Ex-Vegan (2 Years): 17 Year Old: Veganism Messed Up My Body & Made Me Gain Weight

Watch on YouTube · 2018-10-03 · 25 min

0:00 Start from the beginning and then talk about when you got into veganism and how you got into it and then what happened, the health problems and everything, okay?

[video] 0:11 Okay. Okay, so I'm 17 now, but when I was 15, so like exactly two years ago, I found veganism through my current boyfriend at the time. And we're still together. So actually, we weren't together yet. And his whole family was vegan. He was vegetarian. And I was really interested in that, because he was super buff guy, a lot of muscle. And I was like, how can you be vegetarian and have all of that? And so for about five months, I went vegetarian because of him. And then in between that time of being vegetarian and vegan, I found Freely.

[video] 0:52 really the banana girl crazy vegan YouTube lady that everybody knew about I had never seen her before and so I got very convinced about ethical veganism and the benefits to health and all of that but I didn't do much outside research so there's lots of fear-mongering going on and a lot of like if you eat meat this is gonna happen to you you don't want this to happen so go vegan and so I planned on going vegan around the beginning of the year and And I ended up going vegan two years ago in September. And I did it overnight pretty much straight from vegetarianism.

[video] 1:29 And I felt no significant difference at first. I was pretty fit. I was very, very healthy. And I want to emphasize very normal. Hormones were great. Everything was great at this point. And when I went vegan, I didn't have that aha, I feel so much better that everybody was talking about. I just kind of felt the same.

[video] 1:50 So a lot of what I'm going to talk about is hindsight. So a lot of these things happened and I just wasn't paying attention to them and I was attributing them to other things. So I was gradually gaining weight. That was the first thing that kind of tipped me off that something was going wrong in my body. And it wasn't like I just gained 60 pounds overnight. It was over the course of about a year, I gained probably 40 pounds and a lot of that was water weight. And people don't believe me when I say that, but it was water weight. there would be days where I would wake up and I would look fine. And then I would go weigh myself the next morning and it would be like 20 ish pounds difference. And my mom wanted me to go to the doctor, but I was like, no, this is fine. Like this must just be hormones. Um, so my hormones started fluctuating abnormally, uh, periods were crazy, just a bunch of acne. And so I brushed it off as a side effect of birth control. And I talked to my OBGYN,

[video] 2:46 he was telling me it's normal it's just your age 16 so I was like okay so time passes I gained more weight my body is not doing anything normally anymore extreme depression and anxiety to the point of like very crippling and detrimental and this never happened to me to this extent before and so again it's blamed on my age my birth control my hormones are mainly what's causing it and I know that now but at the time I was like okay I Like maybe I need a diagnosis. So I'm bloated and retaining almost 10 pounds of water every single day. And it just gets to the point where it's affecting my self-esteem. My hormones are still crazy. And so I tried everything. I tried high carb, low fat, high protein, which

[video] 3:35 with actually very difficult almost everything and began had a car and I like you simply that hard for the issue so I constantly like trying to manipulate the card instead of cutting them at all I'm nothing here's the problem I'm working out and I go to work out their huge struggle I'm hired I'm me I'm not able to look at my and on top of it like I think gaining water weight from working out And so it didn't matter how much protein I was eating on a vegan diet. It just didn't work. And I was chugging a lot of water at the time because the vegan community was, like, making all of these videos that were tailored to people who were having issues from veganism. So, like, in my mind, now that I look at it, it's like they're making these videos because a ton of people are saying, hey, I'm vegan, I gained weight. And these vegan YouTubers are like, oh, here's what you should do.

