Ex-Vegan (2+ Years): Veganism Destroyed My Mental Health - Anxiety & Depression

Watch on YouTube · 2018-08-13 · 55 min

[video] 0:00 It's Panda, and I've basically been vegan, like, strict vegan, meaning eating no animal products, for two years. Though, throughout, I would say about six years of my life, I was a pescatarian as well, and during certain periods of my pescatarianism, there were times where I barely ate any fish, dairy and eggs. So I would say maybe within the time I was a pescatarian, I would say for two years of it, I was, I was pretty much a vegan. It was like something you only ate maybe like once every two months, to be honest. So how did I get into veganism? I remember Going back really really early into my childhood. I remember when I was about 10 11 years old I was actually in Iran. I was born in Britain, but I've got I'm ethnically Persian.

[video] 0:57 So my family from Iran, so I was at a wedding and I remember Like in Iran, there's a tradition where when you get married you have to kill a goat and jump over the blood of the

[video] 1:15 the blood pouring out of the neck of the goat. And I remember looking at it. That was the first time I ever seen anything like that. I never really had the connection between what meat is and the fact it came from an animal. But even then, even though I saw that, it shocked me. I thought it was disgusting. I kind of sort of justified that at the time more as a necessary evil. I thought it was something humans had to do. So, in terms of how I actually got more into vegetarianism, well, at school I noticed that a few of my friends were vegetarian and they didn't eat meat, and I kind of thought, ooh, that's kind of cool. Like, there's people who don't do that. Like, I didn't know it was a thing at the time until I made friends with these people at school, and they were, like, telling me a little about, like, documentaries like Cowspiracy, Earthlings, Forks and Knives. So, I would say...

[video] 2:11 When I was around 14, that's when I was interested in veganism. I idealized it, but when I talked to my parents about it, they were really against it. They were just like, look, just be a pescatarian for now. To be honest, I don't think at the time I was able to give up some of the stuff I enjoyed, like the cakes and chocolates and all of that. Basically, the unhealthy stuff. I kind of thought, Like, meh, I'll go pescatarian, but I did want to end up going vegan. That was my goal, but I knew whilst I lived with my parents, I thought it would just be easier for me to stay pescatarian. But even that, they were still pretty against that as well, but they were kind of like, well, it's your choice.

[video] 3:00 I remember when I went to, like, I go to Iran quite often to visit my family and on many occasions, even just as a pescatarian when I was going to Iran, like, many of my family friends were just basically telling me how I'm going against human nature and, Like, the doctors in my family, they're basically telling me that I'm killing myself. I'm making myself mentally deficient. So, like, in Iran, they're, like, very anti, like, this whole, like, even vegetarianism, let alone veganism. So, but at the time, I kind of saw it as, oh, they're just telling me this because they don't want to eat. like the stuff they like, they're just only eating meat for the sake of pleasure and convenience, as what many vegetarians and vegans would say. So, the way I kind of saw it is, oh, they're just saying this to me because they feel bad, and I'm actually doing a good thing, and they're just trying to bring me down.

[video] 3:56 So, during this time, even when I was pescetarian, I did actually experience a bit of anxiety and fatigue. And I did get a blood test, and I had to go on, I had to actually go on iron tablets and vitamin D supplements for a bit. So even during just me being a pescatarian, I still had issues, and maybe this could be just because I come from a background where we are really meat-heavy, like meat is pretty much most of our meals. If not, like there's dairy and eggs. So maybe that could have been why... Even just still even eating fish, I still had a bit of issues. But it wasn't anything terrible, but there were some issues. So...

[video] 4:42 It was really when I went into university, and I was really involved with the metalhead community, and many of my metalhead friends were vegan, and many of the bands that we liked, like Arch Enemy, Crater, Cattle, Decapitation, Between the Buried and Me, all of these bands, a lot of them were vegan. And I also really got into, was it Vegan Black Metal Chef, and who else? I also really got into more Nimmi Frost as well at the time, and to me, it just seemed like this really alternative sort of movement. It's like, oh, we discovered something cool, and everyone else, oh, they're just kind of stuck to their old ways, and we're the cool people, I guess. At the time, I also really considered it to be something really healthy. I'm eating a lot of plants. It's cleansing, and I'm not eating the corpses of animals.

