Hi all, ive been lurking this forum for a little bit, learning all i can about changing to a raw food lifestyle. It seems as good a place as any for an intro in the journals section so howdy.

First up i just want to say thanks everyone for creating such a wonderful place for me to learn and be inspired.

My story of what brought me to raw foodism seems long when i think through it in my head, so ill try and keep it as brief as possible.

A couple of years ago i was what i believed at the time to be a healthy happy person, worked lots, loved my job, went on holidays where part of my trips would involve hiking 20 or more kms in a day. I however was not healthy, lurking in the background my body was preparing to fall to pieces. I was a heavy drinker, thought nothing of eating large unhealthy meals and at the time really didnt consider a meal of cheesy pasta bad.

Ill step back a little further, in high school i was sick, not bad, i still functioned well enough most of the time, but i was one of those i believe it is 1 in 10 women to suffer with endometriosis. I was diagnosed young, my symptoms were bad so the doc was happy to give me a presumed diagnoses, put me on hormones, and several months later i had my life back. For 7 years i buried my head in the sand about this, i was better as far as i was concerned and no part of my mind ever considered that it would come raging back.

Sadly, it did, with a vengence. In Aug 2005 id been married a little over 6mths, was in a nice home, and my adorable niece had just been born, life was good. Within days of my niece being born, coincidence or not my body started 'misbehaving'. Starting as a few unusual pains that i brushed off, a little nausea, to constant deblilitating pain and constant nausea within two weeks of onset. I had to give up work suddenly, leaving my beloved casual night work as a nurse, a few weeks later i was offered the chance for part time office work. I wasnt well at all, i was making no improvements, the doctors had no idea what was wrong. My presumed diagnosis of endometriosis was no longer good enough and i was treated essentially, as a nutcase. My condition got worse and worse, i gave up on medicine and went down the natural path. Through this i got well enough for a little while anyway to manage a long overseas holiday, i was pushing myself really really hard. While id done some diet changes, supplements, herbs, i hadnt really taken things far enough, and i was still burying my head in the sand.

For a while after i got back from my trip i was still reasonably good, id changed to community work, better suiting my health as i was able to break up my days. As you can see, i never slowed down, despite how sick i was i drugged myself with hefty pain relief and carried on. As time went on, i gradually decreased my hours as i handled less and less. I kept trying new natural treatments but nothing was helping anymore, i kept getting worse.

Then the worst happened, my father was diagnosed with a terminal illness, it required intense treatment for him to have any chance at all. After his diagnosis my health issues spiraled out of control, my fatigue that was slowing me down was grinding me to a stop, i wasnt sleeping, i was barely eating. Eventually i had to give up work, the pain and the fatigue had become unbearable.

I decided at this point i had to take charge, i had to get better. At my worst my fatigue and pain was so bad i required a walking stick to get around the house, and apart from visiting my dying father i didnt leave the house, often i didnt leave my heating pad at my computer chair. I had reached rock bottom. I went back to the docs, they were taking me more seriously this time, but test after test showed nothing. In the meanwhile i was making drastic diet changes, had cut out gluten, meat (except fish), dairy (except yoghurt) and refined sugar. This was a success, i was getting improvements in my pain, my fatigue improved to the point i no longer needed my walking stick. I pushed myself to do short walks every day (this started as walking across the road with my walking stick on one side, my husband on the other and coming back).

I then found a good endometriosis specialist, he seemed like a godsent, he believed me, he wanted to help. His first attempt at treatment however made me really sick again, made the pain worse than it had ever been, all my progress was lost. At that point to make matters worse, my father died.

Once he was gone i had renewed determination, seeing his strength on the deathbed made me want to be better more than ever. I went back to the doc, this time i decided to go ahead with surgery, it was a success, all endometriosis removed and i finally had an official diagnosis. Within a month i had little or no pain at all, however the fatigue remained and hadnt improved in the slightest. I was also unwilling to have hormone treatment again, so i knew i had to be really good about my health to keep it under control.

I made more diet changes, got really strict with my therapeutic diet, this solved the pain issue and my fatigue was slowly, very very slowly improving. This brings me to now, i tried a few things to get more energy, olive leaf extract, coq10, they both helped me do more in a day, i was able to handle more, but i was still getting really bad days where i could barely get out of bed and was badly effected by any activity.

