Autoimmune Diseases

The prevalence of autoimmune diseases is growing with more than 23.5 million Americans affected by them. And, over 100 autoimmune conditions have been documented. An autoimmune disease occurs when your own immune system attacks your body, which results in an array of symptoms and additional health problems.

However, with appropriate changes to your lifestyle and diet, you can help improve your autoimmune symptoms. Fasting is an effective strategy to deal with autoimmune conditions. By fasting, you abstain from food for a set period of time to help your system and reduce inflammation.

Let’s take a look at what autoimmune diseases are and how they develop and progress. Then let’s take a look at how fasting affects your immune system and several fasting strategies to try. We will also review how to use the various fasting strategies and how often to use them to improve your autoimmune symptoms.

Normal versus autoimmune responses

In a normal immune response, when antigens invade your body, your immune system produces antibodies that remove the invading antigens. The antibodies remain and protect you from future attacks.

In a dysfunctional autoimmune response, your immune system forms antibodies to self-antigens. Those antibodies attack the self-antigens resulting in inflammation and tissue damage.