Raw Food Diet and Running
Friday August 22nd 2008
What's wrong with raw vegan?
I am a member of the UK raw food forum, albeit more of a lurker these days, too busy to be actively posting all the time. Anyway, I recently stumbled across a thread detailing an article written by Shazzie about bringing up raw vegan children.
The article is of interest to me as I have two daughters (9 & 7) and another daughter(lucky me!) due in 3 weeks. My two daughters are about 50% raw, they do eat eggs and dairy (occasionally). They were 4 and 2 when I discovered raw food and it's been a gradual process weaning them off certain foods. Habits/addiction are just as hard to shift when you're 7 as it is when you are 35! Luckily they are fruit fans and fruit dominates their food intake until lunchtime, as well as the occasional evening meal. They are also (plain) salad fans.
The raw % is increasing but it's hard work. It doesn't help that out of a school of 300 children they make up 40% of the vegetarians! It's easy to forget how tough peer pressure can be at that age. So, back to Shazzie's article.
In it she warns of the perils of bringing up children as raw vegans and lifts the lid on what she calls dogma, lies, cover-up etc. by the raw community.
She strongle advocates supplementation. Frankly I was shocked at the level of supplementation she feels is necessary to raise healthy raw vegan children. I'm not suggesting her research is wrong, it just reinforces what I've felt all along that raw vegnism isn't normal (far from it), I truly believe we should be eating insects (knowingly), living amongst Thais I barely bat an eyelid these days when I see insects for sale at the markets. I also think eggs are a very natural food for us to eat (I choose not to). Obviously the natural state of these foods would be raw.
So the question is if Shazzie feels that the raw vegan diet is inadequate why not address some of the deficiences via cooked (vegan) food rather than make her daughter take a feast of supplements?
This topic is close to my heart since my flirtation with dangerously low B12 and consequently high Homocysteine levels. If I started to show other deficiencies I would not end up taking handfuls of supplements, I would take a serious look at what I was eating. My soon to be new addition to my family is also the reason why I'm interested in this article.
Shazzie's in a tough spot. One has to commend her honesty but I see cracks in her belief system. She's falling prey to the very dogma she counsels against.
In her blog she refers to Doug Graham's child who, I presume is being brought up using 80/10/10 principles.
It will be interesting to see what happens to his child over the years. Jury's out. At least I've got a few years before we need to worry about that with our baby.
A friend of mine advocates this health guru(!) Dr. Schnitzer he is a firm believer of grains (raw and freshly milled/baked) for health. The raw usage of the grains is interesting (Schnitzer's CV is here), there's an interesting article regarding the Roman Army's preference for grains over meat.
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