By the time January 1, 2021 rolled in, my husband and I had gained so much weight that we were both miserable. We both felt very bloated all the time. I was on Nexium for heartburn. The medicine had worked for a while but now I was having heartburn after every meal. My husband had fatty liver and carotid artery concerns.
I started researching a plant based diet for us. On March 1, 2021, we committed to try the diet (for one month) knowing that it was really a lifestyle change. Peggy Hughes helped us get started. She sent information for us to read as well as recipes. We dived in……….it was harder than we thought.
We didn’t miss red meat as much because we ate mostly chicken and salmon. We didn’t miss milk or eggs because we rarely ate them anyway. We just didn’t have a plan and it was overwhelming.
By the middle of March, I was rethinking this life change. We talked it over and decided to keep going but to take our time by concentrating on the evening meal. I began cooking meals that we were used to eating, minus oil or fatback. I learned to experiment with spices that would add flavor. Then I started experimenting with breakfast. We already ate yogurt every morning with a piece of fruit. We discovered we could replace the dairy yogurt with almond yogurt, and I began making muffins ahead of time. This solved the breakfast issue. The noon day meal was the hardest because we were used to eating fast food or making a sandwich and eating chips. I began making a weekly menu. What I fixed for dinner, we started eating leftovers for lunch the next day. The meal planning was the key to solving our lunch issues.
Eleven months later, we are very satisfied with this lifestyle change. We have lost our excess weight and have more energy. There is no more heartburn or Nexium, no more fatty liver issues, and my husband’s carotid artery results last week were better than a year ago.
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