WHy I follow a low fat raw vegan diet
elfo
Posts: 353 Member
I wanted to share with you all a little bit about my dietary lifestyle. While I don’t let a label define who I am, my food choices fall into the high raw low fat vegan category. After almost two years of research on nutrition, I find this to be the ideal lifestyle for not only a healthy lifestyle, but also for fueling the body with optimal energy so that you can take on all that you desire in all areas of your life.
While it’s taken me about a year of trial and error and finally the last 5 months of finally getting control over this lifestyle (and getting to now 55.5lbs lost), I feel that everyone must find their own path to of what “comfortable” means for them. Before, food was a vehicle to some underlining issue I was trying to numb out. After years of numbing out, I lost all perspective of what real food really was. Ridding my diet of all the highly processed and highly addictive food, allowed me to gain back the sensitivity to know what it was my body was asking for.
After making many choices in the right direction, there was one last choice that I needed to make that kept pulling me back to old habits. I started out by cutting out gluten, processed foods and refined sugars. This seemed to work well for me, and I was able to loose about 35 lbs on this lifestyle. However, the more I researched nutrition, and more importantly, the more I cut the “junk” out of my diet, meaning all that highly addictive chemical processed food, the more I started to listen to my own body. Having substituted the gluten with large amounts of produce, I realized that my body was really craving this new source of nourishment more and more.
When emotional ties associated to my food choices were removed, what my body really craved was fresh raw fruits and vegetables. I then came across the raw food lifestyle, and I made the great big leap in one go. After about a month I started to feel incredible changes. I gave up coffee, yet I had more energy than ever before. My acid-reflux had disappeared instantly. I used to have visual migraine auras at least once per month and sometimes up to once per week, which seemed to also fade away. My skin started to glow, and I started to feel an inner sense of joy and peace that I had never really experienced before, and little by little, I started noticing myself smile more and just be happy for no apparent reason.
The one thing that always pulled me back, was the social drinking with my friends. I would eat healthy all day, and then I would go out and have some crazy night out, and my frontal lobe would just go on binge feasts that would make my progress seem futile. I didn’t want to do harm to my body by getting super clean with my diet and then getting super toxic by going out drinking. So I decided that maybe going vegan rather than raw would be better for me.
Somehow, the food on the plate had changed, but my habits were still pretty much the same. Eating really healthy vegan meals (still high raw) and then going out 3-5x per week and having a few drinks and my diet became vegan à la bar menu, which could consist of about 5 martinis and a large plate of french fries or some vegan nachos. I hated myself the next day, and I could hear this inner voice pleading me to stop. Problem was I never wanted the party to end.
Going out, socializing and drinking was my way to relax and let go of all the stress I had going on. I was so concerned all the time with all the things I “had to do” or the person that I “had to be” that when I went out, all that went away as well. It wasn’t as though I needed to drink, I had gone months before without drinking just to see, but it was more like that’s when I felt like I was really “living it up”!
I realized that in order to change my lifestyle, I needed to change my social group, and so I set out to meet more people that were into the raw food lifestyle. One way that I did this was by attending the Woodstock Fruit Festival. While at the festival, I was having a conversation with one of the pioneers, Freelee (The banana Girl), and I asked her how I could still have a social life and have this new lifestyle. I candidly told her about my issues going out with my friends and trying to maintain this lifestyle, eager to hear the answer as to how I was going to be able to merge my two lifestyles, I was shocked when she just came back to me with a question.
She asked me how old I was. Something I was completely NOT expecting! Maybe because deep down I knew that while this may have been ok to do in my early 20s, it was not ok to do in my 30s. What would my life be like in my 40s? If I didn’t change my path would I still be out at bars at the age of 50? This realization really scared the crap out of me. I realized there, in that moment, that life was about soooooo much more than the “never ending party” LIFE was the party, and I was missing it!