[video] 4:30 So a ton of these people were having issues, and I watched all these videos, and they basically just say, chug some water, limit your salt intake, and eat only whole foods, you know, no processed anything. So I did that, and no matter how much water I drank or didn't drink, in fact, when I didn't drink water, it was actually a little better. And I limited my salt, and I was still retaining so much water to the point where I was having back pain because of it. because it was unevenly distributed in my body. So in March of 2018, this year, I went to buy a prom dress. And this is kind of the thing that spiraled me into this gaining knowledge and getting out of veganism. So I went to buy a prom dress. And I was six sizes higher than the last time I had went shopping for a dress, which was before I was vegan. And so I was like, that's really crazy. So I started crash dieting, and I bought the dress. And it was a size 13.

[video] 5:30 And I started crash dieting and restricting. And I was manipulating all kinds of different diets. But I was still vegan, never cheated once in two years. And by the time that prom came around, the size 13 dress was two sizes at least too small. And so I had gained weight between March and May. And so it was just so crazy.

[video] 5:53 Yeah, so my prom pictures are actually out there. I have them. I show them to people all the time. Like, I look so different. Like, my face was puffy all the time. My arms got, like, super flabby and super just fat. So that's what happened with that. And it just, it was very crushing to my self-esteem. And I went into even more depression. And I was like, there has to be some sort of solution. I was gaining clothing sizes, which isn't normal. So I decided to switch my birth control. And this was, again, at a time I didn't think veganism was the issue. And I went to an estrogen-free birth control. And so I thought that that would help with the water retention. And it did for about a week or two. I actually saw a little bit of reduction. And I was eating normally, vegan, healthy. And then after that, I started having the same issues again, just continuously retaining water. Nothing was helping.

[video] 6:51 medication was making me feel awful or so I thought and then I found out that I had an ovarian cyst and so I went into surgery and I quit birth control after that so this surgery was like okay this is the birth control issue that's what the surgery told me and after that I was like okay the surgery is gonna cure this and so after surgery I I quit birth control completely, no hormones in my body. The only thing affecting my body was what I ate, so nothing else was in my body. And my body normalized for about a month after the surgery. I quit retaining water. I lost a little bit of weight. I felt better mentally. And by August, so surgery was in about July. By August, I was back to the same place. It's still horrible mood, retaining water, bloating.

[video] 7:40 Um, and bloating and retaining water was the main issue, but, like, I also want to emphasize that not only was my mood terrible and it was depression and anxiety, I was having so many issues with social relationships and having a good relationship with food, which now seems obvious, but at the time, I was like, no, I have to do this. Like, the animals, you know, need me. So... was just indoctrinated with so many ideas that like if I were to even think about not being vegan I wasn't a real vegan and I was just this immoral person so I asked a lot of people I was like what do I do this obviously isn't working for me I didn't think it was veganism but then deep down I was like my diets the only thing that's unchanging and this is the issue with the diet so everyone says eat meat again and I I didn't want to listen because I was just so wrapped up in the ethical side, and I was like, I'm going to get cancer if I eat meat. I'm going to have all of these issues with my weight and my morality.

[video] 8:38 So finally, on my two-year veganversary, it was actually September 2nd, I decided to eat meat again. I was like, okay, I can't do this anymore. This has to be the issue. And what really sparked this was looking back at pictures from before I was vegan, and I used to eat All kinds of meat. I used to be known for being a meat lover. And in these pictures, my hair was beautiful and thick and my skin was clear and I was super fit, super skinny. So I decided to eat meat again. And I was like, if this works, it works. If it doesn't, it doesn't. I went into it the most open-minded that I ever was as a vegan. And the next day my bloating was gone. So it's so funny in one day, like without a ton of carb overload, because that day I just kind of ate like a bunch of meat. The next morning I woke up and I looked and felt better than I had in two years. And I'm not making this up. Like I, it was like an overnight success.

[video] 9:38 And so My mood was also soaring at this point. And it was almost like when you're starving yourself for a whole day, and then you eat a big meal, and you feel better. That was the feeling I had after two years. So I started thinking about it. And I'm like, OK, what could cause this? Was I just always in a perpetual state of hunger? Or what's the deal? So I'm like, OK, I'll try this out for a little bit. This seems to have worked. But I'm not going to say it's a success after just one day or one week. So after my like one week meeting again, I noticed that I was able to wake up in the morning and I could get out of bed. No energy issues there. I didn't have to use an alarm actually, which was crazy because I was known for, you know, never waking up and always sleeping in. And my suicidal ideation and depression was the main thing I noticed besides my weight. It was almost completely gone. I just had this excitement for life again.

