glitches

Day 26

I can't believe it's almost over.  I have 2 more days of dedicated vegan time.  I don't think I'm going to change much when the 28 day challenge is over.  I have to say, this has been a LOT easier than I thought it would be.  In fact, in some ways I believe it's made my life easier in general.  Having a diet with very structured guidelines has made it really easy to say no to sweets, to extra calories, and to garbage foods.  There are plenty of garbage foods out there that ARE vegan, but so many more that aren't.  It's been a real relief to have an excuse not to eat the whole box of cookies- I can't even eat one of them.  

The biggest surprise has been that the weight loss wasn't grand and exaggerated.  I don't know what I was thinking I would end up at, but I didn't lose near the weight I expected.  That's more about expectations and fantasy than reality, but I am happy to say I've lost some weight.  I'll post tomorrow what the grand total was for the month.

I'm feeling kind of gross today, actually.  I have a cold, and I got up this morning and didn't eat breakfast right away, instead priming my stomach with 1) homeopathic cold remedy, 2) echinacea tea and 3) alka seltzer cold plus.   By the time the alka seltzer was in my stomach I just felt GROSS.  But my stomach has been kind of off for awhile now.  I'm not sure what this is about- whether the change in diet has changed my gut is yet to be seen.  There is some talk among vegan flirts about the change in poops, and I can say that I do poop more and it's relatively quick.  This is a change from my previous pattern, if you cared.  But I also have more gas, which I really don't like.  When I wasn't vegan, I could avoid foods which I knew were smelly- soy meat crumbles and cabbage come to mind.  But now those are actually pretty important to my diet, and I hate to pass on a good crumbles and cabbage slaw, so you can imagine the result.  Actually, don't try to imagine the result- I'd prefer it that way.

So yeah, my stomach is still adjusting.  I was hopeful that my skin would be happier, but it seems to be pretty much the same- very responsive to my cycle.  But my migraines have basically disappeared.  I usually get a few migraines toward the tail end of my cycle, and that hasn't happened yet, but we still have time to stay tuned.  How wonderful would it be if I could finally put an end to the migraine chapter?!

This is coming off as a summary post and the 28 days aren't over yet.  I'll have to come up with something to say on day 28.  and day 27.

Today's meals:

breakfast- quinoa with walnuts, raisins, dried apricots and almonds

lunch- not sure yet- maybe a sandwich with lots of veggies and avocado

dinner- curried sweet potatoes

Day 24

I can't believe the 28-day vegan challenge is almost over.  There's definitely no question I'm going to continue with it after the challenge ends, though.  I wonder if this is a life challenge?  A temporary change or a major lifestyle overhaul?

I didn't post yesterday because it was just a horrible day from start to finish.  I even got all snippy with my online friends, and it takes a lot for me to stoop that low.  It was just a bad day, including but not limited to minor inconveniences and one catastrophic loss.  I don't want to go into it, so just rest assured it was bad.

But I'm back today.  I think I'm getting a cold.  I feel pretty bad right now, and I'm going to close up shop and go home soon, but I wanted to be sure to get in here and say hi.  The one thing that is going well through all this is that the diet is keeping me grounded.

I'll try to check in over the weekend, but I can't make any guarantees, so have a nice few days and I'll see you soon.

day 22

I just had the best lunch.  Pita with hummus, shaved daikon radish, shaved carrots, butternut squash, and sauteed rainbow chard.  delicious.  I have to admit, not the sort of meal I would have even conceived of pre-vegan challenge.  But the bonus unexpected side effect of trying lots of new recipes is learning new ways to combine foods to make wonderful tastes.  There's something really warm and nurturing about hummus, warm squash and greens with the light zip from the radish.  And it makes my heart happy too.

The heart happiness is new for me.  I like eating and I always have, but something about eating this really tasty, earth friendly food nurtures me in a completely new way.  I'm noticing this peace to my meals that I never had observed before.  I'm starting to understand why people say grace, why people have a moment of silent graciousness before eating.  I feel completely grateful and connected to me food in a way I never did before.  Maybe I'm just giddy from a good meal, but I feel so good right now.  My stomach is full, but I don't feel overstuffed and I don't feel guilty.  I'm sated, in many different ways.  I feel like there's this part of me that is just clicking.  

Maybe I'm here because i went looking for it, maybe this would have happened if I stuck with my normal diet and just tried harder to be cognizant of my own feelings.  But just maybe I'm here because I followed a hunch that came from my heart.  

