Foods to avoid with cold sores
are those foods that contain high levels of the amino acid arginine and low
quantities of lysine.
Lysine and arginine are two common amino acids found in foods. They both have a
powerful effect on
cold sores.
Arginine is a protein fraction that is essential in the production of new herpes
virus. The nerve cells have a storage area within the cell specifically for
arginine.
Lysine and arginine compete for the same storage space. The cell cannot create
new virus using lysine.
A high lysine content in your cells often causes the herpes virus to give up and
return to hibernation.
You have just prevented a cold sore. Quite often you
won't even know it.
These are a few of the foods to avoid with
cold sores. These foods are higher in arginine than lysine.
---- Any type of milk or dark chocolate
---- Nuts and Most Seeds
---- Shellfish
---- Grains such as wheat and oats
---- Fruits such as grapes, oranges, tangerines
---- Many vegetables have equal amounts of these two amino acids, however
onions, peas, broccoli, and squash are high in arginine.
Some foods above are very important for your
health needs or difficult to avoid. They are considered nutrient dense essential foods. Doing without
them for a week or so should be harmless.
However, for optimal health, you should not avoid these foods for any length of
time. Do not use avoidance of these foods as a method to prevent cold sores.
To
do so could weaken your immune system. This could actually cause more cold
sores, rather than less.
Better than avoiding good foods, you can increase your consumption of lysine
during the cold sore. This is useful not only to heal a cold sore but prevent
new sores.
Here are some
high lysine foods that are good anytime and are especially good
for balancing out some of the avoidance foods. You don't have to give up
chocolate completely.
Fish (flounder is very rich in lysine), chicken, beef, eggs, apples, papaya,
beets, and all dairy products. Cheeses and yogurt are high in lysine. These
will provide a preferred lysine to arginine ratio of 2 to 1.
A six-ounce serving of
flounder, mentioned previously, will give you about 6000 to 7000 mg. of
body-ready lysine.
Also, you can get lysine in very convenient 500 mg. capsules.
Popular dosage is three to eight capsules daily during the cold sore and one or
two capsules daily as a maintenance dose
to prevent cold sores.
Lysine is a common protein and is perfectly safe in most any normal quantity.
Yes - you can have your chocolate and eat it too. Keep in mind that you just
need to increase your lysine intake to balance
out these high arginine foods.
Keeping to a special diet is not fun and most people, like myself, drop
it quickly. Fact of the matter is - I have not followed these diet
restrictions very well at all.
I love chocolate too much!
Instead -
I use an amazing cold sore home
treatment I discovered by accident a few years back.