Don’t Eat That! 9 Foods That Trigger Painful Gout Attacks

Nine Foods to Avoid With Gout

For centuries, gout was called a “rich man’s disease” because it most frequently afflicted wealthy, overweight men. In years past, most “lower class” people could not afford expensive products like meat and butter. Only the wealthy could purchase the expensive, fat-laden foods, such as marbled steaks and organ meats, that were popular at the time.

As people with gout know all too well, crippling pain can occur when high levels of uric acid accumulate in the blood and cause crystals to form around a toe or other joint. This acid is formed in these joints when purines, which occur naturally in the body, break down.

Reducing your intake of foods that are high in purines, like the meats that were so popular with the wealthy men of days gone by, helps to control your production of the acid and reduce the likelihood of an attack of gout.

Take note of these foods to avoid for gout sufferers.

What Not to Eat When You Have Gout

Gout is quite a tricky condition to manage especially when it comes to diet. Eat the wrong kind, and you may just find yourself suffering from an unbearable gout attack. To help you out, I have listed the top foods you must absolutely avoid if you have gout:

1. Sugar, fructose, high fructose corn syrup
2. Seafood
3. Organ meats
4. Pork
5. Fried and processed foods
6. Alcohol
7. Canola Oil
8. MSG
9. Salt

I’ll explain why these foods are not good for your gout and provide you with some alternatives for the types of food you can eat to help you manage your condition better.

Sugar, Fructose, High Fructose Corn Syrup

Ah, sugar. Many of us are addicted to it but why are we to blame? It’s found in just about any kind of food – your soft drink, juice, ice cream, bread, coffee, cereal, yogurt, and dressing. Heck, even your ketchup probably has sugar in it! It’s no wonder why so many Americans suffer a number of diseases related to sugar.

As a gout sufferer, sugar is one of those things that you need to watch out for; otherwise, you run the risk of worsening your condition.

Dr. Hyon Choi conducted a 12-year study of men drinking different kinds of food and beverages including soft drinks, fruits, and fruit juices. He found out that the more a subject drank sweet drinks that were high in fructose, the higher their risk was of developing gout.

Now, this doesn’t mean you should completely avoid sweet foods. You can still consume fructose coming from fresh fruits, but you should take no more than 25 grams of sugar.

Pay attention to what you’re eating/drinking and do all you can to avoid sugary foods and drinks such as soft drinks, fruit juices, cookies, cereals, and more. At first, it’ll be hard to avoid, but you’ll be surprised by how fast your body adapts to a diet that’s low in sugar.

Seafood

Just about any kind of seafood including shrimps, lobster, oysters, mussels, scallops, and crab, is not good for gout. If you like to eat seafood, a study conducted in 2004 might just convince you to stop eating it.

The research, they found that men who ate seafood had a 51 percent increased risk of developing gout and each weekly serving led to a 7 percent increased risk. This is because seafood increases your uric acid levels.

It’s probably one of the dirtiest foods you can eat. Lobsters are scavengers that eat the waste of other animals and other pollutants. Shrimps are scavengers too, and they live off eating flesh from dead creatures. Tuna also carries high mercury levels.

So to avoid exacerbating your gout symptoms, it’s best to avoid seafood altogether.

Organ Meat

Organ meats include kidneys, liver, heart, brains, tongue, tripe, and many other animal parts. This is another type that you must entirely avoid as it is high in toxins that can trigger a gout attack.

For example, the liver is responsible for safely removing toxins or storing it if removal is not possible. By eating it, you’re eating all the toxins the animal wasn’t able to expel in its lifetime. Organ meats are also high in saturated fats and cholesterol which is not good for your gout as it raises your blood’s uric acid levels.

Remove organ meats completely from your diet to prevent your gout symptoms from worsening.

Pork

Pork is another scavenger animal that eats just about anything including garbage. If you want to improve your gout condition, you’re better off not eating pork products like bacon, hot-dogs, sausages, ham, and pork chops.

Also, consider the fact that today’s meat is full of antibiotics, growth hormones, pesticides, herbicides, high levels of adrenaline, and nuclear wastes. Your kidneys would be required to work harder just to process these dangerous compounds which in turn affects its ability normal eliminate uric acid.

Fried and Processed Foods

Do you know why more and more people are suffering from gout? It’s because fried and processed foods have become so easily accessible. They’re at your nearest convenience store, the mall, in stands, and in your neighborhood. You can even cook it in your home.

Fried and processed foods are just not good for your gout as they take a toll on your kidneys. They’re also quite addictive just like sugar. If you can avoid fast food and other processed foods, please do.

Next Page: More foods to avoid eating with gout, and foods you can eat to help manage gout.