User:Mincan/Fruitarianism
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Fruitarianism and Me
As I have done extensive work on the Fruitarianism article. It may be beneficial to explain my motivation/background history of my experiences with Fruitarianism.
Now I want to make clear that I have no ill will for Fruitarianism or towards any fruitarians.
Contents |
[edit] Introduction to Fruitarianism
I began my study of health in July 2005 whilst apprenticing for a stonemason. I was having decreasing health, which now can only be attributed to being overworked and underpayed :) However, I sought out a diet regimen that would give me increased strength and energy. And if you can believe it, I fell for a high-protein, high-fat, low-carb craze diet with the belief that carbohydrates meddle with our blood sugar levels and thus control our energy levels. Well yeah, but those guys made it sound as if this type of diet would give you control over energy and at the same time allow you to build more muscle and maintain it. (It may be worth noting that at that time I could dead lift a 275 pound cornerstone for laying, with detrimental effects on my knees and back that I feel now and most likely will feel the rest of my life.)
However, I gave up on this as I learned more about nutrition. I was devoting much time of study on the internet to this topic and stumbled across the idealistic sites promoting fruitarianism. This also coincided with a realisation on my part of the horrors of factory farming. I had worked from that September-December as a pressure washer for a Mobile Wash company specialising in washing and disinfecting factory farms - diary, hog, and poultry. What I saw there was truly appaling, and not only could I not work there, but I resolved not to ever eat meat again if I could help it. In comes fruitarianism, with it's honest claims of being the least violent system of eating, and very environmentally friendly. Which it is.
[edit] Detox
I immediately dropped the protein diet in favour of Fruitarianism. My initial detox was horrendous. I will post an excerpt from a record I kept of this event:
"...That night I had a massive headache and felt EXHAUSTED. That night, I was so thirsty at about 3:30 in the morning I had to get a drink, but I could hardly move! Every muscle in my body was stiff and sore and my head was POUNDING! As I moved from my room to the kitchen sink I could barely stand, swaying back and forth like a drunk, super sensitive to light and was so lightheaded I just felt like falling on the ground and expiring. Not to mention I had the worst stomach aches I've ever felt. I could barely take two little sips of water before I felt the need to quickly get to my bed before I fall down. When I collapsed on my bed I had an episode unlike anything else. I felt intensely hot and could not think for the pounding in my head. I could hardly breath, I was panting heavily. And then I started to sweat violently. I swear, within 10 seconds, I had completely soaked my pillow case and my bed sheets! I was so sick I was contemplating screaming for help, I mean I could hardly breath and felt SO BAD! After that immense, nasty smelling sweat came out in about 50 seconds, I was able to sleep. When I woke up I was still very sore and intense stomach pains remained. I took ibuprofen and ate some fruit. By lunch time (I didn't have to work till wednesday, working three-four days a week) I was feeling under the weather, but not like I wanted to die. I went over to a friends house thinking that the major detox was over. Wrong. By after supper I could not do anything but sleep, literally, on his couch. I've had few fevers as bad as this. I had my winter coat on (I live in Canada) and was under 3 blankets, yet didn't sweat. I would shiver if my arms came from under the covers. My hands were so hot I couldn't feel them and when I asked my friend to see if they were hot he said they were freakishly hot. My eyes were watering and I slept from about 8:30 until noon the next day..."
I am now only trying to figure this out precisely. For all this time I have assumed it truly was a detox and of course most likely it was. And I believe that high protein diets are truly unhealthy. Excess protein wreaks havoc on the body not to mention all the saturated fat I consumed along with it. There is virtually nill fiber in animal products. Any diet that is extreme to one side is fairly inadequit. I'm amazed at myself throughout the whole process how blinded one can be by idealism and it strengthens my resolve at classifying myself as an idealist.
So, you are talking about a guy who never enjoyed fruit much at all before this going to eating 100% fruit all the time. I dropped quite a bit o' weight, dropping from my normal 180 to 170. I'm 5' 11" and have quite a bit of muscle mass from the physical demands of my construction based occupations. If only I knew all I was losing was muscle mass I would have been upset. It's taken me until now to realise this. So of course the weight loss was not visible as a little muscle weighs quite a bit compared to fat. I had the usual headaches and light-headedness that is supposed to happen on a massive detoxification program. I even did some water fasting and juice fasting for a day here or there or for three days once. I do admit I felt energised during these periods and I am a firm believer still in the power and importance of cleanses and fasts for regaining health and keeping the body clean inside. Especially the more animal products one consumes, as they rely on the body for their breakdown and removal/expulsion.
