Need Help! Calcium and Vitamin D questions

[RawRevolution]

Hi Everyone,

Your help is deeply appreciated.

I'm a male in my mid 20s who has suffered anorexia nervosa a majority of my life and bulimia nervosa for many years now. I was recently diagnosed with a new health challenge/consequence to add to the list of many that eating disorders have caused me. I have full blown osteoporosis and my bones in my 20s are equivalent to someone over the age of 85, it's very severe.

I have been raw for about 3 years now and prefer to treat things as natural as possible. I have been advised to take 1,500 mg calcium and 1,000 IU Vitamin D daily and that is all they can do for me because medications are not approved for my age group and my health is too complicated for them to even attempt to test bunny me as I'd be a liability issue.

I am aware of certain foods I can eat raw that contain higher amounts of calcium (kale, bok choy, raw milk/dairy, almonds, grain sprouts, broccoli, sesame seeds and tahini, etc.) but would love any more knowledge/resources on this. Also, does anyone know of any good supplement brands to use in addition to foods? Please keep in mind I can only tolerate small amounts of food at one time - about the size that fits into the palm of your hand, which makes it hard for me to meet my daily requirements.

I live in an area with great stores to buy natural products so that isn't an issue.

I have done research on and offline but I know this is a great resource and thought I'd post here!

I also juice and would be interested in juice recipes that are high in calcium!

I have some good books with further info but they are packed right now as I am in the process of a move.

And for the record, yes I am getting professional help for my eating disorders. I really must take it one moment at a time, continue to remain hopeful and move forward.

Thanks so much for your help!

[SmilingRawDancer]

I've gotta run so I can only answer the juice question:

juice kale and collards -they pack ALOT of calcium.

[FloridaPatty]

a hold of. It's a tree. Leaves and flowers are edible. You can get seeds for it and grow it as a bush. Next would be most of the green veggies.

As for vitamin D - sunshine. Try using Castille soap. You can get it at health food stores. It cleans without taking off the base oils on the skin. You need them to process vitamin D with sunshine.

Juicing greens and wheatgrass should help a lot. You can sip during the day. Make sure you stay away from anything with cows milk in it and any soda pop.

[Veganforlife]

Sesame seeds pack a powerful amount of calcium.

Sunshine for vitamin D

My famous two words: GREEN SMOOTHIES

[Revvell]

I have been raw for about 3 years now and prefer to treat things as natural as possible. I have been advised to take 1,500 mg calcium and 1,000 IU Vitamin D daily and that is all they can do for me because medications are not approved for my age group and my health is too complicated for them to even attempt to test bunny me as I'd be a liability issue.

You don't know how lucky you are. Drugs have never solved these issues.


I am aware of certain foods I can eat raw that contain higher amounts of calcium (kale, bok choy, raw milk/dairy, almonds, grain sprouts, broccoli, sesame seeds and tahini, etc.) but would love any more knowledge/resources on this.

First, raw milk/dairy are the bane of your and anyone else's existence. Dairy does NOT supply calcium. IF this were true, then why/how is it so many dairy eating/drinking women fall and break hips. How is it that people in Asia who have little to no access to dairy have less osteoporosis than people who do have access? You might wish to read The China Study and also check out www.notmilk.com. VeganForLife knows whereof she speaks when she's talking about Green Smoothies and sunlight. Without sunlight, the vitamin D is not absorbed and utilized. Also, weight bearing exercises are mandatory.

I would look at a wider variety of dark leafy greens then what you've mentioned.


I also juice and would be interested in juice recipes that are high in calcium!

The problem I see here is, you are focused on one nutrient. All nutrients work in conjunction with the rest of the nutrients in your whole, natural food. For me, I'd focus on health, not on the disease. A lot of what's going on with you is where your focus is imo.

Look for all around health from the food that goes in your body, the words that come out of your mouth, the movement (or lack of) you are doing, the water you are drinking and the rest you are getting. It's all connected to good health.

[Kalimelle]

My heart goes out to you.

I would like to provide you with a recipe made with Chinese Herbs and Kombu that I have used from a wonderful book (though it is not raw-focused, as in TCM raw is not considered helpful for all conditions), and if you like, I would even be willing to send you some of these herbs that I have an overabundance of if you'd be willing to pay the shipping (I'm not going to be able to use them all up before they become stale.)

Could you email or private message me? I'm afraid that providing all of that information here might not be looked upon kindly as the recipe does involve boiling the ingredients together and thus is "cooked". It is a vegan recipe.

I hope this is helpful, and if not, I hope that you will find the healing you seek.

Namaste,
Kali

[Arky]

Since this is a calcium issue, you may find some relevant information in some of the tooth/dental-related posts, so you could try doing a forum search for those.

