Question about maintaining weight

[Shmoopie]

I tried to post about this before and as far as I can tell, the post never even showed up on the site. If it did...sorry for posting it twice.

I'm 6' tall and 117 pounds. Very underweight. I've always been this way, fluctuating between 15 pounds all year long (and just in case anyone is wondering, I can eat more than most men that I know). Even when I'm up to 130, I'm still underweight, though 130 looks much better than 117. The one thing that has been holding me back from going raw is the fear of losing even more weight. For me to gain any weight at all is a huge task, and one that involves more protein than most people can stand to even look at, let alone ingest. Typically meat. Since going raw obviously means getting rid of meat, I'm not sure what I could do to gain or maintain my weight after the transition. Because of the weight issue, I realize that I probably couldn't ever go 100% raw...and that's ok. 75% or more would be a serious improvement for me, and one that I would be very happy with. My question is: what can I eat - raw, or the 25% of my food that can be cooked - that would help me to maintain any sort of weight? Would oatmeal and beans do it? Are the powders that are put in protein drinks acceptable, or are they heated in some form, eliminating them as a raw form of protein? Are there raw foods that would help me gain or hold onto weight? I don't see that nuts would help as I imagine it would take a LOT of nuts to make any sort of impact. For me to gain weight on a cooked food diet, I have to eat 5-7 large meals every day, consisting mostly of meat. So to me...it seems that nuts wouldn't do much.
My only goal is too look healthy. Being this underweight, I'm often approached by strangers AND people that I know, and asked if I have an eating disorder. I'd just like to be able to have enough weight on me so not to look like a skeleton, but also be able to enjoy the health benfits of a raw - or mostly raw diet.

The few people that I've talked to about this have suggested exercise. The only trouble with that is that after only 2-3 weeks of lifting weights, I start to build up pretty quickly. I don't want to look like a body builder either. Any info or suggestions at all?

[karenisraw]

Schmoopie,

Hi! I though I would just offer my suggestions. I do not know how long you have been raw. For me and many others after a couple of weeks on 100% raw, your appetite begins to decrease. For me, I almost lost interest in food at all. Maybe when y our appetite decreases, you could just force yourself to eat more food anyway to gain weight. I guess I would suggest the nuts and sunflower seed patés. I eat these wonderful mushrooms stuffed with basil and nut patés that are pretty rich as they are completely stuffed with nuts and olive oil. You could make nut heavy raw crackers and eat tons of guacamole. (nobody gets tired of guacamole!). Also you could make large amounts of nut "meat" loaf and eat that as often as you could. You could make raw corn chips with nuts included in the puree and munch on them with guacamole. Also you could eat raw "nut butter sandwiches" Nutty breads with organic natural jams that you make and nut butters.

Hope this helps you,

k

[Rawkinlocs]

Glad to see you were able to post.

There could be factors to your weight issue including the possibility of parasites (gross I know, but very possible).

What going raw would do for your body, even being an "underweight" male, is cause your body to first cleanse itself of unhealthy tissue, etc and then rebuild with healthier. One thing you must understand is that protein is not created BY protein, but by amino acids. Your greatest and most assimilable (which is most important...that your body is assimilating the protein which is probably why you found it took so MUCH meat) are green leafy vegetables!
Read this article: http://www.rawfoodtalk.com/forum/showthread.php?t=3708

Get more and more greens into your diet...might wanna check out http://rawfamily.com and look into getting the book entitled "Green for Life" for a delicious way to get more greens in...green smoothies!

Also, healthy fats such as avocado, nuts and seeds, coconut oil, coconuts may be helpful. You could also try Hemp Protein Powder (Alissa sells some on her website http://alissacohen.com) in your smoothies and shakes.

But upon going raw, at first you might lose more weight, but your body will rebuild it. As long as your raw diet is balanced with a good variety of foods, you will gain the weight back and your body will get to ITS ideal, healthy weight, which sometimes isn't what WE think it should be.

Also, getting Alissa's book with the recipes is good in the beginning because many of the meals are rich and hearty and will help you get over the initial "hump" during the transition from the SAD to raw!

I'm sure you will get other suggestions, but that's my .02.

Also, check out http://thegardendiet.com as Storm is a raw vegan of 30 years (I think) who looks GREAT and has a great physique. He has an ebook for building muscle on the raw diet. In fact, check out this recent article and pictures they put on their site: http://thegardendiet.com/storm2.html

I think the suggestion of exercise is excellent as well! You might "build up", but you'll be a nice, lean muscular reminiscent of the late Bruce Lee perhaps.

