Introducing myself

[cts]

Hi everyone! I thought I should introduce myself. My name is Kim and I am 31 years old. A little over 4 years ago, I had severe adverse reactions to 2 prescription medications that caused minor neurological damage. I became very very sick and it took me about 15 months to start to recover, but I still have residue health problems from this damage.

It is now many years later since this reaction and I take no medications at all now. Because of what happend to me, my body is very hypersensitive (trying to protect itsef from further damage) and I cannot even tolerate synthetic vitamins, herbs, and especially medications. I tried doing 100% raw but my body was not ready and I got very ill. I really don't think it was a healing crisis, rather, I think my body is just not strong enough to do a hard core detox and the toxins only recirculate b/c my body is not strong enough to push the toxins out so fast. The reason I think this is b/c a couple of years ago, I did detox and it caused me to have an immediate increase in my glares and halos in my eye and the increase of glares and halos stayed. I have learned that I am very sensitive to detox and can only do it in a very very gentle way. I am unfortunately very weak for a 31 year old. I feel that I look older than my age b/c of my complexion and have jaundice from my liver being congested!

As you can imagine, I am a unique case as most ppl are strong enough to handle a 100% raw diet right away. I have been slowly tapering into the raw food diet. The only non raw foods I have been eating are sprouted grained breads and rice but everything else is raw. My body seems to be okay with that.

I am very excited to become healthy! I am especially interesting in living a healthy lifestyle since I had such a tramatic experience with conventional medicine and my moto for me is to be as natural as possible!

[streetsurfer]

Welcome and Bless you. It is good that you at least know some of the things that precipitated and caused your decline. I too was damaged by prescriptions and still working my way out of the damage.

Have you been checked to see if you have food sensitivities? I had a few prior to the meds but they multiplied drastically post medication. Most of my life I had refrained from phamaceuticals, as I never really tolerated them well, and usually suffered much of the list of negative side effects whenever they were taken.

I encourage you to have testing for food sensitivities done if you haven't yet. You may be trying certain raw foods, that would be good for all people, yet your immune system reacts to them and makes you ill. That's not becaue itis raw, but because your bldy has made antibodies for the protein in them and each time you eat them you have a severe immune system response, running you down further, causing pain, mental fogginess, neurological problems, disregulation of the bodies autonomic functions (sound familiar?).

With me, if I had gone raw before finding them out, I still would have been made fairly ill by consuming the wrong raw items. You can become sensitive to these foods as a direct result of the damage the pharmaceuticals do to the functioning of the gut. In time, and with the help or raw, you can overcome these sensitivities provided you leave the offending foods alone for now.

In hopes of encouraging you and showing you that you are now on the right track, I had been fighting getting better for maybe three years after discovering the allergies, but when I came here and switched to high raw the rate of recovery seems like it's tenfold.

[cts]

hi streetsurfer!

thank you so much for your kind post!

i wa thinking, perhaps it is something to do with our enzymes if we are sensitive to medications and foods?

that is such a good idea about food allergy testing. i have very severe dry eyes that cause cornea inflammation and i always suspected it might be from an autoimmune issue and food allergies can cause those!

which test do you think is the best to find out food allergies? do you think kinisiology would be good or do you think a blood test? what foods did you find out you were allergic to? i read somewhere you can check for a food allergy by checking your pulse before and about about 30 minutes after eating something to see if it is much higher than it was before you ate. have you heard of that?

[cts]

btw, thank you so much for sharing! i did not realize i could have a sensitivity to a raw food! but it makes sense b /c we can become sensitive to anything. i had assumed it was more processed, unnatural foods that would cause an autoimmune reaction. i thought the biggest offenders were wheat flour and dairy.

[streetsurfer]

You're very welcome cts!

