Foods To Avoid With Cold Sores To Be Cold Sore Free

Foods to avoid with cold sores are those that are particularly high in arginine and have low levels of lysine. In this article you will learn about the key foods that have the biggest effect on your cold sores.

Lysine and arginine are two common amino acids found in foods. They are the two most widely researched nutrients that affect cold sores.

These amino acids work like this.

Cold sore events occur because of the replication process of herpes simplex virus (type 1 and 2). This is a sub-microscopic virus that creates more virus by forcing your cells to become herpes factories. When the cell becomes full of new virus, it is destroyed to release them. This causes the cold sore ulcer.

Arginine is a protein fraction that is essential in the production of new herpes virus. Your nerve cells have a storage area within the cell specifically for arginine.

Your cells store lysine in the same area. New virus cannot be created using lysine.

If you have a diet rich in lysine, your cells will discard some arginine to store more lysine. The herpes virus, looking to clone itself, will avoid the cells that cannot support the cloning process.

With enough lysine in your diet, quite often the herpes virus cannot replicate and will go back into hibernation. This can stop a cold sore from developing any further.

Foods to avoid with cold sores. These are foods with higher levels of arginine.

---- Chocolate (ouch)

---- Nuts such as almonds, walnuts, pecans, peanuts

---- Flax, sesame and most other seeds

---- Shell type seafood such as oysters and crab

---- Grains such as wheat and oats

---- Fruits such as grapes, oranges, tangerines

---- Most vegetables are neutral but avoid rutabagas, winter squash and pumpkins, broccoli, carrots and corn

Fact is - it can be hard to avoid certain foods. Some should not be avoided. You will notice many of the foods on the avoid list have a high nutritional value and are important for your optimal health. You probably would not hurt yourself by avoiding these foods for just a week or so.

Keep your immune system strong by not avoiding these foods for more than a couple weeks. This avoidance program works as a treatment for a current cold sore. It is not healthy for a prevention program. If your immune system weakens, you could end up with more, not less, outbreaks.

Better than avoiding good foods, you can increase your consumption of lysine during the cold sore period. This is useful to heal a cold sore quickly and prevent new sores.

Here are some high lysine foods that are good any time you have a cold sore. They are especially good for balancing out some of the foods to avoid with cold sores.

All dairy products are rich in lysine, such as cheeses, yogurt, and whole milk. Other lysine rich foods include chicken, beef, beets, apricots, figs, avocado, apples and soybeans. Fish is a particularly good source of lysine, especially flounder.

OK - I know keeping to a special diet is not fun. Most people, like myself, drop it quickly. Truth is, I have not followed these diet restrictions very well at all. I love chocolate too much!

For a large number of people, an easy and powerful alternative to this restricted diet is to take lysine as a supplement. Lysine is available anywhere you find vitamins. It is normally found in 500 mg. capsules. Taking four to eight capsules daily during a cold sore and one to two capsules daily between cold sores is common.

Is lysine safe to take in large quantity?

Lysine is perfectly safe. Eight capsules daily is only 4000 mg., or 4 grams. No bad side effects have ever been noted. You often exceed this just by eating food alone. A four-ounce serving of flounder, for example, will provide the equivalent of 4 to 5 grams of lysine. The capsules are just more convenient.

Yes - you can have your chocolate and eat it too. Keep in mind that you just need to increase your lysine intake to heal or prevent cold sores and balance out those high arginine foods to avoid with cold sores.