View Full Version : DD might have shingles
I'm diagnosing this myself at this point. She called yesterday with a weird rash on one side of her abdomen and a few dots on her back. Her left back was hurting, but she thought she just strained it.
I was thinking maybe poison ivy, but she hasn't been around it.
Then this morning she called and has severe pain under the area with the rash. Unfortunately, she hasn't needed a doctor where she lives, so she doesn't have one. I would feel better if she went to an emergency room because I think the docs would be pretty competent, but that would cost quite alot. So she's going to an urgent care place near where she works. It has several good reviews. So I hope the doctor is good.
The reason I'm feeling urgency in her being seen is because I've read that if you take the medicine within 3 days of symptoms, you can hopefully avoid the post-herpetic nerve pain you can get with shingles.
Poor DD........
Actually, she told me a friend of her's had shingles awhile back too. I've read that shingles is on the rise in younger people. What's going on?
Anyone have any experience with shingles in young people? DD is 25.
Thanks.
It is on the rise and not just younger people. I've had 4 friends with it in their late 40's and 2 in their 50's.
Very painful.
One friend had it last March and thought she was finally past it, got a flu shot the other day and is back to having nerve pain again.
I'm sure the urgent care will take care of her, that is where I'd go. We can't seem to keep a family Dr we like (they all move away) so I've given up on having one.
Thanks Float On. That's really weird. I wonder why its happening so much more?
I had a cousin who had it 2 years ago. She was about 62. Really painful.
I remember when I was little, my aunt Lucy called my mom to come over and see her and I went with her.
She had on one of those black see-through robes on, and you could see these huge oozing blisters all over her. Very strange affliction.
DD has started to teach french horn to some younger kids at a school. I wonder if that's where she got it.
I guess I'm getting ahead of myself. She hasn't even been diagnosed yet, but she sure has the classic signs of it. She had mono when she was 18. Seems like that danged Epstein-Barr virus causes problems later, with a number of things concerning the immune system.
I thought shingles was the chicken pox virus.
I am sorry to hear your dd might have shingles. Seems like only a few years ago, that illness was seen only in those with compromised immune systems like the very elderly or someone with HIV.
Just my convoluted unscientific theory, but I wonder if all the pharmaceuticals used in people and food animals are messing with our immune systems and overall health. I don't think young people can even register for university classes at some colleges without being immunized for one thing or another. Where I work, I get an email every week "Have you had your flu shot yet?" Thanks, but no thanks! And now that so many are coming down with shingles, I would think the shingles vaccine is a huge money maker. Skeptic I remain...
pinkytoe.........I wouldn't get the shingles vaccine either (and I don't get the flu vaccine anymore, since I got deathly ill after the last one).
Herbgeek.......It IS the chicken pox virus. But if you've already had chicken pox, for some reason it manifests as "shingles" later on if you are exposed to someone with chicken pox.
DD went to the doctor's and it is shingles. He gave her an Rx for Valtrex.
She is so bummed. She is such an energetic, positive person. She had mono when she was 18, then lots of strept throats. Then she dealt with bedbugs for a year. Now this. Bless her heart. Plus, she's trying to not need financial help from anyone, but the doctor's bill is over 200 and the med was $130. She's working several jobs, but none of them are great-paying jobs (she's a musician).
They say if you get the anti-viral medication within 3 days of the rash, you can really shorten the length of the 'disease' and hopefully not get the severe nerve pain that can last a long time. Hopefully we got it in time.
She is a Vegan, but she's excellent at making sure she eats well and gets all her vitamins/minerals/nutrients in her diet.
Bummer.
fidgiegirl
11-2-12, 5:48pm
I had a friend who had it recently at 33. Bummer, but glad she got a straightforward diagnosis and meds right away.