[video] 10:38 And I had changed nothing other than the diet. I mean, my life was the exact same. And if anything, it was more chaotic. So it told me that I was missing some essential nutrient or some part of my body that needed that. Almost no water retention was happening. And after a month being this way and eating meat again and just not restricting, not carb overloading, I can say that the only time I really retained water is the week of my period, which is scientifically accurate. So my skin also cleared up, um, and I don't have a skin routine. So like I didn't do anything special. I just literally like stopped carb overloading. Uh, so here I am now I'm happier than I've been in two years and it sounds like an infomercial or something, but I really like, it's my reality. I feel so much better. Um, I'm not like morally torn anymore and it's kind of a hard thing to describe to people.

[video] 11:40 It just feels like things are a lot better in my life and it feels like my social relationships have kind of cured themselves of, you know, this constant disparity of like what I'm eating versus what you're eating and this very like I'm going to look down on you attitude. I just want to list all of the symptoms, and I've planned this out and thought this through, of every single symptom I had before I was eating meat and dairy. And this is everything that has been cured by eating meat in four weeks. Excessive bloating, extreme water retention, obviously, weight gain. I was having some skin texture, so not just acne, but just a lot of weird rash-like symptoms. Depression and anxiety.

[video] 12:26 lethargy overeating excessive hunger I was always hungry I had to stuff myself and then I'd be hungry an hour later apathy mood swings irritability social isolation um post meal nausea so that's something that happened was I would be very nauseated after I would eat a big vegan meal um and it was just like this weird like queasy feeling and I just kind of got used to it um And I was also losing a lot of hair when I was vegan. And my hair has grown a little bit. I mean, it's only been a month, but my hair lady has noticed that it's gotten better. Back pain is gone after a meal. Like, that was a big thing was my back would hurt after a meal because all of the water would go, like, straight through. A lot of muscle soreness. It would be weird. Like I would wake up in the morning after doing no exercise and my muscles would hurt and it was just very strange. That's pretty much gone now completely.

[video] 13:26 And I'd say general inflammation. I don't have as many sinus issues anymore. I have like chronic sinus infections and I still have a little bit of trouble when the weather changes. But other than that, it's like day and night. I've had no issues with inflammation. So after only about three or four weeks of normal dieting, I just feel the best that I have felt in years.

[video] 13:50 And I just truly believe that these symptoms were attributed to veganism because I tried every single type of vegan diet and none of it cured it until I ate meat and dairy again. And specifically meat. I'd say that dairy doesn't have a lot to do with it. But I can fully say that I will never go back just because it's not worth feeling so terrible physically and mentally. And now that I've done just even a tiny bit of outside research, I've realized that veganism was full of pseudoscience and a lot of anecdotal evidence. And so I was very convinced by that. And that's why I want to make this and tell people about this. Like, hey, they're going to tell you the best results that they have on their side. And they're going to give you the anecdotes and the stories, but it doesn't work for everybody. And in fact, I don't know if it really works for anybody. There's been rumors that like all of these popular vegan YouTubers have symptoms of bulimia and anorexia and things like that.

[video] 14:49 And so I just really don't want other people to fall into the same thing. And I think it's a placebo effect of seeing these beautiful skinny girls and these really jacked guys like vegan gains. And it's like, You know, you see that, and they're just eating tons of fruit and carbs and pasta and sugars. And that's what really told me, like, oh, I can just eat as many carbs as I want. Like, carbs don't make you fat. And at the end of the day, that was what was causing my weight gain. So I just – I got tired of feeling that way. I am a teenage girl. You know, I don't want to be gaining weight. So – and it just – it was crazy how much indoctrination there was.