This evening we're celebrating my uncle's birthday at a fancy restaurant.  I already looked at their online menu and there is NOTHING vegan on the menu.  I think I can pull off a salad or something, but I'm worried that there won't be anything for me to eat.  My uncle has requested we bring an ice cream cake, which I won't be able to eat either.  I will definitely fill up before I go, just in case, but still...  This morning I had coffee with a friend in a restaurant I used to enjoy, and there was nothing on the menu that I could have eaten.  They had huge piles of baked goods, none of which I could eat.  It was a little hard, but it was also good.  I didn't have to have a second breakfast- I was hungry but I had a soy latte and that helped with the hunger until I got home and had a handful of nuts.  It wasn't a big deal.  I don't think it will be a big deal tonight either- I'll just deal.  One way or another, I won't die from it.  It's just weird to be going someplace not because I want the food but because I want to be with family and celebrate.  

Today's meals:

Breakfast: oatmeal mixed with the poached ginger pears and almonds recipe from The Kind Diet (OMG those pears are good!)

Lunch:  see above.

Dinner:  Who knows?  mystery.  It'll be good though, because I'll be surrounded by family.

Day 21

So the whole question of vegan vs nonvegan is becoming more of an issue.  I was eating a food I believed was vegan, had even confirmed through a thorough check of ingredients on the box, when I went and pronounced to the world that I was drowning my sorrows in that food.  Lucky for me, I have some pals looking out for me (thanks, Jstar) and my food was determined non-vegan.  I'm still perplexed as to why this particular food is non-vegan, I have two theories:  1) manufacturing in a factory which processes dairy trumps an ingredients list; or 2) One of the ingredients is actually an animal product, but when listed in its food science form it doesn't sound much like "egg" or "milk".  Kind of like how casein is really a dairy product, but you wouldn't necessarily know it by looking at it.  But the official product website, an otherwise trustworthy source, does not include this product in the vegan list.  The fact that they have a vegan list (and a kosher list, and a vegetarian list, and I think even an aquatarian list, although that one is pretty short:  water.  sparkling water. steam. ice.)  indicates they have someone within the ranks who actually cares enough and knows enough to produce the list in the first place.

So this sort of forces the issue of what vegan is and isn't. If eating foods made in factories which produce other foods with dairy, eggs, or ham means those foods aren't vegan, I'm going to be very disappointed.  Now I know the vegan ideal is to eat foods whole and as close to the source as possible (dried beans are better than canned, whole grains are better than refined, agave syrup is waaay better than (gasp!) refined sugar).  But I'm not sure I can do that all the time.  Or even at every meal.  I mean, I've already done so much to get to this point, are you saying that I have to give up more?  Where do I draw the line?  Am I going to be looking for aquatarian recipes soon?

I had a friend from the Bay Area who I visited with briefly after I had moved to CT.  She was passing through the area, on her way to a meditation retreat, and we met while she was in New Haven waiting for her bus.  When I saw her, I was shocked to see how skinny she'd become.  She acknowledged the severity of her weight loss and told me this fascinating story.  Her life journey, like mine, led her to vegan life.  Along the way she became interested in meditation and began traveling the world participating in these really harsh meditation retreats- the kind where you only eat broth for a week, or where you don't talk to another person for a month at a stretch, or where you chew your food 78 times in order to fully appreciate the generosity of the world in providing you with that barley and gravel stew.  Anyway, somewhere along the line of these severe food and lifestyle restrictions she became obsessed with the whole idea of control, specifically of controlling her natural urges to eat or sleep.  And this led to anorexia.  So she'd started with a simple and harmless path to enlightenment which included a diet which wasn't harmful to other living creatures, and ended up with a chronic, life-threatening mental illness.  So when does dietary restriction cease to be about altruism and start to be about control?

I've been forgetting to include my meals, so will revive today:

Breakfast: raisin bran with soy milk, soy chai

Lunch: (this was awesome, by the way) leftover asparagus, leftover sauteed mushrooms, leftover butternut squash, tofu cubes, soba noodles drizzled with sesame oil and tamari, and sprinkled with red pepper flakes.  I probably should have included some seaweed, but I forgot.  It was deeeelish and I'm sad I finished off all those leftovers because I could eat that every day.

Snack: vegan chocolate morsel, granola bar.  I could have done without the granola bar, but I knew I'd have a late dinner

Dinner: sweets got take & bake pizza for the boys, so I asked him to get me a veggie pizza without the cheese.  This was kind of dumb, because it ended up just being a fancy and very unfilling bruschetta.  I supplemented with carrots and hummus.

