Paleo Diet: Raw Paleo Diet and Lifestyle Forum
Members' Journals => Journals => Topic started by: jasongitar on May 02, 2011, 08:00:52 am
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Day 0 Starting Tomorrow, What Do I Do About My Relationship?
Hey everyone, I have been reading the forum posts for awhile now and decided I would join today and start a journal.
So I have been fasting for the last 25 days, starting with a brown rice fast, then a juice fast, and a little bit of water fasting in between. I feel pretty good doing the fast esp. after eating the crappy processed store bought and gut tearing fast food off and on for the last four years. I read "We Want To Live" about 5 years ago and even tried most of the raw suggestions in the book at the time. I felt amazingly well when I did and even cured of most of my ailments after about 3 months of doing it 100%. I couldn't handle the raw dairy back then, but the raw meat, raw honey, some vegetables, and a little bit of fruit and nuts did the trick. I quickly lost those last impossible 20 pounds, felt euphoric, had immense energy, attracted the most amazing people in my life, and was very successful at everything that was important to me. I made the mistake of allowing a little bit of cooked food in after awhile, thinking it would be ok and some people gave me a hard time for doing a raw diet because they didn't understand it, so I kind of got self conscience and strayed from the one thing that gave me true healing. The weight started to creep back on and I started to feel sick again as soon as I quit eating the Primal Diet/Raw Paleo way of life. I got focused on other things and put my health and well being on the shelf.
To make a long story short I met a great woman, we fell in love and ate unhappily ever after. She has a great metabolism and can get away with eating anything. She stays thin and in great shape and has loads of energy. I on the other hand put on about 90 pounds after eating a SAD diet with her, my old issues of anxiety and depression started reemerging. Then came the headaches, migraine auras, fatigue, irritability, inability to handle stress, sleep issues, sleep apnea, and obsessive thoughts. And many more things to add to the list. I remembered how good I felt on on Raw Paleo, but just remembered how expensive it was and how nobody could understand it. So I thought there had to be something else out there that would help me with my ailments.
I tried cooked low carb, low calorie, raw fruitarian, calorie cycling, exercise, Testosterone replacement, medications you name it I tried it. The 2 things that did help me feel better and actually lose some weight were "The Body For Life Program" and Brown Rice fasting. I dropped around 47 pounds in the last 9 months of doing that. Although they helped immensely with weight loss, it didn't get to the root of my problems and I knew that I had to do the one thing that did give me results years ago "The Primal Diet".
I knew from previous experience that fasting would kill my sugar and cooked food cravings and also help clean myself out. So that's what I have been doing for the last 25 days. I made a vow that I would start up on the Raw Paleo lifestyle tomorrow and see where it takes me this time.
The one stress-er that keeps revolving in my brain is my girlfriend. See we always have what we call a "date day" every Sunday. We normally spend the whole day eating and going out. For the last few weeks I have been fasting on our date days, and it really seems to be upsetting her. We go out to places but I have little energy and can't eat anything with her. I have a feeling that doing Raw Paleo is not going to be any different except that I may have more energy and feel better. Today she got really upset with me and took off with the car and said I don't know what we are going to do if we can't eat together anymore. She is totally turned off by the thought of eating raw meat, and she is one of those clean freaks that is always worried about getting contaminated by food. I offered to do picnic style date days where we can bring our own food anywhere we want, but she just isn't going for it. There are no raw food restaurants around, and unless I eat what she's eating its not any fun for her. I just don't know what to do ???
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seriously??, your relationship revolves around food??? i'm sorry for harshness, but i cannot imagine someone telling me they love me, but ready to walk out the door because i won't go to mcdonalds. that's the most ridiculous thing i've ever heard! i would not date, nor consider spending the rest of my life with someone who didn't want what's best for me/my happiness.
when you're sick and tired of your health concerns you listed, then i'm sure you'll know what you need to do.
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and welcome! :P
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Date days are pretty common.
And yes, food tasting, going around restaurants is common.
I haven't forgotten that.
These things take time.
I myself had some adjustment periods with my wife.
You can start by choosing rare steaks and sashimi when you go out.
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A lot of Primal Dieters have mentioned asking restaurants to do "cold on a cold plate", which means searing the raw meat for 10 seconds on each side. Phone them beforehand to avoid issues on-site.Alternatively, experiment and see which cooked foods affect you least. For example, in my own case, unsurprisingly, I find cooked lean meats and cooked vegetables to be far less worse for me than cooked fatty meats. Still, Ioannna does have a point. Being judged on one's diet is really petty. I can understand people having psychological aversions to themselves eating raw meats due to past social conditioning etc., but this is a bit much.
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People are people, Tyler.
My wife just abhors seeing me drink raw blood at the dinner table.
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People are people, Tyler.
My wife just abhors seeing me drink raw blood at the dinner table.
What I mean is , people should be able to compromise. Not eating raw blood at the dinner-table is a minor issue, so you could eat it at other times without her present.