Thats when i read about green smoothies, they seemed a great idea, and my initial hope was just to reduce the amount of supplements i was taking, i felt i was getting no where with them and hated relying on pills. The smoothies were wonderful, for about an hour after i had more energy, but it wasnt lasting. This was around 6wks ago. Then my period came and it was incredibly heavy (ill compare it to postnatal bleeding, because thats what my sister compared it to when i described it to her) i looked for what id changed, i had increased my olive leaf extract of late, i had also forgotten to take my extra iron tablet on day 1, and of course id started the smoothies. Out of fear it was the cause i stopped having them. I remained really sick again after my period went, felt like id been set back 2months. After a while i realised i wasnt picking back up, id been reading more and more on raw diets and realised the heavy bleeding could have just been detoxing.

So i started them again, the energy i had after was addictive, it made me want more and more raw food. I wasnt able to have more than 1 smoothie a day often because of bowel issues so i started just eating raw all day. Wonderful things were happening, my appetite improved, my energy and stamina improved. I stopped getting energy crashes post activity or randomly through the day. My energy levels were stabilising. I was doing more and more every day and not getting tired.

Then of course i over did it, football finals meant pushing myself when i wouldnt normally. Surprisingly i handled being out at football reasonably well, was able to focus well on the game till about the 70th min. I of course ended up really sick that night and slept for a ridiculous amount of time, as i usually do when im really sick. But the next day i decided id be proactive. I had 2 blenders full of green smoothies that day, and was strict about raw food only. By the evening i was starting to feel ok, by the next day i felt good again. I could only attribute such a bounce back to raw food, normally it would take me all week to recover from something like that, this was incredible.

Im now eating about 90 - 95% raw food and feeling much much better for it. Im also just on my next period since starting my raw journey, theres minimal pain if at all, and ive found a wonderful thing, leafy greens completely eliminate any pain i do get. I had terrible nausea on day 1 and barely ate at all, but im recovery quickly, its day 2 now its already lightened right up, and im starting to get energy back again.

Im really excited, this is the first time ive been able to genuinely feel that i can not only get through this, i can come out the other side a stronger healthier person than ive ever been. My journeys been tough, but i feel that im really just coming into who i truly am, hence my title.

So my aims in my raw food journey are:
- eliminate any leftover pain im still getting
- lighten my period so its just a part of my life and not the disaster it is to my system now
- Regain energy and beat my chronic fatigue
- Eliminate acid reflux (have already achieved this one)
- Combining the bates method with my raw food journey, fix my poor eyesight
- Get back a normal appetite (this has improved, but i have a long way to go)
- Become so fit that i can do 20km hikes again and jump around at the football

I look forward to sharing my journey with you all 

Nice to meet you Kebbster,

Thank you for sharing your story in such detail   It's great to read that you're already being helped so much by raw foods, and I'm sure it'll just get better and better.

I'll put my hand up as being another diagnosee of endometriosis. 

To share my story:  I was theoretically diagnosed at age 21, as much as they can diagnose by answering a checklist of questions, - as you know the only true diagnosis comes through visually seeing it in a surgery. Then I also went down the surgery path 6 or so years ago to have it properly diagnosed and have most of it removed.  The swelling from the internal bleeding of it was pressuring some nerves along my spine and making it difficult to roll out of bed to the bathroom, let alone walk, for days at a time.  So thankfully they cut those bits out, but left a lot of it along my bowel as I was not 'prepped' for bowel surgery it was too much of a risky procedure.  So I still had white-knuckle gripping pain from that, pre bowel-movements, to live with.  I went on hormone treatments for a while too... the drugs were so strong, I lost a good year of my life being swept up in side effects.  It wasn't worth it to be a slave to feeling tired nauseous and downright bad, just to eliminate pain; so I decided to live with the pain.  I stopped the hormone treatments and went on the contraceptive pill full time - trying only to have 2 to 4 periods a year (although my body never did cooperate with that). I was being told by my doctor that endometriosis worsens with the more frequent estrogen flushes that regular hormone changes submit your body to.  Add to that, my natural cycle was 3 weeks not 4, my frequency of estrogen in the system was theoretically making the endometriosis problem worse than it had to be, thus: take the pill.  Then the side effects of the pill were getting to me.  Weight gain, nausea were the only phsyical - but I felt it more on a psychological level.  It's a theory, but I think having a changing hormone cycle allows one to express different sides of themself and different emotions at different times.  Experiencing life without these cyclical changes was perhaps making parts of myself somewhat pent-up, and again resulting in unhappiness. 