15:30 Yeah. What exactly did you eat as a vegan?

[video] 15:36 It was very repetitive. That's one thing I will say is that it is a lot of carbs, but it was also a lot of the same carbs. So what I would eat typically for dinner, it would be potato-based or pasta-based. So for example, I would have a baked potato with a bunch of stuff on it with a bunch of veggies and some fruit. Breakfast was mainly fruit.

[video] 16:01 I would do very starch-based pasta. So, like, I was kind of on the gluten-free thing for a little bit, and I was having a ton of pasta every night. And I would have, like, a tomato sauce, or I would make vegan cheese sauce. And that was exclusively carbs as well, because it was, like, cashews and just all these ingredients, like nutritional yeast. So I would say, like, to answer that question, mainly carbs. I did try to put a little bit of protein in as a vegan. I tried to put in some black beans, some kidney beans, chickpeas, normal peas. But it was, yeah, a lot of carbs.

16:42 Yeah, okay. You don't have to answer this, but what happened to you and your vegetarian boyfriend?

[video] 16:51 We're actually still together. Yeah, his family is not happy about what I did by going back, but yeah.

17:00 Yeah, okay. And what does he think about the meet?

[video] 17:06 It's so funny. I talked to him about this so many times before I started eating meat again. I was like, what would you do? Like, what do you think? And he, honestly, I don't think he cares. He tries to make a show of it, like, you know, oh, I'm not going to kiss you if you eat that. But I think mainly... he's like the same one in the family because he doesn't want to go vegan like he's fine vegetarian so he says it's fine as long as i'm happy and as long as i'm healthy like he's seen the positive difference so i think he's actually happy i did it but he'll never admit it yeah that's nice yeah did you also take any supplements such as b12 or anything Yeah, so I was on that train of, like, the only supplement you need as a vegan is B12. And honestly, I probably should have been taking other things. But yeah, I always took a plant-based B12 every single day. And I'd say the only thing that really helped me with that I could feel the difference with was my hair loss.

[video] 18:05 I noticed that if I stopped taking it, my hair would fall out a lot. But it didn't really help anything else.

18:12 Yeah, okay. Would you say that veganism is just a trend? Or what's the purpose of it? And where is it heading? What do you think? What's the future of it?

[video] 18:22 That's interesting to think about because I definitely think it's a trend, but I think that people who jump on the trend genuinely believe that they're doing a great moral service and a great ethical service to the world. And, you know, there's a lot of talk about if everyone goes vegan by this year, then we're going to have, you know, less deforestation, less, you know, droughts and less climate change, less world hunger. I don't believe that's true for many reasons. I think that the future of veganism would be very unhealthy for most people. I think even more people would be sick than they are now, especially in America. I think that in the future, there's probably going to be a lot more people that go vegan. I've seen the plant-based milk and all of that skyrocket in sales. It's kind of unfortunate because I think a lot more people are going to do this, and then after two or three years, they're going to fall off, and then a new wave of people is going to do it.

[video] 19:22 That's really what I've seen in the YouTube community is like it exploded when I was 15 and everybody was trying it. And then now around this time, I see a lot of YouTubers coming out and being like, oh, yeah, I don't do this anymore. Like it was so bad for me. So I think the future of veganism is bleak. I don't want to see it. I don't want people to go through it, but I think it will happen. I think people will learn from their own mistakes. did you have any other vegan friends besides the family of your boyfriend any other contacts nothing no I mean literally no one so I live in Ohio so it's it's like a Midwest state and a lot of people don't believe in veganism out here um I met some online friends but a lot of them I didn't keep in contact with because it just so happened that not only were they vegan they were gluten-free waste-free like crazy people and so they were very like difficult and toxic.

[video] 20:16 But no, I didn't have any contact with anyone who was vegan in my personal life. I actually almost converted a lot of people, and a lot of my friends would come to me and say, hey, I want to try this, but no one ended up sticking with it.

