I think maybe I have information overload.

I am actually feeling rather afraid because of all the stuff I have been reading about life in the raw. There seems to be various opinions on things such as B-12 and other nutrients. Do I supplement or not? I have been reading from raw fooders (on raw message boards) talking about losing their hair, teeth problems, constipation, being depressed, and ect.

I have been reading Matt Monarch's book 'Raw Sprint'. I gotta say that as much as he praises eating raw, he also has some, should I say warnings?

You can actually eat too much fruit! It could give you an eating disorder

He says eating raw changes your body on a cellular level and you become so clean that toxins in the world like smog, second hand cigarette smoke, is much more dangerous for you than a person on SAD.

If you have a raw food child there is the possibility they may end up eating a hamburger and end up in the hospital

"The chemistry and condition of one who has lived Raw for many years has reached a level of unparallel sensitivity. What scares me the most about being Raw long-term is your increasing vulnerability to concentrated chemicals that in this day and age are used in minor surgeries, routine medical testing, and emergency procedures." Pg 35

He states he wears a special medical tag that withholds permission for use of hospital drugs. It says "anaphylactic to pharmaceutical and intravenous drugs. Wearing this tag is a serious choice with life or death consequences".

I bought this book because it sounded like I could learn alot about eating raw and was looking for motivation. I am only on page 37, so maybe if I keep reading it will get more possitive.

I decided to take up the raw diet for numerous health problems and it just scares me to think 'I’m I just trading one set of problems for another; out of the pan into the fire?"

I certainly hope not! Raw is my last resort to heal myself, I would not know where else to turn for healing.

Looking for encouragement!

Sincerely,
Denise

Denise,

These are great questions. With regards to supplementation, I don't use them. Many raw folks do. What I have found is that there exists a choices of raw foods such that when you eat them, you don't feel like you need supplementation, and you have great health. There are other choices of raw foods that don't feel good without supplementation.

There are issues of detoxification, that include losing some hair (though it always comes backs), teeth problems (usually a result of pre-raw living), constipation (food choices), being depressed (usually a pre-raw condition), etc.

Yes, one can eat too much fruit. But one can eat too much of anything, including water! Myself, I get over 80-90% of my calories from fruit. There are some that get 100%. But for some people, 20% of calories from fruit may be too much, based on the other foods that are currently in their diet.

Are you finding that book you are reading helpful to your raw journey? For me, it sounds like an argument against eating raw!

Some people mistake sensitivity for weakness. Myself, I find sensitivity a result of great health and an internal guide for me of what is going to be healthful or not healthful for myself.

I suggest you quit reading and have your own experience. Even if all these things are true, and I can see why you might see them as negatives, there is a huge positive that can occur from eating raw foods, and you might find that raw foods is what it takes to set you free from the worries of bad health and our failing medical system.

Aloha Denise,

Seems understandable that you are confused. Something to understand is that, while I'm sure a person can continue to cleanse and gain higher and higher levels of sensitivity with the foods that they are eating, that person can also choose at any time to ground themselves more, by changing their diet (raw or cooked or partially cooked or whatever!).

Mr. Monarch is clearly choosing to go all out in a quest for as he puts it "unparalleled sensitivity". That's his goal, and his choice, and I am certain there are tradeoffs. Your goals might be different, like "optimal health given my environment", and your methods and diet will look different as a result. Both goals can be met through raw foods. And I think you can moderate the level of sensitivity you are comfortable with in a healthy way if you so choose, so you needn't fear it.

I'm ready to encourage you... to put down that book and test this out for yourself. You really have to kill the gurus here (figuratively) and just go explore it on your own terms. I've only been on my own raw foods journey for a short time, but one thing I know: I can't know for sure is what is the best diet for anybody else --not for my mother, not for my daughter, not for the 350lb guy munching a Whopper at the Burger King. I can only know what is the best diet for me, and raw foods has brought me a level of health and vitality that I never dreamed possible. And what's more, I FEEL IT, I don't need a test to tell me whether I am deficient or not deficient in something, I trust that I would be able to tell! If you give it a serious go yourself, I promise you will know whether it is for you or not. You'll feel it, and you won't have to second guess yourself constantly, because your body will become more and more trustworthy, and its feedback loop more and more pronounced and understandable. That is my experience.

Good luck, and hope to see you around the boards!



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/21/2008 08:27AM by maui_butterfly.

I supplement with B12 and D2. I am very skeptical that I can get enough of these from my food.

There is absolutely no evidence about increased vulnerability to environmental insults. Evidence suggests the opposite: fewer cancers, better immunity, etc.

What you will notice, among other things, is probably a better sense of smell, and this will translate to earlier onset of avoidance behaviors.

Edited to add: about feeling dazed and confused, well, this is pretty likely if you aren't eating enough. I suspect this is the number one mistake with most folks.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/21/2008 09:35AM by arugula.

