OK. So I truly am in despair. More so than ever. So add to my chronic fungal and parasitic infection, adrenal exhaustion, depression, leaky gut, food allergies, environmental allergies, arthritis, the following - Hypothyroidism, persistent anemia, and decreased protein levels in the blood. What would you do? My diet is a mess. But that is due at this point to the fact that I have no idea how to proceed. I feel dead. And everything except for soft fruits and blended greens hurts. Everything. If you were in my shoes, what would you do? I am about ready to give up in my heart. My young beautiful life is passing me by while I exist in this dreamlike state of chronic pain and confusion. HELP!!!!! Please. I felt that I was on board with this raw thing. But I guess I do not have faith that I can heal on it - Nothing seems possible right now. I am not getting out of bed tomorrow - Or the next day - I am not in love with the idea of facing life right now. It doesn't seem like much of one to face.

I'm sorry you're in a really bad way right now. You said that "everything except for soft fruits and blended greens hurts." Would you be able to do this long term, just on the basis that everything else hurts? I know it may seem very difficult, but if you can just try to give your body this type of long-term stability, it really will heal. If you could just do it day by day, that would be enough; which is to say that it would work physically. Healing emotionally to ensure that you could have no internal obstacles to this path is much more complex. Are you in touch with your past, and sure of what personal events and people in your life caused your eating disorder to form in the first place? I believe somewhere in that must be the key to aleiving your current ailments. The symptoms, and the binging are all trying to tell you something (nothing about food - about your life and the history of your body.) You still have another chance at life as long as you're alive, and I hope you can reach that point.

I'm sorry to hear you're not feeling well.

If I were you I'd get into oil pulling. It's a simple way to feel a lot better fast. Start slow as it can cause Herx reaction in the beginning.

[oilpulling.com]

If I were in your shoes, I would only eat the foods that didn't hurt until I felt strong enought to eat other foods. Until then, only eat what works, not what your mind (or other people's minds) wants you to eat. Get plenty of rest and sleep, try some meditation and yoga, and get yourself well.

PS -

If you do decide to try oil pulling, there is a forum at curezone.com that can give support when starting out. Here's the link :

[curezone.com]

Anyone trying this should read as much as possible on it first. There are many benefits to be had from it.

-I agree with Bryan 100% Do what is COMFORTABLE for you now - not what you feel you SHOULD do.....or HAVE TO DO.......or what others are doing.....or what you think OTHERS think you should be doing. Not of that crap matters. Now is the time for you to be real 'kind-selfish'. That is, VERY selfish in giving kindness and appreciation to yourself. Go to the places you LOVE....eat the foods that you LOVE.........

-You are not having a problem from not having enough/the right foods. You are having a problem from not having enough love. This is something food (or even another person) will never truly be able to give you.

-Just my opinions.

-David Z. Mason

It sounds to me like your body is telling you exactly what it needs right now, soft fruits and blended greens and rest. It is your mind that is agonizing over the decisions. You are so sick, like and old woman, and you are only, what?, 32. It sounds to me like you have an ultra sensitive body and up until this time your eating disorder has only made you sicker. Right now you are going to have to treat your body gently and care for yourself like you would something very fragile, because you ARE fragile and will be until you get stronger. The only other route I can see is the traditional medical route and I have seen what that can do to a sensitive person. Drugs and more drugs and all the while getting sicker and sicker. IMO that would be the worst thing you could do to yourself. Be strong in your mind and give your body what it is telling you it needs. Remember this diet is not some radical new concept. It is the oldest diet in the world. It is the diet nature created for our bodies and some people, me included, are not able to survive/thrive on anything but what we were intended to eat. Please fight for your life. Remember, one day at a time.

Love,
Kise'

Dancer in the night,

It sounds as though you are feeling really discouraged about your health. Some strategies i ultimately found useful in my long struggle battling depression: sunshine and nature, supportive relationships, meaningful work (of any kind, mine is parenting) spiritual and cerebral introspection. I would also like to echo the wise and compassionate sentiments of the members above (except Lurch 'cause i don't know what "oil pulling" is). Diet and exercise have such an impact on our physical and mental health. Wishing you peace on your path.

Dancer in the night,

It sounds as though you are feeling really discouraged about your health. Some strategies i ultimately found useful in my long struggle battling depression: sunshine and nature, supportive relationships, meaningful work (of any kind, mine is parenting) spiritual and cerebral introspection. I would also like to echo the wise and compassionate sentiments of the members above (except Lurch 'cause i don't know what "oil pulling" is). Diet and exercise have such an impact on our physical and mental health. Wishing you peace on your path.

leaky gut is treated with the supplement glutamine or L-GLUTAMINE

L-Glutamine is a natural amino acid dietary supplement

first hit with a google search, " glutamine leaky gut "

gets this site which looks good

see [www.nutri-notes.com]

also

[www.fungusfocus.com]

----------------------------

if you have enough energy,

and a juicer ?

you might try adding carrot, celery, beet juice ( only half a beet to 16ouncesjuice),

or just some carrot juice, and see if your body likes it.

