Vegan/plant based and/or vegatarians

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I became full time vegetarian about 3 months ago and then eventually became full vagan shortly after. Who else here is either vegan or vegatarian and how long has it been?

I'm a vegetarian... I have been so for about 9 months now... decided to cut meat from my diet as a way to achieve and maintain weight loss and to achieve an overall healthier diet...

I haven't gone vegan, though... partly because of concerns about malnutrition... and partly because I really, really love both cheese and eggs...

I don't eat bread and other starchy foods like pasta or rice, either...

I've been a vegetarian since '99 or so. Can't recall exactly.

I have been a vegetarian for most of my life. Meat makes me sick to my stomach. I cannot digest animal proteins. I've tried the vegan thing before, but I am also a cheese fan so it never sticks for me. I am lactose intolerant though, so I really have to watch that stuff. I don't remember the last time I drank cows milk. Blech... really though that stuff makes me think of opaque fat in a glass. Just grosses me out anyway.

Only if it's well planned can one can maintain a vegan/vegatarian life style.



Cheese is like crack to the everyday person there is cheese on EVERYTHING I am actually allergic to milk and I feel much better that I don't eat dairy anymore. I find it interesting though that you feel that milk is fat in a glass and cheese comes from milk

Agreed. Cheese is like crack. Heh. Not only is it on almost everything, it makes almost everything better as well.

I think my grossness about milk is because it is a fatty liquid... in a cup... that you are supposed to drink. I don't find cow milk as gross when it is used in cooking, but I still do not use it when I cook. Drinking cows milk seems almost the same as drinking a big glass of canola oil or melted butter, except people seem to like drinking cows milk and not the other two.

... well...

this is cheese... Or more specifically, Danish smoked cheese (rygeost)...



and this is a glass of regular milk...



Fat percentage in the former: 0.4 - 0.5 percent
Calories per 100 grams in the former: 57-70
Fat percentage in the latter: 3.25 - 3.7 percent
Calories per 100 grams in the latter: 60-64

... that's right... you can get cheese with a lower fat and calorie content than regular milk...

I've been vegan for about 4 years now.

Before I went full vegan I was a vegetarian for about three months. One of the things that turned me towards veganism was finding out more about rennet. It's an ingredient in cheese that comes from the inside of a calf's stomach lining. It made it hard to consider myself vegetarian knowing that it comes from a dead animal. Soon after I learned that the male calf's from milk cows are sold to make veal. So I said screw it and went full vegan.

Rennet is sneaky. The whole 'enzyme' thing is sneaky as well. Doesn't it usually mean rennet? If I understand correctly it always means some animal based enzyme, but only sometimes rennet? I dunno, but I avoid it. Heh.

There are non animal enzymes that are used, rennet is one, but the problem is they don't usually label the source on ingredient labels. So the safe thing is to just avoid it when you can like you said.

Nutrition labels are unfortunately very vague. I'm happy though that more people are becoming concerned with what they eat and this is causing a lot of companies to move to more transparent labeling.

I've been a vegan for years and a vegetarian for a large portion of my life before that. If you are concerned about malnutrition, you need to seriously educate yourself. All nutritional studies and observations are out there for free these days, you just need to be patient and shape your own opinion after sifting through so much.

anyone concerned about malnutrition just needs to educate themselves like someone else said. Some good places to get educated on are Dr. John McDougall, Dr. Caldwell Esselstyn, Rip Esseslstyn, Dr. Dean Ornish, and Chef AJ, among others.

Namaste,
Nice to see others here.

I've been vegetarian for about 3 years, been vegan since May 2015. I was in a program.
The Vegan Living Program. I found it on Meetup. Found it very helpful and now attend,
Karuna Kula gatherings for advice, support others and learn new ways to be peaceful
I also have learned some new plant based living as well.
My mom and I are vegan, we grow almost all of our fruits, veggies, nuts, berries.
Some edible flowers and seeds from sunflowers.

Peace and Love
to all beings!
Om shanti

I take it you were lacto vegetarian so you weren't consuming eggs either at the time right?

Speaking of veganism the food is GREAT ! ! Yesterday I made my own falafel with chikpeas, spinach, cilantro, and some other seasonings and it came out so amazing ! !



I learned about veganism from a local vegan fest I attended for the sake of networking and information at the time. I had just become a full time vegatarian at that point so I entertained the idea of becoming vegan in my mind.

I've wanted to go vegetarian for a very long time, but I'm an extremely picky eater and I hate pretty much all fruits and vegetables. And veggie meats are kind of expensive.

I am a lacto vege and have been for 25 years.

One note, if you plan to be a vege or a vegan long term, I recommend that you get a set of blood tests for vitamin and minerals each year and get any vitamins that you need.

I was very ill for some years (and still am to some extent).
I was feeling really drained of energy and stressed.

All the doctors I went to couldn't work it out, so i started to go through a process of elimination. Researching conditions that could cause the symptoms that i had.

I first found out that i had clinically significantly low testosterone and started treatment for testosterone replacement therapy.

Even after treatment i found myself to still be tired and feeling crap.
So I went back to the doc and ordered a set of bloods for vitamins and minerals.

The blood tests came back and i found that I had the following:
B12 anemia
Hypo-calciemia (low calcium)
Vitamin D deficiency
and low iron

If you are clinically low in any of these, you are going to feel crap and if you allow yourself to stay low in some of the essential vitamins / minerals, there can be permanent long lasting effects especially B12.

This is because B12 does not come from vegetables and can only be found in meat or related food products, or synthetic supplements.

The good news is B12 is fairly cheap and you can take it everyday at high doses with little risk of getting vitamin poisoning. Doctors can also give you high dose shots too. and may do if they find you as B12 anemic.

BTW, B12 anemia can lead to long term and permanent damage to the nervous system.
This is why there are so many vegans that are a little bit nutty!

So, make sure you get your B12 kids. The world has enough nutty people in it already.
And suffering from ASD you will also likely suffer from anxiety, which depletes B vitamins super quick!


good luck