Questions for vegans/vegetarians

leavemealonee wrote: »

Hello!
I am thinking of becoming a vegan or a vegetarian. Is it true that this diet can make you loose weight or is that a lie? Also what is the hardest thing about switching over to becoming a vegan or a vegetarian? What are some of the struggles?

Depends on calories...there are plenty of vegetarian and vegan foods that have loads of calories...weight management comes down to calories, not a particular diet. You can lose, maintain, or gain weight with any diet depending on calories in/out.

CAN it? Sure. So can a diet where you only eat animal products. Either of those could also make you gain weight.

The biggest problem I've seen new vegetarians encounter is that they just remove the meat from their diets and don't replace the nutrients they get from meat. Meat substitutes are not necessarily nutritionally similar to meat. A good example is a portobello mushroom cap substituting for a hamburger -- it takes the place of the meat in the meal, but it doesn't give you what you were going to get from a hamburger.

This is why you get people who went vegetarian or vegan for a short amount of time, then come back complaining about how they became anemic, or felt awful the whole time, because they didn't think about things like where they were going to get their protein or their iron or their B vitamins, etc. Most long-term, healthy vegetarians (and ESPECIALLY vegans) have to know more about nutrition than the average meat-eater.

If you really want to become a vegetarian or vegan, welcome! Spend some time learning about the nutritional side of it first. This is a fairly active MFP group you could join: http://community.myfitnesspal.com/en/group/45-happy-herbivores. But don't do it just to lose weight, because those diets don't make you lose weight in and of themselves.

I'm vegan, but avoiding animal products won't make you lose weight in and of itself. Some of the most calorically dense foods don't contain animal products (eg: vegetable based oils). Certainly eating nutrient dense food can be a factor in weight loss, if you're a volume eater, but I'm not sure i'd really suggest a plant based diet purely for weight loss. I feel adherence will be difficult if you are doing so purely for weight loss reasons (although, certainly many people start off plant based for health reasons, and stay vegan for ethical reasons).

The difficulties transitioning to a plant based diet mostly center around how important animal products are to you. A lot of people find dairy to be more of a struggle than meat, and sometimes the things you think would be a struggle end up not really being a factor (that was me with cheese, which I thought would be problematic, but it hasn't been -- and I don't usually bother with vegan cheese).

Obviously a lacto-ovo, ovo, or lacto vegetarian would be an even easier transition.

Whatever foods you choose to consume, you'll need to be eating at a deficit to lose weight.

I've been vegetarian for 43+ years. Yup, since 1974. There is no weight loss magic in vegetarianism.

In my early 20s, I was a thin vegetarian. Got a desk job, became a fat vegetarian in my 30s, then an obese vegetarian in my 40s & 50s. I became very active in my mid 40s, part way through the obese phase (intense workouts most days, competed as an athlete), but out-ate the activity and stayed obese. At 59, I started eating fewer calories, lost 50+ pounds, became a thin vegetarian again, and am now in my 3rd year maintaining a healthy weight, still vegetarian.

Unless you have strong reasons to become vegetarian or vegan (other than weight loss or abstract ideas about "healthy eating"), I'd recommend against it.

Either lifestyle is very doable, but both are slightly less convenient than staying an omnivore: Veg people need to pay more attention to get optimal nutrition - not just protein, but also certain vitamins and minerals. Travel, especially international travel in meat-centric cultures, can present challenges. You have to gracefully negotiate social situations like being invited to your non-vegetarian new boss's house for dinner. If you're single, vegetarianism could even constrain your choices of life partner.

None of this is even remotely insurmountable, but it's really not worthwhile unless you have ethical reasons to go that route.

I think you can read between the lines about what issues you need to address if you make the switch. IME, there are no "struggles", just things to learn & do.

Edited: typos.

Any way of eating that creates a calorie deficit will result in weight loss.

I used to be a vegetarian, since I was 12 and then became pescetarian when I was 30, so now eat fish. The thing you have to be careful of is that you get enough protein as it is harder to do that when you don't eat fish or meat. Protein helps you feel fuller for longer so you could end up eating more carbs etc just to try and fill yourself up. I agree with others, it's not a good idea to do this if the only reason you are doing it is to lose weight. You could try having some meat free days and eating more fruit and veg and see how that goes.

I'm mostly vegetarian sometimes pescetarian, I didn't lose any weight until I started counting calories, the hardest part about being vegetarian for me is finding something to eat at fast food places or restaurants, that's why I eat seafood sometimes at restaurants.

leavemealonee wrote: »

Hello!
I am thinking of becoming a vegan or a vegetarian. Is it true that this diet can make you loose weight or is that a lie? Also what is the hardest thing about switching over to becoming a vegan or a vegetarian? What are some of the struggles?

Ovo-lacto vegetarian here. I got up to 254lbs this way. I've gotten down to 156.2 (as of Sunday's weigh-in) this way. There's nothing magical about it.

I was vegetarian for around 4 years on and off. Before that, I was one of those ppl who never gain weight regardless of what I eat. In the beginning, In the beginning, I lost few pounds but with time my metabolism got so slow and even though I started eating healthy vegetarian food (veggies, legumes, green smoothies and lentil) but I would still not lose much weight. Eventually, I had to go back to normal diet because of iron deficiency and also to lose weight. On the other hand, I know someone skinny who told me that she was always overweight till she turned vegan, but also she go to the gym and monitor her food very strictly and she is only 25). I personally believe in vegetarian and vegan diets for moral reasons, but not for weight loss.