Added email account 1000's of read emails coming up as unread!

I deleted my email account then added it back 3 days later. When I added it, all past read emails began downloading, in 100 or so increments, as unread. I tried marking them all as read and deleting, only for more emails to download. How do I add the email without this glich occuring? These emails are marked as read on my server? It would take days to get all of the past emails to download and delete.