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Testimonial: Edwin Casimero, Philippines
My raw paleo diet adventure came about with my desperate search for the cure for everything that afflicted me. The challenges to my life always needed a solution. Being trained as an engineer, a computer geek, a problem solver, led me to finding ultimate solutions or else.
Born in 1969, I grew up just like every urban kid on baby formula, drugs, some fast food, lots of cooked food and following the debunked food pyramid of high cooked carbs and low fat.
When I was a child I was diagnosed with asthma and doctors prescribed anti-histamine drugs. When I had cystic acne at 16, dermatologists bombarded me with steroid injections and creams. Finally one decided I should take an experimental drug called Ro-Accutane. We had to go to the drug company main office and sign a waiver for their drug was experimental and sever side effects were possible.
In 2004 while visiting the beaches of Boracay I got bit by sandflies and suffered for 2 whole years of itching all over my arms and legs. After months on steroid injections and steroid creams, I gave up and just let it be and in 2006 the suspected leishmaniasis went away.
All throughout my life I had foliculitis, got red splotches on my body when I took a bath, got easily faintly tired with strenuous activity, had heart burns, left rotation shoulder pain, was hospitalized for various unknown viral diseases and had some heart murmur called mitral valve prolapse and became obese at 170 pounds and wore 38" waistline pants.
Beginning with my spouse and I's secondary infertility adventure in 2002 led us to clean up our diet eliminating junk foods and eliminating anything not edible from being put on our skin and throwing away the microwave oven. And using raw oysters to increase sperm counts.
In the same 2002 while trying to conceive I came down with an unknown viral illness, was hospitalized for 3 days, then suffered from chronic fatigue syndrome for 1 month. The heart doctor who ordered a battery of tests said nothing came out of the tests so he wanted to shape my heart by prescribing a heart shaping medicine called beta blockers but it may kill off my erections! This was so unacceptable to my core personality as I only had one child and my life goal was at least more than 4. I sternly refused the drugs and found out that by merely eliminating all sources of caffeine I was able to cure myself in 3 weeks.
When my 2nd child was born in September 2003 I was obese at 170 pounds, I desperately wanted to lose weight to look sexy enough to have more children. I blindly attempted to follow a cooked Atkins diet. I then sought the teachings of a mainstream western medicine nutritionist and she taught me the way to reduce weight was to reduce the starches and up the vegetables. I did lose weight and maintained some 140 pounds for some time. But I still was not healthy.
In 2003 a small eczema began on my lower right leg, it was a good itch, I paid no mind to it. It became full blown in middle of 2005 I had full blown eczema with the size of a steak on my right leg, on my whole face, my ears, my left arm. I was a mess, I could not work, I could not go out, all 5 doctors I saw told my I was INCURABLE and I was going to be this way for the rest of my life.
The incurable diagnosis was unacceptable for me. I was always the open minded type. No DOGMA was my motto in life. I'm an engineer, a problem solver, if these so called "doctors" said I was incurable, it only meant THEY DID NOT KNOW the cure and that their common educational foundation was AMISS. I had to find people who DID KNOW the cure... NON-DOCTORS so I drove to a far away town where there were NO western medical doctors, and my true health learning journey began with a 3rd generation herbalist named Manang Lorna. My eczema cure story is told in full at
www.eczemacure.infoI learned about electro-medicine, herbs and detoxing: kidney cleanses, liver flushes, colon cleanses and many other cleanses which eliminated my eczema symptoms. Free of eczema symptoms. But I wanted more. I wanted vibrant health. I knew there was more and I wanted to be healthy so bad I just had to learn more. All detox and no diet change meant no real cure.
In 2007 I had stumbled onto raw veganism through Dr. Tam Mateo. I tried 2 months of raw veganism his way, his recipes, his consultation, but I got too thin and finally gave up raw veganism. I added cooked meat and rice again to my diet and to gain weight.
