New and nervous

[a1icia]

Hi,

I'm new here and relatively new to a 100% raw foods diet and a bit nervous.

I've been trying to go raw for some time now. I love the concept because I've always eaten very healthy and I LOVE fruits and vegetables. The biggest bonus of eating raw is it's the only time my digestive system works. Everything else goes in and sticks like cement!

My problem is this, every time I try to go raw, vegan or vegetarian, my immune system goes haywire and I catch every bug that comes along and don't seem to get better until I start consuming animal protein again. I've been so sick for two weeks now and I'm at my breaking point, I just don't know what to do. I start eating animal protein and I see improvement but I don't want to eat it anymore. I feel stuck between a rock and a hard place. The last time I tried to just be a vegetarian, I was very sick for 2 months with no relief. I lost my motivation for everything I loved and got to the point where I could barely walk. It was awful. I don't want that to happen again.

I know I could be detoxing, but my brain is having a hard time believing that because I'm so healthy and always have been. Even when I'm not eating 100% raw, I eat so clean and really take care of myself, I rarely get sick.

I recently did a 3 week detox and felt amazing afterward which propelled me to try raw foods again.

My other concern is I'm 5'3" and before the detox I weighed 97 lbs. Now I weigh 91 lbs., which doesn't feel good to me, plus, I look emaciated.

So, that's why I'm nervous.

I really, really want to eat raw and have a strong immune system.

Has anyone else experienced this? Or do you have any words of wisdom?

Many thanks in advance,

Alicia

[RaeVynn]

Hi Alicia, welcome!
I'd suggest that your "sickness" is detox... and, in eating raw, you might try eating a bit more nuts, seeds, avocados, etc. Just fruit and veggies, while very nutritious, is also very, very cleansing, hence can bring on detox really fast. Nuts, seeds, avocados, and other sources of natural plant fats, can slow that down a little, help with nutrient absorption, and can slow weight loss (which you obviously don't need).
Be sure to get a variety of food, too. Fruit, veggies, leafy greens, raw nuts, seeds, oily fruits, like avocado, olives, durian, etc. Drink lots of water, too. :)

[michigan roman]

welcome to site :)

my weight gainers :

- walnut
- avacado
- banana
- ground sesame seed


* the immune problem is interesting to me as a 15 year vegan thats caught every cold / flu bug thats hit earth over that period . i wont alter my ethical foundation on veganism though so have to keep seeking out my complete raw vegan diet .

just tonite a friend mailed me on some type toxin being more readily found in vegans / vegetarians , and my thought was that its from all the pesticides / herbicides / fertilzers being used on farms . and now upon your immune statement its got me wondering if the farming methods are the cause , we're maybe corroding away at our g.i. tract with all the pesticides were ingesting which is wrecking our immune systems . so maybe all organic is the key .

[spicyfull]

Sure sounds like Detox to me. When you resume your old way of eating.....you stop the Detox. Do stick with the Nuts and Oils that are RAW and it will keep your Calories up. Please Don't give up.......... I wish you everything you need to Stay RAW.........Welcome to MY World.

[Dimond]

Welcome Alicia. If you can give an idea of your daily food intake, you can receive more specific suggestions. You may want to consider taking non-dairy probiotics to help strengthen your immune system while going through this detox.

[Lovemylabs]

Welcome Alicia. If you can give an idea of your daily food intake, you can receive more specific suggestions. You may want to consider taking non-dairy probiotics to help strengthen your immune system while going through this detox.

I agree, could you post what you are eating now?
I would for sure toss in probiotics, take them at night before bed - start out with 1-2 caps then try and work up to 3-4, I had a friend that caught EVERYTHING....twice I swear and I told her to start taking 4 probiotics a night and honestly she has not been sick sense ....must work.....I do not go to be w/out them.

Regarding the losing to much weight, post what you are eating and I know others on here are willing to help.
Eat more figs, bananas, oils, nuts, walnuts, avacodo with each meal if you can, that should do it and your skin will glow!
Take care, be strong, you have a support network right at your fingertips.

[T-Bird]

Those are frightening thoughts, Michigan Roman.


May we all live to see better days - planet health wise!

[T-Bird]

I would for sure toss in probiotics, take them at night before bed - start out with 1-2 caps then try and work up to 3-4, I had a friend that caught EVERYTHING....twice I swear and I told her to start taking 4 probiotics a night and honestly she has not been sick sense ....must work.....I do not go to be w/out them.

