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Hi. So, I should introduce myself. I'm a 27 year old homeschooling mom to 3 little ones and best friend to my sweet husband. We're preparing to conceive again. I have had 2 homebirths with midwives and 1 unassisted homebirth where I caught my own baby as he entered into the world. Looking back the interesting thing is with #1 I was a cooked vegan and I'd guess about 60-80% of my food was cooked, sometimes twice and I used a microwave. That labour wasn't too long (4 hours 5 minutes) which I think is due to my very strong will and relaxation techniques but it was nonetheless incredibly painful and I had a very hard pregnancy in my opinion, although other people have said that's just the way it is when pregnant. I also had terrible postpartum depression afterwards, and my skin is so dry and I have some wrinkles starting already and my hair so frizzy. My health went down hill very fast and I was absolutely depleted and worn out physically. I was 20 when I had my first baby. So, after being vegan for 5 years and with my health having gotten so bad (heart problems, all sorts of obvious nutritional deficinecies, blood sugar problems, depression and very painful joints and muscles, bruises all over my body), I decided to look for answers and concluded veganism was not for me (please note that this is what I concluded at the time, I hadn't heard of RAW veganism yet, or else I probably would have gone that way at this point). My health did recover and I conceived #2. The pregnancy was wonderful and the labour was practically painless, I hardly felt like I had had a baby at all just moments after birth. Looking back I can see what made it so blessed: my main staples were raw milk, raw fermented vegetables, large vegetable salads, tons of fresh oranges and bananas, everything was organic, I also had some cooked foods and a small amount of meat and fish but this was very minute (imagine how good it would have been had I known about a raw diet at this point, but hadn't yet known and only accidentally ended up eating high raw foods), but a great deal had been raw without me not even realising it (that was what made the difference I think), I was simply eating what I felt my body wanted although I still ate the small amount of fish and meat because I thought I was supposed to and was worried that my health would go down (I had assumed veganism caused my health problems I hadn't considered it was all that cooked stuff). This baby was so serene from the beginning and such a good-natured baby and still is as a 4 year old, while my first was so cranky and very high-need and not at all secure emotionally even though I did do attachment parenting. Then with my third, we were going through some hard times and we oculdn't afford to eat much fresh food, so although the food was organic it was mostly cooked foods, that was a hard pregnancy, I was stressed and depressed and felt sick and tired. The labour was good compared to most of society, but was longer than the others I had (forgot to mention the 2nd was a much shorter labour) and it was very painful. The baby was very similar in nature to my first as a baby. Soon after he was born, I had depression although not as bad as with the first as I was taking a cold=pressed omega-3 oil every morning. Also, alot of my health problems came back. I did start eating more fresh foods again, but still alot of it was cooked (probably 60 %), I began to improve and was healing but there was a definite limit. I had alot of mucus, a chronic sinus infection or something, lots of candida issues, heart palpitations, carpal tunnel syndrome, painful joints, underweight although I ate so much and was always hungry and the worst of all for me was being so darn tired ALL the time and never feeling like I had enough sleep even though I did, and tension in my muscles. I also felt that I didn't want to degenerate with age like the "old" people in society, I didn't think 60 was old either, I though it was young and in my mind 100 should be normal, I also wanted to pass away one day passed 100 years og age just naturally and never have to have diapers and become like a little baby physically and die in pain, I didn't feel that was right or that I should lose all my teeth with age either.

