Just wondering how many of you had a chronic illness which brought you to raw? Or what caused you to turn to raw?

I've had eczema all over my body for 12 years (since I was 15) and after exhausting professionals, I resorted to cortisone cream for the last 12 years. i had to go off it when I was pregnant with my first child and found the eczema difficult to tolerate.

Last year, trying for the second baby, whenever it was 'possible' that I was pregnant, I stopped using the cortizone and whenever I stopped, my eczema was unbearable. I thought that I couldn't go through 9 months of that. I came to a point where I wanted to stop using the drug and find a cure.

I went to a well renowned naturopath here in Australia 4 months ago and began her program which I am still on. As part of her program i was introduced to raw foods and began doing my own research.

Thus, I am here. Still covered in itchy, red excema but many kilograms lighter and certainly healthier than I was 4 months ago.

May the eczema go away eventually

Grayzie

What brought me to raw?
I have had an intrest in nutrition and fitness since the late 70's.
And always will.
I went thru the entire 80's trying to build my body with SAD.Well not SAD,but one step better than that.The nutrition beliefs from 20 yrs ago were to eat as little fat as possible,and load up on skim milk and pasta.Well, doing that I never got the physique I wanted.Or even felt the way I wanted.
I believe the extremely low fat diet I was on led to EFA deficiencies,which I have read can lead to depression.Depression started to be a way of life for me in the early 90's,and so I was wanting to escape BIG time.
I chose alcohol.
For general escape and dealing with losses at the time.
Enough said.
I always knew in my gut that the live living foods of the earth were the way to go.I have read so much material in the last 10 yrs on nutrition,and need to let go of alot of old beliefs about it.
I am electing to eat this way to clear my mind of depression,give up ways of escape, and get on with life.
So here I am.
Brian



Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 04/08/2008 05:14PM by Raw1228.

well here goes about me.
When I was a teen I desired to not eat meat however I lacked the knowledge of eating different vegis and really had no resources to eat a nutritional vegitarian diet. My parents were against me and my desire to be a vegitarian. I became very sick after existing on peanut butter and other non meat foods then. \Later in life I lived with a comunity of people who were reletivitly health minded and I was able to get sugar out of my system and eat some real healthy foods, but not raw or vegitarian. I tryed to raise my first two children to eat more healthful choices and discouraged sugar again my parents chastized me for being so overboard in not allowing the kids sugar. I had several tramatic things happen and really became self destructive and just ate anything for years. My mother got breast cancer and my father discovered ann wigmore and they went to Boston and visited her, She was very kind and generous in helping my parents the best she could but the cancer was very advanced in my mother. I watched the cancer grow around my mothers chest and it eventually suffocated her. The wheat grass and other remedies my father found only aided her in pain control and gave enough nutrition to extend her life beyond what the doctors were saying she would live. For a time after her death I could not look at food the same way, everything looked like the cancer growing on my mother. At that time I tryed to eat raw foods but I became very week and I must have been doing something wrong because I really felt awful. Eventually I started eating regular foods and numbed myself enough to just forget about foods effect on us. In the back of my mind I always had the desire to eat all raw foods. Last year I was sitting on my back porch smoking a cigerette and wishing I had the energy to do things but due to my extensive overweight and bad habits I had no energy I felt like death really was knocking at my door. I realized that I was not getting any younger and that desire to be a raw food eater should be aither addressed or tossed away with other dreams that never came to pass. I started eating raw foods that day. I quit drinking coffee and baisically became a raw food eater overnight. I did have a bit of a hard time quiting smoking but after a week of eating raw foods I quit smoking. I lost 100 pounds from June to thanksgiving. I took a very wrong turn during the holidays and had a hard time getting back to raw. I kept trying and trying to start but would cafe in at just the simple thought of eating some cooked foods. Each night I would go to sleap saying I will eat raw in the morning and fail. I began to regain my weight back and the raw glow dissapeared from my face. I desired to celebrate my 50th b-day being raw but still I couldnt make that move to eat raw. I realized that there are other factors involved besides what we eat that we need in order to change. I started reading a couple phrases out of the bible each night and found I woke up with a more positive disposition. With this positive attitude many other things began to fall in place for me. I began to desire to be kinder to myself and started eating raw foods. I have been raw for almost a week now and feel more certain that this is the way for me.

hmmmmm this ones simple:


Why Vegan?
Because I have the most love and admiration for all animals of the earth!!!
a rawvegan hopeful, rawdev4life!!!

I was 50% raw after an eye-opening Master Cleanse, but only dove in 100% as an act of desperation when I was stuck in a vicious cycle of antibiotics that destroyed two months of my life (I missed Halloween, my birthday, an anniversary with the boyfriend--@#($*)@#(*% I had enough!).

