The Reluctant Raw Foodist

hmm .. This sounds very specific. let me give you some questions to consider and ask your nutritionist ( in a nice way to get answers rather than to put the nutritionist on the defensive ! :)) Ok here we go:

On what basis does your nutritionist know your body won’t absorb iron from non animal sources? What condition do you have to make your body work like this? Have you  always been this way? What evidence does the nutritionist have for you? Based on what research? Or is this an opinion? How much meat do you have to eat to get enough iron? Is it that you have lately not been eating meat without adding in a lot more fruit and veg or otherwise have you been calorie restricting? If you stopped / changed what you are doing ie added in more calories / cut out junk food  ( you know what is appropriate for you)  etc  would this inability to absorb non animal iron change? if not why not? 

See, I would need a lot more info. It is important to ask and to get answers. 

Bodies do not hate us. The try to function in spite of illnesses and what we put into them. What we eat/ do may well distort that purpose.

When I first went to see Dirk I was low in iron and had been previously advised by my skin surgeon to eat meat which I had reluctantly added back into my diet (it made me feel ill - I now know why). I was also low in Vitamin C although I ate quite a few fruits and although I thought my diet was in general ” healthy”.

I then made the massive shift in my diet (taking out all the junk food, processed food etc as well as meat and then dairy ) and actually eating quite a restricted diet and my iron and Vit C levels have not been down since. I do have them checked regularly.

Vit C is a natural antihistamine and maybe my body had been using mine for this purpose rather than iron production. Who knows? (well Dirk might well) but the point is my body was out of sorts and was trying to function as best it could under the circumstances of my having an underlying and undiagnosed condition.

Research suggests that Vitamin C increases the body’s ability to absorb iron and, of course, my diet is now very rich in vitamin C as almost everything I eat contains it. There is also some research which suggests that dairy products might actually suppress the body’s ability to absorb iron. I have no idea about this but, of course I reduced and then came off most (and lately all ) dairy too.

I think you have to / get another opinion/ try things/ do some research. I do not believe all I read / am told without understanding why and asking, where appropriate, for evidence.

The guy who told me to eat meat (for my skin rashes) helped me to become more sick  - because of the histamine overload. Actually I don’t get skin rashes now! 

We are all different in some respects and what works for one may not for another. But the point about just treating symptoms is that if we don’t find the cause we don’t know why we have the symptom so we suppress rather than get rid of them. Symptoms show us that the body is out of sorts.

As you know, I am not a doctor and based on my own experience I cannot tell you that if you add a few fruit and veg into your diet you will be fine. I can tell you that based on my experience things altered radically when I made big changes and now, quite a strict mostly raw vegan diet without a lot of processed foods seems to suit me. I am monitoring this.  

I recommend as a starting point you watch Forks over Knives which has  doctors recommending a plant based diet and Fat, Sick and Nearly Dead too and then go and ask for some answers as to why a plant based approach will not be suitable for you.  

Hope this helps.

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