After 2 years of that I decided to cycle myself on and off the pill.  Stop trying to skip periods entirely - which wasn't working anyhow - my body was still bleeding a bit each month despite taking the pill constantly without the sugar pills.  So I decided instead to just accept 4 weekly bleeds - which was better than 3 weekly bleeds.  If I took the pill for 3 months, then stopped for 3 months, I could maintain the 'normal' 28 day cycle.  If I went off for about 4 months it started to drop back down to ~20 days, although sometimes this happened earlier at the third month too - and would be my cue to take the pill again.  Was never really happy taking it, but told myself it was stopping endometriosis from getting any worse.  Was still getting endometriosis pains before using the toilet, as well as being frequently tired and lethargic. So it definitely wasn't making it any *better*, and there's no concrete proof that it stopped it from worsening, as maybe it would have stayed the same regardless of what I did... who knows.

Mid last year, went raw - about 80%+.  This coincided with an awareness that I didn't want to use my body as a chemical dumping ground anymore either, so I also decided not to go back on the pill, at all, ever.  And hey, wouldn't you know it.  I'm feeling better.  There's not much lethargy left in me - when I'm sleepy it's just that - sleepy, or an earned tiredness... so I rest... it's not a draining unexplained lethargy that lasts for days.  I'm sure this is the energy most people are feeling by eating live foods   That and the downright bounciness/hyperactivity at times, haha... have even been getting the urge to RUN lately! This is unheard of! (& I must go buy a sports bra that fits so I can go indulge this urge). 

Endometriosis pain wise... improvements, vast improvements.  I am still getting some pains, but I couldn't even tell you how frequent they are.  I think I remember some pain a few weeks ago... could have been longer, and it wasn't white-knuckle-gripping pain anymore either, more just a discomfort.  I think it's been at least 4 or 5 months since I had white knuckle pain... which is AWESOME! Yay!  I think this means it's healing! :D  But I'm not going to have surgery to prove it

Period wise - yeah, having to deal with ~20 day cycles.  They were very very heavy when I stopped the pill, and sometimes/often lasted up to 10 days, ugh... way to spend half my life bleeding.  Although last month I went for 25, with a a 6 day bleed, naturally.  Maybe and hopefully this will normalise for me too.

I've only 'been raw' for 9 or 10 months, to have had such changes so fast, wow... I'm happy.

hey kebbster, welcome to the forum, and thanks for sharing your story.

take a look around at the topics discussed here, do a few searches, you will find some great information  X X

Hi all, thought id update my progress.

Im still finding myself lurking bout this forum a bit because there is still so much to learn, and am spending all my time on here reading and learning new things. I thought i new alot about good diet but changing to raw is like learning how to eat all over again.

So far im really enjoying the raw journey, im enjoying my food more than i expected. Im finding the odd time i feel like breaking it is when im preparing my husbands food and am myself hungary, but its only when im hungry, as long as i eat plenty i dont want anything but raw.

Im settling into a nice 95% of my diet raw, i say 95 because so far i havent really looked hard into dressings im using, and am still using up some old foods that are open in the fridge. At this stage ive decided to keep the odd bit of steamed fish in my diet at least until i get better at the diet, later i may change this but atm i know im not eating nearly enough.

Today i had a really nauseas day, could barely stomach anything, this isnt detox this is something thats plagued me for a long time now, the days im like this are alot less frequent now, but as you can imagine alot of days like this in the past have led to some very serious and unwanted weight loss. So i decided to stick to smoothies, or i should say thats what my body decided because even they were a struggle. Despite feeling so off i did manage 2 green smoothies and one bananna, date and egg (i thought the raw egg would be a good idea since id eaten so little), plus one diluted orange juice. Im really happy with this, normally on a day like that id probably eat a little bit of rice with yoghurt and pick at nuts, and that would be it, so through smoothies i ended up eating a reasonable amount of fruit in the end, and still got some greens. Im already getting the comments that ill become anorexic doing this, but i know that i couldnt possibly lose any more weight than i have, and if anything i think ill put on weight, im also actually eating alot more now because i cant fill up on rice and yoghurt ive got room for lots of fruit.

I seem to have gone through a small detox today, super active in the bowel department and i feel alot better for it, feel lighter.