From that day on (August 2013), the lifestyle became intuitive for me. I continued to set out to find the real me that I had buried deep down below so long ago. I thought about the person I wanted to be… that day… ten years from then…20 years from then. I knew that my weight wasn’t just about physical appearances, it was something that was holding me back from doing all the things in life I wanted to achieve. I wanted to be athletic, and to surround myself with people who were thriving, and I wanted to become the best version of myself that I could become in ALL areas of my life, and I knew that I needed health and vitality to do that.
August 17, 2013 was the last time I had a drink with my friends (or at all for that matter) and to tell you the very truth, I haven’t missed it one bit. What I’ve gained is immeasurable! The day I made that decision, was the day that my dietary lifestyle finally started to “click”. It was no longer a conscious thing of having to eat a certain way, or not eat “this”, or only eat “that”. I gained the control I had struggled to find before. I was eating the food that my body was asking for, and for the first time in my life, I could hear what my body was calling for loud and clear.
I knew that I felt my absolute best when I was eating a diet high in raw fruits and vegetables, and because I was getting a large amount of my calories from fruits (sugars), I knew I had to keep my fat intake low (~10%). I won’t lie, there are still times when my body wants to just eat something outside of the LFRV (80/10/10) plan, and when that happens, the first thing I do is to try and understand what it is that my body really needs. If I can get it from my LFRV food then I do- If I crave something savory – I’ll make a HUGE bowl of salad, If I want some fat- I’ll have some guacamole, If I need something sweet- I’ll munch on some dates, but there are just those times when it’s our subconscious mind that wants something “bad”. So when this happens, you know what I do??? I have something “bad”, but not without first understanding WHY it is I want it. I take the time to explore my subconscious. There is usually some emotional reason that has NOTHING to do with the food AT ALL! So after I’ve identified what this is, acknowledged it, and make the CONSCIOUS decision that I still want to “be bad”, I allow myself to do that. The thing is that NOW my definition of “bad” is A LOT healthier than anything I would have eaten before.
Bad for me now might mean a bowl of quinoa or wild rice made into a vegan vegetable paella. Maybe a hot homemade lentil soup, or some hummus made from real garbanzo beans (not from a can and no oil). Or if I really want to veg-out (irony I know) I will make a plain bowl of popcorn on the stove. AND if I’m REALLY REALLY REALLY needing something super bad – I will go to Chipotle and have a vegan bowl with black beans, brown rice, veggies, pico de gallo, corn, lettuce and guacamole which is 555 calories, and me at my VERY worst. I want to stress that I don’t eat like this often. On a day-to-day basis I am pretty much eating VERY high if not ALL raw, but once in a blue moon, I will say F@^% the label and give my body what I think it needs, and I find by the next meal my body is lusting after a green juice.
Again, the important thing is to LISTEN to your body. Don’t just go numb it out by going into some food coma. Learn to have a good relationship with your mind and to identify what are the non-food habits that cause you to eat out of your healthy conscious food choices? When you start to identify these- two things will happen- first, you will have less and less cravings as time goes on because as you identify and deal with your emotions, you won’t need to numb out with the food, AND more importantly, you will find that your “diet” will be the best therapy for all other areas of your life because by eating clean you will be able to better identify the triggers that make you reach for the bad food that keep you at your best. You will find that your mind and your body will start working together rather than against each other. You will find that other areas of your life begin to change as well, and as long as you keep being honest and true to yourself and cut out the processed foods and toxins that dilute the real message that your body tries to give you, that inner bliss within you will start to grow.
You will come to realize that food is nourishment for your body, just as love, and sleep, and peace of mind. You will want to nourish your body more and more everyday, and with each day, you will see it blossom into something beautiful. This is what comes from eating clean living food, and this is why I strive to stay crude!
While it’s taken me about a year of trial and error and finally the last 5 months of finally getting control over this lifestyle (and getting to now 55.5lbs lost), I feel that everyone must find their own path to of what “comfortable” means for them. Before, food was a vehicle to some underlining issue I was trying to numb out. After years of numbing out, I lost all perspective of what real food really was. Ridding my diet of all the highly processed and highly addictive food, allowed me to gain back the sensitivity to know what it was my body was asking for.