I've never heard to take them before bed, can you explain why?

[a1icia]

Thank you so much, everyone, for your input and kindness.

I take probiotics every morning on an empty stomach. However, when I've tried increasing my dose in the past, I would feel pretty nauseated throughout the day. So I try to stick with one dose in the AM. I take PB8, which out of the many over the years that I've tried, seems to work the best for me.

I also take 2 Tbs. of ACV. Normally it's only 1 Tbs. but while I'm sick, I take 2.

I have a big bowl of fresh fruit in morning. Strawberries, blueberries, pineapple, mango, and baby bananas. If I'm still hungry, I'll have a green smoothie, or eat more fruit, soaked almonds, or raw cereal with almond milk.

For lunch I'll have a big salad with lots of greens, bell pepper, cucumber, tomatoes, beets, carrots, shallots, avocado, sprout salad, and walnuts with balsamic and olive oil. Some days, I might add something like zucchini pasta if I need some variety.

For snack I'll have more fruit, like a couple kiwi, an apple or asian pear and maybe some nuts like brazil, macadamia or cashews. Or some veggies with tahini dressing.

For dinner, another big green salad like the one at lunch.

3 or 4 hours later another big fruit bowl like the one at breakfast.

I also love coconut oil, coconut butter and just recently bought a couple of young coconuts and I'm enjoying the coconut water and fresh meat.

I tried having a Vega meal replacement shake for the last couple of days and I think it helped me feel a little better but again it goes in and sticks like cement and I just can't live with that. Plus, it made me not hungry at all and I already, barely have an appetite.

I'm feeling a little better today, probably because I had some cooked food and halted the cleansing process but at least I wasn't hacking up leprechauns for a half hour this morning. I've really had all I can handle of doing that every day for two weeks now. Geez!

Thank you so much for your support and guidance. I appreciate it soooooooo much.

Alicia

[Aleesha Sattva]

i've only read your original post...

how about adding in bee pollen? it's an animal product and a protein...

[Veronica01]

Hi Alicia, While initial weightloss on raw is most likely water (as you flush out water and salt when you stop consuming salt) you need to make sure you're getting enough calories and food into yourself too. Make sure you are eating throughout the day if you cannot have 3 big meals of fruit, salads and smoothies. Try tracking the calories you are eating the first while to see if you're severely undereating which can make detox worse if your body thinks it's starving. You can go to fitday.com and enter in your food to see how many calories you are getting, even at your weight you'd want to be eating atleast 1400-1500 calories if you're sedentary.

[Aleesha Sattva]

ignore calories... just eat eat eat. allow yourself to be full. calories mean nothing really. focusing on variety and listening to your body is, in my opinion, much more valuable to you. ;)

it baffles me why people say initial weight release is water. i have one of those fancy scales and it shows my water % going up and the fat % going down... it never shows the water % going down unless i stop eating raw and/or stop drinking.

think about it. you are changing from dry cooked foods to juicy live foods... so how can your water levels go down? ya some people retain water, but not THAT much unless they are doing some crazy salt levels daily.

but... it's just my opinion... take it or leave it... and above all... have a GREAT day!

[Veronica01]

I was just mentioning calories to help be aware of a bare minimum for someone starting out and being so low in weight in the first place. It would be detrimental to assume you are full on 3 pieces of fruit every meal right? Not that she is, i'm just saying in general everyone is different for how full they get on raw food. If you were still losing weight and never checking food consumption but thinking you just eat until your full 3 times a day, you can't necessarilly say that is better. I don't suggest anyone count calories, but if you do the same activity most days you will burn the same amount of calories every day. It takes practice to change your perceptions of how much you need to eat every day, because visually you cannot tell the difference between most fruits and veggies for calorie content, and it's easy to underestimate in nuts and oils. Checking when you start off will give you SOME idea as opposed to no idea and no help tweaking your new eating style.

And sodium is in every processed food and I noticed that even when i was 50% raw most of the last few years i wouldn't lose weight even counting calories, when i went high raw 2 months ago i lost 12 pounds in 5 weeks, there's no way that it is all fat, i wasn't undereating or starving so there's a good chance a lot of it was water retention from eating any kind of salt in the past. Any salt directly ingested and not in whole foods will make you retain water as it is toxic to the body and needs to have so much water around it to neutralize it's PH level. Even as raw fooders many still add salt to dishes and recipes.

