Tempting Fate

I’m tempting fate once again in my life as I begin to count down the days to when we move to New Mexico and I begin the long journey back to the raw food lifestyle. One of the most interesting things that I learned recently about NM is that only one hour away is The Ann Wigmore Foundation. I didn’t know that it actually existed until I started doing research into the raw food community out there. Eight years ago I spent a month in Puerto Rico studying and being trained in the living foods lifestyle at The Ann Wigmore Institute, but I don’t recall them ever mentioning the Ann Wigmore Foundation in New Mexico…but I was so messed up back then that they could have mentioned it and it just flew right over my head!

I have been dreaming of being raw again, and I can feel it coming ever stronger, pulling me back, tempting and teasing me to just have that one piece of fruit or salad. I don’t dare eat anything raw at this point when I am at home. Let me put it to you this way; if we left a coffee cup out over night that had some coffee, cream and sugar in it, by morning there would be a layer of mold on top! That is how contaminated our home is, so eating raw foods of any kind in this house is something I won’t do.

These are some of my feelings on the raw and living food lifestyle for anyone that has already started their journey or is thinking of transitioning:

In the raw world you will get many opinions, claims and “facts.” But the raw and living food diet is not a “one size fits all” diet. Before jumping in to it you must know your own body, what you need personally as far as nutrients are concerned, and how best to utilize this diet to get the optimal results…longevity, clarity and physical and emotional balance.

Some will say “only eat organic”, but how demineralized is the soil that the fruits and vegetables are grown in? This is a very important question when considering the raw food lifestyle. Are you going to be aware of where your food is grown? Will you be in touch with the local farmer to find out if his soil is mineralized? If the soil is depleted, those rawfoods do not carry all the minerals our bodies need to be vibrant and healthy.  Where does our food come from? These are the questions to ask ourselves when embarking on the raw food journey. If you’re not willing to do the homework, discover what is best for your body, and just shove nuts down your throat because they are the fastest way to end hunger or out of some sort of “fear” that you aren’t getting enough protein, then you are better off taking a very slow transition into raw foods until you get your priorities in order.
I haven’t met many successful rawfoodist, NOT because the raw food lifestyle doesn’t work, but because these people weren’t thinking for themselves about how their body worked or what their body needed. They held tight to ideology and dogma and refused to listen to the wisdom of their own bodies screaming out.
I have seen them hoovering over lovingly prepared meals at raw food potlucks and get togethers, gobbling everything up in site without properly chewing the food or taking moderate portions. They gravitated towards heavy nut sauces, nut cheeses, oily treats and gourmet raw foods. Salads were often left untouched as well as fresh fruit displays unless there was some sort of heavy dipping sauce to compliment it. Although their diet had changed, their core eating habits had not.

We can grapple over what to eat and what not to eat, but there is so much more to being raw than just food. It is a way of life, a way of being. We can rush into it unconsciously and make the same mistakes we did when we ate a regular conventional diet and end up even more unhealthy then when we first started.

Educate yourselves first on all things raw, and understand the commitment that is involved. Be honest about what you are walking away from and what you are now embracing and be incredibly gentle with yourself, taking your time to transition slowly.
If you are suffering from a bad detox because you went “balls to the wall” full force into the raw food diet, cut back on the amount of fruits your are taking in and switch to green drinks and more dark green leafy foods. Raw nuts can help to slow down the effects of a detox, but make sure you know where your nuts are coming from. Nuts will be more readily digestible if they are soaked and sprouted first, and then blended and strained. And everything should be done ultimately in moderation.

For myself, I walked away from the raw food lifestyle a few years ago when I thought it was causing the health problems I currently have. I have been doing research and planning the time when I can safely return back to the raw food lifestyle. It takes time to plan and to also “undo” many of the habits that I have allowed to take over in my life. I look forward to a time very soon when I can transition according to my own body’s needs with commitment not only to the lifestyle but to myself as well, because the results that I have had being raw can not compare with any other time in my life.

My Long Journey Back to the Raw Lifestyle

For a few years I was “Ravishingly Raw” bringing myself back from the brink of ruin physically. I was one of those unlucky people that was struck with Lupus. My sister and I both got struck with it in the same month of the same year only hers was severe and mine was mild in comparison. I was also unlucky enough for the ANA blood test to show a very low presence of anything auto-immune, but it had the Rheumatologist baffled. I had tremors, then lost some of my ability to walk and I was so embarrassed by the fact that as a result I was also incontinent. I was tested for everything under the sun neurological, but in the end I was given a diagnoses of fibromyalgia and Lupus. The doctor explained to me that in some people, Lupus can actually not show up on a blood test, but because I also had a family history of it, that he gave me a diagnosis of both. It was quite strange having both, and he explained both of them to me, and differences between the two different disorders. I was given an extremely high dose of prednisone, and I was told that the prednisone was for the Lupus and it would not help with the fibromyalgia. So double the pain, until the day when my legs started getting numb and feeling really heavy. Then I didn’t feel any pain at all in them. I also had a hard time moving them…the pain was gone, but so was all feeling from the waist down.

After a year of dealing with the medications and the fact that there was no cure for either disorder, I decided to slowly transition to a raw food diet. I started by taking out things that I really didn’t care for anyway, and then started removing other kinds of cooked and processed foods from my diet.

During the transition to the raw diet, I didn’t notice any thing changing in my body or feel any better. But! when I finally took the leap to a raw food diet, within six weeks I lost sixty pounds and felt better than I ever felt in long time. I maintained it for another few years until I started getting tremors again. Being raw, I sent the Lupus into remission for a few years. At the time I didn’t know there were other “triggers” for bringing Lupus out of remission. When my hair started falling out, I thought it was due to my diet and I felt defeated thinking that maybe the raw foods had nothing to do with me getting better and that my diet was making me malnourished. But that wasn’t the case! I wouldn’t find out for another year and a half that I had become very allergic to mold. (That is a good story for another time.) It was at that time that the doctor told me that it was actually the mold allergy that is a trigger for my Lupus. He wanted to pump me full of steroids again and I let him, much to my horror, that course of prednisone brought on drug induced Cushings Disease. Fun huh?

So now that I am moving to New Mexico I am planning on transitioning back to a raw lifestyle. What that will look like is any one’s guess! It is supposed to be very dry in NM (not the place I dreamed of being, by the way!) and if there is no more humidity and mold spores to occupy my airspace, I may be able to take a bash at being raw again.

This blog entry was an introductory of sorts to bring everyone up to speed on what my journey has been to this point, and the rest of my postings will be my journey forward…my struggles and my victories. I will also be posting recipes and my “take” on the raw food lifestyle.