After making many choices in the right direction, there was one last choice that I needed to make that kept pulling me back to old habits. I started out by cutting out gluten, processed foods and refined sugars. This seemed to work well for me, and I was able to loose about 35 lbs on this lifestyle. However, the more I researched nutrition, and more importantly, the more I cut the “junk” out of my diet, meaning all that highly addictive chemical processed food, the more I started to listen to my own body. Having substituted the gluten with large amounts of produce, I realized that my body was really craving this new source of nourishment more and more.
When emotional ties associated to my food choices were removed, what my body really craved was fresh raw fruits and vegetables. I then came across the raw food lifestyle, and I made the great big leap in one go. After about a month I started to feel incredible changes. I gave up coffee, yet I had more energy than ever before. My acid-reflux had disappeared instantly. I used to have visual migraine auras at least once per month and sometimes up to once per week, which seemed to also fade away. My skin started to glow, and I started to feel an inner sense of joy and peace that I had never really experienced before, and little by little, I started noticing myself smile more and just be happy for no apparent reason.
The one thing that always pulled me back, was the social drinking with my friends. I would eat healthy all day, and then I would go out and have some crazy night out, and my frontal lobe would just go on binge feasts that would make my progress seem futile. I didn’t want to do harm to my body by getting super clean with my diet and then getting super toxic by going out drinking. So I decided that maybe going vegan rather than raw would be better for me.
Somehow, the food on the plate had changed, but my habits were still pretty much the same. Eating really healthy vegan meals (still high raw) and then going out 3-5x per week and having a few drinks and my diet became vegan à la bar menu, which could consist of about 5 martinis and a large plate of french fries or some vegan nachos. I hated myself the next day, and I could hear this inner voice pleading me to stop. Problem was I never wanted the party to end.
Going out, socializing and drinking was my way to relax and let go of all the stress I had going on. I was so concerned all the time with all the things I “had to do” or the person that I “had to be” that when I went out, all that went away as well. It wasn’t as though I needed to drink, I had gone months before without drinking just to see, but it was more like that’s when I felt like I was really “living it up”!
I realized that in order to change my lifestyle, I needed to change my social group, and so I set out to meet more people that were into the raw food lifestyle. One way that I did this was by attending the Woodstock Fruit Festival. While at the festival, I was having a conversation with one of the pioneers, Freelee (The banana Girl), and I asked her how I could still have a social life and have this new lifestyle. I candidly told her about my issues going out with my friends and trying to maintain this lifestyle, eager to hear the answer as to how I was going to be able to merge my two lifestyles, I was shocked when she just came back to me with a question.
She asked me how old I was. Something I was completely NOT expecting! Maybe because deep down I knew that while this may have been ok to do in my early 20s, it was not ok to do in my 30s. What would my life be like in my 40s? If I didn’t change my path would I still be out at bars at the age of 50? This realization really scared the crap out of me. I realized there, in that moment, that life was about soooooo much more than the “never ending party” LIFE was the party, and I was missing it!
From that day on (August 2013), the lifestyle became intuitive for me. I continued to set out to find the real me that I had buried deep down below so long ago. I thought about the person I wanted to be… that day… ten years from then…20 years from then. I knew that my weight wasn’t just about physical appearances, it was something that was holding me back from doing all the things in life I wanted to achieve. I wanted to be athletic, and to surround myself with people who were thriving, and I wanted to become the best version of myself that I could become in ALL areas of my life, and I knew that I needed health and vitality to do that.
August 17, 2013 was the last time I had a drink with my friends (or at all for that matter) and to tell you the very truth, I haven’t missed it one bit. What I’ve gained is immeasurable! The day I made that decision, was the day that my dietary lifestyle finally started to “click”. It was no longer a conscious thing of having to eat a certain way, or not eat “this”, or only eat “that”. I gained the control I had struggled to find before. I was eating the food that my body was asking for, and for the first time in my life, I could hear what my body was calling for loud and clear.