I read Matt's book and thought it to be concerning but the little taste I have experianced from eating raw foods has opened my eyes to a very new world. I have also discovered I am more sick than I thought I was. I have a long road to travel to get better. Just think of what you were eating before going raw, for me I gave nno thought to how the food I ate made me feel. I just ate and was not aware of how this food made me feel. Perhaps a different book would be more encourageing. I find the writings of ann wigmore to be very encourageing mostly because she not only talks about eating raw foods but also talks about other things that we need to think about like spirituality and comunity. I think it is important to not just focul on the food aspect of our lives but to obtain a balance in our lives. Changing to a raw diet not easy sometimes and we need to fill our minds with encourageing things. I encourage you to keep striveing for that raw way and you will find healing and a new life. I am finding healing and you will to. In some way it is my last hope. I hang on to this and strive for it. I am not all that good at it and some days I eat real bad stuff but I still am working towards a 100 percent raw life. The one thing I see about being raw is an awareness that is unobtainable when eating cooked foods
I want to encourage you to keep raw and you will find the health benifits outweigh anything else
Good luck and I hope to see you around this board more
Pam

I agree with the above great posts from Bryan and Maui and the others. Life is only confusing when you are looking away from the path that lies RIGHT IN FRONT OF YOU. Even the masters have the same task: put one foot directly in front of the other! LOL. YOU need to do all the research you can...and then set YOUR goals....YOUR over-all lifetime raw %...what's important to YOU. YOUR idea of what you think are the healthiest eating practices. Set SMALL goals...with timetables....and work on them. Talk to those who have really done well.....and mastered eating this way in modern life...and modern social situations. They are out there! (including myself). People get frustrated by seeing failures...when there is so much success to model after. The tools that are right for YOU cannot be judged by the aggregate success or failure of an entire 'movement' of people. Take the best points....and put them to the test. Do the many VERY SMALL things that you are MOTIVATED and DESIRING to do on a daily basis. Choose them....DO them....and FEEL successful. In such a case, the HUGE successes with then be on the horizon! Keep us informed!

-David Z. Mason

WWW.RawFoodFarm.com



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/21/2008 12:28PM by davidzanemason.

Denise,

I think you raised some EXCELLENT questions, and I'm glad you brought this up.

It would be enlightening for someone to study the cause of deaths for long-term raw foodists to see if any were accidentally killed by hospital drugs (like say, you were in a car accident and rendered unconscious and they you OD'd on the "regular" dose of hospital meds), or what they die from. Cancer from smog? ... This would be REALLY INTERESTING.

I know from personal experience after a month-long cleanse I had a HARD time readjusting to "normal" life (violent movies, cooked food, lots of emotional upheaval) the crude, cynical things people would say that I normally laughed at became intolerable. Cigarette smoke made me nausious. An ibuprofin for my period made my kidneys THROB with pain. It's hard to know where to go with that, since I really can't afford to be all raw or even mostly raw, get massages and chiropractic care, etc. etc. etc. So yes - being raw definitely makes you more sensitive. But then on the other hand being diabetic and having a host of other annoying health problems sucks too. You just have to find the balance that is comfortable for you. My goal is to be mostly raw with some cooked veggies and alkaline grains - that is where I feel the best right now.

I had a friend who was raised vegan. Parents never gave her meat or dairy. If we went to a restauraunt where the server was unaware there was beef stock in the veggie soup she was extremely ill for two weeks. It is for that reason my son (10 mo.) is getting MINUTE ammounts of those items. Kind of like a "vaccine" in a sense, so his body will recognize and digest it and not react to it with a severe allergy-like reaction.)

So yes, I suppose there are some pretty serious trade offs to 100% raw, and I'm glad Matt brings that up. I've never heard anyone else actually take that question seriously.

There will be a level of "unparallelled sensitivity" that feels comfortable to you, if you listen to your spirit. And I personally believe the more raw (or actually, alkaline) you are, the less muddled your thinking will be and you will be more aware of the Spirit telling you to do or not do certain things, and therefore will avoid impending doom like car accidents, etc.

Don't let this discourage you!

It's just a decision you have to make. Being more raw is MUCH better than SAD!


Me (30), Joseph (24 mo.) Jeremiah (4 mo.)

We are enjoying spring and being outside!!!

Denise,

I am a reader too and I had that exact same fear when I started my raw journey over a year ago.

I wouldn't worry for a minute about being too sensitive to toxins. It would be many years of totally 100 % raw and colonics/fasting etc to get you that clean and by then you would have a much different perspective and level of health, more than you know.

The benefits I've experienced in just a year far outweigh any worries about sensitivities. For instance if I took a painkiller now I would feel off. But the point is now I don't need to take any pills, Advil, inhalers, SSRI's, arthritis meds, chiropractors, endless doctors appointments, I DON'T NEED THEM NOW!