THEN, as I began to reap the benefits and experience an amazing transformation on levels I did not expect... I dug deeper... and kept going... and now it seems the path for an incredible journey has hijacked my life. >8)

i was diagnosed with IBS right before i started working at an indoor organic sprout farm and living foods resources centre. since my mama is a big ole hippy i was used to teh crazy food ideas and it wasn't really a big stretch for me. i read all the books in the shop (many, many, many of them) and went 100% overnight. after two months, the master cleanse and a colonic ~~presto chango~~ no more belly trouble. fancy that eh?

I like the taste of the food.

oooooh. a big question.

i always had problems with foods- cravings, constipation, dislikes, vomiting, etc. when i hit puberty i couldn't stomach most foods, i either threw them up or felt ill for days on end.

when i got married, my husband noted "whenever you eat bread, you get very sick"- so obviously i has started to eliminate foods in bulk to keep healthy. my grandmother has celiac sprue, so i listened to my husband and body (for the first time) and stopped eating anything that made me ill or swollen. oats, cereals, packaged foods, all went out the window rapidly. meats and veggies were all i could handle.

then i started to wonder about my weird diet- so i went online and found sites on raw foods. and voila- here i still am.

peace-

I am with Brian (raw1228) - I started working out and played a lot of sports in school. As I got older (hs) I started restricted my foods (first signs of eating disorder) while I was still working out like crazy and involved with sports. I instinctively knew that I didn't want to eat meat, however, was not given the choice of what to eat in my house growing up ("you will eat what the rest of us are having, period." Hence, the growing need for control over food - and more restricting of fats especially (I was definitely tuned into the "fat free" craze at one point - and like Brian began eating ultra "healthy" according to weight loss/workout experts - low carbs, low fat - which I/ED brain interpreted as no fats, no carbs.) On the other hand, because of the sports I was always in need of a "quick fix" and would turn to whatever crap I could get my hands on somtimes, which I think definitely led to an addiction to sugar, white flour, additives, and whatever other poisons I was eating.

Throughout the years, I have worked out many of the issues as to "why" the ED came into play (I could have easily picked alcohol to deal with my stress, or drugs, but food was my choice - later becoming bulimic). I also didn't realize that the fat restriction would cause severe depression (along with the situational things I was dealing with.) I still battle the issues every day, and hope that they will get better as I continue my journey on raw food. However, I certainly don't see a raw food lifestyle as a cure in any sense.

I am still working with a counselor that is helping tremendously with the depression and repressed anger, however, it is really difficult to try to counsel with a therapist who questions a rawfood lifestyle (is there one out there that doesn't?) When I explained to him how I eat and what I eat he immediately raised the red flag. I had to try to convince him that it wasn't merely part of the ED. His first question was "WHERE DO YOU GET YOUR PROTEIN?!?!" I guess that is the other reason I am crazy about inputting my numbers into fitday, so that I can prove that I am not losing anything by eating this way.

Regardless of all of that, I am studying to become a naturopath. I have researched a million diets and at first really was attracted to macrobiotics. There are some incredibly wonderful attributes to that lifestyle, however, the foods were not suited for my body. I hated all that cooked and pickled food. I never once heard a macro counselor recommend a regular ol' salad. So, intuitivey, I knew that raw food was/is the way to go. Hence the reason I am here! Phew, sorry for the long ramble!

How did I get to this point in my life? Gosh, It's just a big jumble in my head right now.

I am a 31 yr old Wiccan from Kansas. I am now realizing that I have an alcohol problem. I also have a weight problem. Truthfully I don't want either of these things. The weight is only 30 lbs overweight so that really takes a back seat to the drinking. I am noticing more and more desire to drink. What does that have to do with anything... I dunno! Ok, moving on!

I have been interested in health and natural healing for years now. Almost to an obsession. I like to study eating habits and their effect on the body and also herbology and remedies. I tried going raw with my last pregnancy but it didn't work so well. In those 2 weeks of raw eating we went out to restaraunts more often than we ever had before. It was like telling myself that I can't have it made me want it more. Plus I was just hormonal. So I stopped for awhile.

Well, here I am again. One week into the raw lifestyle again. I love it! Yes I have cravings here and there but not nearly the amount that I had the first time around. It's as though my body remembers us doing this and recognizes that this is what needs to be done. It's more accepting this time.

I get frustrated because of the reactions I get from others. I can't stand being treated like I am stupid all because I am doing something different, especially when I know that this is the right thing for me to do. I have always been interested in being vegetarian. Not vegan, just vegetarian. Then I went to YouTube and watched that video called "Meet your meat". I haven't touched it since then.

Another thing that brought me to raw is my spirituality. I have a desire to become closer in tune with the earth and nature. I think this will definately help. I also hope it will help with those alcohol cravings. Well folks, that is why I am here. Basically for self improvement both physically and spiritually.


River Willow