Plant Based Dilemma

karlhama

I’m reading the book “How Not to Die” by Dr Michael Gregor. He promotes a plant-based diet. He provides a lot of research-based information to back up his argument.
I do know that I really need to incorporate more fruits and vegetables in my diet but I’m considering the benefits of a plant-based diet.
My dilemma is that I’m married and I believe that my wife wouldn’t be happy if I were to propose this change.
She actually is trying to follow the Wahl’s Protocol so she’s aware of the benefits of a healthy diet. I just don’t think she’d be willing to go all the way.
Any suggestions on what to do? Thank you.

Hiawassee88

I don't see it as that big of a challenge. These aren't competing interests, and are not at odds with one another. There's no need to push the boundaries of your framework onto her protocol. I think you can make it work.

Alatariel75

You don't both need to convert, there's a fair bit of overlap and where the ways of eating differ, you have tweak meals so hers fits hers and yours fits yours.

snowflake954

I guess I don't understand why you both need to eat the same thing. You just load up on fruits and vegetables. You may need to learn to cook if you don't know how. Watch your protein levels. It's harder to hit on a vegetarian diet, but possible. There are experienced long time posters that make it work @AnnPT77 comes to mind. She'll help you.

There is also a thread running called "For the Love of Produce" that you may want to look at.

AnnPT77

OK, I got whistled in, so I'm in! Unfortunately, because it's me, it's going to be an essay.

TL;DR up front: With care and flexibility, you can work this out, IMO. Still, I'd encourage you not to make a purely-by-choice (non-medically dictated) major dietary change based on one source (or even a few) that are in the advocacy camp.

Background: I'm vegetarian, have been for 48+ years. For 20+ of those years, I was married to a meat-eater/hunter. (Widowed, not divorced - long ago now.) This makes me believe that dietary "mixed marriages" can work.

What it takes for them to work, IMO, is entering the situation with caring, kindness, flexibility on both sides. "Let's you eat just like me, OK?" is not a defensible idea.

You two (maybe) have one factor that limits flexibility. I understand Wahl's Protocol to be an eating strategy - quite a specific one - that some find helpful in managing MS (multiple sclerosis), a profoundly serious and potentially debilitating disease. I even know someone who follows the protocol, and understand that some people report quite dramatic positive results (reduced symptoms). If that's why your wife is trying Wahl's, that's a big deal. Your marriage is yours to negotiate, but personally I'd never expect my spouse to flex what he actually ate in ways detrimental to his health (and he wouldn't have expected that of me). That would extend to dietary experiments, possibly long-ish term ones, to see if they helped.

Still, I think there will be ways you can co-exist. Cooking completely separate meals is always an option, though an extreme one. If only one of you cooks, that may be an imposition on the one who does the cooking, and IMO there should be some compensatory adjustment in shared routines for the time that takes, at minimum.

There's significant overlap between Wahl's and WFPB, in the range of veggies/fruits, and some fat sources. The issue would be that - from what I read - most of your key protein sources would be off-limits for your wife, and most of hers off-limits for you. Cooking the overlapped part in common, then having separate proteins, is the obvious option. The proteins needed be complicated cooking productions.

In my "mixed marriage", there were meals we routinely ate separately, i.e., most weekday breakfasts/lunches. I don't know whether that's true for you. We also ate separately (together) at restaurants. That left the remaining dinners to work out. In our case, my husband liked vegetarian foods, would happily eat them for dinner when we ate at home, and get most of his meat/fish in the other meals. That made it easy. We alternated cooking dinners, but both cooked vegetarian meals. On the rare occasion, he'd cook meat to eat alongside the vegetarian food. On the even rarer occasion (usually when we had guests), I'd cook meat (obviously didn't eat it). It was pretty stress free for both of us.

Your case is a little more complicated, but I'd encourage you to discuss it with your wife, in an open-minded way. "Could we make this work, so we both can eat what we want/need, without it being unevenly burdensome or a source of conflict?" is the question. Just my opinion, obviously.

A few more comments, from my background and experience.

Obviously, I have some understanding of the benefits of eating plenty of plants, even though I'm 'only' ovo-lacto vegetarian. A fair fraction of my protein comes from plants, and I routinely target 800g+ of varied, colorful fruits daily . . . and exceed that more often than I fall short. In addition, I eat nuts, seeds, and other plant foods daily.

My nutritional bias - pretty well supported by nutritional research not by me but by actual experts - is that the average person would materially improve their odds of long term good health if they ate more than the generally recommended 5 servings of veggies/fruits daily. In reality, most people don't even eat very close to that 5, according to surveys.