Hi, Cathy! I was wondering whether your daughter was supplementing, given her vegan status; you said that she works at getting her needs through her diet, but some nutrients simply are not available in a particular form in a vegan diet. When my father in law had shingles, we were told that vitamin A deficiency is often implicated, and he was prescribed vitamin A when Vicodin failed to ease his pain (vitamin A worked). I've just googled it, and two websites follow on shingles and vitamins; the third gives a nice overview of vitamin A. Some people are good at converting carotenes (the plant form) to the retinoid form of vitamin A, some aren't, and people with impaired thyroid do very badly at it, so your daughter might need a retinol supplement. Vitamin B12 also helps to lessen the effects, as do large doses of vitamin C.
http://www.livestrong.com/article/369855-vitamin-therapy-for-herpes-zoster/
http://www.healingwithnutrition.com/newsclips/archive/shingles.html
http://www.whfoods.com/genpage.php?tname=nutrient&dbid=106
Thank you so much for that info and those links Suzanne! You're a great go-to person for these sorts of things!
I'll send these links on to DD.
Thanks again!
I hope your daughter gets well soon, CathyA. Shingles is miserable, and anything that can ease the pain, heal the sores, and lessen the longterm effects is worth a try.
Thanks Suzanne.
We're racking our brains, trying to think of where she was exposed.......then it hit us......she teaches french horn to younger kids at a school. Plus, her friend that had it awhile back works at a children's museum. I think we've solved the mystery. Those little kids are just big petri dishes! :~)
Yup - we're embedded in a world of germs! I see the attempt at fighting germs to be hopeless, so I look to building up my immune system. When I was first diagnosed with chronic fatigue syndrome, possibly from the Epstein-Barr virus (my cerebrospinal fluid was loaded with its prions), I was a total pushover for any pathogen that glanced in my direction. After two horrible years of immunoglobulin, mineral, and vitamin transfusions, and intense nutritional research, I came out of it. I will always be vulnerable to relapses, so I try to support my body as well as I can.
I'm curious Suzanne, if I may ask.....did you develop chronic fatigue syndrome during perimenopause? (maybe you're too young for that yet...)
Seems like lots of bad things can happen during that time.
After DD had mono and several bouts of strept throat, her ENT told her to definitely have her tonsils removed. Well, we just waited it out and she got over all the problems with her throat. I'm glad she still has her tonsils, since I think they're there for a reason.
She's always eaten very healthily. She does take Vitamin D2 (the only Vegan option), which concerned me, because I read it wasn't as good as D3. But we've kept track of her blood levels and its come up to within normal limits. But she does take 4,400 units a day, plus B12. I'll encourage her to take more Vitamin A. Do you think carrot juice is good for that? I usually buy the Bolthouse carrot juice and mix it half and half with O.J.
I'm glad you seem to be doing better with your chronic fatigue. I developed tons of problems after a horrible bout of influenza and pneumonia, then fibromyalgia, then perimenopause. There's about 10 years there I'd like to forget about!
My big Achilles heel is my appetite. It just won't stop, no matter how healthily I eat.
I'm proud to say that in spite of my over-active appetite, I raised my 2 kids to be extremely healthy eaters.
I do wonder if the Epstein-Barr virus causes alot of seemingly unrelated problems after its initial infection.
Anyhow......thanks again for your help!
http://www.m.webmd.com/skin-problems-and-treatments/tc/shingles-cause
Shingles can occur for many reasons, and most of the time its not cause you caught it from someone else.
In my case, I had it at age 17 due to stress in my life. Overbooked on activities in my last year of high school.
Hi CathyA,
I developed chronic fatigue syndrome in my late twenties, and got a diagnosis when I was 30. There are always a number of factors! I was stressed beyond endurance, trapped in an abusive marriage to an active alcoholic, and I pushed my body to breaking point through physical overwork and obsessive dieting and exercise. I think the Epstein-Barr was just the final insult to my system. At that time I was an ovolactovegetarian and I am extremely stubborn, so I refused to accept the evidence that my body couldn't support the diet, and my attempt to detox my system with a vegan diet precipitated the final crash. Note, I am not saying that just because I can't be healthy on a meatless diet that nobody can!! However, my experience back then, 23 years ago, and my ongoing research, have made me conscious of dietary differences. In general, I do pretty well now, but have to be constantly aware of my nutrition and energy levels. I had a crash two years ago after a complex root canal treatment, and came out of that about five months ago.
