Go Vegan

I am not convincing anyone to go vegan just because I am one of the now growing population of individuals taking that route. I know how difficult it is to give up consumption of meat and dairy products especially if you have gotten accustomed to consuming animal products and by products practically your whole life. Being vegan is a lifestyle choice and it's not a fad.

I just have had enough...
I cannot eat anymore animal meat just to satisfy my palette and live the guilt everyday when you know very well another poor animal gets slaughtered and a mother cow taken away from her baby just to provide consumers milk and what else they can get out of each and every body part of every cow, pig etc. I cannot bear a sight of another lobster in a griller dying a painful/excruciating death right in front of someone's face just to give humans that tasteful and high on cholesterol buttered lobster meat, to look chic sporting one of those sleek leather bags or shoes made from animal skins (pigs, goats, sheep, alligators, ostriches and lizards). I think, as a compassionate human being, I can do better than that. 

Transition...
Transitioning to veganism isn't really difficult for me  (yes I'm still in the process) because my diet before consisted mainly of vegetables, dairy, white meat and little to almost no red meat so cutting these from my diet isn’t really that challenging so long as I have Tofu and mushrooms. The world we’re living in made us believed since childhood that meat is the main source of ‘protein’ and discarding meat from our diet would make an individual protein deficient which I recently found isn’t actually true since vegetables are excellent protein source as much as meat say for instance Broccoli, it has more protein than beef and so as Pease, Spinach, Kale, Mushrooms just to name a few.

Why Vegan?
I decided to go vegan for two main reasons--ethical and health. When my elder sister underwent an open cholecystectomy (a surgery to remove the gallbladder via a single, large open incision in the abdomen) because of a gall bladder enlargement since she no longer qualified for a laparoscopic surgery (a less invasive way to remove the gallbladder) the rest of the family immediately changed our diet (since gall stones form as a result of high on fat diet and genetic factors). We then eradicated the use cooking oil from our kitchen for vegetable oils such as olive, palm, corn, coconut and consumed less to no red meat because of our notion that white meat is less carcinogenic compared to red just again to find ourselves wrong as any meat is carcinogenic per se and being a meat eater makes us more prone to cancer compared to individuals on a plant-based diet. Going back, years later, discarding red meat from our diet 90% did not help neither to elude gall bladder stones as I also went through surgery only it’s laparoscopic and trust me, as you get older all other health constraints will start to emerge which are all related to what you eat so it's best to eat healthy as young/early as possible. 

a true sad story about animal cruelty...
source: PETA Vegan Starter Kit

Going Vegan...

I am a transitioning vegan and the myth that you can no longer eat practically anything because everything uses dairy or meat isn’t actually true neither because you can always substitute meat for Tofu, Jackfruit, Mushrooms and the list goes on. Just think of the usual sautéed recipes you have without the meat and fish sauce if you often use it to make it a vegan recipe.  The only sacrifice I had to make is resisting dairy ice cream (since I have no access to vegan ice cream where I’m based) but I have been successful so far fighting the urge to devour that sinful cold treat. I also love baking and chocolate chip cookies which main ingredient is butter so I now have to substitute it with coconut oil. If you haven't watched this Netflix documentary 'What The Health' then you should because it will blow your mind about the things we were made to believe concerning the role of meat and poultry/dairy towards the human body. However, what really stick with me after watching that documentary was how a persons health is able to dramatically improve in just a span of two weeks after going on plant-based diet and a year later the very same people featured on the documentary were off meds (believe it or not) which I am hoping  to be in years to come. If you have read my old blog entries I've been on lifetime hormone replacement meds for Hypothyroidism for roughly 5-6 years now and it sucks big time because I hate taking medications and if only given a chance to eat organic over taking medications I would rather just eat healthy because I think all medicated drugs always has side effects. I mean, why not just eat green/red bell pepper, oranges etcetera versus taking a Vitamin C pill considering both does the job right?

Vegan and Vegetarian

I know a lot of people confuses vegans from vegetarians so let me differentiate the two: Vegetarians do not eat meat yet consume dairy products as oppose to vegans, they totally avoid meat, poultry/dairy, seafood or to simply put, vegans avoid eating animal meat and consuming animal by products or they use cruelty-free make-up (not tested on animals), do not use leather bags etc.

As an end note, there are tough life choices worth giving a try and I think veganism is one of those because aside from it's good for our planet, you can also enjoy a guilt free meal by not eating animal meat. If you consider turning into a new leaf and is looking to be vegan you may check out PETA's Vegan Starter Kit here.