I'm much more skeptical that fully plant-based eating is essential for good health, let alone the best course. I'm aware of Gregor, admittedly haven't read his book.

I'll give you my generic opinion on all books that advocate a statistically unusual eating style: Seek out critical reviews, and weigh the totality of evidence. Look at credentials. Look at the quality of sources, i.e., a site selling vegan supplements is probably more biased than a major, respected academic or medical institution or nutritional group. There are a lot of poorly-scienced very popular books with eating recommendations, some of them written by people with persuasive letters after their names. It's a lucrative field.

That's not a dig at Gregor, his science or his sincerity. I don't know Gregor. However, there are a lot of biased sources evangelizing for plant-based eating these days, most of them have lots of footnotes, quote experts, some make a good case, but some cherry-pick and misrepresent, too. Caveat emptor.

On questions of nutrition for plant-based eating, I think this is a great science-based, dietitian-run, non-supplement-selling, expert source:

https://veganhealth.org/

AFAIK, they've not reviewed Gregor's books or ideas, but they have excellent nutrition-information content for plant-based eaters. It's worth checking out from a how-to perspective.

Personally, I think vegetarian, vegan, fully plant based eating are fine things that can be very healthful, but they're not automatically healthful.

Any form of good nutrition requires learning and attention to implement in one's life, and the plant-based styles require a little more of it than do omnivorous styles. Humans evolved in an environment where, for thousands of years, most societies have consumed at least some animal-sourced foods. That doesn't make eating animal protein required (with a few quibbles around the edges about B12, D, etc.), but it does make me somewhat skeptical that an eating style that is limited in human history is the very, very best way of eating.

That said, clearly there are many good reasons to be vegetarian, vegan, or plant-based. Obviously I think so, because I'm in that camp, or at least the near neighborhood, myself. I just think it's important to be clear-eyed about the pros and cons, because there are some of both.

Whatever you decide, I wish you good nutrition, good health, and a happy marriage. All of those are great blessings in life, and each is worth care, attention, and nurturing.

AnnPT77

Self-snipping below for a correction (oops, sorry):

AnnPT77 wrote: »

Cooking the overlapped part in common, then having separate proteins, is the obvious option. The proteins needed be complicated cooking productions.

* needn't

Yikes.

kermitch

I really wanted to drop the meat, and at one time was ordering food parcels where the meals were delivered at the start of the week (all veges, meats, ingredients, depending on the menu) and it was rather nice for a time, as I was wanting some variety and not enjoying time at the supermarket! Anyway, I ordered four meals a week and just found the whole thing very interesting, getting different flavours and dishes I hadn't tried.
So then, getting adventurous whilst I was still ordering this way, I switched over to the vegetarian menu for a few months. I was totally delighted at the flavours that came with it. Rather loved it actually.
I'm married again now, and sadly hubby tends to like his meat, and it has become a lazy way to do dinner... meat and veges. Doesn't take much to think about it.
So I'm doing my best to still reduce the meat, and hope to progress more to that when I'm not getting home late in the day.

JaysFan82

My gf and I eat completely different. We work opposite shifts so we only eat dinner together on the weekend but we collaborate on meals. We'll even have the same thing, just cooked differently (fried vs baked). It can work!

neanderthin

When talking strictly mortality there is no science so far that can say which diet is better and that study will never ever be done, plus the fact that other lifestyle factors will contribute to overall mortality. I will say veganism would be pretty low or not even qualify as a diet for a thriving civilization given its shortcomings. imo.

What is based in hard science is replacing UPF (ultra processed foods) with either plant or animal whole foods improve most health markers, which is vital to reduce or help reduce our overall fasting insulin levels which higher levels are associated with increased overall mortality. again imo.

My partner and I eat different diets both are based in whole foods but I'm low carb so it's pretty easy for the most part for her where I on the other hand need to be vigil and resist the temptation. Today she made cinnamon buns and was a pastry chef so very tempting lol.

BarbaraHelen2013

There’s no law saying a married couple have to eat the same things. 🤷‍♀️

I’m a long time vegetarian - my husband emphatically is not! I just cook twice, he gets dinner around 5pm which is what he prefers, I clean up after that then do my own meal around 7pm.

I do tend to cook several portions where appropriate - think chilli, bolognese, curries etc and freeze extra portions - which gives me an easy option for days when I just can’t face cooking twice or days when one or other of us is having something complicated and time consuming. Works fine.

missylectro

Vegan here and I agree with everyone who said that you don't both have to eat the same thing. Start doing it and then she will see what difference it makes in your health. Good luck!