When you say your daughter's vitamin D levels fall within normal limits, are the tests showing the 25 hydroxy D levels? This is the active form. A test that shows only total amount of vitamin D might come back looking normal because it's recording the total of the D2 and D3 forms, but fail to pick up a D3 deficiency. Some people are able to efficiently convert D2 to D3, and others are not, and only sensitive tests for specific forms of the vitamin in the blood will tell! In my own case, I have to take 2,500 units per day of D3 just to keep at the low end of normal. Megadoses of D2 (50,000 units a week for 12 weeks, repeated when the first treatment had no effect) did nothing at all for me. Apparently my thyroid dysfunction derails the conversion of D2 to D3. Megadoses of D3 also didn't work, while constant trickle-charging does. It just goes to show how mileage varies with the individual!
This link is worth checking out for vitamin D information. http://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2009/10/10/Vitamin-D-Experts-Reveal-the-Truth.aspx
Information about the test: http://labtestsonline.org/understanding/analytes/vitamin-d/tab/test
The potential problem with carrot juice is that the vitamin A in it is the carotenoid form, which has to be converted to a retinoid form in the body before it is of use for some vital functions. A person who's not an efficient converter can be swimming in carotenoids, and still have a deficiency in the retinoid form while a general blood test might look normal because it records the total amount of vitamin A and its precursors. The WHFoods link I sent you describes this problem. The same thing happens with B12 and has been a serious problem for vegans taking B12 analogs. These register on test as B12 and all looks well, but they're ineffective. One has to request a cyanobalanin test.
The carrot/OJ mix will supply plenty of Vitamin C! Sorry to sound like the voice of doom, but it would be dishonest not to say that I was told never to give my children neat fruit juice, and never to drink it myself, because it's so high in sugar even when no sugar is added. I was told to always dilute one part juice with three parts water, to buffer insulin surges and protect the kidneys.
Tammy's right that your daughter may not have been directly infected by somebody else in the recent past. The shingles virus can lie dormant for years and roar into action when the carrier's immune system goes down. If she had chickenpox as a child, that could do it; she could also, years ago, have been exposed but not had a reaction, while the virus still snuck aboard and stowed away. Let's hope for a quick recovery. The virus might be with her for life now but she might not have further attacks if she can keep her immune system running at full blast.
I hear you about the years you'd like to forget! I had a horrible perimenopause and still have sporadic hot flashes and I still have hormonal-swing migraines; fortunately they are much milder now. Definitely I have more and severer hot flashes when the carbohydrate percentage of my diet goes too high, and the severer hot flashes are linked to worse migraines.
I wish you the best possible outcome!
Sorry I missed that part about the carotinoid conversion. (I think I have a learning disability and find reading pretty darned hard).
Yes, we tested for the 25 Hydroxy D levels. Her first level was 9. She had gotten very depressed and began to get so dizzy that she couldn't get out of bed. I suggested we draw a D level and it was barely there! Her symptoms began to improve in about a week or 2 on the supplements. I also like to use methylcobalamin B12.
I have low D levels, as does my son, so it must be something we're deficient in or some genetic thing.
DD is a very "high strung" person and seems to be stressed alot of the time...........which I'm sure isn't good for her.
My neice (around 35) who had mono when she was about 18 and is having all sorts of funky problems now.....so that does make me wonder about the EB virus. Those viruses can surely do a number on you.
Thanks Tammy.......I didn't know that about shingles.
