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Heres a link to signs of low iron.
A lot of people tell me I look pale,and ask if Im ok. Im tired most all the time.
Its like I have to make myself do things, especially at work.I try to sleep 8 hours a night but find myself waking up 2 hours or so before my alarm goes of ready to run a marathon, so i get up, and within an hour or so Im tired, and this goes on the rest of the day. I do have periods of energy but mostly Im tired. This is pissing me off! I eat a lot of spinach, like a pound a day along with greens, banannas, alot of banannas. and apples, and raisins which raisins are supposed to have alot of iron and so do greens. Is this detox or what i dont know but i dont want to go to a doctor because theyll just knowck down the raw diet and tell me I need meat etc which i dont. I read all the time of people going raw and they all say "wow,I have so much energy" well why dont I?? I dont get it.
I dont know if iron is my problem or what my problem is but i do know Im told I look pale. And I am tired. waking up before my alarm and being full of energy then within an hour or 2 later Im tired?? Come on this is wrong. Maybe I need seeds and fats even though I keep being told keep avacado and seeds to a minimum, well I have been and it isnt working. i was always understood good fat is our fuel , well then why not eat more avacado? I have felt better when I did eat seeds and avacado and didnt gain weight from them but yet Im told not to eat much of those items, more fruit and greens so i swith to fruit and greens and still tired, TIRED!! GRRR!! I think Im still detoxing but when does the detox end?
Rob

One way to see how beneficial taking iron supps might be for you, is to take them for 2-3 days and if you don't get anything out of them then most likely you are fine and don't need them, food items will be plenty eventually. Also, when eating iron rich foods, or taking the iron supplements take them with plenty of vit-c.

I took iron the first year before I found raw foods, but the benefits were so striking that my clients noticed almost from the first day! Iron saved my life and did so much I won't relay all the benefits here. I took 3-4 tablets thru-out the for most of a whole year. That would be the 365 mg. tablets with 65 mg. of elemental iron. They never constipated me at all.

I found I could breathe once again, got color back in my face, had more energy, could lay on my back, and much else..it was so striking I wrote a list of what it helped with. It was the start of having enough energy to get on the computer and start searching for some answers as to why Iron helped me so much, and what else could I do about losing weight, and rebuilding my health..which led me to raw foods! It's been over 5 years now, and I'm still learning, but wow..has it all changed my life!

Love,
Prism

Thanks for chatting about the iron here. Does anyone know which value in your bloodwork shows the iron you guys are referring to here? Is it Ferritin? Or is it Iron (serum)?

My Ferritin is superlow, but my Serum Iron is midrange. Any thoughts much appreciated

If you felt better when you ate avocado and seeds then maybe you should do so again. Recommendations and things like that are but, at best, guidelines; look at them, evaluate them, try some of them, but in the end you have to do what works for you and your body (for that period of time) because you are the only authority on you...my opinion...

Blood Builder by New Chapter is an excellent herbal combo to replenish iron.

Are you using spices and condiments? These can be stimulating, and prevent restful sleeping. Also, are you under stress in your life? Stress, worry, anxiety will all hamper sleep. Before I went to a low fat raw diet, I was sleeping 6 hours or less on my high fat raw diet. When I changed my raw diet to only fruits, vegetables, nuts and seeds, my body finally was able to get the rest it needed. My body went into chronic fatigue when I gave up the more complex transitional raw foods for the simpler whole foods because the stimulants were gone.

I want to add that the chronic fatigue I experienced was the beginning of a detox that lasted 4 months. I slept 16 hours a day for the first month, and each successive months my sleep decreased by 2 hours. During this 4 months I did not work, because I wanted to be able to sleep as much as my body needed. If you are unable to make space for the sleep to occur, this will prevent the healing that is necessary.

You might want to play with adding more fat and see how you feel. For myself, after I went through the 4 month detox, I increased my fat intake to 20% of my caloric intake because eating at 10% fat felt too controlling for me. I did this for 2 years, and over that time, my fat intake fell to under 10% effortlessly.

When you describe what you are going through, this reminds me of my detox. If you are finding that you can't sleep soundly at night, perhaps try finishing your last meal of the day a bit earlier. Also, see if you can nap during the day. If you can, see if you can take time off from your responsibilities so that you can sleep whenever you feel tired. It feels like there is something(anxiety, stress) blocking the sleep.

When my detox hit, my skin was ash grey and I had dark circles under my eyes. Also, at the time I weighted 130 pounds (I'm 5'10". Now I weigh 140.

roadrunner,

I want to say that you are looking sickly to others because you are doing something right, not something wrong. Your body is asking for you to slow down, to get more rest, like mine did. You can choose to stop this detox process, by backing off your current diet, but in that case you will slow down or possibly stop the healing process your body is going through. Eating more fat will slow down the detox process if that is what you desire. For myself, I choose to detox. I made my diet as cleansing as possible at this time, and at one point I was eating only fresh sweet fruit and no vegetables for 3 weeks. After the detox, I raised my fat intake because I felt I was doing too much control, and my body was asking for more.

If you choose the detox, and making a space in your lifestyle for your body to get all the sleep it is asking for, you will achieve a level of excellent health in your body to which you have never seen before. I was excited when my fatigue hit me, because I could tell my body was trying to heal me. I think you should also be excited. In my process, this happened about 5 months after being 100% raw, and 10 months after I first started my raw journey.

