I always assumed that in order to take it to the next level, up from already being a caffeine-free vegan, I would need to add “gluten-free” to my list of self-imposed rigid restrictions over my life…
Furthermore, I assumed that by completely nixing gluten (wheat) from my diet, I would discover even more health benefits; like how when I became a vegan: my eczema, constant sinus pressure, reoccurring sinusitis, and pet allergies all went away in just a matter of days.
Plus, I had hoped (also like when I became a vegan), I would accidentally lose some weight (since I recently admitted to gaining 7 pounds over the course of the past year when I ate vegan chocolate bars and tater tots with my pregnant wife).
Well, after a month of being gluten-free, I can officially confirm that none of those things came true for me.
I have a feeling you were expecting me to say that going gluten-free totally changed my life, because that definitely seems to be the trendy thing to say these days.
And for the people who say that, I’m confident it’s true for them. I am happy for them that they found what works for them. I give them all my moral support.
But personally speaking, based on my experiment, the gluten-free experience didn’t impress me.
Time after time, I turned down all kinds of magnificent vegan gluten-containing foods. At the Ponce De Leon Whole Foods where we ate several times, they had a tempting vegan pizza bar as well as plenty of other fun vegan yet gluten-filled delights. And I said no, for the sake of my gluten-free experiment. I sacrificed during an inconvenient time!
But in the end, I saw no benefits.
Granted, I lost 2 of the 7 pounds I had gained for the “vegan chocolate bar and tater tot” incident. However, that easily could have been for the fact I don’t eat vegan chocolate bars or tater tots any more.
I am willing to acknowledge though, that gluten-free is a way of life for many people. However, I am not one of those people.
My body processes gluten just fine; no issues at all. But the trade-off is, I can’t process eggs or dairy without major instant health issues.
As for my future with gluten, the experience has taught me this: I prefer corn tortillas over wheat.
So as my wife makes Mexican meals, I will continue to only eat corn tortillas; not wheat. And I truly enjoy spelt and quinoa in her Italian meals, which we have been eating more of here lately.
In the end, I won’t eat as much wheat as before. Going gluten-free opened my eyes to other options. Yet still, gluten is my friend.
Being a vegan keeps my addiction of overeating in check. I can’t trust myself with eating animal products. And I shouldn’t.
I’ve overeaten my entire life. Before and since becoming a vegan.
As a kid, I got away with it because I had a high metabolism. As a 4th grader, I remember how I would get the Double Whopper combo meal and finish it all. I would eat at buffets, consuming more food that most adults; and I know this because adults would tell me.
In my mind, if I wasn’t overeating, I wasn’t really eating.
As a teen and young adult, I would be the guy who would eat the most pizza or the most fried chicken at gatherings.
My metabolism finally caught up with me full swing by the time I got married, at age 27. That’s when my health problems came in full swing, as well. Even though my metabolism slowed down, my desire to overeat never did.
As you know by now, committing to the vegan lifestyle over 3 years ago has eliminated and kept my former health issues in remission; including eczema (dyshidrosis), constant sinusitis, pet allergies, and sinus pressure.
I’ve realized that one of the many benefits of being a vegan is that, for the most part, I can pretty much each as much as I want of the food I am able to eat.
Now granted, eating oily tater tots and sugary vegan chocolate bars did cause me to gain 7 pounds in the past year while I was “sympathy eating” with my pregnant wife.
But when I stick with my normal regimen of veggies, fruit, grains, beans, nuts, and seeds, I’ve learned that I can get away with “overeating”. Ultimately, I just don’t have to worry about counting calories or portion control.
The reason for this is because by sticking with those 6 food groups, I am eating food solely for nutrition, including my daily allowance of protein and good fats; yet with 0% of my daily allowance of cholesterol.
I overeat simply because it’s fun. I openly admit this.
I’m not overeating because of some traumatic event in my life, nor because I feel incomplete in some way. I just simply like eating more food that I need to.
It’s fun.
If I ever went back to eating meat, eggs, and dairy, I would go so far the other way with it. I know it. I would be visiting the Wendy’s drive-thru on a daily basis.
Eating food is something I can’t be trusted with. I have no control when it comes to food.
Therefore, I keep myself safe behind the electric fence of veganism.
I am not addicted to alcohol. I have never used drugs.
But when it comes to food, I rely on the strict limitations of veganism in order to keep myself from getting out of control… because I am an addict of overeating.
Mommy is now officially one week into in her 2nd trimester with you. I have noticed her nausea has seemed to have majorly subsided since crossing that line.