There is a difference between a true allergy, and a sensitivity due to antibodies having formed, as I understand it. An allergy, I think would show up right away with the pulse checking just as it would induce immediate symptoms like congestion or sneezing, watery eyes, hive, etc,. Because it is not a true allergy for me the effects are not immediate, rather spread out over the next four days or so. I tried the pulse check recently with a known problem food - eggs, to test (testing only, not promoting cooked foods) if I was getting better. I am, since going high raw. It still bothered me some but much much less than several months ago when pre-raw. The pulse did not rise more than a few counts per minute. However I had got up and walked to another room and back during it. You should sit still through the test. Therefore I disregard the pulse test as a valid check for my sensitivities. I have to wait through those next few days to watch for symptoms. Since going raw this is how it has made it much easier to find what set of symptoms are caused by what foods. It makes sensitivities due to antibodies very hard to self diagnose.

The only test I have had is an IGg Elisa, short for Immunoglobulin G Enzyme Linked Immunosorbent Assay. If you have it done the results will come back with a fairly comprehensive workbook to help you work on your health and food sensitivities. There were other tests performed for candida and some nutrient defficiencies I think, by the same lab Immuno Laboratories.

I can't comment on kinesiology since I have never had it done on me. I've heard of it but know little about it.

My reactive foods-the bad foods are basically most of what I was eating at the time I developed the problem that caused them, a mixture of celiac disease, a severe infection/illness, pharmaceuticals, injury and end of a career, and probably a little ptsd from it all. Everything all happened within the same short period of time so it is difficult to tell which was the greater of the causes. I know from the worsening as a result of the pharms that they were a large part of it. My list is just the known ones out of only 120 tested for. For more cost of course you can be tested for more. If I could afford it I would go for more.
My bad foods:
avocado banana kidney bean brazil nut celery cheese chili pepper coffee cranberry egg haddock cows milk oat onion peanut B/W pepper green pepper pineapple quinoa radish safflower sesame soybean tomato wheat baker's yeast brewers yeast

You are right to suspect wheat and dairy. Soy and egg are two other highly common offenders.

Also the book Adrenal fatigue by James Wilson has some tests mentioned for checking foods. A description of how to use the pulse check is in there. It also lists Cellular Immune Food Reaction Tests, which is also called DTH for delayed-type hypersensitivity reaction tests. I've heard of others like RAST, and Cytotoxic allergy testing but I don't know anything about them. Tha same book mentions four methods for self testing at home...Observation method, Reflective Diary method, Food and Reaction diary, and the Cocoa Pulse test we discussed. The book tells how to conduct them.

I really hope this helps you. Forgive me for being so long winded about it all, but it is a strong desire of mine to try help others in the same or similar situation who can't find an answer. I was misdiagnosed by several professionals (6 different MD's I think it was), misguided by many friends and family and suffered for so long before I found the right information and finally found a doctor who treated for all this on a large scale. He happened to have won our statewide boards award for the top chiropractor that year that I saw him and the year prior, maybe even beyond/since that. I can't leave out that working on and improving my spiritual life has also played a big role in my recovery.

I wish you the best. I'm glad to help if you have any other questions. Definitely focus on nutritious RAW foods in the meantime, until you get testing done if you decide to do so.

[Dimond]

Welcome. :) It may benefit you to work with a raw coach, nutritionist or homeopathic that is familiar with the raw diet and can help create the best plan for you as well as help with your health issues. Having some assistance can make the transition easier.

Any allergies you may have should eventually be alleviated with raw. Usually it's not the good food you'd be allergic to permanently, but more allergies created by the unhealthy foods and other toxins. Though occasionally people could have long-term allergies for questionable raw foods.

Streetsurfer, my chiropractor always helped me way more than any MD did. The good ones are very knowledgeable about natural remedies.

[spicyfull]

I wish you everything you need to Stay RAW..........Welcome to MY World.

[cts]

thank you so much, where did you order the IGg Elisa from please? i think i am very sensitive to wheat, even in the purest form like sprouted frozen bread b/c i can't seem to loose weight when i eat any wheat at all and i thought that was a sign of a food allergy, not able to loose weight when you eat the food? when i was eating only fruits, vegetables, and nuts (even if the vegetables were cooked), i was loosing 1 pound a day and then i added back sprouted bread and the weight loss halted!