This has the potential to add a lot of nutrients in a gentle way.

i belive parsely has a lot of iron, but like beet should only be added in small amounts. this would be good for anemia

-------------------------

you look like a sweet person

i hope you have some non-judgemental friends you can talk to
when you feel most down...

it may also help to write down negative thoughts on paper
and then write down positive contradictory statements
so that you don't totally buy into the gloomy part of yourself
and the version of reality it is painting

you certainly are dealing with a lot of problems
it would get me down too...sometimes I draw my demons

I don't know about your parasites or how you "know" you have them
and i don't know about Hypothyroidism and how that was diagnosed
and what treatments have been tried...
if you indeed have these problems
you are probably stuck with the difficult balancing act
of getting some help from medical profesionals
while staying as close as possible to alternative diet

i thought i had candida once, went to the doctor and he insisted
on sending a stool sample to great smoky labs
turned out the doc was right---i had an amoeba...and had to take a very strong
antibiotic drug Flagyl
but the doc was smart and got me on some good probiotics during and after

right now your body is keeping you away from fats...this is good
according to Doug Graham, DC excess fats can cause candida & many other problems
for more info. on this you may want to check out
[www.vegsource.com]
however be forwarned
the "8-1-1 folks" are dogmatically blind
when it comes to the benefits of juicing during certain health crises

I think the book Pefect Body by Roe Gallo could help you because it has a couple transition stories about people going thru same kind of things. It was my raw food bible for the first 3 years of being high raw.

Also find a raw food pot-luck or start one yourself, that might help also. Being around other people that have gone or are traveling same road as you helps.

If I were you and in that shape (I was in terrible shape and alot of pain before raw) I'd do daily green juice, lots of juicy fruits, and the tender greens mixed with whatever else you can tolerate. I couldn't eat much of the greens when I started either, but I could if I put them in my juicer. I would cut up my favs like tomatoes,and cucumbers and eat those.

I also would try doing some light green smoothies. A little juice or water, some baby spinach, small amt. alfalfa sprouts, and some fruits like blueberries or raspeberries, bananas, mangos..up to you.

Think of making the word 'cleansing' your word for the month. What you eat is going to cleanse your body from inside out. Carry out the toxic waste, by eating fresh ripe produce, light juices and smoothies. Drink lots of distilled or filtered water. Drink young or mature fresh coconut water even if you don't eat the inside of the coconut.

Things like dates, avocados, coconuts, nuts, you can add as you go along. Try to keep the fat ratio low, and if you get a craving for fat, add some young coconut meat to a smoothie first. Have some almond butter on a pear or apple. For sweet, eat medjool dates or whatever is you fav.

You have a lot going on in your body, I'm wondering if all those things are diagnosed and or how you know you have them? Sounds like most of them could be interdependent on each other. For one to sustain itself, it manifests another anomoly in your body. Anemia can cause a ton of symptoms, I know because I had chronic anemia before I found raw. I took iron supplements which saved my life, it gave me enough strenght to get up and start searching for a life-long cure of my general ill health. Do a search for (anemia in women, low iron, anemia, iron supplements, etc. tons of info. on it. It has at least 12 symptoms that manifest and I had at least 10 of them)

I'd lump them together as one disease, and just overall think 'cleanse' from the inside out. I'd go in for colonics after a month or 2 of being as high raw as you are able. Do a series of them, usually between 8-12 sessions. Take probiotics, mild ones to start with.

If you aren't able to do the colonics, buy an enema bag, and use that. I used it with just warm tap water which then makes the treatment readily accessable, cheap, and easy to do. You can go to websites like enemabag.com for lots of info. and even supplies.

Post lots here too, your best resource is the people on this website. Oh and come over to the forum where we post on our personal online diary. There's tons of support and individual contact there. And yes you will get out of bed tomorrow, because you are a strong willed person, that's why you are posting a 'help' on here. We want you to get up, get out, and get on your personal healing path.

Love,
Prism



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 03/31/2007 05:02PM by Prism.

I am in agreement with Dream Earth, that the emotional/spiritual healing needs to happen, so that there won't be internal obstacles that will prevent your healing. The mind is so powerful, and if the mind has some false beliefs in place about one's lack of worth or value, healthful lifestyle is not going to overcome the mind's belief that it has no right to exist, prosper, thrive, be happy and healthy.

This is just my opinion, and I'm only posting this for debate.

Bryan, you may be in a place now where you can work on deeper issues such as emotional/spiritual/ as you have been a raw fooder for a long time.

While it's good to keep the connection between our emotional/spiritual and body/diet issues somewhat connected early on in our search for better health, sometimes it's just plain necessary to not worry about that and get to crux of the most acute problems first. I'm not talking about anyone with food issues, like Anorexia Nervosa etc. They imo need professional help.