So I prayed for answers, and then I met a woman with a vibrant glowing energy about her, she was also naturally happy and just glowing, I've never seen a person like that before. The color in her skin was just beautiful and she didn't have any dark circles, she was naturally beautiful and colorful without makeup. So I asked her about her diet, lo and behold she said she only ate things that were raw, mostly greens. She was in her late thirties, yet she looked far, far younger. I searched the net but soon became discouraged with all the complicated recipes and imitations that I thought there's no way I could do that (and I'm not lazy, I already cooked from scratch). I continued to look for answers and then I met another woman in her 40's with the same beauty and energy all around her as the first, I asked about her diet and lo and behold she said she only ate things that were raw and her diet consisted especially of raw greens. Then later on I met a man with this same energy and vibrant health and happiness all about him and his diet was the same as the first two. I again looked into raw on the net and became discouraged with all the complicated recipes. Then I thought and prayed about it, and though how strange it is that I had never met anyone raw before or with such health and energy and then prayed for direction for health and met 3 who weren't related at all and all had similar diets. There must be something to it but I was absolutely overwhelmed with all of the complicated recipes. Then it dawned on me, that just as Alissa’s book states that later on you’ll gear to eating more simply, I could eat simply from the beginning. My husband agreed to eating mostly raw with me, not completely though, he said he wanted half of our family dinners to be cooked but the rest can be raw. So in October I began and I found this website that has been so helpful. I had a lot of acne at first which was probably a detox and was feeling turned off by the cooked food at dinners, even my 2 youngest wouldn’t eat the cooked food and my almost 4 year old said his body didn’t want it. Then due to poor planning I had to eat the cooked part of dinners, which really made it very hard. I’d feel all good all day long and then after dinner I’d be so hungry and craving things and just wanting to eat and eat yet nothing would satisfy me and I became incredibly thirsty and drank so much water my bladder felt sore. But I had no choice because I planned poorly and had no more money to buy more fresh foods. My husband gets paid monthly (this Friday) and I get a certain portion towards groceries which is plenty for our needs. So, now that I had some experience and learned from it, I felt like October and November were a time of dabbling but not me eating raw, as I slipped so much and although I thought I was eating mostly raw evenings would come and after dinner I’d eat and eat all kinds of cooked foods. So, starting this Friday I am planning very carefully and in advance and am going to be raw from the beginning to the end of each day. The only exception to this is manna bread, I have a slice of it a day, I feel I need sprouted grains in small amounts and manna bread is cooked at a lower temperature than most breads, according to the company it is partly cooked but the inside is still mostly raw. So for now that will be the exception and it doesn’t make me crave cooked foods. Also, as I get more settled into raw I will be making my own sprouted rye bread and it will be raw. I just don’t want to overwhelm myself in the beginning, I just want to concentrate on being raw. Also, I know most people are raw vegan but I will be including some raw milk cheese in the beginning but it will be raw, organic and grass fed. Interesting the grass-fed part, I won’t have any dairy unless it is from organic pastures and they are grass fed, that should tell me something about where the omega-3’s and health benefits really come from, raw greens! So, that’s enough for my intro and I’m sorry it’s sooooo long. Thank you for reading this far and joining me on my raw journey. Here’s a pick of me cooked, it’s the most recent. I’ll then post pics as I go along.

Also note that in this pic I am of a normal weight because I didn’t loose it all yet after the pregnancy, but I am normally underweight. In that pic I was 120 pounds at 5’3”, but pre and pst pregnancy I’m 90 pounds and very bony. I eat and eat and eat but can’t maintain a normal weight and feel very undernourished, yet I eat all organic but a great deal cooked. Most people start raw to loose weight, I’m guessing that I can’t maintain weight because I’m not being properly nourished with the cooked foods and grains, so I figure I should gain weight with a nourishing raw diet, and my children are transitioning to raw too. My husband will be high-raw, he’s got tons of health problems so I’m looking forward to seeing the amazing health benefits of living raw.





Edited to add: I'm only including some raw milk cheese for now as I get started, this is where I am at, and will continue to improve. I will however make sure I'm 100% raw though and that raw cheese is only going to be in such a small amount. I guess I have a little fear of losing more weight without it as when I didn't have it before I'd loose more weight and I once reached 83 pounds until I started having raw cheese again and at the time I concluded it was the raw cheese that made the difference. Now that I know about the raw diet, it was most likely because it was RAW and most of what I ate was cooked (that's the key I was trying to say). So, at first I'll include some as it's atleast still vegetarian for starting or else I would be too afraid to even try raw as it was such a scarry time for me, I really thought I was going to whither away and die, it caused alot of trauma at the time and I know I need to get over it. But I think that as I start truly being raw that I'll be able to see how it nourishes me and will find that I don't need it, atleast that is what I hope and believe will happen because I think the issue is RAW foods as supplied by this wonderful earth God gave us. So, this is where I'm at for starting out.

Also, I'm reconsidering the manna bread, I'll probably not be eating it until I get the kernels to make my own completely raw version.