vegandonelight newsletter - September 2009

As you know, last month we celebrated two years of this newsletter. And, in all that time, I've yet to show you a picture of me or really give my story! I've included some of my guest's photos, but not mine.

For those who are just joining us, this will be perfect timing, serving as an introduction. For others it'll be an "about time," likely serving to throw your own mental picture of me, based on my writing alone, into the scrap heap — like when an actor is cast for the part of a character you'd gotten to know so well from reading the book. I just hope it won't be as disappointing as that usually is.

First, I wanted to draw your attention to some studies, the conclusions of which had caught my eye over the last few months. They are presented in brief for your researching pleasure.

In February, a handful of clinical trial results were made public at a Canadian conference sponsored by Pulse Canada. Now there's an advocacy group we can all stand behind! (Or maybe we're better off in front... bad joke).

They supply further evidence for the health benefits of eating pulses ("beans, peas, lentils, and chickpeas"). I'm always happy to read such data.

Speaking of legumes and such, the same month also saw the release of this paper with the good news title:

And in July, an extra piece to the soy puzzle was introduced, perhaps confirming the suspicions of many that ethnicity could play a complicating role in comparing the diets of East and West.

The Physician's Committee For Responsible Medicine (PCRM) recently kicked off a 21-day challenge consisting of daily emails with recipes and advice for the new vegan. They also have a support forum and an archive. I signed up just to check it out, and I can definitely see how it would be encouraging to someone starting along this path.

I had the good fortune to review two DVDs from Dr. Furhman this month. The first is an exercise video focused on bone health. It opens with a quick lecture on osteoporosis, including some of the dietary and supplement strategies for combating it. While the talking head format is maybe a little too close for comfort, the information was good. It then moves into the exercises, breaking them down so you get the hang of them and understand why they're important. We also discover the ladies joining the good doctor are staff and family learning the moves right along with us. The final segment is the one you'll probably watch most often as it's all the exercises strung together into a fifteen minute routine. It's not highly aerobic, just high impact and meant to improve your balance. I definitely felt it in the legs the next day.

While it was nice to see the doctor getting right in there and exercising up a sweat, Dr. Fuhrman was clearly in his element in the second video, joking with his wife in the kitchen and cooking up a delicious storm. The recipes run the gamut from salads with dressings, to soups and main dishes, to green smoothies and desserts, all of which are also provided in an accompanying booklet with charts for additional combinations.

It's hard to know where to start condensing thirty-five years on this planet (make that any planet) into a few paragraphs, so I'll just jump in headfirst on topic.

Warning: No cutesy asterisks were used to hide the meat in the following discussion. It's not always pretty, but it's the way it was.

Christmas 2003

It almost seems inevitable that I would end up eating vegetarian, if not ultimately vegan, as now. Even as a kid, I never liked steak. I considered it too hard to chew and had swallowing issues with it and hotdogs for a while there. I also remember being grossed out by the little hard lumps (we called them blod clots, not sure if that's what they were) in McDonald's chicken nuggets, though they were otherwise my favorites.

My younger sister and I grew up in the country after our parents divorced. Though my Mom would not likely have done this on her own, when she remarried, they ended up building a turkey coop and pig pen in the lower yard. Both my sister and I became attached to the animals, particularly one of the two pigs who would "bark" at the dogs in stunning immitation. The day he wound up on our plates from the butcher/smokehouse was not a happy one for us kids.

This experience no doubt helped motivate my sister to embark on a courageous senior project about vegetarianism. One of the elements was convincing the cafetaria to serve just vegetarian food for one day only. (Even at that, many of the macho guys opted to pack their lunches and give my sister grief instead of taking the hot lunch.) My sister still eats meat, but she says she seldom has pork and smoked flavoring is a turnoff.

Then it was off to college to get my Computer Science degree. There I promptly gained the freshman fifteen due to late night pizzas, burgers, and beer.

