My Vegan Experiment

catbaloous · 11-13-2006, 12:27 PM

After about 6 months of bad health I have decided to do my own extensive research on healing through nutrition. My health concerns have been a staph infection, fatigue, allergies, hormone problems, digestive issues, candida overgrowth, acne, and depression. I was not feeling well at all for a long time and was relying on energy pills and drinks just to be able to function. My lymphnodes became really swollen and I could no longer workout. I finally decided to go to a homeopathic doctor and discovered I had a pretty bad staph infection and candida overgrowth.
Interestingly, the subject of meat, dairy, and poultry has come up through much of my research. I figured, I will give this new thought a try. I really have nothing to lose. I know many people's first response is, "well, you will lose muscle." That was my first thought and fear also. But, my recent health issues have also caused me to lose muscle, too. I am going to give it a shot. I am cutting out meat, dairy, and poultry to try to stimulate the healing process of my body. For the last 2 weeks, I have significantly cut down on animal foods and have already noticed a difference. I haven't been back in the gym yet, so that will help alot. I have only been walking/jogging for 30-45 minutes a day. I am so ready to start weight training again. I will see how my body responds to training without animal protein. This is just an experiment. If my body doesn't respond the way that I want it to, after giving it a significant amount of time, I will just simply go back to eating like before.

TRAINING:
Since I have taken about 3 months off from weight training, I am going to do a full body break in routine. I may even experiment with full body routines for a while instead of going back to a split. I really am just going to challenge myself to break old thought patterns and let my body discover what it likes best.

NUTRITION:
I am going to really have to break through some mental blocks of carbohydrates. I will still eat only complex carbs but I will have to eat more fruits and several different types of vegetables. I will eat more beans, nuts, and seeds. I haven't ever tried tofu, but I am going to have to experiment with it. I am also going to be eating lots of soy products. I bought soy milk, soy yogurt, and soy protein powder. I bought veggie burgers and veggie chicken cutlets also. They are low in carbs, high in fiber, and moderate protein. It really is going to be alot of trial and error, but I figure it's worth a shot.

Everyday, I will post what I eat and my training log also. I will do my weights and measurements tonight so that I can track my progress. Most of you probably won't agree with what I am doing, I wouldn't have if someone told me a couple of months ago. But right now, my main focus is to try to heal my body without the use of drugs. Just like the title says, it's an experiment. This is not an ethical or animal rights issue for me, it is strictly for my health. We will just have to see!

edit: I am adding in my starting stats here.
Weight- 116.2
Omron%- 19.7 (not very accurate but atleast it's a tracking method)
Chest-36
Waist-27
Hip-32 3/4
Thigh- 19 1/2
Arm-10 1/2
Calf-12