[Marine Mom]

Welcome here! I am new to this forum too, and new to raw food. Went vegetarian in November after watching Food Inc., then in a quest to be off of prescription pain medications due to fibromyalgia, possible RA, or osteoarthritis, and ruptured disc I started the raw quest. I bought a far infra-red sauna two weeks ago and this has been a God send. I have been off of pain medications but have been very stiff and sore. Today is the first day in years that I got up and was not stiff or in pain. I am so grateful for that I just cried. Also, no more knee pain and no more deep muscle pain. So, if it is possible you might want to check into the far infra-red sauna. Message me and I can give you details on what we chose and why we chose it as there is some misleading information out there about types.

Kris

[cts]

Hi Marine Mom! Good to hear from you!

I am sorry, I hope you don't mind me giving you this advice, I just want to spare you tha pain I have heard so many went thru. I have been told to never got cold turkey off any addictive prescription meds (unless there is a toxic reaction or a severe adverse raction) and that it is best to slowly taper off. How are you feeling? I am so happy to meet you! How long have you been raw for?

[streetsurfer]

thank you so much, where did you order the IGg Elisa from please? i think i am very sensitive to wheat, even in the purest form like sprouted frozen bread b/c i can't seem to loose weight when i eat any wheat at all and i thought that was a sign of a food allergy, not able to loose weight when you eat the food? when i was eating only fruits, vegetables, and nuts (even if the vegetables were cooked), i was loosing 1 pound a day and then i added back sprouted bread and the weight loss halted!

The Chiro I saw ordered it through the Immuno Laboratories, Inc. Other tests were from Smokey Mountain Labs or something like that. Wheat can disrupt a lot of body functions so it may be behind the weight issue. It was behind my neuro stuff, walking with a disturbed gait, clumsiness, uncoordination in my hands, a tremor at times...parkinson like symptoms. This is how celiac disease is so often misdiagnosed as parkinsons. I had two of my grandparents and now both my parents diagnosed not as full blown parkinsons, ms, als, but with most of the symptoms of one or the other so they call it parkinson-ism or like parkinsons. And yet in spite of my discovery and removal of the symptoms, I can't get my parent's to understand it could be wheat and/or other food allergies causing theirs. Very sad and frustrating to me.
Just a comment on the getting off meds. For me it was stop cold turkey or suffer longer while continuing downhill, and possibly do others harm by my loss of control and inability to function properly. I had a few days of flu like symptoms and then a few years of slowly detoxing and having a few of the miserable side effects reoccur for short periods. I chose cold turkey as the lesser of the two evils. I suppose it depends on the drug, and definetly keep a close watch on yourself with someone else keeping tabs too.

[cts]

i am sorry to hear about your experience, streetsurfer. how terrible! it sounds like you were having a toxic, adverse reaction to the drug so it is understandable why you had to get off quickly.

sorry, i should clarify what i meant. i heard though that if a person is metabolizing the drug okay with no severe negetive reactions, it is better to taper slowly off b/c (unless he/she is on it for a very short time) it can be dangerous to abruptly stop a drug that the body is addicted to. the abrupt withdrawal of the drug can throw the nervous system into chaos and shock the body and that is why some ppl can get seizures and neurological issues from coming off too fast.

thank you so much for the info on ordering the allergy testing! that was very helpful! for dairy, i wonder if ppl who are sensitive to it are sensitive to the caesin or the lactose?

[streetsurfer]

You're very welcome Kim and thank you for your sympathy. I apologize to you and all reading for going on at length about my condition in your introductory thread. I feel it was rude of me, but it is out of concern for you. I just wanted to point out the severity that intolerance to foods can cause to some people.

The more experienced here will put you on the right path with some very good recipes and advice for transition into the raw lifestyle, which will be full of healing for you.

[cts]

hi streetsurfer! please, no need to apologize at all! i am so happy you spoke about your experience since it helped to know there is someone else on this forum who was hurt by prescription medications. it is nice to have someone to relate to this so i am so glad you did.

i am so glad you mentioned the food allergies too! that had crossed my mind but you mentioning it really made me think about it at length!