- Felicia's Story: A Gastric Bypass Patient Goes Raw- Part II of II by drpr
18 y
3,299 3 Messages Shown
Blog: Raw Odyssey
 Photos: Felicia, Winter 2005 before going raw / Today, after going raw
For
me it started with admitting that I could visibly see without a shadow
of a doubt that I had a problem. It sounds so cliché but I can honestly
say that I know where it comes from. I sat in my house running from
room to room (I hid the cookies in the guest room) munching on cookies
until the bag was gone. When I weighed myself at the end of the week I
had gained about eight pounds. I was sick! I don’t mean physically
(though I should have been) but sick with remorse, guilt, frustration
and whatever other emotion you want to attach to this. I HAD to do
something because I had read stories of OTHER bypass patients gaining
all their weight back, but that would NEVER be me. PSYCH! It was
becoming me; with a vengeance!
Enter Allison; gently coaxing me
to join her in the raw food revolution. She had been there all along,
whispering sweet benefits of being raw. Her depression had lifted; she
was losing weight at the rate of a gastric bypass patient. She wasn’t
craving anymore and she seemed to genuinely be satisfied with the
lifestyle and willing to stick to it. I couldn’t do a thing to make her
“cheat”. I wasn’t interested though, I had all kinds of reasons why I
wouldn’t be able to do this. I wasn’t strong enough to adhere to all
the rules of being raw. I felt like if I couldn’t eat my favorites then
I couldn’t eat anything… and I surely couldn’t survive on a raw diet.
After my “Costco” episode I started to “hear” her calling me to her
side. I guess I was ready to listen, because I knew my life depended on
it.
I said I would do it, but only for one week because I could
not possibly survive anything more! That week was hard. I craved and I
compensated by overeating all the fruits and veggies that I wanted. The
sky was the limit, and I said to myself if I can’t have cake, damn it I
am going to have 4 bananas! They are sweet delicious goodness! I was
making fruit pies, and drinking fruit smoothies. I made my version of
raw cookies and tried my hand at other raw deserts. The only problem
with that was that my GAS(troentestinal) problems became even worse
with all the fruit I was eating. Sugar is sugar folks!
At first I
didn’t care. My week came and went, I decided by the end of the week
NOT that it wasn’t so bad, NOT that I wasn’t having cravings because I
thought that I still experienced craving, NOT that I was ok with doing
this for the rest of my life but I had lost my eight pounds and that
was good enough to keep at it for at least another week. By the end of
the second week my problems with gas continued to bother me and those
around me. I told Allison that I thought maybe my body was trying to
tell me something… maybe this diet isn’t so healthy for me and that I
should cease immediately and go back to the old way of eating. After
all I was having problems. But the problem was that I was still eating
too much fruit and through education and common sense I had to stop
drinking smoothies and eating more fruit than actual food. By the time
I looked up I was three weeks into the program, jamming in the kitchen;
trying my hand at new creations by Felicia… yada yada yada and that
brings me up to the present.
I can’t say that this was
an easy journey as much as it was necessary. I don’t feel like it’s
over but I certainly feel like my eating is more manageable since I
went raw. I say on my obesityhelp profile that things are clearer for
me since I started this program. Before with all the sugar, the little
voices in my head were always turned on and revved up; telling me to
eat this and eat that. Now, they are still there but they are muted by
the other little revved up voices that say “good job”, “you’re finally
in control”, “keep up the good work”, “how about a nice tasty salad?”,
“it looks like we are going to achieve our goal this time”. It would be
awfully hard to ignore the newer, friendlier voices these days. It
would be a deliberate and extremely conscious move on my part that I am
not willing to make. I feel like I could do this raw thing forever
because I like being rid of my bigger problem which is my food
addiction.
Although I still think I can eat more than a gastric bypass
patient should be able to eat, I feel blessed that I can eat a normal
amount of food. Now that I am paving a path to good nutrition and
health I feel that eating a regular amount should not be a problem. I
feel confident that what I am putting in my body is helping me and I
feel really proud to be able to say that day by day I am further and
further away from my old, bad habits and on my way to a healthy
lifetime of good, new RAW habits!
Thank you Allison… MWAH!
______________
NOTE: Felicia started eating raw March 26th, at 215 lbs. Today, almost 5 weeks later, she is at 197 and counting.
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