I knew that I felt my absolute best when I was eating a diet high in raw fruits and vegetables, and because I was getting a large amount of my calories from fruits (sugars), I knew I had to keep my fat intake low (~10%). I won’t lie, there are still times when my body wants to just eat something outside of the LFRV (80/10/10) plan, and when that happens, the first thing I do is to try and understand what it is that my body really needs. If I can get it from my LFRV food then I do- If I crave something savory – I’ll make a HUGE bowl of salad, If I want some fat- I’ll have some guacamole, If I need something sweet- I’ll munch on some dates, but there are just those times when it’s our subconscious mind that wants something “bad”. So when this happens, you know what I do??? I have something “bad”, but not without first understanding WHY it is I want it. I take the time to explore my subconscious. There is usually some emotional reason that has NOTHING to do with the food AT ALL! So after I’ve identified what this is, acknowledged it, and make the CONSCIOUS decision that I still want to “be bad”, I allow myself to do that. The thing is that NOW my definition of “bad” is A LOT healthier than anything I would have eaten before.
Bad for me now might mean a bowl of quinoa or wild rice made into a vegan vegetable paella. Maybe a hot homemade lentil soup, or some hummus made from real garbanzo beans (not from a can and no oil). Or if I really want to veg-out (irony I know) I will make a plain bowl of popcorn on the stove. AND if I’m REALLY REALLY REALLY needing something super bad – I will go to Chipotle and have a vegan bowl with black beans, brown rice, veggies, pico de gallo, corn, lettuce and guacamole which is 555 calories, and me at my VERY worst. I want to stress that I don’t eat like this often. On a day-to-day basis I am pretty much eating VERY high if not ALL raw, but once in a blue moon, I will say F@^% the label and give my body what I think it needs, and I find by the next meal my body is lusting after a green juice.
Again, the important thing is to LISTEN to your body. Don’t just go numb it out by going into some food coma. Learn to have a good relationship with your mind and to identify what are the non-food habits that cause you to eat out of your healthy conscious food choices? When you start to identify these- two things will happen- first, you will have less and less cravings as time goes on because as you identify and deal with your emotions, you won’t need to numb out with the food, AND more importantly, you will find that your “diet” will be the best therapy for all other areas of your life because by eating clean you will be able to better identify the triggers that make you reach for the bad food that keep you at your best. You will find that your mind and your body will start working together rather than against each other. You will find that other areas of your life begin to change as well, and as long as you keep being honest and true to yourself and cut out the processed foods and toxins that dilute the real message that your body tries to give you, that inner bliss within you will start to grow.
You will come to realize that food is nourishment for your body, just as love, and sleep, and peace of mind. You will want to nourish your body more and more everyday, and with each day, you will see it blossom into something beautiful. This is what comes from eating clean living food, and this is why I strive to stay crude!
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Replies
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I see the benefit of eating raw veggies and fruit and I even followed a mostly raw vegan diet for a while
however it was not sustainable for me , not everyone has access/resources for/ to the amount of fruits/veggies you need to do this properly
raw vegans kind of turned me off on the whole thing with how preachy and judgmental they tend to be also
good for you for finding something you can do and makes you happy though0 -
I'm glad you've found something that you love. However, I've found the same bliss and satisfaction in all the foods you deem evil. There is no need for everyone to label foods the way you do. There are no good or bad. Foods are what you make of them, in the context of a balanced diet, all foods processed or not, are perfectly fine.0
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no thank you. I will continue to hang out with my same friends, eat what I want, drink what I want, and refrain from labeling any foods as "good" or "bad". I will do all of those things while still losing weight and feeling great. I can't imagine the stress you must go through on a day to day basis with those kind of restrictions and what it must be like to feel so guilty after a 555 calorie meal from Chipotle.
