Is Vegetarianism Healthy?

Is vegetarianism healthy? That’s the question, I ‘m gonna be asking’ myself as I bite into my organic turkey in November. I’ve been wanting to write about this subject for a while but I just wasn’t “feelin” it enough to put pen to paper. I am feeling it now and inspiration has kicked in so its time to start scribing! Over the past few weeks this topic has weighed on me heavily and I think its because it keeps coming at me from all angles. I recently had a friend of mine who I didn’t know was vegan until she revealed it in a conversation.

Upon her telling me that, I immediately asked her if she ate soy and she said “yes”, I began to connect the dots about some recent health issues she had been experiencing and sure enough I was right! Now… I am not a vegan basher and I don’t like to tell people how to eat or what to eat, but I am a big advocate of eating to live versus screeching recklessly into the pit stop of death. As a matter of fact, I tried being a vegetarian myself but I was living on a recent college graduate’s budget which almost always narrows your choices to Taco Bell, Mickey D’s, or Wendy’s. Back then, my food choices were always dictated by my finances and I didn’t know sh** about eating to prevent physical degeneration. I’m glad I finally woke up and now my mission is to wipe the morning crust out of other people’s eyes.

My first venture into vegetarianism was very simple. I went to Subway for about a week and instead of getting meat on my sub, I elected to get vegetables and vinegar and oil. I told myself I was vegetarian but what i really was, was an idiot for thinking I could become vegan by just electing to “hold the meat on my sub”. I’ll admit I didn’t know “jack” about being vegan and within a week and several hunger pangs later, I went back to meat with a vengeance. I decided to give it another try when I moved to Atlanta and started seeing a girl who was beginning to explore a religion called the Black Hebrew Israelites. They believed in eating no animal products and so she would frequently cook vegan meals. The stuff she cooked was delicious and a far cry from the sub sandwiches with vegetables I ate years ago when I called myself a vegan. I was amazed at how she cooked things without using animal products but they tasted just like she used meat. Although they were some tasty dishes, I was never really convinced that I should give up meat. My rationale was this,” my grandfather ate meat, my grandmother ate meat, and my mother ate meat” guess what I’m gonna do? Yep…eat meat and that is exactly what I did every chance I got. My decision to continue eating meat was a good one because if I had stuck with being vegan, I wouldn’t have been able to enjoy my organic free range turkey I’m having for Thanksgiving. I just love a big juicy turkey leg, how ’bout you?

I’ve never been one to push my beliefs on anyone so I won’t do that here. If you’ve been reading my blog by now you know I like to deal in factual information. Its easier to make a decision when you deal with facts versus hearsay, wouldn’t you agree? By the way, even though I never really made it completely vegan I leaned heavily towards it because I thought it was a better way to eat. I also thought it was more “spiritual” to not eat meat. In order to be as unbiased as I possibly can about this topic of is vegetarianism healthy, lets talk about some of the reasons why vegans actually become vegans and then state the real facts.

•  Cancer – I recently saw a documentary called,”Fork over Knives” which was Pro -Vegan and one of the main points was it lowered cancer risk. This isn’t necessarily true as a study was done in 1994 which showed vegetarians had a lower risk for breast and lung cancers but there risks for the following cancers were considerably higher: brain, skin, cervical, ovarian, prostate, and uterine. Research indicates carbohydrate based diets are prime instigators of cancer. Yes..vegetables are considered carbohydrates. On a side note meat consumption was never associated with higher cancer risk.

•  Heart Disease – India has one of the biggest populations of vegetarians and one of the highest occurrences of heart disease. On another note, female vegans have a higher incidence of heart disease than female non-vegans.

•  Arteriosclerosis – Vegetarians think plaque won’t occur in the arteries as a result of eating plant based foods…not so. Vegetarians have just as much incidences of plaque in their arteries as meat eaters.

•  Life Span – Some vegetarians say eating only plant based foods will extend your life. Hindus who are mostly vegetarian have the shortest life spans in the world.

•  Osteoporosis – Eating meat was considered to make the body acidic but consuming plants makes it alkaline therefore meat was considered a contributor to Osteoporosis.The rationale is if the body is acidic through meat eating calcium in the bones is used as a buffer to make the body alkaline. The studies used to prove this were done with protein powders and not real meat. How can you make a generalization like this if you don’t use real meat?

•  Energy and Growth – Vegetarians will usually claim they have more energy when following a plant based diet but in reality most vegans will complain of lack of energy because meat provides some nutrients plants can’t provide. On the flip side, children who follow a vegetarian diet can have growth and development problems. I’ve myself heard more than one story where women have problems conceiving as a result of following a strict vegetarian diet. Not to mention problems with the teeth and emotional issues.

•  Saturated Fat – Vegetarians believe eating a plant based diet will help them lower cholesterol by reducing saturated fat. Well…our bodies need saturated fat and cholesterol isn’t necessary the evil its made out to be. It has been proven that cholesterol is needed for brain and hormone function thus the body needs the saturated fat meats provide to function properly.

•  Moral Issues - We shouldn’t eat animals is what some vegetarians list as a reason for not eating meat. Well, if we didn’t eat them they would overpopulate the earth, right? Think about it this way if you were tossed in the jungle or forest and a lion or bear was hungry would they have a problem eating you? We are all part of one big food chain and its just by luck that humans are on top of it.

*** Just make sure if you are going to continue to eat meat that its organic. Its the antibiotics and the hormones in commercially raised animals that is making people sick.****

Now…as I stated earlier I don’t push my beliefs on anyone and I’ll stick to that. I believe we get into problems when we try to take things to the extreme. Like it or not, vegetarianism is an extreme way of eating which doesn’t have any significant health benefits over those who choose to eat meat. So what’s the conclusion? All things in moderation. Too much meat can be bad, just as too many plants can be bad but if there is balance which is what the body wants you can get the best of both worlds and there will be no need to ask the question, “is vegetarianism healthy”.

PSS. – Although I am not vegan, there are some days I choose to eat very little meat or just abstain from eating meat for a meal or two. I didn’t know much about preparing meals so I picked up the Easy Veggie Meal Plans. It has a ton of bonuses and was very simple to use.

 Please like, google + stumble and tweet this by looking in the upper left hand corner of the post. Let’s get the word out! Have an awesome Thanksgiving!