i've been a raw vegan for more than three years. I spend a lot of my hard-earned money on "the world's healthiest foods" I eat between 20 and 35 servings of fresh, raw, organic fruits and vegetables every day -- if it's whole and raw and oh pure i eat it.. blueberries, raspberries, strawberries, kale, i eat so much salad...daily i eat so much salad, and i've been down the "blending" road with my vitamix, i eat only good food, i eat nothing of the crap i see others all around me eating daily.

so, ha! on me the guy with the "pure diet" is sick. no one i know is sick. i'm sick. and i take a lot of crap from people who eat whatever they want. i'm razzed about being "mr pure" eater or whatever. my only non-raw food is cooked quinoa and lentils, sweet potatoes, and a bit of dark chocolate every other day. i'm very serious about what i put in my body, i've been eating this way for years.

so why, why, WHY??? am i so damned sick right now? why do i have a fever? why does every bone in my body ache? why am i so tired i can't get out of bed? this is my third day in bed, i feel worse everyday. some good all this healthy eating does. my friends eat whatever they way -- beer and pizza, burgers and fries, chicken and barbeque, they go to parties, drink all night, live their lives and have fun eating, and me? i'm way too pure to eat their food.

yet no one i know is sick. just me. so i ask you again, what is the good of all this damned healthy eating if when any little virus comes up, i'm so easily catching it? i thought eating well was supposed to " build a healthy immune system"? i thought eating well was supposed to protect you from the ravages others face who eat junk food?

i'm a healthy weight, i practice yoga five times a week, i have a cool, laid back job, i'm under no stress. yet i'm sick, i feel like crap, and i feel like my body -- which i thought i was being "good" to by eating so damned healthily -- i feel like my body has betrayed me.

do not expect any miracles from the raw food diet.

i'm so angry i'm sick. and when i'm well again, i'm probably dropping this whole stupid raw vegan thing. clearly it does not work to keep you any healthier than the next person who eats whatever he wants. healthy. it's a fairy tale. eat what you want, i'm going back to bed to be sick for being so damned healthy

minor illness is nothing compared to the serious ones your friends will likely get later.

Perhaps your body is taking you to the next level of health. Your body being sick is because your body is removing toxins from within. These toxins come from the cooked elements of your diet, and perhaps there are some elements of your lifestyle that are not as healthful as they could be. Are you getting enough rest and sleep each night in general?

So your body is working as it should. I would be grateful that my body was getting rid of the toxins, rather than leaving in them in my body. Getting a flu like sickness is no big deal, and perhaps you really needed the break anyways (well, actually I guess you did need the break, since that's what you got).

I got food poisoning when I ate the raw spinach from Ca. due to dirty water contamination..ecoli bacteria. So, eating raw is not a promise to always keep you healthy or from catching things.

Wash your veggies and fruits with water and hydrogen peroxide lightly. You keep your hands clean, and have some good practices with keeping things you come into contact with clean too..just wipe with paper towel and water and bleach or hydrogen peroxide or keep some citric acid in a small spray bottle near sinks.

You can try adding some few drops of food grade hydrogen peroxide into a drinking glass of water and drink that. About 4 drops of the hydrogen peroxide into 8 oz of drinking water and it helps to offset any food borne illness and flu.

I'm very sorry you are sick, but it's not the consuming of whole plant foods as your diet.

Oh and all the toxins inside your body..where and how do you think they come out of your body? Any way they can!

Love,
Prism

shane Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> my only non-raw food is cooked
> quinoa and lentils, sweet potatoes, and a bit of
> dark chocolate every other day.

If I ate the above foods, I would also be chronically "sick" from the detoxing of those cooked foods. I'm not sure about quinoa, but lentils and sweet potatoes are starchy and therefore mucus-forming; chocolate contains the toxins caffeine and theobromine.

Thankfully, I eat a mucusless, stimulant-free, 100% raw vegan diet, so I don't get sick.

The MORE pure one's diet, the more sensitive one's body becomes to even "innocent" cooked foods.

I would suggest trying a 100% pure diet instead of a 98% pure diet and see if those detox symptoms go away.

I'm with you there. I've suffered for YEARS with constant torment from my co-workers (who are also nurses) because I don't take the flu shot (and still occasionally get sick - even with the FLU - which they don't understand can happen for ALOT of immunological reasons, PLUS I would be alot sicker alot longer if it were NOT for my diet), and because I don't eat meat or dairy, blah blah blah. So any time I don't feel well, have period cramps, or get sick (heaven forbid!!!), I am tormented from my associates who blame it on my diet and lifestyle. I've always suffered from immune problems, so it makes me so angry as well when I go down with some nasty bug no matter HOW careful I am with my diet and lifestyle, because they tease and torment me endlessly.

Hang in there and just remember that no matter HOW careful we are, there are some things we simply cannot avoid because our bodies are not perfect and are constantly healing and de-toxing, and remember that we would probably be alot sicker alot longer if we were NOT on the RAW vegan diet. Hang in there and feel better!!

