Here is my latest Ask Grettie from Chic Vegan…
I am VERY unhealthy, overweight, tired all the time and depressed about it. I really enjoyed the Kind Life Diet Book and have bought several others on veganism and on being a vegetarian. I have been trying for several months to convert and keep “falling off the wagon”. My cholesterol and trigs. are over the top. If you can offer any advice about staying true to this lifestyle change I would appreciate it. I WANT to change to be healthy and to life a long life. Thanks for your website I can’t wait to try out some new recipes.
~Melissa
You need to be kind to yourself and not beat yourself-up for “falling off the wagon.” Transitioning to a whole new way of eating IS hard and will require some time. I did not make the switch overnight; rather it was a more gradual shift.
That being said, if you are experiencing health problems, it is very important that you do make the switch to a vegan lifestyle and make your health top priority. If your cholesterol is through the roof it is due to the animal based foods you are consuming and moving away from those foods will be tremendously helpful to you.
Instead of focusing on what you can’t have, I’d like you to add something to your diet for the next week. Eat one pound of raw vegetables a day. It’s that simple. Take some time to weigh and then fill some containers with one pound of raw vegetables (any combination of veggies that you like). Keep that container near you and snack on those veggies when the hunger pangs strike. This is a trick I learned from Dr. Joel Fuhrman in his Eat For Health book series. Those veggies are going to help you stay full.
Contact me in a week and we will add in another trick to help you on your path to a plant based diet.
Here’s to health!
Grettie
Do you have a questions for Grettie? She is here to answer any of your health and nutrition related questions! Email her at askgrettie@chicvegan.com .
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Dear Melissa, I can imagine how you feel and how much support you might need. It was only a month as Ed and I became vegan. We are doing this to fight Ed’s diabetes. So far, vegan diet was easy for us, probably because I love cooking and am so exiting about this that just cook and cook (when not working) and find inspiration on this and other nice and friendly blogs. Also, thinking back at the beginning, I see that by some sixth sense I decided that we shouldn’t make a lot of changes in our eating habits except as removing animal products. For the first several days we even didn’t go to the store, just ate what we already had at home. And then gradually started adding new products like nut milks, miso, tofu (never tried it before), new to us greens (funny, but I never noticed their existence in stores), new beans and grains. We also found that consuming cooked fruits and vegetables was gentle for the stomach, and didn’t try to push ourselves to eat more raw fruits and vegetables than we used to eat. Only now in more than a month we started eating much more vegetables and fruits but just because we bought a juicer – that can be one more new habits to acquire. But I cannot imagine that either of us could do this alone. And honestly, except for my daughter we don’t see much support in our parents and friends — they are just waiting when we’ll give up and they all tell us in unison that our ancestors used to eat meat and therefore we should too. You definitely need to form a support group for yourself to stay motivated – join us at our blog about our life since we became vegan at reversingdiabetes-2.com and we will start exchanging our thoughts and help each other to stay motivated!
I agree with the one step at a time 🙂 It has taken us well over a year to change our diets. Our started simple (BUT we had no health problems) “Should we really be eating artificial coloring and additives?” and we have dropped something else every few months. On the beginning side it looks overwhelming, where we are now I think we can do it and it was easy LOL!!!
I agree with taking it one step at a time. When people make changes in this manner it tends to “stick.”