I'm happy you're so happy but... again, no thank you. good luck with everything.0 -
Glad you found what works for you. Raw vegan isn't optimal for everyone though. I will keep doing my thing. I don't label foods as good or bad. Food is just food. The only foods I have cut out are those that I am allergic or intolerant to. Even then those foods are only bad for ME.0
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Overeating does produce a lot of negative physical effects. Hard to overeat as a raw vegan.0
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While the heavy restriction may work for you, it would be a miserable approach for others. It sounds like you replaced the alcohol with other unhealthy behaviors, feeling guilty for having Chipotle is one of them. You have convinced yourself you are in control and I would be interested in a longitudinal update.0
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I follow a very restricted diet too but don't let it interfere with my life!! If I have a couple drinks I'm not gonna feel guilty!! good luck and if it works for you!! everyone is unique and that doesnt give us the right to judge!!!0
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I felt like this about food myself once... they called it anorexia after a year or so. No disrespect, your path is your own and congratulations for finding something you think works for you, sincerely. But, and I say this with love for you, eating something should never make you feel guilty. That is clinically the beginning of a disorder that stems from a need for control.. by removing yourself from your friends? You've placed emotions in to food vs. people. I'm not a doctor? But the one I had to see to conquer my food habits was pretty clear about putting my relationship with food above my relationship with life.
Nothing we eat is evil or bad. It may not all be the best of choices? I mean I'll eat an apple before a snickers, but in moderation there is no reason to deny ourselves meats, cheeses, etc. You are completely allowed to experiment with your body, by all means find out how it affects you long term.. but please be careful what information you deal out to others, clinically what you are doing could be very harmful by denying nutrients from various foods. I may be wrong in that and I welcome anyone else to correct me? But I know both of my grandparents were raised on meat and dairy (evil foods) and both of them maintained incredible body structures without restricting anything.. IMO.. today's culture has gotten so fad obsessed they've forgotten how to just eat normal.0 -
wow.0
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Low fat.. vegan.... so low protein.... high carb, low fat? Yeesh.0
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Please name one of these toxins.0
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Holy great wall of text.
Did not read. Probably don't need to anyway.0 -
.0
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cliffs for anyone interested:
OP did dukan diet, lost some weight, decided high protein was bad for her
started vegan diet, regularly went drinking with friends and ate french fries, nachos, and all things delicious (except meat and cheese)
met the banana girl at some festival and decided to dump all her friends and stop drinking
now eats high carb, low fat, and freaks out when she goes to Chipotle
pretty sure that covers it0 -
Holy great wall of text.
Did not read. Probably don't need to anyway.
^^^^^This^^^^^
Though the title alone made me want to post a "Why I don't follow a low fat raw Vegan diet" thread.
Reason #1: Threads like this one.
Rigger0 -
You did an excellent job of explaining your thought processes and why you feel this was the right decision for you. I also like that you didn't spend a lot of time trying to tell everyone else that you believed it was the right decision for everyone.
To draw a comparison, an alcoholic has a serious drinking problem, but many people *can* drink like gentlemen and ladies. Similarly, it sounds like you had a food problem, and it sounds like you've done a marvelous job of fixing it for yourself. You sound happy, and that is good.0 -
I am happy you found something that work for you. That being said, what you wrote sound like disordered thinking related to food and potential food issues. I might very well be wrong but I would encourage you to keep this in mind.
Good luck0 -
OK I actually went and read the whole thing. Just sounds like the OP reacted to an inability to control herself by instituting an essentially arbitrary set of extremely strict rules. This is pretty common. I guess some people need an extremely rigid structure to enforce compliance. Sounds like she went first to one rigid diet, which she raved about while she was on, to another rigid diet, which she is now raving about.
OP, there's nothing magic about your diet (and a lot that is not good about your diet). The only magic you discovered is compliance.0 -
I couldn't read all of that. I'm sure it was great.0
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I'm curious what your friends think about you giving them up in favor of your new lifestyle?0
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I'm sorry, when you say 80/10/10, is that your macros setup? Because that is far from a healthy and balanced diet. Your way of eating is taking over your life. If that's not an unhealthy relationship with food, I don’t know what is...0
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I'm sorry you don't have a healthy relationship with food.