I was then ready for fasting and I tried a 14 day orange juice fast under the tutelage of Barefoot Herbalist MH. It was an eye opener. I got rid of cooked meat and rice addiction. I was ready to try raw fruitarian. And I did try raw fruitarian which only lasted me 2 months. I was getting thinner on raw fruitarian than raw vegan plus I felt cold and I was living in a tropical country, in warm Manila at 25 to 30 degrees celcius. What finally knocked me to stop the fruitarian madness was when I asked for support as to when my cold feelings would stop. A long time fruitarian said it would take 5 years! That did it, I had to find something else.
I stumbled onto the Wai Diet by Wai Genriiu (A form of Raw Paleo Diet). It was an easy step from fruitarian to Wai Diet, just add extra virgin olive oil and raw fish sashimi and raw egg yolks to my tropical fruits. Bam! Instant feeling of good health! I gained sane enough weight from 112 to 120 pounds on Wai Diet. The addition of raw meat to my meat less 4 months was a life giving breath to my health.
After 3 months on Wai Diet I got bored with just sea food, why not try land animals? I stumbled onto Aajonus Vonderplanitz who went on and on about the benefits of raw land animals, raw beef, raw chicken, plus raw dairy.
I needed some hand holding, some support to get me started and I found Geoff Purcell (in the UK) at AllExperts.com very accessible. He and Craig Bates started up
www.rawpaleoforum.com which was very helpful for newbies like me.
I experimented with various raw land animals with duck, chicken, goat, lamb, frogs and liked raw organic grass fed beef the best... the legendary grass fed Batangas beef with yummy yellow fat is true! I experimented with many kinds of raw dairy from goat, cow and carabao and all failed, I just could not digest dairy, I realized I was lactose intolerant. My tummy also disagreed with raw green juicing.
I got curious about the Homo Optimus Diet involving cooked pork, I made my one month experiment and felt my health was inferior on cooked meat compared to raw meat.
I found out that on raw paleo diet of organic fruit and raw fatty organic animal foods, I never got sick for a whole year. I felt invincible. This was a first for me, going on and on everyday expecting not to get sick. The only times I felt sick were the times I tried eating a non-raw paleo diet. Plus for the first time I've got bicep muscles on my arms and I'm a sedentary computer geek. Gosh, that talk about eating raw meat will make you put on muscles without gym exercises are true.
In 2009 I shifted to a high fat low carb raw paleo diet and I found it to be even more comfortable. Gone were the shaky hungry feelings characterized by hypoglycemia which I thought was normal throughout my life when every meal time comes.
Raw paleo diet is the easiest diet I have been on, but high quality organic fruit and organic meat is expensive. Even easier than regular SAD or cooked paleo diet. Being free from the shackles of cooking is a dream that must be experienced. It seems I have found "home" as raw paleo diet is so easy even a caveman can do it.
To even further my access to the best foods possible I moved my company office to Cubao, just beside my favorite wet market “Farmers Market” for daily fresh marketing.
My diet these days is a high raw fat, low carb diet composed of:
- raw organic low glycemic local fruits in season – high vitamin C fruits (guava, papaya, indian mangoes), hydrating fruits (watermelon, melon), fatty fruits (durian, coconuts) we follow the seasons
- raw fertilized duck eggs flown in from Palawan
- raw grass fed fatty Batangas beef and sometimes raw goat or raw lamb
- various raw sea food like oysters, clams, small and big fish, sea prawns, etc.
Raw paleo diet and its variants is curative. My own small children have experienced eating raw paleo diet themselves. When the kids are sick I put them on a raw paleo diet same as mine, they know the cure for their illness is RAW because they experience immediate relief. The kids know who the healthiest person at home is these days.
At the end of this year 2009 I will have been 2 years on raw paleo diet and I now weigh a more respectable 128 pounds with a short height of 5'5" and 31" waistline pant size. Always expecting to achieve new health heightsover the next years as I fine tweak and continually adjust. All my health issues have been resolved. It has only been these 2 years I have ever felt truly healthy.
Today at 40 years old I look younger, slimmer and have more strength than when I was 30. It is on raw paleo diet that I realized that I as a human were meant to be healthy and stay healthy, effortlessly. No supplements can match the power of real food. I was just always running on the wrong fuel.
Best wishes,
Edwin
09 December 2009