As you have already noted, dark leafy greens are definitely your friend. They are low in calories but provide a wealth of nturients such as calcium, magnesium, vitamin k, silicon etc. Basically, they are superb for both general health and bone-building. Check out Jarrow Formulas' 'BioSil' product. It is a highly bio-available form of silicon and will definitely help your bones. I notice it's effects on my hair and nails within 4-5 days of taking it, it makes a huge difference. Also, if you haven't already done so, you might consider using MSM as it assists the building of a myriad of connective tissues. Definitely consume sea vegetables as they contain a wide array of trace minerals which your bones desperately need. I believe they are also (safely!) steroidal in effect, thus encouraging the growth of new tissue (bones are not inert, they are living)

Avoid consuming too many sugary/sweet foods (including fruit) as these may increase your rate of calcium excretion. Similarly, avoid consuming too much of the diuretic foods such as parsley (even though parsely contains bone-supporting nutrients). I'm not saying avoid any of these foods altogether, I'm jst saying keep them to a relatively small proportion of your diet as you want to maximise your body's stock of bone-building nutrients while minimizing its excretion of those same nutrients.

Books you might find useful include:

Paul Pitchford's 'Healing With Whole Foods'

Paul Clayton's 'Health Defence'


Good luck.


J.


Some other threads:

http://www.rawfoodtalk.com/showthread.php?p=77710

There was another, very detailed thread on this, in the archives, which TruthSeeker and myself, and many others participated in, but it seems to have been deleted. Perhaps I just missed it in my search...

[Alomonger Pete]

Where can I get Vitamin D over than from sunlight?

I live like I'm a vampire and have no plans on changing this :cool:

(I'm aware of the ironic emo) :D

[Clare]

I am pretty sure you can find vegetarian vitamin D supplements if you can't get enough sun...neither can I. I prefer natural foods to pills...one day I will bask in the sun!

(note from moderator...Clare, please do not post non-vegan suggestions!)

I truly hope you have found help with the bulimia in eating a raw diet. I have learned that, for me, even raw dairy is a binge-trigger most of the time so I avoid that now...I am so grateful to be bulimia-free now on raw and I am sure that just by solving that issue your mineral balance will be vastly improved...

btw, my dentist is very impressed with my teeth, which still surprises me after a few years with bulimia. Over the past year, with drinking green juices, supplementing A and D as I mentioned, and getting plenty of healthy fats like coconut, flax, etc, my teeth have even improved! Where I had 2 pre-cavities the teeth are completely restored, praise God. So believe that your bones can be healed if you do what needs to be done.

[Juicy Girl]

Leafy greens and MSM are great. I also recomend raw chocolate it has the highest amount of magneseum. You need magnesum for your body to make calcium. From what I understand taking calcium pills does not work as well as magneseum does.Personally I hate poping pills. I love cacao. What a great way to improve your bones. My prayers are with you.

[chilove]

Orange juice is an awesome source of calcium.

Vitamin D in pill form in not very bio-available at all in my opinion. We don't need that much at all and our body can store it for a long time.

DON"T WORRY!!!! You will get plenty of nutrients on a raw vegan diet!!! Way more than with any other way of eating.

Blessings,

Audrey
www.rawhealing.com

[girl81]

Orange juice is an awesome source of calcium.


Just curious; why do you say that? Raw oj has less than 30mg calcium.:confused:

[rawstrength]

Please go to www.youtube.com and watch type in "David Wolfe on calcium". All 7 parts of the video are amazingly informative.

Wishing you a quick, healthy, and peaceful recovery!

[The Forager]

Just curious; why do you say that? Raw oj has less than 30mg calcium.:confused:

One whole, raw orange contains 7% of your daily intake of Calcium. Pretty powerful for a little fruit if you ask me. Also, if you juice many oranges, you can imagine the ratio goes even higher.

Seems like a winner to me!

[The Forager]

For 1 large Orange - and this is conventional, not organic.

Amount Per 1 large (3-1/16" dia)
Calories 86.48
Calories from Fat 1.99

% Daily Value *

Total Fat 0.221g 0%

Saturated Fat 0.0276g 0%

Polyunsaturated Fat 0.046g

Monounsaturated Fat 0.0423g

Cholesterol 0mg 0%

Sodium 0mg 0%

Potassium 333.04mg 10%

Total Carbohydrate 21.62g 7%

Dietary Fiber 4.42g 18%

Protein 1.73g 3%

Alcohol 0g

Vitamin A 8 % Vitamin C 163 %

Calcium 7 % Iron 1 %

Vitamin D 0 % Vitamin E 1 %

Thiamin 8 % Riboflavin 4 %

Niacin 3 % Folate 14 %

Vitamin B-6 6 % Vitamin B-12 0 %

Phosphorus 3 % Magnesium 5 %

Zinc 1 % Copper 4 %

[girl81]

I guess I look at it like, I would need 14 of those per day to meet my RDA. Is there a better way of looking at it? I'm always up for suggestions from this forum; I learn so much from you guys. :)

[The Forager]

Do a search for the post by jenjen about calcium - the RDa should be more around 300-400mg according to the china study et al, if I remember correctly. Lots of good info in her post.

[The Forager]

Found it. http://www.rawfoodtalk.com/showthread.php?t=34624&highlight=calcium+jenjen

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