Its a steep learning curve, learning how to feed me and my husband at dinner has been difficult, but im making progress on working out how to keep him satisfied and still eat best for me.

Im finding at this stage i definitely feel better on high fruit and simpler meals, anything raw gourmet tends to make me feel tired like cooked food did so am keeping things simple now. Im enjoying simple fruit for what it is more than i used to enjoy gourmet meals that would take hours to prepare and cook.

Hi kebbster
Im glad that raw has helped much with your symptoms. I suffer pcos and chronic fatigue(which has somewhat subsided a little) S i pretty much sypathise.

Start looking into juice or water fasting fasting for you and your husband. The not wanting to eat might be a sign of this http://www.keithhunt.com/Fast1.html

Had a really really bad day today, spent the whole day wishing i was back in bed, slept late, went to bed really early (like 7pm) and am now awake again at midnight.

Have had headspins, felt out of it all day. Nausea was really bad so didnt eat a thing today till about 5:30pm, spent the day drinking green tea and hot lemon drinks or water. So because i was listening to my body today it was late before i ate, i had a savoury smoothie/cold soup thing of corn, zucchini, tahini and lemon. Made me feel alot better but was still incredibly tired. Im assuming this is detox, or at least hoping. Is so hard to tell when sick already whats detox and what is just my sick body.

Am out of food pretty much, because ive been so sick havent been able to shop, so ive ordered some stuff online to be delivered tomorrow, cant wait. I guess in a way today i ended up fasting, and i guess since this is what my body seemed to want it was the right thing to do. I think it was about 19hrs without food apart from a bit of juice in my drinks.

Hopefully will wake up feeling well tomorrow, while i love how much better i can feel on raw, am not a fan of how much worse i can also be.

Thanks BerryBliss

Am feeling a little better today although still not great. Though despite feeling off i managed to grocery shop with my mother taking me (wasnt up to on my own, she was visiting and was going anyway), and cooked hubby dinner.

Im starting to think me being off is not just purely detox but also im simply not consuming enough. I was looking today at the calorie content of fruit, and when i added up a typical day im lucky if im consuming 400calories. Theres no way that could be enough for a decent level of energy, so im going to try and eat more. To do this im going to start having dessert after dinner, i know alot of people do this, but i very rarely eat after dinner, so im thinking a small fruit salad after dinner might help me sleep better and wake up better, so tonights the test.

My problem is the same as its been for a long time for me, i rarely feel hungry, and when i eat i fill up fast. So im just going to try and eat often hungry or not to get up to a decent level of calories.

Feeling more and more like the 80/10/10 diet is better suited to me, im not enjoying vegetables much now that i have them raw, but am loving my fruit and greens. Its not feeling like much of a hassle to cook hubby a seperate meal like i thought it would, because my meal is so simple i can throw it together in no time.

Im also finding im not drinking as much water as i used to, i have alot at the end of the day, but otherwise drink very little, i suspect im getting enough water still through fruit and my love of tea, but this is a change. I dont feel dehydrated and am not showing any physical signs of it, so i must still be getting plenty of water.

Im now happily fruit shopping twice a week and its suiting me alot better, never run out of food that way. I will likely have to order it online a fair bit to keep this up, but i dont mind as long as i have plenty fresh. Despite buying so much fresh food my shopping bill isnt going up, we need far less groceries now, and my husband is eating alot more fruit for snacks anyway, since hes always wanting what im having.

I got a compliment on my skin yesterday, could have been random, but it could also be raw working for me. I know my skin is looking pretty clear atm and has good colour once im out of my just got up stupor that is, lol.

Morning all, bad bad night, have not slept at all.

Ive just spent a while looking through your journal BerryBliss, wow, your meal ideas are fantastic, they all look so simple and still really tasty. Im very inspired by it, has given me som great ideas.

I do love green smoothies, i have one most days, they have been a wonderful way for me to get more food in easily. Made a great one this morning, just with banannas, baby spinach and asian greens. Very bright green, and this time used 3 banannas so got alot at once, normally only use 2, also used more greens than normal and feel much better for it.

Amazingly since i havent slept, i actually feel pretty good. I went for a walk early to wake myself back up from the lack of sleep, made some orange juice when i got back and had a nice warm bath, by then the smoothie was very appealing, and after all that feel good (ill crash later im sure).