Suzanne.......After I was finally in post menopause, I started feeling lots better. But now, I'm getting hot flashes again and waking up several times a night again. I think my FSH went up and is flogging my ovaries, and they're spitting out the last of the eggs. Sheesh! I wish they'd die already! :~)
Isn't it funny how some people go through life without any problems? Maybe we'll be one of those in our next life. :)
I had shingles a couple of years ago. I understand that it is caused by the chicken pox virus which can lay dormant in the nerve endings for decades before becoming active. I did take the anti-viral medication, also I took Neurontin for the pain and Ambien to help me sleep. It cleared up in about 2 weeks. DH had his shingles vaccination but I had put it off--bad decision! I had to wait 3 months after it cleared up to get vaccinated. Sure don't want to go through that again!
Maybe she's one of us who isn't cut out for a vegetarian diet. When your physical and mental health start breaking down, it's time to take a second look. Listening to your body is always a good idea. And I'm not going for the cheap legume joke here...
ETA: Aside from anecdotal reports, attention is being paid to the connection between mental disorders and vegetarian diets:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22676203#
Interestingly, the onset of vegetarianism seems to follow, rather than precede, the mental disorders:
"Vegetarians displayed elevated prevalence rates for depressive disorders, anxiety disorders and somatoform disorders. Due to the matching procedure, the findings cannot be explained by socio-demographic characteristics of vegetarians (e.g. higher rates of females, predominant residency in urban areas, high proportion of singles). The analysis of the respective ages at adoption of a vegetarian diet and onset of a mental disorder showed that the adoption of the vegetarian diet tends to follow the onset of mental disorders."
My mother's advice when we were feeling peckish was always "Eat a nice steak, dear."
I agree Jane, but DD is very opinionated, and I'm sure won't change anytime soon. :(
Tussiemussies
11-4-12, 8:26am
Hi Cathy A, this page also has some great essential oil suggestions for relieving the pain...
http://www.livestrong.com/article/256171-essential-oils-used-for-shingles/
Tussiemussies
11-4-12, 8:32am
PS I too will never get the flu shot again as I did when I was 25 and got so terribly sick from it. It damaged something in my one ear that has never changed back to normal. I try to stay away from any meds as much as possible although I am on some that I cannot get off.
I think you started this thread a little while ago, I hope your daughter is getting relief by now...
I didn't get the boys the chickenpox vaccine when that came out, thinking 'thats a childhood illness they should go ahead and get since we really don't know how well this vaccine will work in the years to come'...well they never did get chickenpox when they were little (and it wasn't for me not trying). Now they are 15 and 16 and I'm wondering if I did the wrong thing. Any suggestions?
Thanks for that link Tussiemussies. Suzanne gave me a link to that same place, but with vitamins that are useful in Shingles..........so we're getting a pretty good supply of suggestions, for which we are grateful!
Thanks so much!
Float on ... You could ask your doc if they give the vaccine to teenagers. I think they do ...
I don't think you did the wrong thing. I never got chickenpox either--unless my body threw it off when I wasn't looking--and I've been exposed to it in adulthood. Maybe some of us are just naturally resistant. I'd let your boys make the decision when they are adults.
I was also thinking this, Jane and CathyA, that this nice young woman may not have the biochemistry required for a vegan diet. It must be very hard on you, CathyA, seeing your daughter's health spinning downward, and doing your best to respect her choices. I know from my own experience when I was doing ovolacto and getting sicker and sicker that any criticism of my diet, however glancing, threw me into defense mode and heightened my determination to stick to it. On paper, my diet was completely adequate, even excellent; when I discussed it with my doctor when I was first diagnosed, he kept saying things like, "It should be impossible for you to be deficient in ....." My magnesium levels were so low that my heart was affected, beating so arrhythmically and stopping erratically, and I was told I had irreversible heart damage (it came right!), and my vitamin B12 and iron levels showed up as "trace" with all the unpleasant effects attached to these deficiencies.