I don't quite understand why you write off alot of my posts in threads. People do ask for advice and no one is saying one person is more right than the other, but why write it off when you are different than her and i am different than her. We're all just trying to give advice and personal experience. I think it would be more appropriate to judge our advice if someone was having the same problems and the same weight and height as her. As neither of us are we do not have the right to say the other is wrong.

[a1icia]

I agree, eating more food and consuming more calorie dense foods should help the weight issue, if I can just get a bigger appetite.

I've tried bee pollen in the past and wasn't fond of the taste. It seems like you'd have to eat a lot of it to get a decent amount of protein and I'm not sure I could handle the flavor. Although, I might be able to disguise it in a smoothie.

Thank you both, for your input. Even though it's conflicting, I want to hear what everyone has to say. It's important to me and I really appreciate it.

[Veronica01]

Well it never hurts to ask advice and try things out for yourself. Who knows what the answer will be but it's great you are open to adapting your eating plan and figuring out what works for you. You dont necessarilly need to eat lots of high fat foods and less fruits and veggies, you could still maintain weight eating high fruit and salads and some nuts and avocados too, so just see what makes you feel the best and healthy.

[mommyliz]

have you tried spirulina in place of the animal protein? or hemp hearts?

[Myca]

When ever you change your diet, the body comes under stress. Even if it is a better diet. I think Veronica may be onto to something with the amount you are eating. Try eating something every two hours or so for the first week you go all raw. You are very small anyway, it may be your body does not have a lot in reserve.
Myca

[RawHeaven]

Alicia, you've gotten a lot of great advice from everyone. I will try not to repeat what has already been shared. I tend to lean with Aleesha in terms of ditching scales, worrying about calories and just eating raw. Your body is undergoing massive regeneration, cellular healing and cleansing itself. If you simply provide the tools, your body takes it from there. This process includes so many transitions, not just physical. Add to that our bodies are similar, but different and it's truly garbage in/garbage out. ;) What works for one body, may not work for another. What one person experiences in terms of detox, another may not. It takes time to heal. The "illness" you're experiencing is a great thing ~ something has come to the surface and it's on its way out.

Regarding your raw food list: I would wean myself off of the balsamic vinegar (consider not replacing it when you finish the bottle). Switch to raw apple cidar vinegar if you must have it. Just in case you don't already know this: make sure the bell peppers are any color except green. The green ones are not ripe and don't digest well in the human body. I would watch the shallots also if your detox is intense. Avocados and coconut oil will slow down your symptoms.

Don't worry about getting thinner, but yes pay attention to it. Conflicting, non-medical advice I know. What I mean by this is, you are shedding your cooked food body and eventually as you continue to eat raw foods you will rebuild with a much healthier foundation. You look extra slender because you're releasing (toxic) fat stores and what's left is lean muscle tissue. The less muscle you have (which is usually the case with women), the thinner you will appear. Over time this will correct itself, again, you got it, because the body innately knows how to heal itself! It happened to me, I dropped a lot of weight and I didn't recognize myself. I didn't like it either, but I trusted the process. I'm not talking about you necessarily, but underweight people have gained weight after adopting the raw food lifestyle.

Good luck!

Best wishes!

[a1icia]

I haven't tried spirulina. Sounds like it's worth looking into. Also, I've never heard of hemp hearts. I guess I have more researching to do. Thank you for the info Mommyliz.

It's true Myca, I have no reserve and eating every few hours really helps.

RawHeaven, that's a lot of great information. I'm sad to hear about the balsamic. I LOVE the one I use. It's 4% acidity and so smooth and devine. Is balsamic not a raw food or not good for you?

I didn't know that about green bell peppers, but I always buy the organic baby ones that are red, yellow and orange. They're so sweet. I've never cared for the green ones. Now I know why.

I'm trying to be brave and stick with this, believing it's for the best. I'm feeling better today than yesterday, which I'm very happy about but also worried about a relapse. I haven't done any work in two weeks. Yikes! I feel like I'm teetering on the edge of breakthrough or backslide. I just need to know beyond a shadow of a doubt that I, Alicia, can thrive on a raw food diet and not be thinking that, because I'm SO sensitive, I'm not cut out for it.

I noticed that when I added more avocado and nuts than usual yesterday, I felt really foggy, heavy and a little sick for hours afterward. So I'm thinking more calorie dense foods are not the answer for me.

On a positive note, I'm getting little glimpses of a general "buzzing" energy once in a while which keeps me hopeful.

Thank you so much for all your support. I love reading your responses.