Bryan,
Just pepper and sea salt on my dinner salad. but lately for about a week now I havent been using salt and pepper. I dont use condiments of any kind. And yes I am under stress right now. Debt problems from having a lousy job this last summer so I got behind on everything. But I had to quit my previous job before that because of high stress there causing spikes in my blood pressure causing dizzy spells, so i quit the job and took another job that paid much less to get me by until I found a better job. I found an awsome job now that pays excellent and very low stress which is a plus but Im burdoned with constant phone calls from creditors every day and I am so close to getting cought up, but they wont leave me alone,I was close to being sued by one of them but I got it taken care of then my car broke down costing me almost 700 dollars which I dont have right now but I need my car so I had to pay it. I work from 6 am to 5 or 6 pm so the only rest i get is at night when I go to bed but i go to bed by 9 and get up at 5 so 8 hours sleep is what Im getting.

Bryan,
I am basically doing the 80/10/10 based on others who are on it. I dont have the book yet but i am going to order it when I get the money. I have talked to others who are on it and that have read it and asked them their eating habits and have chosen to do this:
I eat sweet fruit all day one thing at a time till full like banannas, then later in the day when I get hungry I will eat more fruit. then in the evening for dinner i eat a very large salad with leafy greens and 2 avacados, topped diced tomatoes, all organic.So fruit all day, salad at night eating light to heavy, light in the am, moderate mid day building up to the large salad in the evening and this has helped. I find that when I go through periods where i dont eat for like say 3 hours straight I have more energy, this also happens when I fast, i fast on weekends only(short term fasts more frequent) and when I dont eat I have energy and when I do I am tired and burdoned so sounds like my body doesnt want food, also the other thing that I forgot to mention is the nasal drip, my nose is CONSTANTLY running, not plugged up or stuffy, just running and running and it drives me crazy, because i do not have a cold. But it is also very cold here as it has been averaging zero to about 20 degrees daily and I work outside.And you know what is wierd is it begins running AFTER i eat something say a couple of banannas it starts running. and in the evening when Im home and in my house my nose does not run.

I am 5-11 and 158 lbs , by BMI is 22 which is in the normal range. I no longer worry about others comments because I know over time i will be VERY healthy after my transition, its just sometimes I wonder how long this phase will take and I also know it varries with each person.I havent done my weekend fasts now since christmas weekend because of the holidays but the raw diet itself is a detox. i will get back to my 36 hour fasts this weekend and it is the beginning of the year so it is time for a 7 day fast but I will not go 7 days on water i plan to mono fast for 7 days on banannas only, lately i have been practically living on banannas anyway with the exception of the dinner salad all i eat daily at work is banannas.
Rob

Thank you for your responses I appreciate the advise, I have been taking naps whenever i can and resting and feeling much better. I know my body is transitioning because this is why I have days where I feel tired and run down and days like to day where i feel great and refreshed. I just got done sleeping for 10 hours and this is rare for me.I have been practicing deep breathing and meditation with relaxing music. I also deep breathe when driving as some of my loads at work require driving for a while and so i practice deep breathing with relaxing music while driving to my destination and this is helping. I want to learn yoga but i dont have time in my schedule for a class so im trying online yoga with things im finding on you tube.I have a busy mind so I find it hard when meditating to clear my mind and relax because Im always thinking about things.
Sorry for the long posts but I want you and others to know my situation more clearer as to what is going on in my life and sleep habits/eating habits etc. I personally dont feel low iron is my problem I feel it it detox. Just because one has some symptoms of something doesnt mean you have the problem. I eat alot of greens and raisins which are very high in iron. i snack on raisins daily but not a whole bunch but a few handfulls here and there.
Rob

Is it actually true that raisins are high in iron? I remember reading something a few years ago that said there was confusion about raisins because they'd tested high in iron during a certain period of time during which all raisins were cured in iron vats, which leached iron into the fruit.

Organic blackstrap molasses has %20 iron per TBSP. Mix in fresh squeezed orange juice.

I doubt that it's 20% iron per tbsp - that would mean 3 grams of iron, which would probably be lethal, or at least poisonous.

Rawrrr,
Thanks for the info! I am putting a tbsp of organic black strap molassis in my bananna smoothies now daily and it seems to be doing something,I dont look quite as pale. I think part of my paleness has to do with WINTER and Im not tan right now!! but I used molassis while on the master cleanse and I felt great while taking it! Oh and WOW I love your picture, just a comment relax!! And thanks again.
Rob

Hey roadrunner I too had a runny nose last winter every time I was out on my push bike, it was almost like water. It was fairly early in my 100% raw days so I'm assuming it was the body adjusting to such a liquid based diet.

Bryan :
I've got dark circles around my eyes now and have had for ages, at least for as long as I've been raw ( 7 months ). I have a problem being able to sleep well. I've had a habbit of drinking water at night times for a long time and unfortunately it means getting up to pee 3 or 4 times a night which I reckon is screwing with my sleep cycles denying a full rest. I even get thirsty on an 80-10-10 with no extras.. just raw fruit + veg.

I'm hoping it will pass and I wont get so thirsty at night. Otherwise I'm going to try fasting from 6 pm until bed time and drink water before hand to see if it helps. Nice to know that you hard a period with dark circles and that it went away.

Lightform,

Getting enough sleep is a not always easy. If your mind is active, this alone could keep you from getting restful sleep. If I eat fruit late, I do have to wake up once or twice during the night, but I am mostly able to fall back asleep in matter of seconds after returning to bed.

One thing you might play with on the weekends is a 3 day water fast. Don't eat anything on Friday, but still go to work. On Saturday and Sunday just stay at home, drinking only water, and staying in bed and sleeping as much as possible. You might find that without the stimulation of food, your body will slow down enough for it to get the deep rest it needs. Once your body catches up on its much needed sleep, those dark circles will disappear as mine did.