W9 - My Vegan Adventure

For this blog post, I chose an excerpt from my blog titled “A Quest for Optimal Health Through Veganism” – a blog that details my 27-day journey into veganism and the health benefits and changes to my body which result. Though I was raised vegetarian, I am an extremely inexperienced cook, and thus, I also detail my vegan adventures in the kitchen.

I have found the key to resisting all foods that contain animal products is to avoid situations in which they will be present -- at least during the initial stages of a vegan transformation.  At moments, the smell of fried food is enough to send my head spinning, and thus, I attempt to avoid environments such as the dining halls, food court at our student union, and my apartment kitchen when my roommates are cooking.  However, there eventually will come a time when I will need to eat at a restaurant and unfortunately, that time for me is…TOMORROW.  I can only hope I’m ready to forgo the bleu cheese on my beloved spinach salad.  Also, there’s always a possibility a restaurant’s menu may not provide any vegan-friendly options, and in that case…well, we’ll cross that bridge when we come to it.

Another great way to battle cravings (though I’ve hardly had any) or a situation in which unhealthy food will be present (such as my pizza adventures) is to pack an abundance of vegan-friendly snacks in my purse or backpack.  Every morning for the past four days, I packed a bag of snacks to munch on throughout the course of the day.  Typically, I pack a bag of raw almonds, a piece of fruit, a bag of baby carrots and sometimes, soy yogurt.  If I ever feel hungry during the day, I just pull out a snack.  Also, snacking every hour or so on healthy food is a great way to keep my appetite to a minimum.

For yet another day in a row, I experienced an unusual amount of energy and slept extremely well.  My stomach pains and headaches have subsided, and I believe my body is finally adapting to the abundance of fiber.  However, my face is breaking out slightly and I was particularly moody today (symptoms sometimes cause by this change of diet), but I am more than willing to bet the aforementioned symptoms are caused by my menstrual cycle.  But I still feel great!