Exercising and healthy living - can these be paths to remission?

I had always been a healthy eater and always exercised. Hit with UC and continued to eat healthy and exercise. Had a 10 year remission, and with no changes in maintenance medications or eating, I went into a severe flare which resulted in the loss of my colon and rectum. Personally, I don't think diet or exercise has anything to do with the onset or turning off UC. Of course it's always better to eat healthy and have an active lifestyle, illness or not.

Sue

There are so many athletes, runners, and gym rats on this forum that I actually ran a thread last year asking if exercise encourages ulcerative colitis.

I'm with you tiesto81! I'm still pretty hopeful about eating right and exorcising. I'm in remission, and would very much like to keep it that way! I read the other posts in this thread, and while it is a little discouraging, I'm still going to try. Because like everyone says, UC affects people differently, so while some things may work for you, they may not work for others.

Its common sense....living a healthy lifestyle will increase your odds for success with overall health. Will it prevent or guarantee anything...NO, but why not do everything you can to help yourself in the chance it may. Look at the show, "The Biggest Loser"...its crazy that exercise, diet, and mindset, can improve overall health so quickly. So, will it help with UC? Why not do it just in case.

Eating anti-inflammatory foods ( for myself this includes non-red meat may not work for others ) such as curcumin, salmon, yogurt while being active + avoiding known trigger foods is keeping me in remission med free. It is important to note that avoiding foods/supplements known to cause problems is key here as well as not over training. Active lifestyle to the extreme vastly increases inflammation in the body. Happy medium for both.

in my experience, exercising and eating healthy hasn't done crap for me. i was still diagnosed with UC and even though it's my friends and family that eat countless amounts of junk food. my diet actually has to be less healthy when i flare because i can't eat all the fresh, high fiber foods i usually eat. i also can't exercise either.

without precise terms, and without recognition of the combined genetic and environmental factors in UC, this thread has no clarity, no value.

"eating healthy" means different things by different people. For some this may mean high fiber, but there are times when fiber is and is not helpful to UC. Some may look at the elimination of hard to digest foods that are often linked to sensitivities (or exacerbation of symptoms) such as gluten or dairy. Some folks focus on anti-inflammatory foods, but these may or may not fall into the "healthy" category for any particular diet. Some association has been found between diet and onset of UC in some sub-populations with high genetic susceptibility. (2nd generation immigrants demonstrate this because they get UC while their parents, eating the same western diet, don't). Generally however, across all genotypes, their is not a strong association between diet and initial triggering of UC; but there does seem to be an association between diet and relapse of UC. Still, much more precise terminology than "eating healthy" will be needed to avoid discussing apples and oranges.

It truly amazes me how many people who see an environmental trigger (e.g., antibiotic, toxin, stop smoking, ... etc.) want to completely dismiss genetics. At the same time, folks who see UC in the absence of apparent environmental trigger (e.g., athlete, healthy eater, active) want to completely dismiss both genetics and environment - making statements like "its completely random". In the first case, genetics explains why the environmental trigger gives some people UC and not others. In the second case, genetics explains why some folks very predisposed to UC (e.g., several relatives with UC) will be triggered by things so subtle that the trigger is not recognized. THis is just rehashing the nature/nurture debate when the evidence is clear in UC and many other things that it is BOTH!

Exercise, and other things associated with better health, may not directly impact UC, but there are always indirect impacts. For example exercise tends to lower stress and promote good immune function. Lower stress may make relapse less likely, and better overall immune function may undercut genetic disposition. But, there is a big difference in what may cause or protect someone from UC, and what may manage it or cure it. Once something triggers autoimmune (dysregulation of the immune system) there is not good evidence that removing the trigger will fix things - although restoring gut flora balance with probiotics/FT may be a step in that direction.

Finally, saying random things that have no logic, never helps. For example there likely are more toxins in food, and there likely are less nutrients, however you cannot assert that the food is probably contaminated because they are no nutrients. The laws of logic and causality must still apply. Likewise, asserting that "you were born healthy" is never grounds for dismissing genetics in favor of environment - especially when you have several close relatives with IBD, and you develop IBD at about the exact age it is usually expected.

IMO eliminating processed sugars, omega-6, having the right fiber between flares, lowering stress, guarding against food sensitivities, and trying to keep the rest of your body as fit and healthy as possible is always going to be good in the long run. Some may still spiral down and end up with surgery; but this does not mean that none of those things do not matter.

     I don't think eating healthy and exercising regularly has anything to do with whether or not you develop UC.  Personally, I think there is a strong genetic factor involved and the overuse of antibiotics.  At least in my case, I do think they were big contributers to my onset of UP (proctitis).

well said pb4, I agree with everything you posted.
It's not how or why you got UC but the choices you have now to at least have some control over your disease and your overall health.

The vast majority of people that say they eat a healthy diet, do not. I personally believe in the primal/paleo approach so any diet that includes grains, whole or not, sugars, and processed foods is not healthy in my estimation.

As such, I do believe a truly healthy diet and regular exercise are huge factors in preventing and reversing the effects of many diseases, IBD included. It has been working for me.

As for food triggering flares, it does for me. I believe in the bacterial imbalance theory of IBD as described by SCD advocates (although I have many issues with the SCD itself). My UC got much worse when I was eating what I thought then was a healthy diet which was heavy on the whole grains.

beatUC said...
well said pb4, I agree with everything you posted.
It's not how or why you got UC but the choices you have now to at least have some control over your disease and your overall health.

That is what I was thinking. His posts sounded spot on.


Everything is relative. Does eating more healthy make a difference ? Does working out more versus less make a positive difference ?

It has for me. I am looking forward to my 2 year anniversary of no UC with NO MEDS.

No fake foods no fake drinks
Food you could get 500 years ago
Weightlifting followed by adequate rest
Various cardio
Regular bloodwork thru directlabs.com to see how much body inflammation I have, platelet counts, iron levels, organs etc. 4 pages of metrics per draw.

This wont work for everyone as I believe UC is a catchall for problems the doctors dont understand and there are 3 groups, those like myself going natural and finding meds not effective, those who are able to rely on meds, those who unfortunately cannot get anything to work and may need surgery route.

I wonder how much owrse off the health-nuts and workout junkies might be with their IBD if they didn't eat totally healthy and continue working out...that's just the way I look at it knowing the living that particular lifestyle won't obviously stop one from still getting an IBD but it may just be helping them cope with it better compared to the couch potatoe that eats mainly a poor diet.

By cope I mean maybe less frequency of flares and maybe less severe flares, less or no issues with osteo and/or arthritis.

I've been exercising for the most part, for the last 8-9 yrs, I altered my diet maybe around 5ish yrs ago....I've had my crohn's colitis (still active and still no full remission) for 21 yrs now and absolutely no osteo or arthritis issues which considering the fact that I've never been in full remission the entire time I've had this DD, I think that's pretty good odds to not have those osteo/arthritis issues...or maybe I'm genetically-IBD programmed not to have them, I don't know but I love working out and combined with eating healthy I think it's good for my overall health and coping (for the most part, we all have our brake downs) with my IBD.