After my impromptu appendectomy in December followed by travelling to visit family and friends, I checked-in with myself and my health and I decided that The Vegan Experiment has not been working for me.
Health-wise, I had not gotten that boost of energy that everyone writes about with all plant diets and as a sufferer of fatigue from the double-dose of autoimmune illnesses, I was really hoping for that. In fact, I was finding myself dragging more and more. I actually was beating myself up every weekend because I wasn’t getting anything done except sleeping all day.
My skin was actually rather itchy though it didn’t seem dry and my scalp was growing increasingly itchy as it usually does during the Winter months, despite the expensive all-natural organic restoritive shampoo and conditioner for sensitive scalps with fine hair. In fact, my hair was getting thinner and rather lack-lustery. I just couldn’t do anything with it. My nails, which got new life after my 2 years with braces in high school, have always been long, relatively hard, and appeared as though they had a French Manicure all of my adult life; however in the last few months of 2009, they had become fragile, weak and brittle. They tore, broke, bent, and dented at the mere touch of anything — open the car door and I’d lose a nail; grab my keys and I’d lose a nail; brush my teeth and I’d lose a nail; file one nail and I’d lose another nail.
Then of course, I felt like shit for the last few months of the year as well. I really had thought that I would have the same reaction I’d had when I’d given up beef and poultry a few years ago when I gave up dairy, eggs and fish. I honestly thought I’d immediately feel as if a layer of fog had been lifted from me and weights had been pulled away from me. I dreamed of feeling immediately better. Yet, I didn’t.
Not to mention that I realized how hard it is to eat that strictly, especially when you are recovering from surgery and there are very few things you can or want to eat — or when the hospital doesn’t ask you and they serve you scrambled eggs and oatmeal with milk in it, neither of which I care for even when not eating the vegan way. Bleh. Plus, I walked all over Terminal B in the Atlanta airport and there is only one place that sells one vegan sandwich and both coming and going, they were sold out. Considering how paranoid the TSA is these days, I don’t know how vegans can travel anywhere and not starve.
I felt badly for my family and family friends throughout my holiday vacation because I seemed like a burden with my nutrition restrictions. My mother and her friend really wanted to accommodate, but that meant that two Christmas Eve dinners and two Christmas day dinners had to be made and when I say “dinner”, I mean “feast” for both occasions. I wonder how real strict vegetarians handle such situations. In the past, being only a pescetarian, I stick to non-meat parts of the meal as long as it has not been prepared with the meat or meat fat in those scenarios — for example, last year at my aunt’s house, she served spaghetti and meatballs; the meatballs were cooked separately so I had my spaghetti and red sauce and everyone added their meatballs to their dishes.
I believe that because of my gastroparesis, I wasn’t getting all of the vitamins and minerals I should have been, even with my multi-vitamin and other supplements. It’s possible that some medical disorders make it harder to eat the vegan way, just as some medical disorders don’t mix well with meat and potato diets.
I found that I really missed butter and cheese. I am not a big eater of eggs unless they are baked or cooked into things and, well, I admit that it is definitely more convenient to buy bread, pasta, and other things with eggs (and dairy) in them. Plus, I like having butter on my bagel occasionally and on my rice always. And you can never have too much cheese. Never. Melted all over something or sliced on a cracker. Cheese is proof God wants us to be happy. Now, raw milk doesn’t agree with me so I didn’t miss it all that much since I already drink soy milk but I’m glad to be able to have more choices when buying yogurt again. I like making my own soy yogurt, but sometimes it’s fun to try some of the exotic flavors you see in Whole Foods and I’m sorry to say that the soy yogurt flavors are pretty limited.
Shortly after January 1rst, after returning home and returning to work, I returned to eating the pescetarian way. It’s too soon to tell if there’s been any great improvement — but I didn’t spend all of last weekend in bed and that’s a start. And I must say, gooey cheese on pizza is just dreamy, better than I remember, better than that soy stuff any day.
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