Eventually, I came around. My Dad had gone vegetarian (macrobiotic minus the fish) a couple years before me, and I always felt so much better upon visiting from school when I'd get to eat big plates full of rice and beans, steamed bok choy, and bowls of soup. I really enjoyed all the flavors (my sister would always say, "it's *different*") and was gaining an education from my father about the conditions of livestock and the effects on human health from animal-based diets.

I knew then, I would go vegetarian, but it wasn't "supposed" to be until after graduation, when I'd be out on my own. Alas, it happened quite suddenly, as an epiphany in the middle of eating the first of two cheeseburgers from the local mobile stand late one night. It felt wrong and unnatural to be eating them, so I stopped cold on the spot. My inebriated friend was quite happy to accept the unfinished remains, and I've never looked back.

Oddly enough, it was around this time and early into moving into an apartment by myself after college that I started having panic attacks and general anxiety. I soon bought every supplement and herbal remedy under the sun in a vain and probably unhealthy attempt to stop them (like the big drinks of kava kava). Going out become more difficult and less frequent.

Ultimately, what helped the most and got me over the hump was a book gifted to me by my sister called Don't Panic. It was invaluable in explaining what was actually happening during an attack, building coping skills, and for perhaps giving the biggest takeaway and best advice of all: tell your friends and family. Keeping it secret and trying to hide your anxiety or explain why you suddenly got up to "get some air" makes it all the more likely that it'll occur. If your companions know you may have to excuse yourself at any moment, you feel you have that escape, if you will, in your back pocket and come to find you need it less and less often.

I believe it was Christmas 2000(?) when a couple more gifted books lent their significant influence. They were Beyond The 120 Year Diet by Roy Walford, M.D., and The Anti-Aging Plan with his daughter Lisa. The former was for the nitty-gritty science (at the time) of calorie restriction and I devoured it in a mere few days, the latter had the recipes I would be following. I lost quite a bit of weight as a side-effect of my conviction to CR, and my family become concerned. My doctor, however, upon noticing the trend stabilizing and understanding the longevity studies, had no problem with it, and I've since gained back some of those pounds.

As time progressed, I got into fermented foods, including a wide variety of milk cultures such as kefir and the room-temperature Caspian Sea Yogurt (CSY). We're talking lots of dairy (organic, skim) as well as egg whites and seitan for low-calorie protein sources. It was fun and exciting, but I think I overdid it. I started getting "fuzzy-headed" and suspected an induced gluten and/or dairy sensitivity.

I started my personal blog in April 2006. You can see some of the yogurt dishes from that early period (as well as some gorgeous tempeh and kimchi, both of which I still consume as a vegan). But it was only a month in that I read Eat To Live and The China Study. Convinced the dairy was doing me no favors, I wanted the extra push to go vegan. I knew these two books would do the trick, and they did. I launched into a two-week "experiment" from which I've not emerged. The way I figured it, even if the probiotics, etc., of kefir were super healthy, it would do no harm to go without for a couple weeks. That's been my mantra for any dietary change, "anything for two weeks." Alas, I started to feel better and have been vegan ever since.

Apparently, I got rather passionate about it too, because I wrote the cookbook and started this newsletter! I'm also currently earning my Certificate in Plant-Based Nutrition thru the program taught by Dr. Campbell via eCornell and will be adding Wellness Coaching to the mix shortly from another institution. My layoff in February had me in a depressive funk for a while and my exercise routine stopped being so routine. That's being remedied with the help of the SurfShelf which holds my laptop while I'm on the treadmill. Now, I just have to get back on the Bowflex, so I can have the muscles you see in this pic from 2001.

OK, so I was cheating by showing pictures from six plus years ago!

Here's a blurry candid from this July when my Aunt was visiting from Washington state.

Note: I've had glasses for near-sightedness since 2nd grade and just happened to be trying out contact lenses during the span covered by the two other pics.