So much gets tied into dietary choice that goes against mainstream that it can be very hard to disengage. There's shame and a sense of failure; loss of identity; loss of support group - whose rejection of one may well involve anger and even hateful expressions; and very genuine feelings of betrayal of one's ethics. When you fight so hard for your diet and invest so much energy into proving to yourself and everybody around you that it's good and healthy and search out evidence to support your view, and point triumphantly to all these fantastically healthy and longlived people who eat the same way you do - well, it's not easy to walk away, especially if one has alienated the omnivores around you! Knowing that insensitive omnivores will crow over you is another major hurdle to reintroducing previously taboo foods to one's diet. For me, the sight of that 40-page medical report, test after test, with big red rings around just about every result, and the flat statement of my doctor that I was literally killing myself when I tried to cure myself of chronic fatigue by detoxing through going vegan, was a huge slap upside my head. It bears repeating; the diet was nutritionally excellent on paper. I simply don't produce some vital enzymes and I have abnormally high requirements for certain elements that I can't metabolize even from eggs and dairy products. No shame, no blame. That's the genetic hand I was dealt.
CathyA, I wish you all the best in your support of your daughter. You're a good and loving mother to her.
Slip her a copy of John Nicholson's The Meat Fix. He managed to make me laugh while describing horrific bouts of IBS, which is no easy feat. Thought-provoking and entertaining.
Just my convoluted unscientific theory, but I wonder if all the pharmaceuticals used in people and food animals are messing with our immune systems and overall health. I don't think young people can even register for university classes at some colleges without being immunized for one thing or another. Where I work, I get an email every week "Have you had your flu shot yet?" Thanks, but no thanks! And now that so many are coming down with shingles, I would think the shingles vaccine is a huge money maker. Skeptic I remain...
Yes, you have to be immunized to register for college. Unless you sign a statement saying it's against your religion and get it notorized. I did that myself about 20 years ago. I had just graduated from the same university the previous Spring and now in Fall, going to graduate school, they were requiring this. It wasn't against my religion but it was against what I think is good for my health. So, I refused.
I'm with you, Pinky. I believe all these things that are currently in our diet and all the damn shots and pills we take are to blame for weakening our immune systems. I do not take ANY immunizations and I steer clear of all shots. I DO NOT get a yearly flu shot. I also don't take any prescriptions except for short term actual illnesses. Try to eat as much organic as possible and stay away from process foods (all the chemicals.) I don't want to get sick in an effort to keep from getting sick.
Jane, Suzanne, and Cathy: I don't think I'd make an assumption that a vegan diet may be the cause of the problem. Normally, vegan diets are VERY beneficial for health for the VAST MAJORITY of all people who follow them. (Nutritional statistics support this claim.) I wouldn't place the blame there unless you'd actually analyzed her entire vegan diet over several weeks. Yes, a diet of potato chips, poptarts and coke is vegan and very unhealthy but most vegans don't eat that way.
But an anecdote for the other side. I have been a vegan for 8 years and am in perfect health. My health had never been bad before I became vegan but has improved dramatically. I have no ailments and have never felt better in my life. I have lost and kept off approximately 65lbs.
I don't doubt anyone's claim that veganism is not for them but I don't think it's right to imply that veganism is some kind of fringe, dangerous lifestyle that may place one's health and life at risk or makes someone weak and listless. The irrefuatable evidence shows the exact opposite and veganism absolutely REVERSES heart disease.
And Cathy, as far as perimenopause is concerned, I am 48.5 and I think I MUST be in perimenopause by now. But, aside from 3 14+ day long periods over the past 3 years, I've had absolutely no symptoms. My mother had menopausal symptoms (all of them) and took the hormones by the fistful by the time she was my age. I am convinced that eliminating animal products from my diet is the explanation for this because I can't imagine what else the difference could be. I am also convinced that most people who cut way down on their animal product consumption will see health benefits, regardless of their ailments.
But maybe I'm wrong, I may not be in perimenopause, yet.
"My mother had menopausal symptoms (all of them) and took the hormones by the fistful by the time she was my age. I am convinced that eliminating animal products from my diet is the explanation for this because I can't imagine what else the difference could be. I am also convinced that most people who cut way down on their animal product consumption will see health benefits, regardless of their ailments."
