A few days ago Tasha, the blogger at Voracious Vegan, wrote an epically long post about why she abandoned veganism - "Vegan No More". It basically comes down to her health: after going to the doctor and finding out she had a severe vitamin B12 deficiency, with the typical anemia that results, and realizing that her tiredness, lack of stamina during exercise, and depression were all symptoms of B12-deficient anemia, she realized (after many rounds of denial) she had to start moderately eating meat products, or she'd harm herself. Logically, she says, a harmful diet cannot be a natural diet. Therefore humans are not naturally meant to be vegan.
At 5 weeks I noticed a steady, permanent buzz of energy that carried me throughout the day. I started being able to run errands, work out, and do my writing ... Joy and the most indescribable sense of relief and tranquility were now just a given when I woke up in the morning. And now, after 2 full months of non-veganism, I can honestly say that I feel reborn.To put it in clinical terms, she reversed her anemia and probably bolstered her B-vitamin-deprived neurological health immensely.
Vitamin B12 deficiency is very common with a vegan diet. (Don't believe me? Google it; countless vegan nutrition websites acknowledge it.) This is because the only things capable of making B12 are certain microorganisms, and these microorganisms (for our purposes) only live in animals. Plants and animals cannot make B12. Animals, however, depend on it to make blood and DNA and other seemingly necessary things. Therefore, if you are an animal, you must either perform cool feats of digestion like hindgut fermentation (moving food through the colon to generate B12, then regurgitating it back for digestion)...
...or you have to eat animals. I can't do hindgut fermentation. Therefore I have to eat animals, or their eggs, or their milk. It's not my fault; it's my ecosystem.
 |
| Bovine digestion is way vegan. |
If you're a vegan, you have to take B12 supplements made in factories; since that's a luxury our ancestors didn't have, I'm assuming it's not 'natural'.
Vegans try to manipulate their diet into something resembling a complete human diet, but it doesn't really work. As Tasha said:
I was baffled by the suggestions to eat imported goji berries, use maca powder in my smoothies, or eat more spirulina. All these exotic recommendations were supposedly needed to make me healthy on a diet that is heralded as natural and ideal; it absolutely did not make sense.But even in simple nutritional terms, veganism fails. All you can eat is beans, veggies, and grains, right? Carbohydrates, indigestible fiber, and incomplete proteins. From what I've seen of oh, probably ten years of hanging around vegans and seeing them eat, it's mostly carbs. Tons and tons of carbs.
I only chose to write about this because I've seen more than a few people deteriorate through veganism, becoming unhealthily skinny, almost cachetic, like cancer victims.
Incidentally, it's meat loaf night.
 |
| Not this guy. |
I'm glad you discussed that we can get B12 from other animal products besides meat. The beginning of your post seemed to link B12 with only meat...
ReplyDeleteI could never be vegan because I love cheese and eggs so darn much. But, I am not a heavy meat eater and I can really go for weeks and not eat any meat at all. However, I do take care of myself and make sure I get all the vitamins and nutrients I need. I even went through a pregnancy and my blood was tested a few times and never had any deficiencies.
I think that anyone following a vegan or vegetarian lifestyle should also use common sense and research what those entail (i.e. what nutrients might you be missing & how can you avoid any nutritional deficiencies).
I am very concerned about my cousin who is vegan to the extreme...he is always sending away for extremely expensive and rare antidotes and supplements....but still looks like he is at deaths door. When I spoke to him last wk he told me he was just starting to put fish into his diet....so am relieved. Honestly, I thought he was ready to collapse last time I saw him...never mind so preoccupied with his diet.....it overshadowed everything else...never mind that no one wanted to have him over because nothing you could prepare - would he eat.
ReplyDeleteYOU NOW HAVE VEGAN ADS ON YOUR SIDEBAR. LOLOLOLOL.
ReplyDeleteInteresting...I think that veganism is almost more political or a social statement than anything else. I definitely think that I could be vegetarian, but even that doesn't seem as "natural" to me as a real food diet that includes moderate amounts of meat, fish, and eggs. mmmm.....eggs. So excited that I just got my first delivery of raw milk!
ReplyDeleteAside from seeds, eggs are the only food I know of that has everything necessary to sustain life.
ReplyDeleteWe love eggs.
Thoughtful response to her post from a vegan nutritionist:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.theveganrd.com/2010/11/do-ex-vegans%E2%80%99-stories-make-the-case-against-vegan-diets.html
I'm not a vegan myself, but there is a ton of literature available about health benefits of a vegan diet. Sounds like Tasha was grieving for bacon and latched onto a recent book that told her it was ok to eat meat. And she shouldn't be encouraging ANYONE to up their cholesterol intake.