[video] 5:42 I just saw it as... I mean, for me, whilst obviously there was the health stuff that I was sold, but I would say for me, the main reason was really on ethical grounds. As I said, this was something I felt since I was 14. So, I mean, what really actually got me to finally go consider actually being vegan was that many people kept on telling me that if you just have fortified foods, you'll be fine. Because to me, the idea of having to take a daily supplement just to me didn't seem right. But if I thought, oh, I'm just buying like soy milks, oat milks, almond milks, whatever, like most of them have like the B12, vitamin D. So I kind of thought, well, that's fine. Like to me, it kind of seemed like a logical, rational, if anything, an intelligent thing to do to choose the cruelty-free option.

[video] 6:40 So, I mean, I didn't go vegan instantly. It was something I had to do gradually, like at first. maybe I was like only eating like maybe like a can of sardines like maybe like once every two weeks and then slowly and slowly I reduced it um and once I actually cut it out I really felt proud of myself and I did feel better but I'm not quite sure if I felt better because I was vegan um perhaps maybe I just felt better because of the ego I had for not killing animals uh I felt like I'm doing something great for the planet, and I was just helping the world, essentially. That's really how I felt. So, also during this time, I also started to develop pretty bad anxiety and depression, to the point where I had to see my GP quite regularly, and I was put onto antidepressants, which

[video] 7:41 I mean, looking back now, it actually does seem pretty inconsistent, although many vegans seem to do this, considering the fact many, like, antidepressants, they are tested on animals, but many don't seem to have an issue with this. But we'll get into that a bit later. So, I mean, a lot of the times, because My mum would post me articles telling me that there's a link between depression and veganism. Like I said, to me, I always saw it as my mum's just trying to... she feels bad about her diet and she's just showing me all of this to bring me down and to make me go back to their old ways because she isn't willing to go vegan. And the way I kind of saw it was, oh, I think it's just more people who are anxious and depressed are just more likely to go vegan. So that's the way I justified it.

[video] 8:36 I didn't really see, at the time, I didn't even really think that me being vegan was causing the mental health issues I was having. So, I mean, a lot of the times whilst I was vegan, I noticed that I was starting to get really angry at people eating. I never really expressed it. Because I always like to try and be nice, but I did deep inside feel this big anger of, oh, why are you eating the suffering and all of that? So, a lot of the times when I was just by myself, I had to constantly watch factory farming videos just to keep telling my mind that, look, if you eat that, you're basically justifying the animal holocaust. That's the way I thought about it. So... I had to keep watching his videos to basically train my mind to tell me that, no, you shouldn't do that. It's kind of like a religion if you think about it in some ways.

[video] 9:36 So, I mean, for about, I'd say, my first year as a vegan, I actually gained weight. I know many people don't get this, but I think for me, the reason I gained weight was perhaps it, I mean, I didn't feel this at the time, but perhaps I just wasn't satisfied, so I kind of felt like I kept on eating and eating and eating, because I kind of felt like I wasn't getting the adequate nutrition. A lot of the times, like many popular vegans, they'll promote like, look, you need to eat more calories, you need to get more nutrition. I always kept on reading a lot. When I was vegan, I kept on having to read a lot of literature, like how to get complete protein, iron, zinc, calcium, and vitamin A.

[video] 10:26 And I also kept on sort of thinking, well, how on earth can I get vitamin A and, like, what is it, omega-3, ALA? And I kept on thinking, oh, well, my body can just convert it. It's fine. So, I always had to keep assessing my diet all the time. And even... Though I was assessing it all the time, I was always thinking about food. I still was having issues. So, there are many times I had to keep changing. Like, for instance, I would up my protein. I would eat a lot of protein. One thing I had, there were times, you know you can get those packets of the fake meats. I would eat an entire one in a sitting. I also really got into energy drinks as well, like the ones where they fortify stuff. I never even used to drink energy drinks before I was vegan, and I really kept on having to have a lot.

[video] 11:23 Maybe this was just because I was deficient, and I felt like I had to keep getting the vitamins. Was it like Red Bull and all of that? They put a lot of B vitamins in it.

[video] 11:36 And then, at this point, during my veganism, there was the whole soy boy sort of scare, like, oh, if you eat soy, it's really bad for you, and all of that. So, I really sort of tried to decrease my soy. I started getting into protein powders, peanuts, lentils.