Dessert: tofutti cutie

Day 20

Sweets and I had a good conversation yesterday about this whole diet change thing.  He's been pretty supportive all along, but now he wants to know what direction I'm going to take once the 28-day vegan challenge is over.  I think I'm going to stick with it for the time being, but I reassured him that I didn't expect the whole family to adopt this unless they were willing.  Already we've been eating mostly vegan meals, just because it's easier to make one meal for everyone than it is to tailor the foods to each person's particular diet.  On days when we make something that is clearly unchild friendly we still expect them to taste it, but we will also make them an alternate (mac and cheese, veggie chicken nuggets, that sort of thing).  I'm really hoping that he doesn't burn out on my food stuff early- his support is crucial. He's always been supportive when I did weight watchers (and my most recent disaster with Jenny Craig), but he's sort of balking at this change as a long term adjustment.  He was particularly concerned about whether or not I would ever make chocolate chip cookies again.  poor guy.  I promised him I would make him chocolate chip cookies.  (although I am scheming a way to make them vegan... must experiment with egg substitutes)

One thing that did come up in the discussion is how much easier this is than I thought it would be.  I've been noticing that having a vegan diet means I don't have a lot of choices.  Much to my surprise, I don't really miss the options.  It used to be, I would linger at whole foods in particular sections- in the cheese section, and in the baked goods section.  I liked to linger, smell the different foods, touch the foods and think about which one I would buy.  I would feel guilty, knowing that eating and buying cheese and baked goods leads to increased weight, increased dollars at the checkstand.  While I'm somehow making up for the break in expense somewhere else (really!  way too expensive, this diet), I'm definitely not eating sweets, cheese, and crazy baked goods.  The same is true with chocolate, candy, and other sweets. Knowing that I can't eat them makes it a lot easier to just pass right through, and I just don't seem to miss it.  I enjoy food, but it's a lot harder to buy comfort foods to fill that sad gap now.  And I'm not binging.  Binging on nuts is just unpleasant, and the same goes for carrots.  I don't really like that fiber-full feeling, and too many nuts just makes me feel logy. 

So yay! for less options anxiety.  yay! for slow and steady weight loss (I'm down to 155.8 now, which is progress.  slow but sustainable, right?), and yay for not missing those things I thought I would miss the most.  I still need to find a way to get Zabar's to make a vegan chocolate babka, but whatever.

Day 17- what makes a vegan?

I just put some industrially-produced honey in my tea and thought to myself, "what makes a vegan?"

Originally, my plan was to be less than militant about honey.  I had hoped to use bee-friendly honey, but isn't any honey better than factory-farmed sugar or high fructose corn syrup?  But apparently vegans are all up in their grills about honey.  I need to do more research, apparently.  But it seems like honey is a by-product of bee life, and bees aren't really domesticable in the same way cows or sheep are.  We can't pump bees full of antibiotics and force them to live in quasi-fertility for their entire lives.  they're bees!  They live, they die, they make honey.  They still live under a monarchy, for pete's sake.  So I grabbed some honey packets from starbucks the last time I was there and now I use it in my tea, but I'm starting to wonder if maybe I should just get a jug of agave syrup and do away with the massive amount of packaging and bee abuse.

What makes a vegan, part two:

I know that the responsible vegan thing to do would be to stop wearing leather.  I have a good collection of shoes, and none of the shoes I have purchased in the past 36 years have be bought with the justification of "and it's vegan!"  I love my new leather boots, I enjoy the longevity and style of leather shoes, and I really don't see myself ending the leather use.  I try to buy high quality shoes, and often with quality comes the assurance that the leather was ethically obtained.  But I don't have that much cash, and I need some style in my life.  Not buying leather shoes is a much bigger imposition on my lifestyle than avoiding dairy and I'm going to feel pretty resistant about this.  I will confess that my friend KK's simple shoes are pretty darn cool, though.

So I won't win the vegan award this month.  I still believe that making small changes is better than making none at all.  By consuming fewer animal products and buying higher quality produce and legumes, I'm voting with my dollar.  So I'm not going to get hung up about bees and leather, but I am going to do my best to buy well and encourage sustainability over consumption.

ps- I just did a search on Zappo's for vegan shoes and came up with a lot of spirts-inspired shoes, slippers, and these horrifying items.  

Wondering

Sorry I couldn't post yesterday. I'm sure it was torturous that you couldn't follow my vegan life for one whole day. It was bad for me too, my friend.

I'm wondering when this whole vegan thing won't be at the forefront of my thinking all the time. I went from perseverating about making the hange to perseverating about meal plans and grocery shopping. Where is the balance?

day 15

Last night we went to one of our favorite restaurants.  This is place where I typically waffle between choosing the green chile enchiladas or the huevos rancheros (green).  It was kind of torturous to scan the menu knowing the only thing I could order without a lot of rigmarole was the fajitas.  I'm not a fajitas lover- they seem like a bastardization of southwestern food.  I don't ever remember any restaurants of my childhood offering fajitas, I have a sneaking suspicion they were developed by some Texan and brought to the mainstream via the advent of the chain family-style "Mexican" restaurants. 

