Health Tips to Help with Multiple Sclerosis (MS) & Continence
Multiple sclerosis is a difficult illness to have to live with each day of your life. Especially, with one of the most common grievances related to MS being related to incontinence. Whether it be leakages, constipation, excess gas, or any related symptoms, continence can affect people with MS in different ways.
There is good news. There are established ways that incontinence can be managed, with many of these being very simple lifestyle adjustments. In this article, you’ll learn and discover health tips to help you with multiple sclerosis (MS) & continence, so that you can start better managing any issues you may be experiencing.
Ensuring your diet is healthy
One of the biggest impactors of incontinence in people with MS diet. Although the temptation for people with bladder issues might be to stop drinking water, this often exacerbates the underlying problem. This is because with less water being consumed, water becomes more concentrated, which can irritate the bladder even further.
Instead, space out water consumption throughout the day. In the case of food, high-fiber is by far the best solution – wholegrain foods, fruits, vegetables, and wholegrain and legumes will help a lot in this regard.
Caffeine in its many forms can quickly irritate the bladder. As it is a diuretic, it will make you need to urinate much more frequently. Although saying goodbye to your morning coffee might be sad, it’ll save you a lot of hassle in the long-run.
There are quite a few problem foods that can very quickly make incontinence worse. These include alcoholic drinks as these can stimulate the bladder. It is also advised that people avoid highly acidic foods, especially fruits like tomatoes, lemons, lime, grapefruit, and oranges.
Spicy foods, like hot curries, chilies, and hot sauce also can cause unwanted stimulation in your bowels. There are other food products that can affect people in different ways, however. One of the best things you can do to better understand issues in your diet is to keep a food and drink diary to identify any specific triggers. Then, you can adjust your diet accordingly.
More healthy lifestyle options for better control
There are quite a few other things that you can do to help manage incontinence – one of the easiest ones to start with is increasing the amount of exercise you do. Regular exercise improves your body’s blood flow, which includes blood flow to the gut, which in turn helps manage constipation.
Plus, exercise has the huge advantage of helping out with your general health, which also has a positive effect on your body weight through alleviating weight pressing on your bowel and bladder. Even people with limited mobility can exercise – simple pelvic floor muscle exercise is simple to do and can work wonders for your management of the surrounding muscles.
It is also highly recommended – for many reasons – that people with incontinence issues quit smoking. Smoking not only causes people to cough (which exacerbates issues related to incontinence) but can hasten the development of symptoms related to multiple sclerosis.
Taking better care of yourself is an investment
Ensuring you stay fit and healthy and concentrate on a high-quality diet is an excellent way to ensure incontinence is managed. With the right approach to a well thought out lifestyle and the right advice from your doctor, you’ll also be fortunate enough to be healthier overall.