[video] 11:59 I was starting to get dissatisfied, because at least when you have soy, even though there's issues with it, you kind of at least feel like you're eating something meaty. It kind of brings that into your psyche. But at this point, I just kind of started to feel like all I'm just eating is just mush. And I also at this point started taking a vegan multivitamin. And the way I justified it was, well, most humans have to take vitamin D. So I thought, well, it's pretty much the same thing. It's just got other stuff in it. So I would say maybe like a year and a half, I kind of actually started to realize that maybe I don't have the healthiest diet, especially that I told you I was drinking a lot of energy drinks. And

[video] 13:02 I just kept on eating a lot of stuff just to feel filled and just to try. So I was gaining a lot of weight as well, but I was dissatisfied. But I always felt like every time when I went to bed, I was just like, I was so happy that I was helping the environment and the animals. Like to me, that was the main thing that was making me happy. Yeah. Also, at this point, a lot of the times, my mum would tell me, like, hey, I think your hair's falling out. There's a lot of hair in the shower. There's a lot of hair in your bed. Even the cleaner started noticing it. She's just like, there's hair everywhere. And she was going on about the spots on my skin. And I kept on thinking, like, I've only just been doing this for a year and a half. Maybe it's detox or... Or maybe she's just trying to push me off the track.

[video] 13:53 Because this is the thing, I always feel like when I kept on talking to the online vegan community, they always kind of like to keep on insisting when people criticize aspects of the symptoms you have or what you eat in your diet. They always try and be like, oh, they're only just saying this because they feel bad about what they're doing and they're trying to make themselves feel better by bringing you down. So that's why I kept on thinking.

[video] 14:22 So, I really, I just started to just keep getting so, so anxious, and I even ended up, on a few occasions, whilst I was at Universe, I ended up actually having a few suicidal attempts, but I never really linked it to my vegans, I just thought it was just something else.

[video] 14:46 Also, during this period, I also got very heavily involved with weed, which I never really even had a... I was so anti-drugs before and until that point and perhaps maybe the reason I resorted to weed is because I didn't want to be suicidal and I kind of thought, well, this is what's giving me the high I need that I wasn't getting from my diet, I guess. I was just so involved with a lot of these vegan groups and...

[video] 15:20 It really felt so cult-y, but I kind of, at the time, really liked it, because I felt like it kind of gave me a purpose, a reason, like, I felt like it felt like we were just doing something amazing for the world, and, like, The reason I sort of say it was really religious, like, for instance, like, I remember one time I mentioned that, oh, one time my friend, like, bought me a curry, and I didn't realize it had, like, a milk protein, and they'll still be like, oh, my God, your friend's, like, the worst person ever. They're, like, justifying, like, the rape of cows and all of that. So I started to become really anxious just hanging around non-vegan people because I always had the feeling that, oh, like, They're going to give me something that's not vegan and I didn't want to just be involved with any of that.

[video] 16:19 I really felt like I was getting really isolated, to be honest. I started developing a bit of a hatred for my family. Every time I open the fridge, I'm just like, there's disgusting stuff in the fridge.

[video] 16:33 I even started throwing away stuff that weren't vegan, because I thought this was just horrible, like this is something you shouldn't eat, it's bad. So, I was just going crazy, to be honest. So, as I said, since I was quite suicidal at university, I had to end up dropping out, and after a few months of dropping out, I got to the point where I really needed to get a job because I was just running out of money. I was getting to the point where if I didn't get a job, I would have had to go on some benefits scheme.

[video] 17:13 I was close, so I ended up finding a job in a sushi counter. We had to deal with a lot of raw fish. At this point, I had to moderate myself because the way I saw it is, well, I mean, luckily for me, since I'm kind of libertarian leaning, I'm kind of against the whole benefits sort of thing. To me, I kind of saw it as, well, I think it's a lesser evil for me to work for a company that sold animal foods, as opposed to me being like, no, I'm not going to work there. I'm just going to go and benefit. At least I had that within me that allowed me to sort of do this job.

[video] 17:56 Actually, the sushi counter is actually in the supermarket, so I was like right next to the meat counter, so I was just basically surrounded by raw meat, raw fish, like every time when I went to work. So, a lot of times when I was at work, there were times where I had panic attacks, I was really fatigued, and there were times where I ended up missing work as well. I mean, at the time, I kind of thought it was just, oh, I was just mentally weak. I'm just shit, everything. I'm just a weak person.

[video] 18:33 So, as I said, I really didn't want to go into some benefits scheme or anything. So, I kind of thought, well, what will help me motivate me to go to work? And I kept on thinking really deeply about this, how I can go upon this.

[video] 18:53 One thing I came across whilst being involved with the online vegan community world, I noticed a few people talking about freeganism. And freeganism for people who don't know, it's when you basically are vegan, but you put an exception to things that are thrown in the bin. So to me, I'm like, hmm, I can actually incorporate that in work. Because in my job, when we go in first morning, like at 6.30, we have to throw away all the sushis in order for us to make fresh sushis for the day. So what I started doing is I would keep a few of the sushis whilst I was throwing it away, and I started to eat them for my lunch.