[edit] Continuation
Overall though through time I gained back my lost weight from "cheating" and binging on taboo foods, as the diet was simply not psychologically satisfying. Although I honestly attribute much of this to my location. In Canada, the farther north you go, the harder it is to obtain fruit of any decent quality or variety.
I was constantly aggressive because of the lack of good fruit in my area and my inability to get any. I believed, and still believe, this was a major hinderance to my failure to thrive in any way on this diet. The fruit I did obtain was of low quality, meaning the nutritional properties of anything I ate was low. Whereas high quality fruit would have at least provided me proper minerals and vitamins. Also, because of the storage factor the fruit had little taste, which promoted my binges into other food groups and also made the whole experience very disagreeable. However, I am able to concede no matter what, the diet would have been unsustainable if for sheer lack of variety, although I despise this concept of having to have fun with food, instead of gaining pleasure from life.
I truly believe we do on the most part have unbalanced relationships with food. Many people only live to eat. Certain processed foods are only designed to appeal to the palate and provide nill nutrition, and people easily get addicted to these things (i.e. fast food). Also, many additives do contain chemicals which make the brain release pleaure inducing chemicals. Such were the beliefs I held and am reconsidering these days.
[edit] Degradation
For the first two months, namely, November and December, it was fairly easy to continue the diet. I attribute this to my bodies stored up "health". As the deficientcy wasn't too pronounced, I could continue to eat mostly fruit with the occasional other food meal (perhaps a handful of times a week). I also think at the same time my body was loving this new nutrient dense food I was dosing it with. Let's fact it, fruit is some of the healthiest stuff you can eat, and it was tangerine season, and I was using them as a staple as one decent quality and tasting fruit I could obtain.
I also believe that the reason why I was able to maintain my weight with very little fluctuations of losing or gaining 10 pounds was because of any stored up health my body did have to fight the other deficientcies I was creating. I believe anyone that does lose a lot of weight on the diet is doing so because they are in other ways unhealty and their body is not doing a good job of fighting the nutritional deficientcies, thus they manifest it in weight loss.
For me, I can now say I was facing metabolism shut down in the following months, January-March. Perhaps even thyroid issues, as I was finding it impossible to get warm, even into the summer months. Making me believe my body was only adjusting to it's proper tropical environment standpoint. Trust me, within fruitarian circles, there is a reason for everything. And while most of them do seem logical, I am examining this personally and on a large scale. I could it seems still put on weight from eating food at this time, which is a sign of health. I became increasingly hard on myself also to stay pure, and would initiate fasts when I would eat "garbage food". For a while I lived off apples and apple cider, as it was all I could obtain in these deep winter months.
I continued the obsession by spending several hours each day reading nutritional studies and articles by supporters and learning about nutrition. Much of it is true I must confess, but sometimes the conclusions are wrong I believe now. I have surely learned much now.
It was about this time that I ceased all employment for about month. In this time, my body ate itself away I believe. Any vitality I had left. I believed this was all a detox of sorts, many fruitarians believe detox can take years or even up to a decade. I believed after a time that I would regain health, even greater than before! and never have problems with energy.
[edit] Lower quality of Life
I began having all the problems after beginning subcontracting part-time with a flooring company. Decreased drive to get out of bed. Aches and pains in my joints, even though the base effect of fruit is supposed to banish such pains to a neverworld. And extreme lethargy even after a little work. Working in flooring is infinitely less labour intensive than stone masonry! I believed then and now had I returned to that trade it would have been impossible for me. I used to be able to bench press a good portion of my body weight with ease. Now with a decreased desire for activity and making little for myself to do I once went over to a friend's training room in this time span and was shocked at my inability to lift heavy weights. Even this did not flick off the warning bells. I just resigned myself with this Fruitarian concept of lost identity that people have forgotten the true form of humans, that we are supposed to be frail looking and very skinny (even though I wasn't, I was just losing all my muscle mass), and that people that aren't are bloated full of water and fat and puffy from toxemia. There is something to say about the puffiness, but I don't agree we are to be Eloi exactly.
