Raw Food Diet – Day 22

Today was good physically, although my energy felt a little lower than usual. I haven’t had any special feelings of euphoria for a few days now. For the most part, I’m feeling about the same as I did before this trial, at least physically.

The psychological aspects of this diet seem to be going downhill. I’m feeling more and more annoyed with having to eat so much food every day. Now that the novelty has worn off, I look at the mountain of food I have to eat each day and feel totally turned off. But when I don’t eat enough calories, I don’t feel as good.

I’m not craving cooked food so much as I’d like to just stop eating such large quantities of food every day. I can barely stand to look at another piece of fruit.

I almost feel like I have to turn eating into a second career to make this diet work long-term. That actually seems to happen to many long-term raw foodists. If I didn’t have a career in personal development already, I’d probably consider this diet even more burdensome.

Dry Skin

My dry skin problem is getting worse. The top surface of all of my fingers looks very dried out, and the skin on my hands is beginning to look more wrinkled. My hands look like they’ve aged a good 10 years. The skin has cracked to the point of bleeding in 5 different places, and the oldest of these now have small scabs. I’ve been using moisturizer for the past few days, but it doesn’t seem to have made any difference. The cold desert air probably doesn’t help. Lately the humidity has been around 30-40%.

Today I noticed that the skin on my forehead is beginning to dry out and flake off too, as if I had a sunburn. The skin on my scalp is starting to peel too, and I even saw some dandruff. I never had dandruff problems before this trial. My hair is dirty blond, so it doesn’t really show, but still…

Whenever I exercise and start to sweat, I continue to experience intense itchiness all over my body. It’s rather annoying to be on the elliptical machine and suddenly feel the need to scratch myself everywhere. Some readers suggested this could be due to dry skin. I agree. I started using a dry skin brush this morning to hopefully scrape off some of the dead skin, so I’ll see if this helps.

These could be temporary symptoms, or they could signal long-term problems with this diet. I didn’t have any skin problems before starting this trial.

Feeling cold

For the past few days, I’ve been feeling very cold again. It’s 72.5 degrees in my office right now, and I’m wearing jeans and a sweatshirt, but it feels uncomfortably cold to me. I think 80 degrees would feel like normal room temperature. My body temp is 98.2.

My hands and feet are especially cold, pretty much all the time I’m out of bed. My hands are cold enough that if I touch Erin’s bare skin on her neck or back, she’ll jump like I just put ice on her. Even with shoes and socks on, my feet feel chilled. I’d love to soak them in hot water just to warm them up.

The coldness in my hands and feet is a little concerning to me. Coldness in the extremities can indicate poor circulation. Also, a common vitamin B12 deficiency symptom is numbness or tingling in the hands and feet. I don’t have any numbness or tingling or any other B12 deficiency symptoms that I know of. It’s unlikely I’d have a deficiency problem after just 3 weeks, since B12 stores can last for years, and I regularly ate B12-fortified foods before this trial. Nevertheless, I’m keeping a close eye out for other potential symptoms. I think I can manage 8 more days.

Weight Loss

My weight went up 0.2 pounds to 178.4. Net weight loss is 7.6 pounds in 21 days.

Breakfast

green smoothie: 4 bananas (524g), spinach (110g), raspberries (134g), 1 cup water 

561 calories, 3g fat, 140g carb, 11g protein

Lunch

Lunch

  1. salad: mixed greens (178g), cucumber (74g)
  2. dressing: grape tomatoes (82g), raw tahini (50g), lime juice (14g)
  3. fresh juice made from carrots, apple, celery, ginger, lime (15 fl oz)

515 calories, 26g fat, 65g carb, 16g protein

Afternoon Snack

green smoothie: 3 bananas (310g), spinach (84g), blueberries (168g), 1 cup water

379 calories, 1g fat, 93g carb, 6g protein

Dinner

Dinner

  1. green smoothie: 3 bananas (442g), kale (74g), blueberries (146g), 1 cup water
  2. 3 tangelos (340g)
  3. Asian pear (220g)

767 calories, 3g fat, 194g carb, 13g protein

This smoothie came out way too thick for some reason. I could turn the Vitamix container sideways, and it wouldn’t even move at first.

Evening Snack

  1. 3 bananas (250g)
  2. blueberries (266g)
  3. blackberries (186g)

454 calories, 3g fat, 114g carb, 7g protein

Daily Summary

2677 calories, 36g fat, 605g carb, 53g protein

461mg sodium, 105g fiber, 323g sugar

11% of calories from fat, 7% from protein, 82% from carbs

After more than 3 weeks on this diet, eating this way is still not easy. It’s taking a lot of self-discipline for me to keep pushing through the resistance I’m feeling. Going vegetarian and then vegan was an absolute breeze. I find this raw food trial more challenging than adapting to polyphasic sleep.

I estimate that by the end of this 30-day trial, I’ll have eaten about 400 bananas.


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