When I was very ill, my eyes were literally clouded with vision being poor, my brain was in a brain fog and that's the truth, I was lethargic and felt 'dead' like I was living behind somekind of veil. I could barely function, I couldn't walk a half block, I couldn't lay on my back, I couldn't catch a satisfying breath, and much more. I could not have delved into emotional/spriritual anything at that time. I needed relief, I needed to get my body in some kind of functioning state, and my route happened to be life saving iron supplements which I might not have needed if I'd found raw foods earlier. But even with raw foods, it was about 6 momths before I even thought of doing my own fresh green juices.

You can start the healing process for body/brain first, then after you are healthier and thinking better, you can delve into and have much clearer thought with regard to emotional/spiritual/body health connection.

Love,
Prism

really solid help all, particularly from prism and happyway. If i recall, you had a previous post about doing water fasting under the supervision of a ?doctor? for 21 days? what people don't realize is how much disease a raw diet, and especially a fast can stir up in the body. eating raw doesn't clean you out, it just stops putting the junk in. Now, not to argue with the idea of the body being self-healing and self-repairing, self-directing, self-cleansing. but I agree with happyway that not only is there a blindness to juicing if one is to swallow this model, but also to the concept of 'therapies'. In my definition, yoga is a therapy, therapy is a therapy. stay at a diet that you feel most comfortable, and less isolated. keeping the problems between you and the computer console sounds less then theraputic to me. From where I stand, I would agree with prisim that juicing and hydrotherapy would be your most useful adjunct, especially since you've had less then success with your water fasts.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 03/31/2007 05:36PM by anaken.

Hey,
I just wanted to say keep on trucking. I agree with the posts that tell you to be selfish; do what you think is best, it probably is. Raw food, medical doctors, meditation...don't make yourself do anything.
Look, I don't know you, so I don't know who you are inside, but I know when I was near that bottom I would ask people for advice so I wouldn't have to do anything myself...it was like, if I followed their advice, and it didn't work, I couldn't be blamed, understand? You might be completely different, but I just wanted to say you should listen to yourself. If you get a sticky thought, an idea or desire that won't go away, try to do it. Coddle yourself, read a good book, anything...just take care of yourself...if you listen to yourself, you can't do anything wrong...Hope you feel better.~Kate

Just a thought, have you considered visiting any naturopathic doctors?

They study homeopathy and may be able to offer you some relief in a natural way.

Also, if you are having that many problems, perhaps it might be a good idea to have some professional advice.

I do hope you feel better and continue to follow the raw way.

Btw, when you are feeling better I hope you have a chance to read the many great articles on the home page here. It's where I first came and found alot of great useful information when I first went searching for a better way to live.

Peace and love

Wheatgrass, it does a body good!!!

I truly hope you start feeling better. I've been where your at, but I am getting better.

I think soft fruit and blended greens is a beautiful diet. The more fresh greens I get from my garden, and the more sunshine I get the better I feel.

i like the oil swishing idea the best
probably because it was the most original
and i never heard of it before

Remember also that alot of people get digestive problems if they are having emotional problems. I agree with others here when they say that you should work on healing emotionally.

Some people can't even eat if they are in a bad emotional state.

Hang in there and know that we are all here for you whenever you need something.



KelBel

You are doing such a good job being honest and opening yourself up to friends here you can pretty much say anything to, now that you have made a space, fill it up with what you want fast so it does not close..

meaning we know how it is, now what do you want instead?

For now why not just eat what doesn't hurt? That's how I came to a diet of mostly fruit and greens, by process of elimination. I never imagined I would ever want to eat that way by choice and have it not feel restrictive at all.

I can relate to the list of "conditions" you name. I know what it feels like to want to give up. I also know that sometimes it takes hitting rock bottom and feeling that despair that makes us willing to admit that everything we've tried to do to heal ourselves until now hasn't worked and we are ready to try something different. You may look back on this time years later as such a blessing and turning point.

By the way on another thread we are talking about doing mono diets (the grape cure thread), you might check it out!

One thing I've been looking at for myself in recent years, and this may not relate to you or if it does you may not want to hear it, but I am examining how there is a part of me that likes being sick, for the attention it gives me. With my family dynamics, I learned growing up that being sick got me love and attention. It can be a learned pattern, however weird that sounds.

Love,
Uma

You are in a lot of discomfort to put it mildly.

Health isnt all about food. I strongly urge you to look into energy therapies, especially cranio sacral therapy. Ive had lots of success with it, along with breathing and visualization exercises, acupuncture, homeopathy and physical cleansing with clay-based toxin absorber. You could read Your Inner Physician by John Upledger,(the developer of craniosacral therapy). Its easy and fun to read, with several anecdotes as examples.

You must be feeling so discouraged right now, but there really is hope for you.

Hope you find what helps, best, Annie