I became a vegetarian when I was 15. It was an ethical decision as I felt wrong that animals had to die just so I could eat them. For the most part of my adult life I have been a vegetarian, and more recently I was a complete vegan. I enjoyed being a vegan for these reasons:
- I felt good about myself that I wasn’t hurting animals or using them in any way for my nutrition, and I enjoy vegan food.
- I enjoyed the feeling of camaraderie among vegans and vegetarians.
- It was easy on my budget.
- I very rarely had to use deodorant as I found that eating little or no animal products protected me from body odour.
- During the birth of my first son I suffered a third degree tear and let’s just say it still hurts to go to the toilet unless I ensure that I keep my stools soft. Being a vegan ensured this was the case and I had no discomfort.
- After my second son was born, by c-section, I was diagnosed with Irritable Bowel Syndrome, and found that cutting out all animal products ensured I had no IBS attacks.
But I started to have doubts about veganism for a few reasons:
- Was it healthy to be a vegan? I didn’t believe that humans were built to be vegan as I was having to take regular B12 supplements - a vitamin you can not obtain naturally through a vegan diet (not in adequate quantities anyway).
- I was tired of always being ‘different’. Whenever I went to someone’s house for dinner, or went out to eat, I was always the awkward one. I used to offer to bring my own food and was usually taken up on that offer!
- I was getting worried about the effects of soy on my health as I was relying quite heavily on soy food - such as soy milk, tofu, textured vegetable protein, and soya oil. I had a rash on my chest and my little boy had a rash on his hand (even though he was not a vegan) and I began to wonder if soy had anything to do with that. As it happens after completely cutting out soy from all our diets our rashes have completely disappeared!
- I started to wonder if my recurring anxiety and depression could be attributed to not getting enough of some vitamin, mineral, or fat that I was excluding from my diet.
So I began to look into eating meat, eggs and dairy again and that’s when I found Nourishing Traditions. It made me understand that animal products, in particular animal fat and butter, were integral to good physical and mental health. To counter my ethical argument, I began to understand that mono-cultures are very bad for the earth and can destroy soil and kill off the surrounding wildlife who rely on grazing animals to keep the natural symbiosis going. I also understood Sally Fallon’s argument that highly spiritual people can be vegetarians because they are focused on meditation and stillness and don’t often do the ‘hard graft’ that the rest of us have to do. I instinctively trusted the information from Sally and the WAPF and these points really helped me decide that it was time to include animal products in my diet once again.
But now, only 6 weeks into it, I struggle with eating meat and other animal products. I find myself feeling guilty, even though I buy organic free-range meat. I always quietly thank the animal for providing for me and my family but I often find myself pushing the meat to one side of my plate and focusing on my vegetables and grains. The only meat I even like the taste of is bacon, ham, fish and beef (not ground). As far as dairy goes, we can’t get raw milk here in Scotland so all I can do is buy the best organic dairy I can find. Cheese and milk give me a sore tummy, but I find I can tolerate small amounts of yogurt and slightly larger amounts of butter (which I love, by the way). I also tolerate eggs well and enjoy them. I started to include Coconut Oil in my cooking when I realised I might not be getting enough saturated fat in my diet but it makes me feel nauseous. In fact, I found myself feeling nauseous almost nightly and I was having to take my IBS medication again. I take Cod Liver capsules because I couldn’t stand the thought of having to put more oil in my mouth. I read and have been advised that taking Swedish Bitters can help combat this nausea but I can’t tolerate any alcohol at all and I know Swedish Bitters is alcoholic (if only very mildly).
I wonder if I will start to get used to eating animal products, or if, like now, I will naturally revert to eating more vegetarian foods like beans and rice. Can I find a good balance between the two and not be so black & white? Did I jump in too fast - going from vegan to full-on meat eating might just be too much too quickly. I really want to find the best and right way to nourish myself and my family, so I will keep at it, and hope I find the right balance for all of us soon.