(pause while I do some research)

Aha!  They were developed by a Texan!  And they weren't popular until the 1990's.  I KNEW it.  It's nice to be right now and then.  Anyway, I don't like fajitas so much, they aren't part of my culinary ancestry, but it's easy to order vegan fajitas at a big family meal without sounding like a picky pain in the ass.  And if I were to try to concoct a vegan version of my old favorites, I would end up with a tortilla swimming in green chile on my plate.  Not really that exciting, even for this green chile lover.

I have to say, having this excuse to write has been really refreshing.  I was at a loss for words for awhile (ha!  loss for words = no blogging!  ha!) and I'm finding that blogging regularly has me thinking about what to write, creating a cycle of self-absorbed creativity.  It's nice to be self-absorbed.

Today's menu:

b: raisin bran (need to find a tasty non-high fructose corn syrup version of this)

l: leftover fajitas

d: asparagus risotto from The Conscious Cook

snacks: soy latte, granola bar, the air of life (trying desperately to lose weight now)

Day 14

I feel like I'm starting to get a feel for this whole vegan thing.  It's been two weeks and one business trip, and I seem to be falling into some sort of groove.  That doesn't mean I don't still stand before the open fridge every morning, wondering what I will eat that day.  But at least I have a good sense of what I CAN eat, which is a good place to be.  I've been eating a lot of leftovers, partly because the kids won't eat most of the vegan food, and partly because they're tasty and safe.  I don't want to have to devise a new meal every time I have to eat.  And I don't use the word devise lightly- it does feel a bit like building up from scratch, designing something new with every meal. 

My biggest problem in the past few days has been pacing myself so I don't end up eating a huge snack and ruin my appetite for dinner.  Chips and salsa have been conveniently delicious, but they are both filling and fattening, so I need to chill it on that front.  As it happens, we have three different bags of chips open in the cupboards right now, so I have to figure out how to use those up without gorging on them constantly.  I have been craving that salty fat for other reasons (pms) but the salt and the bloating and the chippie-ness makes me feel like I'm cheating on the whole vegan thing.

Which leads me to another topic.  There's a lot of discussion in the vegan world about what makes a vegan.  I get the sense that there are levels of veganism- there are the dabblers (like me), and there are the people who are into it on a much different level.  Those are the people who go beyond simply eliminating certain types of foods from their diets, they also eliminate certain preparations of those foods- those are the people who won't eat processed foods at all, won't eat refined sugar or wheat, and I think they actually live on kale and sweet potatoes.  I could be wrong about that last point.  I've been trying to pay attention to the sugar sources and levels of refinement in my wheat and sugar, but it's really hard to be vigilant while still trying to prepare foods for a family of four, three of whom are not vegan.  I think that the more hardcore vegans are probably right about a lot of things, but I really wonder if this is really where I want to spend my time.

As it is, grocery shopping is a serious event now.  I'm reading all the labels, I'm finding so many products which I assumed were vegan actually aren't- boca products aren't always vegan, morningstar farms isn't always vegan, and often it's hard to figure out if they're vegan or not.  Most foods now have allergy statements (this product was made in a facility which processes raw pork knuckles), but I still have to read the whole list of ingredients to determine if the product contains pork knuckles or if it's just been tainted by pork knuckles somewhere along the processing line.  I guess this ambiguity is part of the reason why some vegans eschew processed foods altogether.  The chances of finding a sweet potato that was raised in a slaughterhouse are pretty slim, and bulk dry beans just sort of mingle with other bulk beans, not with eggs and milk.

When I started, a mere 14 days ago, I told myself I wouldn't take this too seriously.  I've tried to stick to that, but I'm finding it's actually much harder when there are ambiguities.  If it was all cut and dry then I would be able to walk away from things without wondering if I was cheating (cheating on my own rules is another topic for another day).  But now that I've made this committment and have been trying my hardest to follow through, I find myself much more motivated than I expected to stick with some semblance of a plan.  I guess I'm halfway through the 28 day vegan challenge now, and I'm really liking it.  Hopefully in the next 2 weeks I'll settle even more into an idea of which rules work for me, and maybe maybe this will end up being more than a 28 day adventure.

The cheese

I'm resisting the cheese but it's difficult. This is helping me realize how much munching I do- right now I'm getting the boys snack and it would be so easy to munch cheese too. Just crackers just doesn't do it for me. Oh, the resolve.