The social aspects were beginning to get to me as well. I would starve myself when at other people's house out of fear of getting impure. Not only that, but I would have a certain amount of pride to keep up, especially with people that knew my stand. I could not eat their food, as that would lead to questioning, and then people may learn the nature of the binge cycle.
Binges now becoming more frequent and more hard to break off as I believe the nutrient deficientcies become more acute. Binges would be short in the last year, but now they would last well up to a week before getting back on track. Also now I would notice that no matter how much I ate I wouldn't gain much weight, and eventually in the last couple months, I don't gain any weight, but actually would seem to lose weight. I believe this was the bodies desperate use of essential fats and protein is was so starved of, making great effort to metabolise and use this immediately.
I also started to lose my hair! Not in clumps and not in a receeding hairline (as I'm not in line to suffer from male patern baldness) but in a refresh rate deficite. I researched it and the condition is transitory and begins from a massive shift in diet to one that is less nutrient dense. My hair simply thinned all over, sides, top, back, everywhere evenly but looked very dull and felt brittle and would could see my scalp clearly when hair was parted or played with at all. This was my first real physical ailment that shocked my intellect into action again.
In the period from May-July I was realising that there was something unsustainable about this way of eating and I wondered if I could continue with this for the rest of my life? Around this time I also stopped visually and verbally expressing my beliefs, as for one I felt hypocritical to preach what I was not practicing, two, needing to be able to binge in secret, and three having serious doubts about it all. Deep down though I still believed in this 100%.
[edit] Decline of habit
After May, everything became chaos. I could not stick to the diet for more than a few days before serious physical and psychological cravings would force me to invariably eat foods such as complex carbohydrates and other heavy foods. I still avoided meat and dairy though, believing (and still believing in the case of dairy) that those products contain pure concentrated disease.
Now I was able to obtain some higher quality fruits some of the time, such as in April there were an abundance of divine grapes, then in early May great early watermelons. These things would keep me motivated and remind me how heavenly fruit can truly be. However, shortly after arriving, these fruits would degrade in quality again and I would find myself becoming very hostile again towards everything and everyone as I was forced to eat tasteless cold storage fruit, and perhaps only 3-5 types. Other fruitarians told me I was brave and courageous for attempting this in my climate. Eventually though the cravings would turn me away from even fruit. I would find my fridge full of fruit and waste much of it anyway in favour of other types of foods.
Constant fatigue and cravings were mine. Making life not very fun. Up until recently in June I was yo-yoing so badly that I learned how to use the salt water flush to flush out any other food types I had eaten and would do this every morning only to a couple hours later binge on all other food types constantly and carnivourously all day long without being satisfyed or resting. Again, in my mind a sign of extreme deficientcies, and the body forcing itself to acquire macronutrients it wasn't getting. These salt water flushes were assigned me by experienced fruitarians as a way to get rid of the cravings. At first this worked, then I believed it had the opposite effect as it made the bodies work much harder to do.
The binging was unbearable. I began to feel as though I had an eating disorder, which I do now truly. Constantly bingeing and then feeling bad about it afterwards. Cycling over and over again.
[edit] Finale
On 12 July 2006, after having practised fruitarianism either exclusively or almost exclusively for 9 months, I burned out from sheer mental exhaustion and a body begging me to eat other food types. This realisation that I must listen to my body reinforced the decision the greatest. I took a survey from a concerned group that tried to show you how your health has been effected negatively by such a restrictive vegan diet. It worked. I was so shocked I showed this survey to those close to me without much shame at all. I realise my way is to be a big man about this whole business and be up front with people when they ask me why I'm eating "normal" again.
[edit] Current Way of Eating
I have decided, from previous knowledge to attempt to follow casually the idea of isocaloric eating. That is, each time of eating have the equal portion ratio of 1:1:1 of protein, fat, and carbohydrate. I am so very tired of constant hunger and cravings that this type of eating system assists. For one, it keeps the blood sugar low and constant, which should mean and end to lethargia. Second, it encouages to eat small meals throughout the day and later into the evening, leading to increased metabolism which will in turn keep hunger at bay as the digestive system is kept busy. All my carbohydrates come from fruit of course. I still stick to a "natural" diet in that I do not consume processed foods. I only consume whole foods, so the only things to be really added are eggs, fish, and chicken, as well as reintroducing nuts and seeds for more fats. In this experiment, since I am adding just a choice few extra foodtypes it will be intereting if they have a direct bearing on my health. A solution to all my cursed afflictions on the fruitarian system? We shall see.
