Why I Went Vegan

This is new to me, since I only made the change to vegan at the beginning of the month. For the longest time I have been struggling with the act of eating animal produce when I am such a huge animal lover. On one hand I am a true believer in the natural food chain, science. On the other hand we as humans have come along far enough now to know how to survive without hurting animals unnecessarily. When science is used to degrade quality, pump our foods full of chemicals, hormones, and unwanted nasties. I’m not going to drone on about all the bad stuff that happens to animals behind closed doors; we’ve all seen it, it makes us all angry, and if it doesn’t upset you at least a little then you’re not human!

So I’m just going to simply list a few of my reasons for swapping to a vegan lifestyle, bearing in mind that for me it is a huge step to take after being a meat and two veg eater for 35 years.

For the Animals

Aside from my fear of flapping wings and creepy crawlies scuttling across my face in the middle of the night, I am the hugest animal lover. During the school holidays we would take care of the animals on my sons school farm, even then I could never eat the eggs we were offered because I knew the chickens they came from. Running around with the rabbits, ducks, chickens; it’s like being at one with nature. It helps make you whole. My father was a farmer half of his life, the other half he continued his worked at multiple cattle markets.  I used to help him during the holidays; rounding up the cows and sheep; we’d always visit one of his farm pals on the way home. Oh yeah, I talk to animals in the street as if they can understand me, to which I get weird looks but I don’t care! I always feed the squirrels and the ducks. I hate spiders and moths (check above statement!) but I won’t kill them if they get in the house, I always make the hubby collect them and release them outside.

For the Health Benefits

My body has been all over the place for years, especially my hormone levels. When you think about animal products, the majority have all been injected with hormones, and we put that into our bodies! No wonder mine went wonky for so long! I have always been a huge beef, cheese and ice-cream eater so there lies that problem. Now, I make my own ice-cream as and when I need to.

I have been overweight for the majority of my life and my goal is to use this change as a way to take more control of my size. Many diets have been tried before and it always comes back to the same thing; eat well, eat balanced, don’t skip, don’t meal replace, be active, drink water, boom! As we’re on the subject, my highest weight ever was 310lbs on a 5ft 2 frame, never again!

For the Nutritional Boost

I have always been a huge fruit eater, for over 25 years I would only eat a handful of different veggies (potatoes, carrots, onion, peas, tomatoes), and never salad. It’s the texture of raw produce and the feeling of chowing down on some grass had always put me off, made me feel nauseated. My goal is to tick one new food off my list every few days, including the ones I know I didn’t like before! We all know that our taste buds change with our diet. Two years ago I was taking powdered vegetable capsules and I found that I was starting to crave broccoli and sprouts. Because it was in the powder capsules my body got used to it and wanted more. At the same time I also introduced courgette, peppers and spinach. So by removing animal produce from my diet I am forcing myself to eat a wider range of plant based produce, one step at a time. Not to mention the fact that most are jam-packed with vitamins and minerals; that’s a bonus for our bodies; including hair, skin and nails.

My Challenges

Meeting my daily protein target (currently at 140g) without animal produce is harder than I thought it would be. I used My Fitness Pal to track my intake and I have always been a huge believer of the high protein low carb when it comes to macros.

More protein, builds muscle, burns fat, calories burn faster.

Less protein, burns muscle, leaves fat behind, calories burn slower.

Depending on my day I reach between 60-85g, aside from eating soy products daily, I struggle to hit it.

This week I burned out 6lb of muscle mass and gained 2% body fat which is bad!

Would love to hear from you

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Brightest Blessings

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