[video] 19:43 And the way I justified this was, well, it's actually better for the environment for me to eat something that's about to be thrown away than for me to just throw all of it away and go and buy my separate vegan meal. So, I first started actually eating breaded shrimp, which, that was okay, but I would say when I really started to notice a difference was when I started eating the raw salmon.

[video] 20:13 I actually, it was kind of nice when I had it for the first time. It felt really firm and that wasn't something I was used to, especially since at this point I pretty much cut out my soy because of the health issues and it felt really nice to eat something like a bit firm again. But even whilst I was eating, I kept on telling myself that this is wrong, and a lot of the times, like in the vegan online community, they kept on telling me I'm just basically normalizing eating animals, and I'm justifying carnism, I could get mercury poisoning, so like, all of these sorts of things. But at the same time, I would say what kept on helping me What helped me actually go along with it, I kept saying, I'm doing it for the environment. I'm doing it for the environment.

[video] 21:08 So I noticed that when I started eating the raw fish, I was a lot better at going to work. I wasn't missing work anymore. And if anything, I actually felt like I wanted to go work, because that was the only time I was not eating vegan. Um, and, um, during this time, actually, I actually did go on holiday for a week. So for one week I wasn't going to work. And obviously at this point I wasn't, I wasn't, I wasn't able to find anything that was being thrown in the bin. So I started to feel bad again because I wasn't eating any animal foods. And at this point, I think I really started to sense that, Hmm. Maybe my veganism has something to do with this. Maybe it is actually my veganism that's what's causing me to feel anxious.

[video] 22:06 So, I mean, I still wasn't ready to be like, okay, I don't want to be vegan anymore. So what I ended up doing is I thought, okay, maybe I'm just deficient in something. And So I started reading more about what's in animal foods that we can't get from plant-based foods. I wanted to understand more of the science behind it. And what I actually ended up realizing, that multivitamin I was taking wasn't a great source. All the fortified foods I was having wasn't a great source. It turns out the vitamin B12 and D that they use in fortified foods is a very, very poor source. and our bodies can't even absorb it that well. It turns out that if I wanted to get a better source of B12, I had to switch to methylcobalamin, which is a better source, which does cost more. I also started going to the gym.

[video] 23:06 I developed a gym routine at this point, and I was not gaining any muscle whatsoever. And I realized if I had to do this, I just had to supplement much more. And as I was sort of just figuring it out, I was just researching loads of websites and watching reviews by vegans. I realized that this is actually pretty expensive for me to adequately supplement what I needed. And then I was just kind of thinking that it kind of struck to me that Is this really a plant-based diet? To me, this kind of seems more like a chemical-based diet. It kind of seems like I'm sick. Someone who has to take five or six supplements, that doesn't really seem like something a healthy person would do. But I still was sold onto the whole veganism.

[video] 24:03 I started watching more, I guess you could say, honest vegans, like our natural vegan and vegan police who really started to show what they're eating. And I was just like, Oh my God, how much are they having? This is crazy. And even they were constantly going, oh yeah, this vitamin doesn't work, I should try this vitamin instead. So even though they were having all of these vitamins, even those vitamins weren't necessarily working and they had to try other ones. So it kind of seemed like they were kind of doing a bit of an experiment on their body.

[video] 24:42 Another thing I started to notice with some vegans was, like, for instance, a natural vegan. She did a video about how she's on antidepressants. And to me, I really started to feel it can't be a coincidence that many vegans seem to have issues with mental health as well. And why is it that many, like, There are also some vegans who also have plastic surgery, which that's also not great for the animals as well, because you have to do a lot of animal testing in order to have the facilities to have plastic surgery. Someone like Free, it shocked me that someone that goes on about she cares about the animals and all that, and she went and got something so vain.

[video] 25:32 So, to me, it kind of felt like, do all of these vegans actually care about the animals, or do they kind of like the ego and fad of being vegan? Do they kind of just like showing off, like, oh, this is my vegan makeup, this is my vegan clothing? Like, it just, to me, kind of just seemed a bit like a trend. Like, I started to get that vibe from veganism. Um... Also, around this point, I'd say about five months ago, I actually became pretty good friends with this girl who was actually an ex-vegan, and she's now eating paleo. At this point, I was so emotionally into veganism, so I kept on going on about the animal suffering, factory farming, and all of that.

