The Health Benefits I have gained since going Vegan
It’s been 9 years since I made the choice to change my diet and then lifestyle to vegan options. People often ask why I made the decision and how I feel now and I wanted to share my personal experiences. I viscerally remember watching Cowspiracy and feeling a seismic connection to the information. My heart broke open when I watched footage of animals in abattoirs struggling for their lives, and essentially being powerless over man and machinery. It was as if the wool was removed from my eyes and I felt a visceral shift in how I viewed meat and animal product consumption. I read about the science and the effects of animal agriculture on the environment and honestly felt no sway to push back. Whilst I had eaten meat before, I had never felt especially attached to it and had simply thought it was part of a ‘healthy’ diet. I allowed my emotions to take me downstream towards what felt like a kinder place to myself, the environment and animals.
I needed this distinction and drive to power through the changes in my whole lifestyle I needed to make. I feel grateful my ‘why’ came quickly. The ‘how to do it’ took a long time, research, cooking courses and education, but now a lot in my life is easier and I wanted to share the positive impact I feel and experience now.
Firstly in making the choice to go vegan I got in touch with my emotions in a way I had, whether through social or societal conditioning, buried down. I have always known I am sensitive to my environment and emotions and viewed it as a burden for a long time. I built up an armour that enabled me to say what I believed were the right things and act in ways that would pass as normal because deep down I was uncomfortable with acknowledging my deep emotions. When I changed my diet and integrated much more healthy plant based options I felt my body waking up in beautiful ways. The fog that dominated a lot of my childhood and twenties slowly disappeared. I had to re-evaluate my routines and very quickly began researching information on how to thrive in this lifestyle. I have completed numerous cooking courses around the world and became certified in plant based nutrition and read all I could to know the science and facts should opportunity present where my choices were challenged. I became more confident in being my authentic self and knowing that I was making choices day-to-day via what I ate that were right for me, my values and who I want to be in the world.
Below are a few things I want to share about this beautiful lifestyle:
Vegan Food is Absolutely Delicious
It feels important to start with this point because, ethics, morals and virtues aside, fundamentally I used to believe that ‘healthy’ food was bland, boring and unsatisfying. I now know I am completely wrong. Along the way I have had some mistakes made in the kitchen and a few poor meals out socially but overall my experience of vegan food is that it’s satisfying, nourishing, convenient (with a few tweaks or lessons learned) and absolutely delicious.
My passion in my Vegan Cooking Classes and when working with companies is to create and share delicious food that, vegan or not, people love and I adore seeing the surprise they experience by how satisfied they feel, often with a side effect of not feeling bloated or overly full. I love familiar dishes made from original ingredients that are packed full of flavour and visually beautiful. Presentation alongside preparation are so important and also in my mind when creating or plating a dish for myself or others I imagine how will I, or they, feel when they eat it and look towards ensuring the following six element of a dish are present: Flavour, Texture, Aesthetic Appeal, Temperature and Balance of proteins, healthy fats and complex carbohydrates.
Epic flavour is essential too and the 4 components of a good dish include the right balance of Salt, Fat, Acid and Heat. It’s amazing how a sprinkling of seasoning, a drizzle of olive oil or pinch of spice can make a good dish great and that’s the standard I always want in everything I do.
You can learn more about my vegan cooking classes >here<
Eating More Vegan Food is an Empowering Choice To Make
Social media and modern news platforms mean we’re exposed to more information than ever before. Beautiful moments can be shared from a thousand miles away, but also the realities of climate change and the impact it’s having in the world, factory farming conditions and global food poverty are now readily viewable on any smartphone. It can feel incredibly powerless as an individual but I’m a firm believer that the world does not need a few people living seemingly perfect lives, but rather as many of us consciously making empowering positive choices as and when we can.