However, her hunger cravings are on still on full speed! And as for me, I’m along for the ride and enjoying it…
After all, it’s only right that I should “sympathize” with her hunger cravings. The best way for me to do so is to join Mommy on this!
She and your brother Jack made some vegan chocolate chip cookies this weekend. And yesterday, Mommy had me pick up some vegan cake from Whole Foods.
(And Halloween is coming up this weekend. I can only imagine the temptations Mommy will face!)
Until now, we’ve never kept fruit juice in the house, because truthfully, it’s just sugar water with vitamins. It’s a processed food so we stay away from it. Once the sugar is extracted from the fruit’s fiber, so much of the nutrition is gone and it just becomes a classier form of high calorie junk food; mostly empty calories.
But here lately, Mommy has been craving grape juice, so now we always keep some in the fridge.
It had been about 6 years since I had enjoyed a nice full glass of grape juice. Because I used to have eczema (dyshidrosis), I had to stop drinking juice because it always instantly flared up my rashes.
But now that I’ve been a vegan for 2 and a half years, I guess it somehow flushed out my body of the toxins causing my eczema to even go back into remission.
Therefore, I discovered that I can now get away with drinking grape juice again! It’s like candy to me!
I see it as a bad habit that I am enjoying a little too much right now. However, this is the time to live it up. (I’ll need to pull the plug on that once you are born, though.)
Your development inside of Mommy’s tummy is causing her to crave more of stuff she wouldn’t normally want. So I might as well enjoy a little bit of the fun along the way.
When I first started out as a vegan, back in April 2013, I definitely wasn’t that cool. I was overzealous and a bit of a loaded cannon.
But I learned from my mistakes and matured from the process; which is what should happen for those of us (like you reading this) who are indeed the emotionally intelligent human beings we think we are.
I polished up my craft over the years. These days, I can very efficiently explain my unconventional lifestyle when people approach me on the subject; even when people subconsciously try to stump me.
It is my policy to never announce my vegan lifestyle in a conversation; the other person has to be curious about what I am eating and ask me. (But that happens a lot, actually.)
The obvious question is always, “Where do you get your protein?”
I explain: “I have 6 food groups; all of which contain the proper protein and nutrients I need: veggies, fruits, grains, beans, nuts, and seeds.”
Sometimes the person will follow up with, “How could body builders they be that big if they were vegans?”
I respond that being a big, buff body builder doesn’t necessarily mean that person is actually healthy. I believe many of them are actually unhealthy.
In my mind, it’s simply unnatural that a person must spend so much time working out and taking supplements; some of which are questionable.
Being abnormally strong does not automatically mean a person is actually healthy; especially for the long term.
Personally, I prefer a more natural approach to being physically fit. I take no less than 2 ten minutes walks a day, plus I ride my mountain bike and run throughout the week as well.
From there, the next question I often get is this: “How do you know you’re healthy?”
I explain that just 6 months ago, I had an appointment with Dr. Thomas M. John of Vanderbilt, in Spring Hill, Tennessee. Without even knowing I was a vegan, he confirmed that for my age and height, I am in the ideal weight range and that I am healthier than most 34 year-old men he sees.
I should point out too that my wife and I are expected our 2nd child to be born in April 2016. Even without meat, eggs, and dairy, I am indeed healthy enough to help conceive a child. Being a vegan definitely did not prevent that from happening.
My doctor specifically noted that my cholesterol levels are great.
That leads to this question:
“Where do you get your fats from?”
Out of the 6 vegan food groups I mentioned earlier (veggies, fruits, grains, beans, nuts, and seeds), it’s the last two, nuts and seeds, which contain the most fat.
On a daily basis, I consume non-GMO, organic peanut butter in my homemade “vegan protein smoothie.” I also have raw, unsalted sunflower seeds in my salad every night for dinner.
Plus, many the dinners my wife makes contain cashews or avocados in them.
By default, vegans consume 0% of their daily cholesterol allowance. Even plants that are high in fat, like avocados and cashews, still contain less than 1% of the daily cholesterol recommendation.
Try finding a vegan food that ever registers having 1% or higher of the daily cholesterol level on the label. It’s impossible. That doesn’t exist.
Sometimes, people are just sincerely confused on what constitutes as a plant. I have been asked these following questions by several people over the past couple years:
“Can you eat bread?”
The answer is sometimes; as long as it’s not made with eggs, milk, butter, or cheese.
“Can you eat eggs?”
No, they come from an animal; and typically just one egg (!) contains at least 58% of your daily cholesterol. Therefore, eggs are very non-vegan.
“Can you eat fish?”