Jan 31st, 2008 at 10:43 am
Your story is so inspiring! I have so many vegetarian friends, and even a co-worker (I’m a personal trainer at a gym). It’s wonderful to hear someone who’s been a vegan find the nourishing ‘truth’. I’m sure that since your body is so used to your previous diet, that it will take time to adjust. It sounds like the fermented and cultured foods have the best effect on you. You can integrate that into all your meals, through Kefir or Beet Kvass, whey to soak your legumes or to make your own condiments. I understand your dilemma with eating meat though. I constantly struggle with the fairness of an animal giving it’s life so I can eat. However, that is the natural way of things. If we upset that balance, the consequences would be catastrophic, not just on our health, but on the environment. I feel that as long as I buy my meats from local organic farmers, that I am going about this process in the most humane way possible. Be encouraged, your body will heal and overcome if you continue to nourish! I think all of us here have our own story of what a change in our diet has done for us.
Feb 1st, 2008 at 3:15 pm
Hi Karina
I think you need to take it slow and be prepared for it to take time to get used to the meat eating after years of a vegetarian diet. From what you have said, it sounds like you could do well with some herbs for liver and gut function. The liver/gall bladder often takes a bit of time to get used to fats again and liver tonic herbs can be really useful. Swedish bitters are great, but you can make bitter teas if you want to avoid the tiny amounts of alcohol in them. Think globe artichoke, dandelion root, st mary’s thistle and include all the bitter greens in your diet too. I would recommend that you see a naturopath who can devise a plan and take a full case history to work out a treatment plan for you.
All the best
Karen McElroy
Naturopath & Herbalist
Feb 1st, 2008 at 3:15 pm
Hi Karina, you are a brave woman. Isn’t it such a shame that we have to have such a conscious struggle with all of this. Just a point on the candida diet (which I have found very useful btw), is that I have used bee pollen instead of the B vitamin - apparently it’s a great food source very yummy and great for energy without having to digest large volumes of food. Also, try pan fried chips cooked crispy in coconut oil with lots of sea salt! Yum!
Feb 1st, 2008 at 3:19 pm
Hi, Karina,
I, too, have followed your path and I would encourage you to talk to a nutrition counselor or naturopath.
What I’ve learned from mine is that when someone is vegetarian / vegan for a long time, the body decides it doesn’t need to make hydrochloric acid, so when you start to eat animal proteins and fats again, the body has forgotten what to do to break it down. I’m now taking hydrochloric acid supplements (and other supplements) to get my gut healed from food intolerances I developed during my veggie years. I’m now doing much much better on my Nourishing Traditions diet. Best wishes to you. I think you’ve found the right path. Carla
Feb 2nd, 2008 at 3:17 pm
The Gold Standard, in my view, on whether or not meat is suitable for YOU, is, go watch the animal being slaughtered. If you don’t blink an eye, meat is definitely for you - you need it. If you are mightily bothered at the panicked lowing/bleating/squawking, collapsing legs, the foam at the mouth, the eyes turning upward, the blood at the cutting-up (as I was), then you can be as healthy as your original constitution (God’s will) intended you to be from a well-planned vegetarian diet alone, all other things being equal. I don’t know about veganism, though! The fellow at beyondveg.com has a good personal story worth reading.
Life can be a struggle, can’t it, at times!
Re hydrochloric acid, here is a little self-diagnostic trick. Take one 500 mg pure HCl on an empty stomach first thing in the morning. If you feel no burning after 20 minutes, it means you needed that much! Next day, do the same little test with 2 capsules. Still no burning? You need those 2 capsules. Third day, do the same, until one day you will feet an uncomfortable burning. Back up one capsule, and there’s your dosage, for a while anyway. You may find that as time goes by and you are digesting your food better, you will experience the burning with fewer and fewer capsules. This means that your body has actually begun to heal itself by accessing the nutrients thru the help of the HCl. I get by with 1 capsule.
Also, Karina, try reading the book Fiber Menace by Konstantin Monastyrsky. I would take everything he says with a grain of salt but nevertheless there is some good advice there, or at least a radically different perspective.
Try, also, some high-quality probiotics. Maybe Dr. Ohhira’s, for one example. Actually, this is probably one of the best things you can do for yourself.
May you be blessed for your kind heart, always. - Anna.
