There is no shortage of protein when eating completely raw. I find that aside from the energy I have, I'm able to workout just as hard as I have been, maybe even a little better!
The protein myths are still out there. Somebody asked me today about the protein, especially after being raw. Come on, where do you think animals get their protein from? Yes, when someone is plant based, they have to constantly defend or educate others on healthy eating.
This is significant to me. If anyone were to have told me six years ago that I would have lost the weight... and would manage to keep it off for 5 years, I never would have believed them. You see, I was one of those yo-yo dieters, but could never mange to lose the weight. So what exactly changed that caused me to lose the weight?
I think I was honestly getting sick of the bad foods. I don't know if psychologically, my mind was telling me those foods weren't good for me anymore, but I no longer enjoyed eating them. I used to lose Reese's, but suddenly, it didn't taste good to me anymore. The nearly half gallon of ice cream I would consume daily didn't have the same appeal. I think my desire to get healthy and my drive to finally succeed played a role in the way the food tasted back then.
It's exactly one year since I went completely plant based (well to be precise, September 6th). After losing 150 pounds almost 5 years ago, I didn't need to lose more weight. I had what many considered to be a healthy diet. I was eating poultry, eggs and dairy a few times a week and did get my blood pressure down and avoid medication. But I had other goals...
It's always been about health, back when I first lost weight. I ate lots of fruits and vegetables based on different articles I've read and from reading books by Dr. Fuhrman and others. I was getting more information on how animal products were not healthy. But this wasn't enough to convert me to a plant based diet. I tried vegan diets a week or two on and off for a couple years but always went back to animal products.
A friend asked me recently why I decided to go plant based. I thought I should write about it because there were a number of factors that contributed to the decision.
I had already lost 150 pounds, so it's not like I needed to change my diet further to keep the weight off. I was mostly flexitarian, eating occasional eggs, dairy or poultry 3 or 4 times a week for a couple years. But I had an issue with my weight loss; I was left with loose skin. I wanted to tighten my skin, not just around my abs, but in my arms, etc. Weight loss really does a lot of damage to the skin and I refuse to get a tummy tuck.
As someone who has been plant based for almost 10 months now, people love to tell me how they could never be vegan. I don't even ask them, they just volunteer the information, automatically thinking I'm going to judge them. And the excuses I get range from "I could never give up meat" to "I could never give up cheese or ice cream".
This article isn't going to focus on why someone should go vegan... there's plenty of articles out there covering the subject. Instead, I wanted to focus on how easy it is to eat this way. So many people think it's complicated and because of this, they don't even want to try.