No, fish is an animal; not a plant. But I can eat potatoes, because they are a plant. (People often ask me that when they ask me about fish; I’m not sure why.)
“I heard vegans can’t eat honey; is that true?”
Yes, it’s true: Vegans technically can’t eat honey. I’m not trying to be funny or gross, but the best way to explain it is this:
One of the final frequently asked questions I get is this:
“Do you ever just wish you could go back?”
My answer is a firm and quick no.
I suffered for 2 decades with constant sinus pressure, sinusitis, pet allergies, eczema (dyshidrosis), headaches, and acne. (Not to mention, I was about 30 pounds heavier in those days.)
Now that’s all gone. I’m not interested in having those health problems again.
The last question I get is this:
“Sometimes, don’t you just wish you could have a big, juicy burger?”
No, I don’t miss beef at all. What I actually miss tends to gross most people out as soon as I say it:
Captain D’s.
Yes, greasy ole fish. That’s what I psychologically miss sometimes. But still, there is no true temptation to go back because then I’ll simply adopt all those health problems again.
If I ever were to open the door to fish, I would give in and start eating meat again. I know myself too well.
Being a vegan isn’t that weird. It actually makes a lot of sense once you understand how it works. It’s just uncommon compared to mainstream society.
As a self-proclaimed “cool vegan,” I make it my goal to make myself easily accessible to answer people’s questions without sounding judgmental on my end.
Instead, my goal is to encourage people to be healthier by nixing the animal products they think they need to be healthy; but again, only when they ask me first. I’m not a door-to-do evangelist. You have to come to my tent.
And in case you need a reminder, look at me.
I don’t need milk, yogurt, eggs, fish, or meat to be this healthy. I just need veggies, fruit, grains, beans, nuts, and seeds. Feel free to leave a comment and ask me a frequently wondered question of your own.
It was March 6, 2013 that I accidently decided to become a vegan. Wow, that was a quick 2 years!
In hindsight, I definitely went through a self-imposed, self-advertised, and awkward public transition during the first couple of months that followed. You could say I may have been a little too zealous about my lifestyle change at first; on Facebook, in particular.
Since then, I have grown up; not only in how much more reserved I’ve become on Facebook in general, but also how I communicate regarding stories about my vegan lifestyle.
Over the past 2 years, I’ve learned to become more inviting (and less bold) when it comes to sharing about it all.
It doesn’t help, as I’ve recently learned, that I have a “D” personality; according to the DISC personality test. In other words, I have the most aggressive personality, so I am learning to control how my passion comes across to others.
At first, I was so eager to prove the vegan lifestyle to the entire world.
These days, I simply want to be known as the token go-to vegan in everyone’s social circle. I’m not eager to convert anyone. I’m just simply here to offer information to anyone suffering from chronic sinusitis and/or dyshidrosis (eczema); both of which I am cured of now that I discovered this lifestyle.
For example, being a vegan for 2 years has taught me a simple concept: Mucus in, mucus out.
No one wants to think about this, but ultimately, both milk and eggs contain a certain amount of mucus, from a foreign species.
When a human ingests that mucus (which is a product of the endocrine system, which truly is disgusting when you consider what else the endocrine system is responsible for), it can definitely have negative effects; as mucus itself is a defense mechanism the body to uses to fight off foreign substances.
This is not the sort of thing I openly talk about on Facebook, like I did at first. Instead, I reserve it for open-minded/curious people who care enough to actually read an entire post like this.
In addition to learning to be more reserved in my communication about it, another thing I’ve learned is how my psychology has evolved.
I see now that my relationship with food has transitioned from an emotional relationship to a functional relationship.
Well, obviously I’ve survived the past 2 years without eating any animal products (eggs, dairy, meat, etc.). Granted, I had already been a vegetarian for more than a year before my vegan conversion, and had been kosher (no pork or shellfish, etc.) for several years before that.
While some people have assumed it must take extra discipline to live my life this way, I actually believe the indirect opposite is true:
I don’t have the discipline it takes to only say “yes” in moderation to certain foods. But if the rule is consistent, that I can never have certain things (anything that registers 1% of my daily cholesterol or greater), then it actually takes the temptation away.
In the past 2 years, by default, I’ve learned the importance of getting all my necessary nutrition from 6 things: vegetables, fruits, grains, beans, nuts, and seeds.
I’m happy. I’m never hungry. I eat all the time. It works for me.
If you have any questions, I am happy to answer. I want to be known has the friendliest, least annoying, most helpful vegan you know.
You might also enjoy these other vegan-themed posts I’ve done as well:
Family Friendly Daddy Blog 