Also, I find I'm NOT as sensitive to cooked foods when I eat them this winter compared to last because my digestion has improved so much and I heal faster.

On his blog he (Matt Monarch) was saying he had to leave the city he was in - he's in New Zealand - cuz he couldn't stand the pollution. Well if I had worked as hard as he does on my health I wouldn't want to stay in a smoggy city either.

I have to second the notion that, barring something like a car accident (knock on wood), there's no reason for someone living a healthy raw lifestyle to end up at the doctor's office, or in the hospital.

Raw, for me, was what finally got me out of those places, for good.

The funny thing is, I became raw because I had been sick for months as a result of a ton of antibiotics given to me for a nightmarish wisdom tooth extraction. I was 50% raw/50% cooked (or fried, ugh) vegan at the time--I got sick in the first place on that diet--and still had the horrible reaction to drugs.

Doctors, homeopaths, naturopaths, nothing worked for me after I had been screwed up on pharmaceuticals.

Then I tried going 100% raw. Now I don't need the drugs, I got better in a snap... and surpassed my previous state of "wellness" with flying colors. My immune system trucked right through the late-January flu explosion at work without a sniffle, I heal very fast, and I would describe my body's reaction to cooked food not as more sensitive, but more informative. It tells me what it needs and what it can't use. I'd prefer to have a stronger immune/digestive response to something toxic to me, than to have a body so compromised, whatever can't be digested just festers.

I never cared for Matt Monarch's style of writing. I would check out Storm and Jinjee's work--they do a lot about the diet and its application to the real world that sounds... less panicked. I'm hoping to get some of Tonya Zavasta's books, too--definitely read more than one author! There's a great thread floating around here, too, with recommended readings.

Another thing I have found with being on raw: my energy and happiness have grown exponentially, while my fear of illness/bad things happening has pretty much disappeared.

I wish you peace and power on whatever path you choose--raw is the path I have found to furnish these things for me, that's all. =)

I just wanted to say thank you to all that responded to my post. Your words of encouragement certainly helped! I am determined not to give up on the raw diet, because as I said in my post, I am in it for healing.

Thanks again to all!
Denise

Be thankful. I haven't felt dazed and confused for years. Enjoy it.

[www.oneillpaul.com-a.googlepages.com]

About the sensitivity issue. . .

I think that as a person becomes more healthy and "clean," they become more correctly sensitive.

It's a good thing to have a body sensitive to harmful substances.

Think about someone who smokes. . . their body has adapted to the smoke and they can't feel how harmful it is to them. They are numb to it. But if you or I were to smoke a few cigarettes, we would be coughing and gagging and sputtering as our bodies try to reject the stuff.

Hang in there. Real healing takes time.

: )

Love,
Julie

Grass juice has the nutrition and medicine you are in need of.

I just had a double shot of wheat grass with carrot juice chaser at Jamba Juice. It made me feel GREAT!! I would like to have a juicer for wheat grass but they are very expensive!

While I make an effort to read as much as I can, I always consider the source.

I would not want to be unconscious in an emergency room with Matt Monarch's medical ID bracelet.

Everyone should have a health care proxy. Google:

health care proxy

if you don't know what that is.

pippin07 Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> I just had a double shot of wheat grass with
> carrot juice chaser at Jamba Juice. It made me
> feel GREAT!! I would like to have a juicer for
> wheat grass but they are very expensive!

i read a post recently on another board from a guy who just fills his blender half full of water, then cuts up about 150 blades into half inch bits (so as not to bind up the blade), blends on high 1 minute, then strains it.

i think i'm going to start growing wheatgrass and try this method (can't afford a juicer right now either...)

Let us know how that works for you.

You must prepare your cells for toxin elimination first or you add stress to the liver.

heathernicholson Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> You must prepare your cells for toxin elimination
> first or you add stress to the liver.

Can you please explaine?

Thanks!

Lee_123 Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> While I make an effort to read as much as I can, I
> always consider the source.
>
> I would not want to be unconscious in an emergency
> room with Matt Monarch's medical ID bracelet.
>
> Everyone should have a health care proxy. Google:
>
>
> health care proxy
>
> if you don't know what that is.

I agree with Lee. I love Matt's personality and his energy but he's far too extreme. I believe he's living at an unhealthy level of purity. Unfortunately, you can't live so cleanly that you have adverse affects from simply breathing the air. (Apparently, he had to leave New Zealand because of the pollution.)

As far as the medical tag he has, I'll bet you dollars to durian that he changes his mind once he gets married and has children. He made that decision as a single person. When you have a family, your perspective changes. He'd want to be around for his wife and children, no matter what the cost. If he doesn't, he's selfish.