity because the symptoms may pop up hours or even days after they have ingested a certain type of food.

Here’s what happens. Normally, food particles from your meals stay within the gut lining as it travels along the digestive tract. But, if you consume foods that your body does not agree with, it can view it as a foreign invader, signaling proinflammatory molecules, such as cytokines, leukotrienes, and prostaglandins. This constant proinflammatory signaling can then cause prolonged systemic inflammation, contributing to your joint pain.

Say “See ya” Stress!

Your body can’t heal if it’s in a stressed state! Stress is one of the most simple steps to say but can be one of the hardest for my clients to actually implement into their life. This is because non-stop plans, long work days, packed schedules, and a million kid’’ sports activities (per kid) have been accepted as the norm.

These stressful days after stressful days eventually, catch up, and your body starts to see the consequences. Stress can increase your risk of autoimmune diseases like arthritis, where antibodies attack your joints and can even disrupt your gut microbiome, causing that severe inflammation.

Natural remedies for arthritis and joint pain, in general, don’t have to be complicated. Incorporating stress-relieving activities into your daily and weekly routine can be hugely beneficial to not only your joints but your mental health as well!

Here are some ways to help manage your stress:

• Journaling

• Learning to say “no”

• Take some vacation time (or even a spontaneous beach trip!)

• Don’t overbook your schedule.

• Pencil in self-care time instead (hello, spa day?)

• Yoga/meditation (bring a friend along who could use some stress relief too!)

• Spending time with those friends where laughing is inevitable.

Heal Your Gut

If you’re looking into how to improve joint health naturally, healing your gut can be one of the beneficial things you can do. When your gut is imbalanced, damaged, or just unhealthy, it can cause systemic inflammation throughout your body. Since joint pain is an inflammation issue, you’ll want to eliminate any contributing sources of inflammation.

Healing your gut may include ridding your diet of foods you are sensitive to, addressing microbiome (bacteria) imbalances, underlying infections, and even replenishing nutrients. Read my blog on how to heal your gut naturally for more insight into gut health.

Focus on consuming Anti-Inflammatory Foods

Wondering what foods help with joint pain? Foods that contain anti-inflammatory properties are key. While you should be consuming mostly organic, whole foods, you can add some extra anti-inflammatory foods to each meal.

Joint Health Foods:

• Fatty fish that contain omega-3 Fatty Acids

• Nuts & Seeds

• Cruciferous Veggies, which contain a natural compound called sulforaphane, shown to block the inflammatory process

• Tart cherries, red raspberries, strawberries

• Olive Oil

• Lentils and Beans

• Garlic, onions, and leeks

Foods to Avoid for Joint Health

You’ll want to avoid any pro-inflammatory foods. These include:

• Processed and packaged foods

• Foods with high-added sugars

• White bread and white rice

• Sports Drinks, Juices, and Sodas

• Fried Foods

A few of my favorite supplements to help with inflammation

They can all be found and discounted here on fullscript with the exception of the protein

• SPM supreme by Designs for Health

• Collagen or protein powder with amino acids (use code TAYLORDUKES)

• Inflammatone by Designs for Health

• TumeroActive by Apex energetics

• Glutathione by Taylor Dukes Wellness

Find Natural Joint Pain Remedies With Functional Medicine

You can find relief with these natural joint pain remedies. Functional medicine allows you to discover underlying issues ranging from infections, nutrient deficiencies, food sensitivities, gut dysbiosis, inflammation, and more.

You may also want to check out one of my most popular blogs, Daily Detox Practices to Reduce inflammation.

With time, you’ll be able to address the root cause of your joint pain, so you won’t have to grab for the medications.

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