Month 2 - Day 28

So technically this is Day 59 and soon to be 60 of my "diet" if you will. I've lost 33 pounds and gone down two pant sizes and one shirt size. I feel better than I have in...well...as long as I can remember! I plan on changing the name of this blog to something else because it wasn't necessarily all 60 days with no processed food but rather about 15 days no processed food and then 45 days vegan with as little processed food as possible. Still.

I've really been trying to get all of my friends and loved ones to watch "Forks over Knives." It really amazes me the whole idea that some people can "look" skinnier, lose weight, be small, but still be extremely unhealthy. These people can still have heart attacks and coronary artery disease. There are some people that think "hey well I can eat whatever I want and then work out really hard and never have any problems." Eh...not so much. There are people that are in their 40s that are seemingly fit, and they have heart attacks out of nowhere. The plaque buildup in their arteries is too strong.  Granted, if someone is already very fit, at or below their recommended weight (that is, not overweight at all!), they can probably get away with eating meat and dairy more often (though it's still recommended to eat them MUCH less than the typical American does) as their metabolisms are faster, they are already living a fit lifestyle, and their heart and arteries are kept in check all the time. Still, for those people like me that are on the road just to being NOT overweight (like many people) I think repairing the damage done to your heart and arteries is the top priority.

I tried the high protein low carb diets and they didn't work for me because I always felt hungry, I always felt run down, I had very little digestive regularity,  even though I was losing weight, and I felt like I REALLY had to watch EVERYTHING I ate, and I was sort of cheating on some things like "oh look, it's a brownie, but it's low carb, so it's okay" or something like that. In the end it just didn't make any logical sense to me.

What makes sense to me is vegetarian / vegan lifestyles. You take care of your body and put in extremely healthy foods, and the rewards are endless. I feel so much more awake, aware, and healthy on this vegan diet than I ever have on any other diet. I've tried the low carb, tried the high protein, tried the calorie counting, tried some other seriously weird diets, I mean I've tried them all. This one is so much less of a diet and more of a lifestyle. It's easy to follow, and the food is delicious.


When I finally reach my goal weight of 180lbs, I'm going to post two photos. The first photo will be of me in late 2009 when I weighed 256 pounds as a college freshman. This is when I first admitted to myself that I needed a life change. I've tried three diets in the last two and a half years and the one that I've had the most success with is clear. I kept teetering back and forth on the other diets between 256 and 225, 240, back to 230...in the end I really only lost a net of 30 pounds in 2 years. The second photo will be of me at my goal weight of 180 pounds, smiling proudly, which means I would have lost a total of 76 pounds in 2.5 years, but 46 of those pounds in just the last 3 months. As you can tell, the Vegan thing has really been the ticket.

It's very difficult for non-overweight people to understand what it's like to be overweight for the majority of your life. I've probably been overweight my entire life and just never admitted it until I was old enough to actually actively do something about it. Before, you ate what was on your plate, you didn't complain, and you got it all for free from your parents. It's not that I'm blaming them, I just wish they would have known then what I know now.