Quinoa = bad?!?!?!0 -
OK I actually went and read the whole thing. Just sounds like the OP reacted to an inability to control herself by instituting an essentially arbitrary set of extremely strict rules. This is pretty common. I guess some people need an extremely rigid structure to enforce compliance. Sounds like she went first to one rigid diet, which she raved about while she was on, to another rigid diet, which she is now raving about.
OP, there's nothing magic about your diet (and a lot that is not good about your diet). The only magic you discovered is compliance.
^^^^This. All "diets" for losing weight no matter what you start doing come down to being in a caloric deficit.0 -
The cliff notes from everyone give me more sads. I'll be honest, I skimmed. One handed phone play fail.0
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Somehow, the food on the plate had changed, but my habits were still pretty much the same. Eating really healthy vegan meals (still high raw) and then going out 3-5x per week and having a few drinks and my diet became vegan à la bar menu, which could consist of about 5 martinis and a large plate of french fries or some vegan nachos. I hated myself the next day, and I could hear this inner voice pleading me to stop. Problem was I never wanted the party to end.
A wise man once told me that martinis are like women's breasts. One is too few and three is too many. 5 martinis would put most people on the floor. I think this would be the bigger problem, not any meat or cooked food that you might consume.0 -
I'm raw vegan, but you, OP, make it sound like a prison sentence you had to force upon yourself by giving up everything and everyone around you.
It's not like that for everyone. And I am by NO means low fat. One can't cut fat to make up for a high sugar diet and think that's OK because the calories add up. There is a dietary balance. Our bodies need fat just as they need carbs and protein. You seemed to have missed the nutritional point of healthy eating just to wear a label.0 -
I'm sorry, when you say 80/10/10, is that your macros setup? Because that is far from a healthy and balanced diet. Your way of eating is taking over your life. If that's not an unhealthy relationship with food, I don’t know what is...
Yup. Disordered eating, revisionist thinking, obsession with eating seriously affecting her personal life, progression from one fad diet to another, unhealthy diet, etc. I'm seeing things like this on her pre-vegan high-protein diet:
"My body does really gravitate towards Dukan naturally. I don't crave carbs at all, but I do crave protein"
"I was really craving bad carbs this weekend, pad thai, lo mein, pizza, but it's the one thing I won't let myself have. I feel like even having one small carb will be a very slippery slope. "
"I am a VERY happy Dukaner this morning!!!! I am so glad I started my fitness plan last night!"
"I need to loose 15 lbs in a relatively short period of time (less than a month) and [Dukan] is the only way I know how"
This is really all over the place and more than a little worrisome.0 -
OK I actually went and read the whole thing. Just sounds like the OP reacted to an inability to control herself by instituting an essentially arbitrary set of extremely strict rules. This is pretty common. I guess some people need an extremely rigid structure to enforce compliance. Sounds like she went first to one rigid diet, which she raved about while she was on, to another rigid diet, which she is now raving about.
OP, there's nothing magic about your diet (and a lot that is not good about your diet). The only magic you discovered is compliance.
Pretty much this.
OP, glad it is working for you, and I hope you find it sustainable with no long-term deficiencies.
It wouldn't work for me, and I wouldn't want it to, but that's fine, too.0 -
Somehow, the food on the plate had changed, but my habits were still pretty much the same. Eating really healthy vegan meals (still high raw) and then going out 3-5x per week and having a few drinks and my diet became vegan à la bar menu, which could consist of about 5 martinis and a large plate of french fries or some vegan nachos. I hated myself the next day, and I could hear this inner voice pleading me to stop. Problem was I never wanted the party to end.
A wise man once told me that martinis are like women's breasts. One is too few and three is too many. 5 martinis would put most people on the floor. I think this would be the bigger problem, not any meat or cooked food that you might consume.
Going out 5 times a week, having 5 martinis at a time..... serial obsession with extreme fad diets...
Anyone see a pattern?0
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