As Suzanne pointed out, we have individual--possibly unique--responses to different diets. I was lacto-ovo for six or seven years during which I gained a lot of weight (due to hyperinsulinemia, no doubt). I went vegan for two months and my regularly clockwork menses stopped dead. I ended up entering menopause a few years earlier than is normal in my family, and I'm convinced that it was because of my diet. I'm not convinced that veganism is healthy for anyone, even though it gets a lot of good press, but I am convinced that adults should eat what suits them best, for whatever reason. There are plenty of ex-vegans and vegetarians abroad who feel as passionately as you do to the contrary that adding animal products is what restored their health.
Jane: I'm not criticizing anyone for any of their dietary choices. I'm also not even remotely interested in trying to convince someone to switch to veganism. However, people try and abandon a vegan diet for many, many reasons and one is that they don't feel as well because of it.
I am also devoted to a vegan lifestyle. I did not choose veganism for health benefits. I am very bothered when people (who generally haven't done a lot of self-education on the topic and have tried and abandoned veganism [for whatever reason]) feel that it is their duty to warn other vegans or those thinking of trying veganism off the diet, implying or stating outright that it either ruined their health or compromised their health and so could easily be the cause of some other person's ailments.
Several posts in this thread prior to my post implied that veganism can be detrimental to one's health. I have done a significant amount of reading on this topic in the past many years and I know the preponderance of evidence clearly points to a well-planned vegan diet benefiting most people's overall health. I never stated that there is no exception to this rule, but it is the rule. I can point one unbiased study after another that shows that well-planned vegan diets are beneficial to people's health.
You may "not be convinced that veganism is healthy for anyone" but many scientists, physicians, universities and government departments of health disagree with you. I am also convinved that veganism has been very good for me and every other vegan I've known.
I'm not going to try and convince any omnivore that they should abandon their animal product consuming ways. That would be boorish of me. I also expect the same courtesy of omnivores to those of us who eschew that type of diet.
I didn't choose vegetarianism for health benefits, either--I've always been a healthy woman--but for the usual ethical reasons. (It eventually dawned on me that the only animals I had saved in all those years were the ones I rescued from the street.) I was perfectly happy eating vegetarian fare. I read all the literature, subscribed to magazines, bought the dogma, didn't eat a bite of meat, fish, fowl for years. I don't agree there is a wealth of unbiased information proving veganism, particularly, is healthy long term. After all, vegans make up a tiny minority of the population, and life-long vegans are practically non-existent. But again, adults should eat what works for them. And if or when it stops working, they should explore other options.
I thought I had made it clear that I have no doubts that veganism works well for some people. My reason for thinking that it is not working for CathyA's daughter is that since the young lady went vegan, her health has deteriorated despite her obvious commitment to eating a healthy diet. As CathyA said earlier, her daughter pays very careful attention to getting her vitamins and minerals from her diet, and takes appropriate supplements. CathyA said also that her children have always eaten healthily, even before her daughter went vegan.
There is, unfortunately, no irrefutable evidence that veganism is never bad for anybody, and none that it is good for everybody. Vegans get cancer and heart disease, they die of strokes. Their all-cause mortality is the same as that of omnivores. Vegan Outreach warns against playing the health card given that there's no irrefutable evidence that vegan diet is healthier.
http://www.veganoutreach.org/articles/healthargument.html
The idea that vegan diet reverses heart disease is also very shaky. H. Jay Dinshah, Founding President of the American Vegan Society, vegetarian from birth and vegan since he was 23, died at age 66 of a heart attack. This is what vegan doctor and researcher Michael Klaper has to say about Dinshah's death: "The recent death of H. Jay Dinshah, Founding President of the American Vegan Society, of an apparent heart attack at age 66, brings to light the reality that consuming a plant-based diet may not be all that is required to protect our arteries as years go by.
Scientists have recently discerned that there are factors — beyond the consumption of saturated animal fat — that may contribute to atherosclerotic plaque accumulating in, and ultimately clogging, vital arteries in the heart and throughout the body. Minimizing these risks should be a goal for all modern-day vegetarians and vegans, as well as for our omnivorous brothers and sisters."