[video] 26:22 And one thing she said to me that really struck me was, like, she said that she herself wasn't even completely against all the emotional arguments we can say, but it came to the point that she's like, what's the point of all of these arguments of, oh, killing animals is bad and, like, we shouldn't milk animals, getting eggs is bad, when humans need animal products to sustain optimum health. It's kind of like saying, well, a lion shouldn't go and kill a deer because it's not nice to animals. It's irrelevant. If you need it, then you need it. The whole emotional argument doesn't hold ground if it's something we need. And she also started to challenge, because see, the thing is, she was an ex-vegan, so she knew how to challenge me. So, like, she kept on asking me about K2.

[video] 27:20 And she told me about vitamin A, and at that point, I thought, well, I can have carrots. She's like, yeah, but you need to be able to convert it, and not everyone can do that. At this point, I kind of felt I actually think she has better arguments, but she's only doing this because she didn't do veganism properly, and I'm going to do it properly. That's how I felt. We did actually talk a lot about bivalves as well, which that actually got me interested, but I did actually end up eating it a few times, and I threw up on three occasions. I was that desperate to want to be able to have bivalves, but I couldn't. So, for me, the only option was to just go on loads and loads of supplements. And this was around the point, actually, when I started to find more ex-vegans on YouTube.

[video] 28:19 And also, like, for instance, I watched a few of your videos. Like, the first video I watched by you was, finally, the one with Monami Frost. And... In the video, she was holding a really big jug of water, and you were saying that water dehydrates you. And that kind of confused me initially, but it got me really interested because I did sense, whilst I was vegan, I developed a big, big craving for ice cold water. Not even on a hot day, even if it was just a normal day, I just always wanted to drink ice cold water. I never understood what that meant.

[video] 29:06 until one time I saw Google, like, why am I craving ice cold water all the time? And it turns out that people who like crave really icy things are actually deficient in iron. But that confused me because I thought my supplements was giving me iron. So I thought, well, I thought I was taking care of that. Why not for my, according to my cravings with, what is it, icy water? Why am I still deficient? And it's really interesting, because then you look at all these vegan YouTubers, they always like to freeze all their fruits, freeze bananas, blend them. And to me, I'm like, is this all to just cover up for an iron deficiency, perhaps? I don't know. I mean, I'm not a nutritionist or anything. But I just started to notice a bit of a trend with that.

[video] 30:00 Also, during the spirit, I remember one time I was sitting next to my mum, and we were watching this documentary about athletes. And there was this one bit in the documentary where they were going on about hydrating after exercising. So they just gave the athletes, what was it, like water, milk, and orange juice, I think. Yeah, yeah. But I remember there was definitely milk. And I think they put coconut water as well, but I can't remember. But there was definitely milk. And during the study, the documentary, they found that milk hydrates you far better than any of the other things. And that really confused me. I was like, what? How comes milk hydrates you? I thought water's hydrating. I just felt like there was just a lot of things that were starting to be quite inconsistent with veganism. I also...

[video] 30:59 watched one of your videos when you were going on about animal blood, and you were going on about how milk is essentially made from animal blood. And I don't know why, but as soon as you said that, I really started to crave animal blood. Because as I said, at work, I'm surrounded by a lot of meat, a fish. And every time I looked at meat, I'm just like, I really, really just want to have the animal blood. But I felt so bad for believing this.

[video] 31:32 It really made me feel bad. But I kind of felt like maybe this is what I need.

[video] 31:41 I guess the way to put it is I really think you doing all those ex-vegan videos really helped me to reconsider my vegan mindset because I was watching those videos and seeing all these people you interviewed and they were going on about all of their supplements and how it didn't even work.

[video] 32:05 And then you also started talking about how these are like chemicals, like they're derived from petroleum or made in the lab. And that's really interesting because you never ever hear a vegan ever, they always keep going on about where the meat is sourced, how the milk is obtained, but they never ever go on about how the supplement is made. And it's interesting how Many of the popular vegans, they never really show their supplements. They kind of like to hide it. I didn't like that. It seemed pretty dishonest. I also didn't like the fact that I was drew... The reason I even became vegan in the first place was because I thought I was just going to be fine having fortified foods. Because like most people who aren't vegan, they just kind of feel funny about taking supplements. So I kind of felt tricked.

[video] 33:02 I felt like I was tricked because I thought fortified foods would be fine. But it isn't.