Feb 2nd, 2008 at 3:19 pm
Hi Karina,
I have been through a similar situation having been strict pritikin and macrobiotic and other vegan eating regimes and am loving the common sense and health of nourishing principles.
For digestive problems with integrating meat back into the diet, I treated the gut as I would look after an invalid with mostly stocks and broths and raw egg yolk and I use the herb gentian as a simple digestive primer - I am also a nutritionist and herbalist and reading other comments previous would like to add my 2 cents about digestive enzymes - I dont recommend them as the body has a natural feedback mechanism that seems to turn the bodies production down in response to added enzymes and I have found it more useful to take it really slowly and use the really easily digested foods until ready for the harder to digest foods while ‘activating’ the bodies own enzymes with the bitter gentian. But I would be interested to hear others experience with this. Also ensuring good gut flora with probiotics and fermented foods and beverages is essential as this is an important part of gut repair and digestion - the good bacteria being the housekeepers of the gut. I sopunds as though you are doing this with the anticandida program. Also I have just been made aware recently that cabbage contains the amino acid glutamine which naturopathiclly we use in supplement form as an effective and quick gut repairer. I imagine in food form (sauerkraut) it will take longer but well worth it I would imagine.
My ehtical dilema still rages as well and having taken my Buddhist precepts I have had to look very closely at the arguments concerning meat eating. I have settled somewhat by remembering the following: that vegetable life is also precious and we take a lot of ‘life forms’ eating vegetable foods especially when you remember how many animals and insects that die in the cultivation of crops and vegetables, and how often do we consciously or unconsciously hurt or even destroy parts of people (generally those we love) with what we say and do. To allow myself to sound like a complete nutter I have cried uncontrollably at weeding the garden when I realised I had come face to face with my Hitler nature. I was weilding my power in selecting what ‘I’ thought should live and what should die all for my convenience. . .I also found the essay on the WAP website written by a yoga teacher (I can not recall his name at this stage) to be very good - he has considered the argument very compassionately. You have probably read this but if not I would strongly recommend it.
enough of my rambling, this subject is dear to my heart!
All the best
Bronwyn
Feb 4th, 2008 at 3:20 pm
Hi Karina, most of what I was going to contribute has been said in the above comments already, however, I would like to add that I too went vegie at 14 after reading Frances Moore Lappe’s book “Diet for a Small Planet”. By 24, my allergies were worse, I had mild chronic fatigue, and frequent constipation. This culminated in a massive gall bladder attack which left me unable to walk for a week. I dutifully worked on my pent up anger, did loads and loads of liver flushing (which produced miraculous results in the first year but the problems always built up again). Finally, nearly ten years later, when my body was fully rejecting olive oil from all the liver flushing I had done, I went to Sally Fallon’s seminar and decided that I had a duty to my as yet unconceived child to give him the best possible start in life and that led to my decision to start eating meat again. This was after 17 years of being a vegetarian and sometimes vegan.
At first, it revulsed me. I cringed with every mouthful as I visualised the animal I was eating. I prayed. I reminded myself of all the indigenous people who honour the animals they eat and I thanked the animal for giving its life. My husband had to disguise it in the food so I could eat it. A year later, I was better but still experiencing health problems when I learnt about hydrochloric acid’s role in digestion. If you don’t eat meat for a long time, your body adjusts the amount of HCl it produces so when you do eat meat/fish again, your body can’t break it down so you experience digestive troubles. HCl was the key factor for me. After I started HCl, my health improved enormously, my hormones came into balance and I conceived my son.
I agree with the writer who recommends bone broths and foods that are easier to digest - especially if you have no access to raw milk. You trained your body over many years to digest a certain diet (with repercussions of course). Now, it needs time to adjust to the “new” diet.
5 years later, my health is wonderful. I feel more grounded, more earthed, calmer and happier. I’m now expecting my second child and very much looking forward to another healthy baby who is getting the best possible start to life.
Filippa
Feb 5th, 2008 at 8:07 am
Karina
I do think it takes time to adjust - and btw I don´t think we are created equally - some people will do better with less dairy meat etc in their life - but we all need to prepare our food a wise way( NT) and we all need real healthy food.