For the full article, which is very well worth reading regardless of one's dietary leanings, go here: http://www.earthsave.org/lifestyle/dinshah.htm
I stole this list from http://rawfoodsos.com/2012/07/01/bad-science-strikes-again/#more-2329
Bif Naked—award-winning musician and actress—was a raw vegan for 10 years before getting diagnosed with breast cancer.
Ross Horne, famous Natural Hygienist and author of a book called “Cancer-Proof Your Body,” died of prostate cancer in 2004—after 22 years of eating a high-fruit, raw vegan diet in the tropics. (Although the previous link says he died “well into his 80s,” his actual age at death was plain ol’ 80.)
Harvey Milstein—leader of the raw vegan “natural hygiene” movement in Houston, Texas—died of colon cancer in his 60s after 23 years as a fruit-based raw vegan.
Vihara Youkta, dancer and wife of famous raw foodist Viktoras Kulvinskas, died of bowel cancer after being raw vegan for 30 years.
More recently, Robin Gibb of Bee Gees fame died of colon cancer at the age of 62, after being a drug-and-alcohol-abstaining vegan for decades (cooked, not raw).
T.C. Fry—fruitarian and early raw vegan pioneer—died of a coronary embolism when he was about 70, and his autopsy revealed additional blood clots in his legs. (Joel Fuhrman notes that Fry’s B-12 levels were extremely low before his death, so he probably had high homocysteine, which makes blood more prone to clotting.)
Vegan diet doctors (Fuhrman, Esselyn, McDougall) order patients to give up tobacco, alcohol, sugar, white flour, and refined vegetable oils, soda and other sweetened drinks, and to exercise. Patients are provided support groups. Oh yes, patients also stop eating animal source foods. Why, from this list, would anybody pick out the last factor as the only important one? For this claim to be true, there has to be a vegan group under medical supervision that smoked, drank alcohol, ate junk food, drank soda and sweetened fruit juices, didn't exercise, and had no support groups, who were healthier than a meat-eating group under medical supervision who didn't smoke or drink, eschewed soda and juices and never touched fast, processed and junk foods, who exercised sufficiently, and had support groups. This hypothetical healthy bad habits vegan group would also have to be healthier than a meat-eating bad-habits group under medical supervision before the variable of vegan versus meat-eating could be considered significant.
Mormons, who eat dairy products, meat, and eggs, but who live as "clean" as Seventh Day Adventists, outlive SDAs. Dan Buettner, in The Blue Zones, interviewed a 90-year-old SDA surgeon from Loma Linda, who said that he could not understand why some of his peers, who lived in the same complex, ate the same way, exercised as often, never smoked or drank, still died young of the same diseases as sloppy non-exercising consumers of the Standard American Diet, and went on to say that SDAs still get the same diseases as SWDers, only about 10 years later on average.
It is perfectly possible for people with that particular biochemistry, access to a wide range of foods, and the nutritional knowhow to put it all together, to be outstandingly healthy and happy on a vegan diet. Take away the first factor, though, and a person is in trouble even if s/he has the other two in bucketsful! For somebody really determined to make it as a vegan despite lacking particular enzymes or having altered insulin metabolism or mitochondrial pathways a bit out of synch, or thyroid oddities, or any other of a host of possibilities, it can still be done, but it means ongoing awareness, testing, and either dietary tweaking or supplementation, and may mean ongoing poor health because of the complicated interrelationships between nutrients and biochemistry. Some vegans are prepared to pay that price, and I respect that.
The vegan doctor Michael Klaper describes failure to thrive among vegans eating an apparently excellent diet, and is carrying out research to try to determine the causes for this very real problem.
http://www.indiadivine.org/audarya/vegetarian-forum/1177910-fwd-vegan-health-study-michael-klaper-md-very-long-email.html
Not only is it very long, it's very poorly formatted and hard to read. I suggest copying, pasting, and formatting to make reading and analysis easier. Note: Klaper has his own blind spot. He has not looked at health outcomes of omnivores who eat the bulk of their food from plant sources! It's perfectly possible for omnivores to get plenty of fiber and plant-based nutrients in their diets, and these are the factors he identifies as health-giving.