[video] 33:10 So I also started to learn about this farmer called Simon Fairley. He was going on about actually veganism isn't actually that superior for the environment. And this environmental figure like I can't remember the exact statistics, but it was like, if you eat meat, you're like, it's this much worse for the environment, but if you're vegan, it's like that much. I can't remember the numbers to my head, but he was sort of saying that this isn't a really, this is like a figure divided by the United Nations, and it's not actually completely true.

[video] 33:53 One thing that he actually brought up, which I thought was interesting, is that these days we don't really eat all of the animal. We're kind of accustomed to only eat just the muscle. We don't ever really eat the bones or the organs and any of that. And that really...

[video] 34:15 struck a little memory in me, because when I was in Iran, a lot of Iranians, they're really into eating the organs of the animals. There would be an entire restaurant dedicated to just selling liver, or just heart, or brain. We don't really see that in the West, which is interesting. I'm not quite sure why it's like that here. And he was going on about how it's essential for animals to graze the land.

[video] 34:47 What other thing? And vegans like to go on about how it's really great for the environment and all that, but many of them fail to consider that a lot of the plants we grow, not all of them are necessarily, they don't grow well enough that it's good for consumption. A good example I can bring up is avocados. At work, we get so many avocados because obviously we use a lot of avocados for the sushi. There are so many occasions where we have to end up chucking two or three boxes of avocados away just because they're all brown. But we never have that problem with fish, for instance. We've never had to chuck away a fish. They're all fine if you store it correctly when you fish the fish.

[video] 35:35 you wouldn't need to throw it away but with avocados like i could see my managers were spending so much money on just bloody avocados all of the time because we always just kept on having to throw it away um so there was a lot of these sorts of things going like this whole inconsistencies um seeing a bit of hypocrisies and also i would say the main thing for me is just the fact that It's not a diet optimum for humans. And as someone who, like, I consider myself someone who's against feminism, I do really like to look into tradition. And I notice the inconsistency with myself, that I'm really into learning about tradition. But I don't even eat a traditional diet. And so I thought, you know what, if I'm really into learning about tradition, why not learn more about tradition in terms of diets? And I started to learn about diets around all over the world.

[video] 36:32 And you don't really see much of a history with even vegetarianism, and there are only countries that do have a history with vegetarianism is India, China, and Japan. Those are the three countries vegans like to refer to. Which is really funny, because both of those three countries are turning away from vegetarianism. Most of them are increasing their meat and dairy egg intake. It's the West that are heavily trying to decrease their intake from, I don't know, pressure from somewhere. One thing that really interested me was the reason why, at the time,

[video] 37:25 A lot of governments in India like the fact many people eating a plant-based diet was because since they weren't getting the adequate nutrition, it allowed them to control them better because their brains weren't receiving everything they needed. Because when you actually look into all of the stuff that's lacking in a plant-based or vegan diet, like creating kerosene, heme, iron, All of the stuff that's lacking is all to do with brain function and muscle function. Isn't that just basically making people weak? At this point, I thought I didn't want to become an experiment for the supplement companies. Because the only reason veganism is this new thing is just because we have the technology to create a lot of supplements.

[video] 38:25 That's the only reason why.

[video] 38:29 Let's put it this way, to anyone that's vegan and watching this, why was there never veganism in our history? Like the only case of veganism you'd ever hear about is only when people were fasting for maybe like a few months. You wouldn't ever find a population who were just vegan throughout their life. The only reason we have veganism now is just because of supplements. This is why, to me, it's kind of inaccurate to call veganism a plant-based diet. It's a chemical-based diet.

[video] 39:08 Once I've started to get to these sorts of conclusions, I thought at this point, I don't think I'm not going to be staying vegan. But I would say for me, the toughest part from transitioning away was probably the mindset I've developed. Maybe some vegans who secretly watch your video may face this issue where maybe they have started to accept that they don't have a healthy diet or that they have to have a little supplements but because see this thing is being it vegans are so good at like tricking like guilt tripping you into this whole emotional argument to the point where like if you end up leaving it's like oh you don't want to end up becoming those ex-vegans like they really sort of hate them and all of that so I guess for me what really helps me

[video] 40:05 push me was honestly, I'll say, I really just started to, I know this is something you'll hear a lot from ex-vegans, but it's more, you start to tune into your body. I actually find people who maybe aren't as intellectual, they don't go and read all the whole was learning about vegan nutrition and all that. Most of these types of people end up giving veganism maybe after a few weeks or months. But I kind of felt like the only reason I persisted to two years was just because I kept on reading all of these journals and articles and all of that. And that's what kind of helped me

