Last December I decided to do a big experiment with my diet, and I went raw vegan for a year. Well, make that nine months, because our trip to France sort of did it all in. Not to mention I never got back on the raw routine once we got back. You can't really be a raw vegan if you're eating cooked food, even just at times.
My reasons for stopping mostly involve the amount of time, money and mental energy for me to sustain a diet that has no cooked elements. I'm not saying it can't be done easily, cheaply and effortlessly, but I sure can't do it. I feel great eating this way, I have tons of energy and my body does backflips of appreciation for me everyday I cram it full of fresh fruits and vegetables. But it's Fall, and squash is calling me, soup is yelling my name and vegan stews - well, you can just imagine how they felt when I shunned them for salads. And since our food budget has been over-the-top expensive, something has to give, and it's going to have to be my raw vegan adventure.
If the time, energy and money weren't enough to get me to stop eating raw for now, there's an oddity about my body that's been making me crave hot and steaming bowls of cooked food. Years ago when I was dealing with some puzzling health issues, a doctor looked at my finger tips and said, "Do you know you have Raynaud's Disease?" What in the world is that?
While it's a "dis-ease" I wouldn't call Raynaud's a disease - it's more like an annoying syndrome. It causes the fingers and toes to get super cold and numb in chilly weather, and they take a long time to warm up. It can cause pain and numbness in the extremities. Imagine how it was shoveling snow off my car window in South Lake Tahoe with this issue. Brrr, my body shudders in memory of those icy mornings.
For me the severity of Raynaud's comes and goes, but has it ever come on with a vengeance this Fall. Drinking a cold smoothie not only makes my fingers numb from holding the glass, but my entire core will be chilled for up to an hour after downing a healthy but cold green smoothie. It's not fun! I love smoothies and they set me up for a great day of energy. But a warm one would be so very gross and the cold ones make me feel like I'm on an excursion to the South Pole. Once I get chilled, it's hard to unchill. This morning after my pumpkin smoothie I tried to grab a few things out of the freezer to make our dog some food. Just touching the frozen food bags made my hands instantly ache with pain. My husband had to come help me get food out of the freezer like I had a fear of frost. Brrr.
Because of this flareup, just thinking about salads and smoothies makes me shiver. Hopefully this will pass, because I love them. But for now my body is demanding warmer foods that I can curl my little frozen fingers around. Hot foods. Cooked foods. Steaming foods. Foods you have to blow on before eating. Not raw, not cold. Cooked. My "Year of Living DangeRAWsly" is over. Pass the soup!
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| Chilly, not chili. |
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| Chili, not chilly. |
