My Transition To Veganism
My eating habits are often the talk of the family, and not always in the most positive light. My progress through to veganism was a long and arduous one, but also an incredibly satisfying one! However, my diet isn’t born out of ethics, even though it does play a part. I eat the way I do for health reasons mainly.
I’ve yoyo’d my whole life with my weight. I was a fat kid, husky teenager, skinny young man, then a fat adult. It was time to take action on my eating habits and not play about with dieting or half-cocked exercise. It required an actual life-style change, one that would stick!A�
Now, when I’m out, I eat junk. I grab a sandwich and a fizzy drink, perhaps a packet of crisps, chocolate bar, or if I was feeling especially frivolous – a take-away. This adds up, and the calories creep up on you because you neglect to keep a mental note of it. “It doesn’t count, it was just a quick snack because I was out”. If you add that up throughout a week, not only is that a lot of junk, it’s a lot of money!A�
So my first step was vegetarianism. This seemed a very pedestrian step to me, as I wasn’t a great meat eater anyway. Not that I didn’t enjoy it, but due to my life style at the time it wasn’t advantageous to eat a lot of it on a daily basis. Vegetarian meals were easy to make, as was going out and snacking. But that’s the problem; the snacking was still there. There’s still a vast amount of junk to be had without meat (pizza being my biggest downfall!).A�
The only thing really stopping me going full vegan at this point was dairy. It’s in more or less everything we’ve come to know and love; every snack, most meals, if not singular ingredients then the things that make up those ingredients etc. Not to mention the milk in my tea and coffee! No, not happening. But then one day I just bit the bullet and did it.A�
It was really no transition at all. By this point I wasn’t having any meals that consisted of a great deal of dairy, only meat alternatives and what not, but there are vegan ones to found, you just have to know where to look. My only step from there was to have black tea and coffee, and that was a cinch. So that was it, I was vegan. I immediately lost weight, I plan my food more systematically and don’t just snack on the fly (because I literally can’t, there is nothing), I wake up feeling better, I’m fitter, have better sleep, more energy and clearer skin. I urge everyone to try at least for a while and see if you don’t notice any improvements!A