My story is a bit different.
I grew up eating a lot of different food- but I was always fighting with my mum over the chicken that I wouldnt touch and the milk and yoghurt that I craved.
Years ago when I was around 20 I changed my diet to vegetarian (Ovo - lacto style )
I was even a vegan for a VERY short while - made me feel awfull and I put so much weight on !!!
Later - almost 9 years ago I changed to bloodtype diet (type B secretor)
and now I have changed my BTD into Wise Traditions… BUT I have kept a lot from BTD.
First of all I never do corn, chicken,wheat or rye… it always upsets my stomach - I get really crappy etc.
I use the foodguide from BTD - but I use the way of preparing food from WT as well as eating almost none- or very little of newfangled food.
AND it works for me and especially well for my daughter ( type O)- who is intolerent to milk- even raw- but can do butter/ghee and small ammounts of fresh cheese and raw cream- she always prefered meat, fish and veggies- wouldnt touch her yoghurt or bread ! as a baby…
When I was vegetarian I thought I lived healthy (but I was sick all the time- put weight on and was sooo tired)
I then got aprox 45 grams of protein pr day - and what I needed was between 70 and 90 gram…..it is pretty hard to get that ammount without meat or fish…
What really surprised me on this low fat diet was that I got aprox 3000 calories pr day !
I needed around 2200 ! so no wonder I put weight on…
I got the calories from low fat dairy (I was pretty abusive- cause it lacked the fat to make me satisfied) LOTS of white breat, pasta and sugar - not to mention all the juice I drank all day !
It is strange that I today find it easy to stay well below 2200 cal- I cook good food, that taste good- has butter eggs, etc and I still loose weight ! How your eyes can be opened!!
Feb 5th, 2008 at 8:57 am
Karina, thanks for sharing your story. Based on my limited knowledge, I think perhaps you have changed your diet too quickly for your body. You might not yet have the proper enzymes to digest your new foods. But kudos to you for being open to change, and to a more traditional diet. It sounds like you are very good at listening to your intuition, which is what you will need to keep doing.
As Lacey suggested, I would put a lot of focus on fermented foods to build up your digestion. Have you tried Kombucha? My one attempt to make my own has failed, but I have been relying on a US brand, “Synergy”, which is excellent raw and real kombucha. When I changed my diet last year, it helped settle my tummy so much! I would drink about 4 oz. every afternoon then. Now I drink it occasionally only, and it does make me feel great.
Also, how about some of the other superfoods in Nourishing Traditions? Bee pollan could help with your enzyme development. If you can’t take Swedish Bitters, perhaps focus on eating bitter greens like dandelion and collards every day, and/or drinking herbal tea made with bitter herbs like dandelion and others (I’ve gone brain-dead and can’t think of any others at the moment…) Also, do you take a probiotic?
Good luck and keep us posted on how things work out for you…Lisa
Feb 5th, 2008 at 3:18 pm
Filippa, when did you stop the HCl?
Feb 6th, 2008 at 3:21 pm
I can’t remember Jo. I’m not that good at taking supplements consistently so I think I just started forgetting to take them and I was digesting fine and feeling fantastic so I didn’t worry about trying to remember anymore. I think they say you need to take them for a while and gradually reduce them as your own stomach acid production kicks in. It is such an amazing feeling to be able to eat meat and fish and not get constipated or feel really uncomfortable!
Feb 23rd, 2008 at 7:40 pm
Thanks for sharing your journey into nourishment. I also have had a journey of recovering from vegatarian diet, its been 1 year now. I used to suffer colitis. The main part of the healing for me was chicken and turkey broth. For 3 months my stomach could only tolerate broth, but how delicious it is, I could feel the strength growing in my guts. Also making and eating saurkraut to build the enzymes I only have raw dairy made into curds and whey, . My digestion still rejects grain and raw vegetables but slow foods are so tasty so I am happy. I also love that I am using the parts of the beautiful animal that our society often wastes, those strong bones. I am now so energetic, going to gym everyday, salsa dancing and loving all that I do.