[video] 40:49 But if you just do something as simple as just tuning in, and for me, what I kept on feeling was I really need animal blood. I kept on feeling that all of the time. I actually ended up breaking it, besides having the raw fish that I was having for free at work when I watched this video when you were going on about raw milk. That's interesting because you never actually hear vegans criticizing raw milk. They always just criticize the processed milks that we have in our supermarkets. They never, ever bring up raw milk. And I started learning more about that. And it was really interesting to me that actually the whole lactose thing isn't even an issue if you have raw milk. So I thought, look,

[video] 41:45 I care about animals, I care about animal ethics, why don't I go and source it from a good supplier? So, I ended up finding a supplier that does raw goat's milk. I specifically went for goat's milk since goat's milk isn't, people don't drink it as much, so there isn't a demand to get as much goat's milk compared to, let's say, cow's milk. Um, and like the one I found about, like, they, they help, uh, we, uh, the, the, the, the baby goats still gets the milk from the mom. So, um, they still have it for like about a month. Uh, and then they slowly wean it off. So to me, I'm like. This is the most difficult thing I'm doing. I'm helping supporting animals, grazing the land, which is essential for farming. One thing vegans fail to consider is grazing is such an important part of agriculture.

[video] 42:44 If we don't raise animals for them to graze, we lose out on a lot of land that we can have food. So I ended up buying this. If anyone's interested, I actually have a video up where I show my reaction to drinking the goat's milk. I'm going to be real here. It was really emotionally tough for me to do it until I actually drank it. Oh my god. I felt like my entire world was just taken away. I...

[video] 43:21 It was so nice to have something that was actually really, really creamy for once. Like, not fake creamy, but actually creamy. And... I felt like after, let's say, about an hour or two, I felt so much calmer. I felt like I was connected to nature. I kind of felt high, if anything, but high in a good way, in a way that it was real. It wasn't like some drug I was doing to just phase me out. It actually helped me get in tune with nature. And I started to focus a lot better. And another thing I also experienced, experience over the duration of having the raw goat's yogurt over, let's say, about three weeks, my teeth started to become firmer. I didn't even realize my teeth were so loose. It was really weird because I was so trapped in the vegan mindset.

[video] 44:19 I didn't even realize I was experiencing a lot of deficiencies.

[video] 44:26 I started to feel stronger. I don't feel anywhere near as anxious anymore.

[video] 44:35 Don't feel depressed at all. I mean, I'm not saying it's completely gone away, but I'll definitely say by about 80%, it's been reduced. A lot more motivated in my life, and I'm like, why did I wait so long to do this?

[video] 44:53 So, I guess for me,

[video] 44:59 I've realized that from talking to a lot of these paleo people, that they actually do care about animals. If anything, if you care about animals, you can actually raise the best meat, dairy, and eggs possible.

[video] 45:16 It was really interesting to me when I started talking to a lot of these ex-vegans and people who are paleo. They always keep going on about how it's important for animals to be grass-fed, how it's important for them to have a good life. Because if they don't have a good life, we don't have good meat. A lot of these ex-vegans and paleo types, they do actually care for animal welfare, but they also care for their health as well.

[video] 45:43 And that Essentially, you are going against nature if you eat this vegan diet. And you're just making yourself go crazy.

[video] 45:58 So... What was I going to say? What else did I introduce to my diet? Yeah, actually, a few days ago, for the first time I ended up... Believe it or not, I managed to... For my first red meat, I actually ended up eating it raw. It was actually at a really fancy restaurant called Duck and Waffle, if anyone's heard of it. And one thing I really liked about the restaurant was when you got the menus. It wrote down exactly where everything was sourced, like the meat, the dairy, and the eggs. And I'm like, that's really nice. And I was able to just Google up the places and see how they're raised, what sort of diet they ate. And the beef that they were serving there was grass-fed. So I thought, well, I'm basically eating an animal that's had a really good life.

[video] 46:55 And I was desperate for animal blood, because it was a craving I had for such a, for like, as soon as I watched your video. So, basically, I got steak tartare, which is, was it raw beef and raw egg? There was a little bit of other stuff as well to make it look more fancy, but it was mainly that. And when I ate that, oh my God, I felt like I was part of my family again. I felt like I was able to connect to them, and I felt like I, I just felt calm. I'll probably say the biggest feeling I had out of everything from eating animals is getting calm and it's amusing because vegans keep going on about how having animal foods is like this violent, disgusting thing when in fact they're the ones that are so violent as well. Just go and watch a vegan gains video. Like, he's crazy.

