Is anyone thriving without reducing fat?

[VeryBerry]

I am just curious, did anyone have any major health improvements WITHOUT significantly reducing fat?

What was your diet like before raw?
How long have you been raw?
What health problems went away after going raw?
What do you eat on a typical day?

Thanks in advance for your responses, I am trying to decide which route to take and it is not easy with all the conflicting info out there.

[Veganforlife]

I am just curious, did anyone have any major health improvements WITHOUT significantly reducing fat? I'm not sure how to answer this. I am eating fats, but good fats, like from avocados, nuts, etc.

What was your diet like before raw?I was Vegetarian for 26 years, then Vegan for 2, now raw.
How long have you been raw?18 weeks this past Monday - WOO HOO!!!
What health problems went away after going raw?My migraines that I suffered my entire life. THAT is monumental. I do not E V E R remember NOT having them. Plus my thyroid meds have been cut in half. I've dropped 33 pounds too.
What do you eat on a typical day? First thing I have a couple ounces of wheatgrass, then for Breakfast - frozen fruit smoothie w/hemp seed powder. Then snack on fruits until lunch. Lunch I usually have a green smoothie and maybe some Kalamata olives. Dinner I'll have whatever I've dehydrated - like chick-un fingers and another green smoothie, sauerkraut. Things like that.

Thanks in advance for your responses, I am trying to decide which route to take and it is not easy with all the conflicting info out there.

Try some simple foods first. Do you have Alissa's book? Do her 4 week meal planner. Once you get going with raw, you can listen to what your body craves.

[VeryBerry]

Vegan for live,

I am happy to hear that you are doing well. Although it does not seem like you are eating a lot of fat. What do you dehydrate?

[Veganforlife]

Hmmmm. What do I dehydrate? Well. I just did up a batch of Alissa's "Chick-un Fingers". I've done eggplant bacon, kale chips, fruit leathers, caramel/coconut cookies, gosh, lots of things.
I don't think I am eating a LOT of fat. Why do you say that?

[VeryBerry]

I don't have Alissa's book, I really don't enjoy any kind of food preparation. I like to keep it simple. I make some smoothies & blended soups in the Vitamix, that's about it.

[Veganforlife]

Oh, I can understand that. But for me? I like the variety. I've never minded preparing foods. Her book is so full of information too about foods and what they can do (healing wise) for your body. I'd say half of it is informational. The other half is preparation.
Have you read Victoria Boutenko's GREEN FOR LIFE? Another excellent book.

[VeryBerry]

I guess it is a lot of fat.
My fat intake per day: 1 or 1/2 avocado, a few handfulls of nuts or seeds.
The rest are fruits, veggies & greens. I have been doing 100% for a months.
I am considering reducing my fat consumption to speed up healing. So many people advocate this way of eating, just wanted to see if anyone is doing well and still eating fats.

Veganforelive, did you eat soy products when you were cooked vegan? Did you eat a lot of wheat? Did you eat proccessed food?

[VeryBerry]

Did not read "Greens for life", i read her article about green smoothies. I figured the main message of the book would be eat more greens, so i do that.

I have "instant raw sensations" by Fred P, it has some good easy ideas. I also have "The complete book of raw foods" but I don't use it very much.

[Veganforlife]

Yes, I did eat quite a bit of soy products, wheat and healthier processed foods, but still cooked. Foods that had the life cooked out of them. When I was Vegetarian I would eat a lot of the processed Vegetarian foods. I called them Vegetarian "fast foods". You know - the frozen food products, like garden burgers and such. Then when I became Vegan, I started to go away from those types of products. Now being 100% raw? I am eating a much more varied diet then I can ever remember. I had some of my leftover food in my freezer that I had created, like tofu, corn, broccoli, bean mixture and it looked grey and dead! I had to compost that baby!
All I know is that this is truly working for me. Losing the 33 pounds is secondary to not having the migraines! I feel alive. I have loads of energy, I sleep well, I am sharper with my thinking. Life is good.

[VeryBerry]

Your improvement can be due to giving up soy & proccessed foods. I did really badly with soy and had major improvements when I gave it up.

[Veganforlife]

It could be, but I truly believe the improvement is due to eating all raw. I did Dr. Fuhrman's which includes NO soy and followed his "plan" if you will, for about six months and did not see the results or feel the way I feel since having been raw for 18 weeks.

Think about it. It just makes sense.

Dead foods = dead bodies
Live foods = live bodies

I know my body. I know what makes it work and what makes it crash. Raw is definitely working.

[Alba]

soy made me feel really bad -giving it up is the best thing I ever did - I ate and drank a lot over a year (almost 1ltr/a day and half a block of tofu!?) - the phytoestrogens made my boobs grow and get all tense and I gained like 11 punds!! After gigving it up (aprox. 2 month before going raw) I immeadeately lost the weight I had gained and my breast returned to normal size - that scared me, I now warn people about soy, sometimes they get mad though.
Love alba

[swingbolder]

I don't eat low fat and I feel great. I usually eat one avo a day, maybe a palmful of nuts and/or a T of coconut oil and 1-2 T of tahini.

Other than that I eat mostly smoothies, salads. Tons of water-rich fruits and veggies. I rarely eat dehydrated food.

I have been raw since December 2004, with a few brief periods of slipping here and there, always when visiting family.

I was mostly vegan before going raw, for years. I feel much better on raw food than I did on a vegan diet, when I was eating lots of grains/soy.

I am a firm believer that some people just metabolize fats differently than others. Two longtime rawfooders that I really respect, Storm Talifero and Gabriel Cousens, don't advocate low-fat for everyone. In his book Conscious Eating Cousens talks about low and fast metabolizers. Fast metabolizers need more fat.

The few times I did eat lowfat for a period of time, I got extremely skinny and felt frail, sort of spaced out. I didn't like that. I couldn't even sit down without my tailbone whacking into the seat. Perhaps at some point I may try lowfat again, but right now I'm happy eating the way I do.

[Trinity]

Hi:)
I do not eat what I would call low fat. I eat dehydrated meals like stuffed mushrooms or pepers, big fan of eggplant bacon too. I also make my own cookies and I eat a good amount of nuts in either whole form or in a pate on flax crackers, I'm generous with my salad dressing. I eat some fruit, like applea, pears, pineapple and berries, I do the green smoothies, love em and alot of greens. I'm about 100lbs. and I feel great. I sometimes think I'm eating too much fat but my weight stays the same. If I feel heavy inside, I just cut down on the avo/nut deal for a couple of days, but I do think I'm a good fat metabolizer. Lovin fat and thriving.

[rawfigure]

soy made me feel really bad -giving it up is the best thing I ever did - I ate and drank a lot over a year (almost 1ltr/a day and half a block of tofu!?) - the phytoestrogens made my boobs grow and get all tense and I gained like 11 punds!! After gigving it up (aprox. 2 month before going raw) I immeadeately lost the weight I had gained and my breast returned to normal size - that scared me, I now warn people about soy, sometimes they get mad though.
Love alba

I have the same reaction to soy, my boobies got VERY VERY sore.