Just like veganism is the sustainable option when it comes to looking after our planet, plant-based living is also a more sustainable way of feeding the human family. A plant-based diet requires only one third of the land needed to support a meat and dairy diet. (Source). Based on global estimations, eating a plant-based diet spares the lives of 105 animals per person each year. In 2018 alone, over 772 billion animals were killed for human consumption, and most were fish. The report, published by the non-profit organization Animal Charity Evaluators, based its projections on data provided by the Food and Agriculture Organization of The United Nations (FAO). Among the 772 billion animals killed for food, almost 90 percent were fish, it concluded. Most of the 85.6 billion farmed birds were chickens, according to the data. Moreover, humans slaughter around 4.5 billion farmed animals, such as cows and pigs each year.The data didn’t just include animals killed in the meat industry. For example, male chicks killed in the egg industry formed part of the figures. (Source)
My Energy Levels Are Higher Than Before
Whilst the internet loves a transformation side-by-side physical image, visually presenting an evolution of emotions and feelings is complex. I turned 40 this year and found myself feeling the fleetingness of time for the first time. No longer was the perpetual response of ‘when I grow up…’ valid. I had to accept that I am now grown up and my life is my responsibility untethered by the foothold of youth or inexperience or naivety. These periodic wake ups tend to coincide with life challenges or indeed milestone birthdays and I’m not immune to that in any way. There is so much more of life I want to enjoy, things I want to achieve in my career, experiences I want to have, places I hope to visit, books I hope to read and write, love I want to feel, and quite simply things I want to get done. I feel incredibly grateful to have made the changes in my diet that now allow me to have the energy to maximise the capacity of however many wonderful years I may be so lucky to enjoy in my life.
Naturally I have days where my energy is sluggish and my mood can of course fluctuate but knowing every day I am eating in a way that best nourishes my body powered by plants, vegan proteins and home cooked vibrant food gives me the best shot at being my best. Occasionally due to work or social commitments I find myself deviating from my own health eating and within a few days that slightly dark cloud comes back over my mind, I find myself less enthusiastic mentally and I get inflammation in my joints and feel sluggish. For me adopting a plant based diet has been such an empowering choice and given me more energy, purpose, ambition and connection than I ever experienced before.
Improved Digestive Health and Beauty Benefits
Prior to adopting a vegan diet I typically ate the same meals on rotation. Vegetables were something I felt I should eat but rarely enjoyed. Once Plants became the focus of my diet, making them delicious was essential and I was soon powering up my mornings with smoothies, and enjoying lots of vegetable filled curries and snaking on nuts, seeds and better quality raw chocolate. After about a month I noticed a dullness that had always been prevalent on my skin lifting and the near consistent small breakouts I used to get on my chin had vanished. There is some very strong evidence and research correlating a reduction in traditional dairy and the effect on clearing skin and other health conditions which you can read about >here<
Vegan diets are high in phytonutrients, which are plant chemicals that have anti-inflammatory and antioxidant properties. This can help to protect the skin from the effects of inflammation and oxidative stress. From a digestion point of view I also noticed a huge change and it seems there are some real benefits for the gut when you decide to undertake a vegan diet.
The most well-researched of these advantages are the changes to the gut bacteria in the digestive tract. Research has found that there is a reduction in inflammatory gut bacteria, as well as an increase in the protective species of bacteria. This is likely due to the higher fibre content of the average vegan diet. Although all fibre is beneficial, there are some types of fibre that provide better fuel for the good bacteria in the gut, these fibres are known as prebiotics. Prebiotics are found in plant-based foods including apples, pears, legumes and wholegrains. By fuelling the good bacteria in the gut, prebiotics support your healthy gut balance - something pertinent to avoiding any inflammation or gut related disorders from developing. (Source)
I have A Stronger Connection to Myself
For a long time I felt a fear of opening the Pandora’s box of my emotions. I was scared that if I opened it up I would never get out. Due to epigenetics we now know that the effects of trauma can reverberate down the generations through epigenetics. (Source) Once I started to eat a more plant focused diet it felt as if my body was coming back to life and with that there were elements I had to process and reflect on. We speak of gut instincts and following them but often that can involve confronting situations or circumstances that are challenging. When I became vegan I felt as if I came back to myself. I could feel if something didn’t agree with me on a physical or an emotional level and I had to learn how to handle that. My body was showing me the way through feelings, intuitions, sensations and discomfort, and also love and brightness were coming through on a deeper level. Over the past few years I’ve made a lot of changes and also navigated turning my passion into a business that involves the realities of tax, vat and business management which are all very new to me and not always straightforward but I feel as if I have been guided by this energy deep inside me I’ve been able to tap into.
Going vegan allowed me to build a deeper relationship with myself, the impact my choices have on the enviroment and gave me the energy to put in the work to connect to turning my ambitions into a reality. One meal at a time I try to make what I hope is the loving choice and I hope my recipes, social posts, classes and courses share my passion. I truly believe this has completely transformed my life and I am so grateful to share it all with you.
For more information on cooking classes see below:
*Includes €5 donation to animal welfare charity of my choice
