What is Nutrition?

When you have a disability, you may be prone to having increased inflammation in your system. This impacts your digestion and can contribute to a number of secondary conditions. Many people then take more medications to address the symptoms from these other complications.

The good news is that the way we eat can address this increased inflammation naturally! Nutrition is using food to nourish your body with the essential elements it needs to live, grow and heal.

People who have disabilities commonly have poor diets, for a number of reasons. It may seem like a healthy diet is more expensive than eating junk food. We will address this in later posts to show how you can eat healthy foods on a budget. Getting to the super market may be difficult. If you don’t drive, and rely on a family member or friend to drive you, you may not go as often as necessary to have fresh food. It may also be inconvenient to take a dial-a-ride service, especially if you live in a more rural area. If this sounds like your situation, consider a delivery service that can bring you good, healthy foods.

Your disability may also make it difficult to prepare healthy meals. I often hear people who have limited tolerance to standing say this gets in the way of cooking. You can certainly prepare food sitting down! You can cut up foods, you can mix bowls, you can even (carefully) cook on a stove! It is better to take longer to prepare your meals because you have to adjust to a different way of doing it, then to deal with the complications brought on by an unhealthy diet.

A poor diet can lead to nutritional deficiencies. Depending on your primary condition, there may be other reasons why your body is not absorbing all of the good nutrients from food. Or you may be on medications that impact the absorption of nutrients in the digestive tract. All of these reasons are why you should consider following a better diet.

This information, and the information to follow, can be found in Eat Well, Live Well with SCI by Kylie James and Joanne Smith. Click HERE for all information.

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