Anyway, I suppose part of the reason why I have this view is that I've come across some very petty people indeed, as regards their views on diet. An unpleasant acquaintance of mine, for example, once went psycho at her mother-in-law and banned her permanently from her home solely because the mother-in-law just wanted to feed her grandchildren with some self-made soup. You see, the former was in the habit of feeding her children on a diet of highly processed junk-food, including tons of visits to McDonald's, so she felt demeaned simply because her mother-in-law, without meaning to, was, by default, criticising her daughter-in-law's appalling treatment of her children simply by offering higher quality food.
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I feel the tension is valid.
I probably feel Jason and his woman talk about these possible flashpoints so it does not get out of hand.
I remember when I started banning wheat on my kids I bodily carried my son away from my in-laws' dinner table while he was eating the vile pasta.
We all got over it eventually.
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Thank you Ionna, Tyler, and GS for your replies and advice! The rare steak, sashimi, some 10 second searing, and lean cooked meat and vegetables may actually work on our one date day, but of course I would probably want to wait awhile before bringing that food in, just to make sure I have tried 100% raw first, and that way I can see how I react to some of the cooking processes. Of course the sashimi would be fine. There is also steak tartare, carpaccio, and ceviches, but I never see those on the menus here in the US.
My girlfriend is really a great person, and we didn't really eat as bad as McDonalds all the time. The main issue is she really has a tough time with are any big changes in her life and food was one of the main things she gets excited about doing with me. I'm just really tired of being sickly, depressed, and overweight and I really feel that my health and well being needs to be of first importance.
You guys have given me some great ideas, I have read many of your posts on this website, and I have to say they have been very inspiring! Tyler & GS I read your testimonial/stories at http://www.rawpaleodiet.com/ and wow you guys look half your age! Very inspiring!
Well today is day 1 I did a lot of shopping last night, I hope I feel as good as I did 5 years ago eating this way!
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Well, my own photos were not all that impressive. They weren't really meant to be. The 2nd photo is of me during a long, experimental period of caloric restriction after a year or so on the diet(which is why I was, deliberately and ironically, posing with my rather threadbare arms at the time), and the 1st photo was after only a few months of going rawpalaeo and my eyes were still bloodshot from inflammation. Took some time to get rid of all that. I need to update the few other photos I have to make things more appropriate.
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Either way, you can tell you look really healthy!
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Day 1
Well started off the day with eating some raw beef strips. Wasn't bad at all. I know most people eat their raw meat plain, I was curious what others in this forum have added to their meat without any detrimental effects. I have read that vegetables don't mix well with meat, but what about fresh herbs like Peppermint and cilantro?
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Day 2
Last night I got ultra stomach pains and burps that tasted like feces, not that I have eaten feces before. I figured that it had to have been from the avocado smoothie I made with the whole raw egg. It tasted amazing but stomach pains started about 2 hours after consuming that. I made the same smoothie today with out the egg whites and yolks only, didn't taste as thick but still pretty good.
It was really hard to sleep with all the stomach pains and I was sure that I was going to ralph -v, but made it through to this morning ok. Today I feel super tired and really really hungry even after 25 days of previous fasting. I feel kinda depressed and absolutely no motivation to do anything, I hope that's part of the detox. On a positive note my teeth feel super shiny and strong just in 2 days which is pretty cool.
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Day 3
Had another bad night of stomach pains after the raw egg smoothie using only yolks this time. On a good note I woke up feeling really good today, still low on energy, but it seems like I have more energy today than yesterday. I've also noticed that I don't have an appetite today like I did the first 2 days.
I think I'm going to go without eggs for awhile and reintroduce them in a few months and see what happens. Other than that, got into a pretty heated debate about raw foods on Facebook. My roommate posted a video journal of me and him discussing paleo raw food, of course everyone I know now knows that I am doing this. I wish he didn't post it, I thought it was going to be a journal just for ourselves to look back on or maybe post it up on Youtube at some point. People are constantly arguing with me telling me how bad raw meat is, how sick I am going to get from parasites. They won't listen to the facts, testimonials or videos that I retorted with. Oh well, what can you do?
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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k2XOqzcHD-k&feature=autoshare
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Day 4
Doing without the raw egg last night made me feel a million times better. Picked up a dehydrator today so I can experiment with some dried meat. Had to make some adjustments in the last 24 hours, but I feel a lot better! I actually had a huge source of energy hit me last night and was able to get a weeks worth of work done, a lot better than feeling dead and unmotivated like I did during the first few days. Also slept really good and peacefully last night!
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glad to hear you are doing so great, and so quickly.
dehydrated meat doesn't digest well at all for me, but i think it's very tasty to put meat in there for a short time (30-60min) just so it's nice and warm fatty goodness :D dehydrated meat could be convenient for travel if it works for you.
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Thanks for tips Ionna, Ill have to try that for 30 to 60 minutes like you are saying.
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Day 11
Been sticking with it the best I can, and noticing more benefits with each day. Getting more and more use to the feelings of detoxing and actually craving raw meat, must be a good sign!