hi everybody,

here's my story: i have known intuitively for many years that raw food is best for my body mind and spirit. however, over the past 10 years or so, i have swayed back and forth from my mostly vegetarian (and very cooked) diet to a few months of raw, and then back to the cooked stuff. i have never been able to sustain the raw diet, even though i feel and look so much better when i eat that way. i don't know, for some reason i can't seem to identify or control the reason i'm lured back into those addictive other foods.

so here i am now, i just finished up a 12 day master cleanse, and unlike other cleanses, when i broke the fast i came back to slowly eating raw food instead of cooked veg soup. it's been about a week now of eating about 95% raw, and i feel great! i can't imagine going back to all that other stuff.

but it's almost like i'm waiting for my resolve to eventually erode, because that's what has happened to me so many times in the past. i really want to continue feeling all of this wonderful vitality and clarity, yet i think that eventually i'll miss eating the other stuff. there has to be a balance somewhere.....the past 10 years of the yo-yo eating and cleansing isn't working for me.

so here i am, looking for support, i guess- looking for anything that will help me find an organic way to sustain this optimum way of living.

thanks for reading this, and thanks for all of your posts. i have been reading alot here this past week, and it helps.

Getting support here is a great place to start. What also helps is to find people in your community that are also doing raw foods, and have some social get-togethers or potlucks and share a raw meal.

marsh Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> so here i am, looking for support, i guess-
> looking for anything that will help me find an
> organic way to sustain this optimum way of
> living.
Keep on 'keeping on'. There will come a time
(called the Point-of-No-Return) when you won't fall back.
You just don't want to. Think about how far you (and all of
us) have come already...WY

marsh

Quote

for some reason i can't seem to identify or control the reason i'm lured back into those addictive other foods.

I think the physical part of changing foods is difficult to get past but I think the psychological aspect can be even harder. I'm talking about finding new ways to deal with the need for comfort in foods rather then eating cooked food. The emotional detox process is part of that change. I have found that when I am feeling my emotions and because I no longer suppress my emotions with cooked junk food then I have to be extra attentive to not slipping up. I have been all fresh raw since Aug 1, 07 and I'm still experiencing emotional detox. Its similar to the waves made by throwing a large rock into a still pond. Like the waves in that pond the waves of emotional detox get smaller and farther apart with the passage of time. I'm sure the adjustment time is different for everyone but like everything else it has a beginning and an end.

wow-

thank you all so much.

bryan- hmmm. i feel very shy to go to a potluck or something like that by myself....i'll think about it, though. thanks for the suggestion.

wheatgrass yogi- yes, just keep on keepin on. i like that. i guess i could see this journey i'm on as my own way of transitioning. i do become stronger each "try," and more tolerant of myself and accepting of where i am.

EZ rider- oh yea, i can definitely relate to eating to comfort myself. dealing with emotions without bread and butter and pasta and all of that stuff?? hmmmm.....i'll bet that has something to do with not being able to stay with this for extended periods of time. the psychological aspects of this transition are probably my biggest challenge. all of the family functions, and all of the celebrations revolving around food, those are tricky for me, too. but i'm noticing how much nicer it is to relate to people from a more elevated state of consciousness. and eating this way definitely supports that. i feel very clear and so much calmer this week of raw. and for the first time in a long time, i'm off of coffee! that really feels good.

thanks again you guys. your comments help alot.

Great post, marsh, and great responses. I for myself have found that making small changes and changes one by one works best. I transitioned slowly away from certain foods over years. WIth wheat and sugar it's been 5 years now, for example. There is no chance I would ever eat it again. THere is no more craving at all, so it's easy. Instead of wheat there was something else i allowed myself to eat, so I did that to fill the 'void', then I let the next thing go and replaced it with the next thing until I was eating tons of sweet fruit, that seemed to do the 'trick' nicely. Then I started to feel very out of balance, mainly because I was still overeating... after all, I had just replaced the 'theme' of my addiction, not the addiction itself. HOWEVER, the healthy stuff had less physiologically addictive components, so that helped big time, empowered me step by step and taught me a lot about myself!

Right now I am on a juicefeast to deal with the emotional ends of things. So far it is working well, but I can 'binge' on orange juice, if you know what I mean. It's a learning process and I really don't have an answer that's definite. i just know certain things have worked and when the next step fails, I can always return to the previous one, versus completely 'falling off the wagon'. That does help a lot.

Very best wishes to you and again thanks for the post.

Marsh, so good to see you back on this forum. Just like wheat grass yogi said "keep on keeping on" For me I created a mistrust in myself to keep up with being raw and I started yo yoing from eating raw to eating cooked and then I would get upset and start a long fast. I was tired of fighting with the desire to eat cooked foods so I decided to just give in for a while but to eat consiously and think of just how the foods made me feel. I have been able to stop drinking coffee this way and have been sucessfully raw for about three weeks now. I still cook for my family and am around all sorts of food throughout the day. One other thing happened to me is some cooked foods made me very sick so that has been a deterant to eating it. I associate the cooked foods with pain now. I am not sure if the last fast changed something inside me but I can't tollerate some cooked foods at all. Oh another thing I have realized is there are many other things that help besides food such as deep breathing and positive afermations. The deep breathing feeds the body in ways that food cannot and the positive afermations help retrain your thinking and heal creating new pathways in the brain so you wont be entrinched with the old perhaps negative thoughts.
Hope these words were helpful
Love pam

cocoa_nibs-
i can totally relate to the addiction thing. i think that replacing my most tempting, and worst offenders, wheat and dairy, with less addictive, healthier raw choices, i'm going to make this transition easier. i agree, the healthier choices, as we progress along the raw path, the less addictive. so for now, raw crackers and avocados are working well when that craving sets in. here's a miracle in my life: i don't eat sugar anymore! ha...it's been a few years now. i never thought i'd say that. i just can't eat that stuff anymore. hopefully wheat and dairy will follow and i'll loose the desire for them, too.

pam-
so nice to hear from you! i thought about you alot when i was doing this last master cleanse. your words are very encouraging. and i also experienced some sort of breakthrough during this last fast. coming off of it, i was craving raw, and have been ever since i started eating again. something changed for me with this last cleanse. i have also stopped drinking coffee, that has been really good for me. i never thought i'd be able to, either. that one strong cup in the morning was a well-engrained ritual. and good for you 3 weeks raw! i am the cook in my house, too, and even though i prepare the cooked stuff for them, lately everyone is being served alot more salads and fruit.

I know how you feel. I have been wavering for the past 10 years also! It's TOUGH. The more you perfect yourself (body, mind, spirit) the more alone you find yourself, because you have to abstain from what 99% of the rest of the world thinks is "good" but is actually just garbage for everyone involved. It's a hard, hard path. But do keep trying, that is the MOST important part.


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

We are enjoying spring and being outside!!!

you are so right, angie1. even though it can be lonely, we cannot un-evolve and go back, can we? best of luck to you!

I think people de-volve. Not you, per se, but I've seen people do positive or neutral things and then go on to morally what is considered "bad" things.

For the dairy, maybe watch Meet Your Meat and consider the cows in your choice. For me at least, I'm more motivated when caring/concern for other beings than I am for selfish reasons. This could be the case for you or it could create more motivation.

But don't get down on yourself. Life's a journey.

utopian life- actually i am fortunate enough to live in one of the most progressive areas in california, and there are some small organic dairy farms here where the humane treatment of animals is held to a high standard. but the good news is that i am really not even wanting dairy that much right now, so it's fairly easy for me to have an avocado or some nut pate and feel satisfied. the dairy i used to crave was butter! that's not so hard to let go of, especially since i'm not eating bread!