*****************************
"Educate and inform the whole mass of the people... They are the only sure reliance for the preservation of our liberty."
—Thomas Jefferson

i just smile at people like that and sneeze in their general direction

...Jodi, the banana eating buddhist

you diss raw foodism ( saying you are a raw foodist for 3 years) but then you also eat cooked quinoa, lentils, dark chocolate and whatever else it was and you then complain about getting sick

i don't care what you eat personally

but why are you getting a conniption just because you have a little cold?

big deal?

you'll get over it

and then maybe you will also realize that you are cleansing your body ( raw vegan) and also clogging it ( with cooked foods) so that your body is at odds with each other

some people get colds even if they eat raw foods

because raw foods is just better than cooked

that's all

it doesn't mean you are given the moon

as for plainly dressed having all her nurse co workers rag on her

i can say only one thing

" put them in line"

you don't have cancer and you are not dying

be grateful that your body is intelligent enough to get rid of the mucus forming lentils, chocolate and whatever.. by giving you a cold

its the body's way of rejecting stuff



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 10/12/2009 07:10AM by la_veronique.

Its not so much the quantities good thing you eat that matter. Its how few of the bad things you eat that determine your health. After some time of eating raw foods, your body is no longer nutrient OR mineral OR amino acid OR fatty acid deficient. So then its just a matter of how much toxins you are putting in your body that determines whether you're going to be sick.

After a few years of being raw, if you are still detoxing, its your last night's meal that you are detoxing, not stuff from your childhood.

at least your not dealing with uc or chrones, i used to eat alot of crap, especailly when i used to work for harrods, now look what i have done, pemanent damage

Am I understanding correctly - that this is the first time you've been sick once in three years? As that seems to be what your message is saying. How many times have your friends been sick? And, because you're sick ONCE in three years, compared with the frequent coughs and colds other people get, you're going to STOP being a raw vegan? Sorry, must be misunderstanding you there, as that would be so totally illogical it would be crazy.

I'm also going to point out here that you are not even following a raw vegan diet!
A high-raw diet is great, and I'd love it if certain people I knew adopted it, as they'd transform their health, but here you are again blaming 'the raw vegan' diet, but you're eating cooked grains and pulses, cooked sweet potato, and 'dark chocolate'! Did you know ALL these contain toxins (baking produces carcinogens for example)?

You ARE still ingesting toxins, most certainly, and it's entirely logical that, because the amount of toxins you're ingesting is small compared with the average diet, instead of falling ill every winter like most people do, you fall ill every three years. In that way, you can see that a high raw diet is far better than the average diet, and that, logically, a 100% raw diet would be even better.

If you were to go 100% raw, there's a high chance that you wouldn't fall ill every three years. BUT you still might! As even 100% raw people will ingest toxins, eg in the odd bit of non-organic food, and in the air we breathe! And, if for some reason, due to stress of some kind, our energy is such that we can't efficiently detox these on a daily basis, our bodies will have to 'clean up' and dis-ease will result.

You're ill now - you're feeling awful. I do sympathise, but suggest that your feeling unwell right now is also preventing you from being logical about this.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 10/12/2009 08:05AM by debbietook.

shane -

just curious as to what your job/employment is? Are you in a toxic environment in any way?

As a mechanic, I used to work in some pretty nasty areas where I had to breathe chemicals & diesel fumes. Even as a began, I had bouts of illness in that setting.

After I left that job, I was amazed at how many symptoms cleared up, especially breathing/sinus problems.

Agreed with everyone that has implied, "well, dude, better a cold than fatal cancer 20 years from now, huh?"

You are probably getting better aleady . . . continue to treat your body right, and get lots of rest, and take heart that the next time will be easier. Or won't happen at all.

Hope you feel better soon, Shane.

Right...I agree with Bryan....LaV and the other intelligent posts. YOU will have to determine the reason why you believe you are sick. Anger is only the first stage....after that comes courage and action. Anger is a middle stage.

It is only important that YOU are doing what YOU think is healthy. That's all any of us can do. If what you are doing is not working for you....ask your inner child (been dying to work that phrase in)...what you need to do to be healthy.

-David Z. Mason

WWW.RawFoodFarm.com

you're serious? you don't know ANYONE who is sick? wow. I look around me and I can say that I know very few people who are not constantly taking some form of medication, for whatever reason. not that they look 'dramatically' sick or anything... just that they have a succession of chronic illnesses. I was on the bus yesterday and it felt like I was in a hospital, everyone was coughing and sneezing!

I learnt my lesson years ago never to look around me and judge others for eating 'crap'. I usually found that a few days later I'd get ill myself and then they would take great delight in telling me my diet was doing me no good. It was almost as if my body was teaching me a lesson for my own smugness. I find it much easier nowadays to simply remember that everyone is on their own path and I am just lucky to have found something that I believe in and that generally works for me. Sure I get sick every now and again, but then again I'm not 100% raw all the time. And, like others have mentioned, there are a myriad of reasons why people get sick; not just their diet.