But if nothing else, try it for 30-60 days and see what happens. If the results are not to your liking, you can always go back!

Oh, and Welcome to the board!! :D

[Shmoopie]

karenisraw -

Wow! I will try those out...thanks.
I haven't gone raw at all yet. This weight thing is the one thing that is keeping me from getting started. I'm trying to learn as much as I can about what I can do for my weight before I get started.

Rawkinlocs -

Thanks! Just to clarify, I'm a woman :)
I think I've seen the site you recommended...the gardendiet one. They both look amazing! I do make a lot of green juices in my juicer...which I love. Drinking them sure is convenient. Anyway, thanks again. I'll try everything out that you've suggested.

[Rawkinlocs]

Rawkinlocs -

Thanks! Just to clarify, I'm a woman :)
I think I've seen the site you recommended...the gardendiet one. They both look amazing! I do make a lot of green juices in my juicer...which I love. Drinking them sure is convenient. Anyway, thanks again. I'll try everything out that you've suggested.

Oh MY!! :o :o :o I read where you said you eat more than most men that you know and made the assumption that you, too, were a man. My deepest apologies!! Green juices are great, but green smoothies are something all around different. One of the major differences is that they keep all the fiber that you end up removing when juicing.

[Shmoopie]

Good point on the smoothies! I'll try that out today.
And no worry about the confusion lol

[dreamrawalwz]

You shouldn't go by the "standard" on what weight is "underweight" or not. Yes, if you're severly underweight then I would increase consumption, fats, ect., but if YOU feel healthy and strong don't worry about it. There was a site I read just last night (i'll post it later tonight) about how what society thinks as "too skinny" is what the human body is supposed to be. You're weight will go to it's "natural" weight after you clean up your diet and if you need to gain you will do so after cleansing :) If you're REALLY worried about it you can load up on nuts, avocados, oils, and dried fruit. Trust me, the keep me gaining and I don't even need it lol.

[beelzebubble]

i'm wondering if you've ever been tested for malabsorption. do you have any intestinal issues? any autoimmune disorders, such as thyroid disease, lupus, ms, or anything else with an autoimmune component?

intestinal issues like celiac disease (which i have, that's why this rung a bell for me-although i have the opposite problem) can cause one to be very skinny. you might want to look into getting tested for it-even if you have no symptoms. celiac can be mostly silent. if you want to know more, just let me know.

:)

[Shmoopie]

As far as normal weight, I'd agree that there's no general "normal/healthy" weight. Those charts at the doctors office always make me laugh. I think the charts say I should be 160...which I know isn't right for me. I have a very tiny frame, very small bones. 130 isn't so bad. This 117 that I'm at right now however makes me very uncomfortable. My shoulders hurt when I sleep because I'm literally laying on bones. Other times when I've been at this weight, sitting has hurt because again, I was just sitting on bones. There are many bones protruding and it's not only uncomfortable, but I personally don't like the way it looks.

As far as health goes, I've had my thyroid tested once. Everything came out fine with that. I've not been tested for celiac, lupus, MS, or anything else. As far back in my life as I can remember, people have always talked about my weight. I figure this is just the way I'm built, so I don't tend to feel any sort of urgency about having any tests done. Maybe I should reconsider. Someone mentioned parasites and I have considered that as well, and am going to do a parasite cleanse soon. Thanks for the advice though, beelz. By the way...is "malabsorptoin" just as it sounds? How do they test for it?

[beelzebubble]

edit: oh, and yes...it's just the way it sounds :)

usually with malabsorption, they do a battery of tests. some doctors just check your vitamin levels. others will go the extra step and order a fecal fat analysis. the reason i brought up malabsorption is that with some intestinal disorders malabsorption is common. the main symptom is low body weight with increased appetite. it can also cause the opposite problem though, if you have a keeper type metabolism (as in slow), you can put on weight, as your body goes into starvation mode-this is what happened to me.

when tested, i was deficient in almost every vitamin that they tested for, and i was passing twice the fat in my stools as i should have been.

celiac came to mind because you mentioned needing to eat protein heavy meals in order to deal with your low weight. protein heavy meals tend to be low in gluten containing grains. if you are doing a mostly/all raw diet, you could try to avoid wheat, rye, barley, and oats for a few weeks or so, and see if you notice a difference. if not mostly/all raw it becomes a little more complicated, as gluten is in most processed food.

anyway, i hope this helps a bit. feel free to pm me if you'd like more info.