20:30 Okay. Were you also into the morals, and did you feel sorry for the animals and all of that?

[video] 20:39 Yeah, I... Yeah, that was probably the hardest part. That was the last thing that was keeping me from eating meat was thinking about, you know, if I do this, like, I'm making this choice that goes against the morals I've been holding for two years, and I still haven't really figured out how I justify it to myself, but I have figured out that, you know, my health has to be above that of an animal that I'm not even going to ever see. I'm not ever going to be around them, and I've realized that, like, Also, as humans, part of the vegan propaganda is that we're frugivores. And I have a hard time believing that because a lot of the features of the human body are just contrary to that. So I've just kind of gotten over that ethical standstill by telling myself, like, I have to be healthy. And also, like, in the wild, things kill things. You know, there's a food chain always. It's always a food chain, no matter who's eating what.

[video] 21:37 So it's still difficult for me a lot of times because I'm like, am I doing the right thing? Like, am I just being selfish? But I have a lot of research to do on the ethical implications of meat eating. And I think that once I gain a lot more knowledge and insight, and especially through channels like yours, I'm going to come to a better conclusion than when I was vegan.

21:57 Vegans believe that they don't have to be part of the food chain and nature because they live in the city. What do you think about that?

[video] 22:06 Yeah, that was something I really subscribed to. That was my argument a lot of the times. I think that that's just crazy. I mean, when you look at the way we live now, we have a lot of modern conveniences, but that doesn't mean we don't need things we needed as cavemen. And that's kind of the whole argument is like, we needed this when we were starving, but now that we have supermarkets, we don't need it. Well, yeah, we don't need it. to live, but to live healthily, I believe that we evolved and we need it. So I just think that if you do more than two seconds of deep thought, you can kind of unravel that whole entire argument.

22:40 Yeah. Is there anything important you would like to say to any vegans who are watching? Anything special you learned? Any message experience?

[video] 22:51 Yeah. So that's why I'm making this. I'm making this because I know there's a lot of vegans out there who you know, whether you're a militant vegan or you're just kind of the person that sits back and does your thing, you know, I was in the same position as you. I fully believe that I would never touch meat or dairy for the rest of my life. And I think that it's important to get out of that, you know, I have to do this. I think a lot of vegans are in this mindset right now, watching this and being like, I don't know, like, I have to do this. I have to do it for the animals. I have to do it for world hunger. Like, this is healthy food. gonna get cancer I'm gonna get sick if I eat anything else and I just want people to know that that's not the case you know I overnight felt better after two years and I have no bias that would make me feel otherwise like nobody was telling me like hey eat meat again like nobody was forcing that on me so just do your own research and you know just for fun even if you're not planning on switching from veganism

[video] 23:50 do some research on the opposite side and see what you find, you know, see if you find any benefits to eating meat and weigh it out for yourself. Don't just think that this is something you need to do forever. And don't think that, you know, the moral shaming, like you don't need to listen to that, like do what's best for you.

24:10 Anything else you would like to add?

[video] 24:14 I just want to, again, add that, like, you know, you're not a bad person for eating meat, so don't believe that. Don't shame other people for it. And there is a whole world of science out there that has so much information that a lot of public vegan figures won't talk about. They'll shut it down immediately, and they're very closed off to it. And so I just encourage everyone to please go out and look at that stuff. You know, look at channels like this one. Look at articles that tell you the benefits of eating meat. do research on the keto diet. You know, you don't have to do it for yourself, but research about, you know, the effects of eating meat and where we came from as a species and why we evolved to be so intelligent and all of that. And you'll find a lot of the answer is just meat. And so just do your own research and don't take my word. Don't take any one person's word, but listen to your body and listen to actual science.

25:09 All right. Thank you for sharing.

[video] 25:12 Thank you for having me on here. This is awesome. I love your channel so much.

25:16 Thank you.