My Evolution Part II
My Evolution; there are two major times in my life when I knew that I was mistreating my body and I had to make a change. The first time was when I was severely fatigued for about two months with a bad cholesterol count of 270 at the age of 18. I changed my diet, but I still really had now idea what eating healthy was.
In My Evolution Part I, I described as how a teenager all I ate was junk food all the time which resulted in me getting sick. Well, if my teenager years were all about eating crap, my early to mid 20s were about drinking and partying (like most people I assume). I really didn’t think I was doing my body any harm, I just thought, this is what you do in your 20s; get drunk and binge on pizza and burgers. Now is the time to do just that, right?
I guess you could say, I didn’t really learn my lesson. And aside from the partying I was doing, I still didn’t know what the heck a good diet was. I was forcing myself to eat a ton of protein and little carbs in hopes of losing the belly I could never seem to get rid of. The low carb diet was in, so cut out bread, pasta and rice in turn for chicken and steak. Man, what a scam that diet is! Sure, you may lose weight to begin with but you’ll gain it back with the first piece of bread you eat, not to mention how unhealthy it is to eat like that.
So in my quest to lose my little belly that wouldn’t go away, I decided the whole eating a ton of protein wasn’t working. I was forcing myself to eat a ton of meat which I didn’t even like and nothing was happening.
Well, one weekend I was visiting my parents and they were raving about this book called the Bragg Healthy Lifestyle. “Oh, you have to read this book! I drink their apple cider vinegar and I’ve never felt better!” On and on about this book. So I decided to read since it did sound interesting and I was wanting to lead a healthier lifestyle.
This book changed my life. First of all, it made perfect sense. It was common sense! I don’t know why it took me so long to realize it.
This was my second awakening: eat a diet that was grown out of the earth; fresh veggies and whole grains. This book was saying I didn’t need to force myself eat meat to get my protein. I could get my protein from rice and beans, nuts, and veggies. It may sound stupid, but I never really thought of that before. I thought I had to eat meat to get my protein and cut out any carbs.
So I tried this new diet and I never felt better. I limited my meat intake to about once a week and focused on eating whole grains (brown rice, whole wheat or spelt pasta and whole grain bread), veggies, and beans. I lost about 10 lbs in a month that I didn’t even know I needed to lose. I feel it was like my body was telling me, yeah these 10 lbs are all the toxins you’ve been putting into your body and now you’ve finally flushed them out.
The strange thing was not only physically did I feel and look better, I also felt happier. I really think cutting meat out of my diet and eating food that we as humans are meant to eat made me feel more connected to the earth.
I also continued to research eating vegetarian diets. There have been so many studies out there linking high meat intake to cancer and heart disease. There are also plenty of studies done showing that people who eat a mainly vegetarian diet in most cases live longer and healthier lives. Two books that I love and recommend are 50 Secrets of the Worlds Longest Living People and The Okinawa Way.
So now a year later, I’ve cut out meat completely with the exception of fish about twice a week. I’ve done a lot of research on fish and it seems to be highly beneficial. I stick to mainly tuna and sardines which are some of the best fish to eat because a. they are high in Omega 3 fats and b. they are some of the fastest reproducing fish so they don’t seem to be affected by overfishing (for more info check out overfishing.org).
For more information on eating a healthy vegetarian diet and natural nutrition check out these sites:
Leave a Reply
Kate