[edit] Other Thoughts
It would really not be fair to write this page without at least addressing the positive points this diet had for me. These included:
- No Illnesses - In the entire 9 months that I was experimenting with Fruitarianism, I had no common illnesses whatsoever! I started in November, and I always get ill around december or january, I usually catch something that takes me down for several days to a week. It's happened the last 4 or 5 years and yet this time around I was in great health. Other than weakness (which most likely was simply caused by calorie restriction, perhaps everything wrong with my experiment was simply not being able to afford and/or acquire enough fruit to eat), but other than the occasions when I had weakness, I never had a cold, fever, not even a sniffle!
- Enhanced vision - I would say I had a 20-30% increase in clarity of vision. It also improved my night vision. This could be attributed to the blood vessels being clear of debris and "cleansed" by the wonderful properties of fruit. Lack of clarity has been a problem with me the last few years. I notice immediately now that I am returning to reduced visual clarity.
- Clear nasal passages - I've always had trouble breathing through my nose. On fruitarianism, I could breath so easily in any circumstances, and especially any exercise based activity. I attribute this to the lack of dairy products, which most honest scientists will tell you should not be eaten if you value your health. Dairy products have been shown to irritate asthma and other bronchial conditions.
- Faster blood clotting rate - I cut my fingers repeatedly at my jobs, and could honestly say my cuts would heal faster on the fruitarian diet. Also, my blood was the deepest red you ever saw, not the dull colour I was used to. This is increased oxygen capacity in the red blood cells due to I believe less animal products. Also with the wonderful properties of fruit. I now this term is overused, but fruit is a truly glorious food, and it's not hard to see why someone would become very initimate with the idea of only consuming them.
- Non-offensive bowel movements(some of the time) - when completely strict, I could have nice tanned coloured excrement or even greeny coloured ones. These would not stink in the least, I serious went in for a "close encounter" and smelled nothing. Although at other times this effect wouldn't seem to occur, but it had never occured prior to fruitarianism for me either.
- Better colon health - I had serious colon problems in the past, obstructions, large excrements, not constipation per se but my colon was definitely misshapen. Fruit helps heal this right up. Now my movements are long toothpaste string looking things that are smooth on the outside, small, and easy to pass.
I am not bitter nor do I resent Fruitarianism. At it's core I believe it has good intentions. I really got to know the fruitarian base well in my stay with them. They are wonderful people, some of the best in my humble opinion. Many of them are motivated by a desire not to see animals suffer, as I partially was. They all believe they are doing the right thing. The common sense reasoning which persuades people is very engaging, especially to idealists.
I have no pride to say that it is completely wrong. In fact I know some that it seems to work for very well. But I can honestly say some people really cannot do this. I don't know why some people cure diseases by this or do so well, and they do, trust me. But I had to go by my bodies signals on this. Many that do well have a body that tells them to do this.
I can understand why a diet that is truly so nutrient dense, packed with vitamins and minerals, can be called nutrient deficient. It is missing those essential fats and protein. Protein is a so misunderstood nutrient and it is often shown to be harmful, but as I have to admit, a certain amount of it must be needed. More than the amount present without eating nuts/seeds anyway, as I wouldn't eat them as they became so hard to digest with my sluggish metabolism, as I also had to give up beans as well, although I don't believe many people are suited to eating them.
Right now I'm having a hard time gaining weight. I am still heavily binging, eating almost all the time sometimes, but I suppose the body is filling its nutrient tank so to speak, fortifying itself in fear I may try something so drastic again. I'm not underweight, which is good, I am still around my normal weight of 180, but with a lot less muscle and it seems much less vitality. I've also lost a lot of tooth mineral I believe. My gums are also unhealthy. I didn't add greens to my diet as I couldn't stand them without dressing, which is a taboo food under fruitarianism. Dark green leafy vegetables contain a lot of calcium.
I hope the hair loss will reverse. The condition is simply caused by not enough nutrients available to rebuild hair folicles at the rate at which they fall out (I believe 150-200 a day for the average person). With an increased consumption of the other two macronutrients fats and protein, I believe, as in most cases happens, that it will reverse itself.
If anyone wants to talk about fruitarianism with me, simply leave me a message in my talk page!