[video] 47:57 Like, to me, I've just found the impression that a lot of these vegans either are really, really angry or pretty depressed. I mean, the only vegans you meet that seem sane are the ones who've only been vegan for only like two years. Like, every vegan that you see that's been vegan for like 10, 20 years, A lot of them look like drug addicts, if I'm being honest. A lot of them look like they're really aging. And I'm just really glad that I managed to wake up from all of this after two years. Because I'm telling you, if I was having such issues, I probably would have ended up in hospital, to be honest, from malnutrition if I decided to continue to eat this way.

[video] 48:52 So, I mean, I'm just really annoyed that I got into this diet because I really did sense that I started eating a lot more unhealthy, like the whole energy drink thing. That was something I never even had to have when I wasn't vegan. But when I was vegan, I was having like two, three cans of energy drinks or like those fortified milks. I had to drink two cartons of it because I just didn't feel satisfied. Was it the goat yogurt thing? I only had to have this much. I didn't even have to drink that much to feel satisfied. Like, about a quarter of a glass was enough for me to feel the benefits of me having two cartons of the fake vegan milks.

49:44 It's very common with the energy drinks. I've heard it a million times.

[video] 49:49 Really?

49:49 Yeah. Did you have any vegan friends and do you still have contact with any of them?

[video] 49:57 I mean, my main vegan friends were at university, but I didn't really talk to them much since I've left.

50:06 Yeah.

50:08 Another question. What do you think is the future of veganism? What's going to happen?

[video] 50:17 Honestly, I feel like the main thing that's going to happen is a rise of more mental health issues. It can't be a coincidence that these two things seem to be linked. A lot more people going on medication, a lot of people having to rely on supplements.

[video] 50:38 I mean, perhaps I'm only just saying this just from my perspective in terms of what I suffered and sort of seeing other vegans going through this as well. Because most of the vegan people I knew, a lot of them were on some sort of mental health related medication.

[video] 51:01 And they haven't even been vegans long. So, to me, the future of veganism seems to be more people with mental health issues.

51:15 Yeah. Do you regret veganism or was it just a life lesson?

[video] 51:26 I kind of see it as a bit of both, to be honest. I mean, the only thing I can say that may have been positive about the fact I went vegan is the fact that I care a lot more about sourcing where I get my foods now.

[video] 51:46 But I don't know, maybe I could have came to this conclusion without being vegan. Maybe I could have learned about raw milks or grass-fed animals without having to go vegan. But I don't know, it kind of seems like a lot of people who are on more sort of paleo-type diets seem to have gone through the vegan route. So I'm not sure if I would have ended up being more conscious about what I eat. if I went vegan or not. But I'd say more of a life lesson, to be honest. I've really realized that you just can't go against human nature, whether you like it or not.

52:28 Yeah. That sums it up. Or do you want to add anything more? Anything important?

[video] 52:39 Anything important?

52:42 Anything special or any lesson you learned? Anything like that?

[video] 52:49 I guess the only thing I have to say is, like, it's mainly sort of just to people who are still vegan or who, like, they're starting to have doubts or feeling a bit weird about it. Like, going off the mindset is really tough. I'll probably say that's the hardest part. But once you actually start having the animal foods you start to realize why have I waited for this long so so just go ahead with it if you really care about animals if that's the main reason why you're vegan go and source it and that way you'll feel a little less guilty. And don't feel bad. We don't feel bad about other animals who need to rely on animals to survive.

[video] 53:48 So why should we feel bad about it ourselves when we need it?

53:54 Yes, that's what vegans need to realize.

[video] 53:59 Yeah, I guess the reason they don't realize is I do feel like there's this whole

[video] 54:09 being egotistical, like within the vegan movement, that they're kind of above it all, that they, they manage to reach like a higher level, that they're going against their instincts, so that's a good thing. So, I really feel like a lot of vegans, like myself when I was one, I saw it more as a, I'm just more intelligent, like I know more about nutrition than you, I record like whether I'm having complete proteins, I record everything in a chronometer, Like I'm doing better and then all vegans always like to bash on people who eat was it like the fake junk foods when It's really easy to bash on people who are like eating just McDonald's and all of that but rarely do you ever see vegans like Criticizing someone that's eating a healthy diet, but just so happens to have animal foods in it as well it's always there was going on about people having McDonald's and

[video] 55:07 like crisps and chocolates and all of that, which to be honest, I think there are many diets that are better than that. So it's just an easy argument to make yourself feel superior, I guess.

55:22 Okay. Well, thank you for sharing. Yeah.

[video] 55:26 Thank you.