Did you know that joint pain may be the result of eating lectins?
Lectins are a plant protein that plants use to protect themselves from having their babies eaten. After all the next generation is what drives all living things right?
Well there's a little talked about lectin in wheat called WGA or wheat germ agglutinin (not it's bigger cousin gluten). This little terror is in whole grain. It's there waiting to protect the seed. However, when we eat that "whole grain goodness" we are digesting WGA which loves attaching to joint cartilage and in turn stimulates our immune system to step up, leading to inflammation.
Most of us drop a couple of NSAID (nonsteriodal anti-inflammatory drug) such as ibuprofen OR take a glucosamine supplement. Glucosamine occurs naturally in your body in the fluid that envelopes our joints and helps our cartilage. But when we eat WGA and have related joint pain our glucosamine binds to the WGA and emits it from our gut before it enters our body.
That's why taking glucosamine can help - it supplements it's naturally occurring sister that's run to our defence. And ibuprofen works by dumbing the inflammation caused by our immune system.
But why not try cutting out the WGA in whole grain altogether and see how we feel?
After all these lectins are not our friends.
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