To my mind, anybody who follows the guidelines of avoiding fast and overprocessed foods, eats sufficient quantities of vegetables and fruits, cuts out sugar and refined flour, avoids industrial seed oils, cooks from scratch, drinks clean water, and gets the right amount of exercise for them, is going to be far ahead in the health stakes. Eating or eschewing animal source foods is a personal decision and should be treated as such.
In expressing my concern to CathyA, I am not making blanket statements about veganism being bad or dangerous. However, I am very strongly inclined to suspect that humans may very well have food types just as they have blood types, and people of food type O for Omnivorous might suffer as badly on diet V for Vegan as a blood type A would suffer from a transfusion of blood type B. Likewise, somebody of food type V might do badly on diet O.
Jane, Suzanne, and Cathy: I don't think I'd make an assumption that a vegan diet may be the cause of the problem. Normally, vegan diets are VERY beneficial for health for the VAST MAJORITY of all people who follow them. (Nutritional statistics support this claim.) I wouldn't place the blame there unless you'd actually analyzed her entire vegan diet over several weeks. Yes, a diet of potato chips, poptarts and coke is vegan and very unhealthy but most vegans don't eat that way.
But an anecdote for the other side. I have been a vegan for 8 years and am in perfect health. My health had never been bad before I became vegan but has improved dramatically. I have no ailments and have never felt better in my life. I have lost and kept off approximately 65lbs.
I don't doubt anyone's claim that veganism is not for them but I don't think it's right to imply that veganism is some kind of fringe, dangerous lifestyle that may place one's health and life at risk or makes someone weak and listless. The irrefuatable evidence shows the exact opposite and veganism absolutely REVERSES heart disease.
Jane: I'm not criticizing anyone for any of their dietary choices. I'm also not even remotely interested in trying to convince someone to switch to veganism. However, people try and abandon a vegan diet for many, many reasons and one is that they don't feel as well because of it.
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This is not a personal attack, but this is exactly the point! In your own words, "Some people abandon veganism because they don't feel well on it."
How is it unethical for people whose health crashed as vegans to tell others about their experience? Would it not be more unethical NOT to share that experience? If I had experienced a severe allergic reaction to a face cream and I told my sister about it if she said she was thinking of buying that brand, or if she broke out in a ghastly rash after using it, would that be unethical?
You make a blanket statement that those of us (Jane and me) who share our bad experience "generally haven't done a lot of self-education on the topic". Now, how is that not boorish? How do you know I haven't put in years of research into the topic? Do you personally know Jane to be a mental slob? If the results of our research don't mesh with yours, that's grounds for discussion, not dismissal, especially given that vegans are only 1.9% of the population of the USA.
Surely forums exist for civil discourse, for the sharing of ideas and experiences from many different people, to increase awareness and stimulate discussion? It is just as valid, and just as ethical, for somebody who had a bad experience with veganism and regained her health on a well-planned omnivorous diet to share that as it is for you to share your vegan success story. Your statement that your mother's horrible perimenopause was caused by her meat-eating could be seen as an attempt to warn off other people from eating meat, and that is discourteous by your standards. Besides, it suggests a general lack of self-education; your mother could have had a horrible perimenopause because of calcium and magnesium deficiencies, through eating sugar and refined carbohydrates, consuming caffeine, eating spices like ginger, drinking wine or beer, or a genetic tendency to wild hormonal swings, for just a few examples. I had a horrible perimenopause, did a lot of research, and discovered that for me carbohydrates and coffee made things a lot worse, but the underlying problem was a genetic tendency to wild hormonal swings, with my levels going off the scale in both directions.
Your decision to be vegan on ethical grounds is fine, but veganism is not innately more ethical than omnivory!
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