I think the thing that bugs me most about veganism is that it's both a political (or moral, if you will) issue and a health issue. People don't want to eat animal products because they believe killing or using animals in any way is wrong. But somehow by magical coincidence, it's also the most healthy way to eat!
ReplyDeleteI might be able to take individual vegans seriously if they were concerned only with the health end. I wouldn't agree with them, but I could take them seriously. Add in the AR end of it and sorry, but there's a bit too much bias there.
I personally think fish and eggs are two of the most healthy foods out there. Dairy, red meat, sure there are arguments against those. But all animal products? I don't think so.
Brian - I don't know that that response is really "thoughtful"...it sounds more like they didn't read her post at all, or only skimmed it for the good bits they could take out of context. Additionally many of the health claims that author makes are kind of laughable - that it's better to get your B12 from supplements than from whole foods (so apparently nature designed humans to eat supplements??), and the claim that she was "taking her supplements wrong" or that maybe she has congenital pernicious anemia! Holy cow.
ReplyDeleteAnd the idea that the feeling of wellbeing you get from eating nutritious, whole proteins rather than carbcentric vegan food is a placebo? How does that make sense?
Nurse XY - totally agreed about eggs.
ReplyDeleteAnonymous - that's the other thing. If you read the comments to that rebuttal article Brian linked, they constantly muddle the lines between "veganism is healthy" and "veganism is ethical."
I can't comment on the nutritional aspects, but I'll take a published nutritionist's word over a vegan cookbook author who is suddenly crazy about bacon. I've been a vegetarian for four years and take supplements. I get blood work done with my yearly physical and am extremely healthy. But that doesn't really mean anything to anyone else.
ReplyDeleteThe "feeling" experience can't be applied to everyone--it's one person's experience in Tasha's post, and the retort did comment on this. I personally feel great eating lighter food. Heavy protein meals made me feel tired and sluggish when I ate them (still do if I eat a large amount of eggs or cheese in one sitting). But that's just me--it doesn't mean anything about another individual, or a population of people that eats a specific diet. I suspect that if she had to eat every two hours that she wasn't eating enough when she did eat. I've had stretches of vegan-only food (I am a vegetarian and only eat eggs/dairy outside of my kitchen) and I'm able to feel plenty full without a "sugar rush" from a vegan meal. But again, that's just me.
The response was critical of Tasha using her own personal experiences to invalidate multiple paradigms related to animals. Any essay writing class will teach anyone that what happened to you is not sufficient evidence for any thesis. She also commented on numerous aspects of the post, leading me to believe she read it thoroughly.
You know, cholesterol isn't a bad thing. In fact it's a good thing. Cholesterol is used by the body in vital hormone production, cell to cell signalling, identification of "self", and many other absolutely necessary cell functions.
ReplyDeleteToo much "bad" cholesterol is bad. But even then, the link between fasting hyperlipidemia is tenuous at best. They may be correlated, but that doesn't denote causality. And that doesn't even address whether hyperlipidemia is the true cause of the negative health concerns we typically associate with high cholesterol. Sure it's correlated, but we don't know if it's a symptom or a cause conclusively. In fact there is an island in the Mediterranean whose inhabitants sport some of the highest measured levels of cholesterol in their blood known to man. They also have a significantly lower rate of heart disease.
All this to say increasing cholesterol intake may not be bad advice, depending on the situation.
Sorry, that would be the link between fasting hyperlipidemia and increased dietary cholesterol intake.
ReplyDeleteBrian - I think what annoys me most about that 'rebuttal' is that it doesn't really address the original article, and it leaves readers like you with the impression that she's "just crazy about bacon." I don't know how you'd get that from reading the original article, which dealt with mainly the nutritional and health aspects that you seem to want to avoid talking about.
ReplyDeleteMost of the supporting comments to that rebuttal also don't want to talk nutrition, so what is the point of it? If it doesn't address her main points, it's not really a rebuttal.
Personally I think that dietitian is angry at some random paleo-diet website I've never heard of (and which the Voracious author never mentioned) and is blaming everything on that site.
nurseXY - I understand that cholesterol is a necessary component of the body, but I'm not quite ready to totally dismiss the badness of hyperlipidemia. Still not sure what to think there. I think the quality of the fats you eat are an important factor people overlook, though. Which reminds me...
ReplyDeleteBrian - you say you feel tired after a heavy meal of eggs and cheese. These are fatty proteins! Of course you feel tired. Eating lean proteins like sushi would probably produce a different reaction. So sorry, I still don't buy that this is just anecdotal placebo stuff.
NurseVince: I bookmarked your blog about a month ago. I love the attitude and more power to you! I am also a trauma ICU nurse for many years and know exactly where you are coming from. Agree with the 14 day myth...loved the article.
ReplyDeleteHaving said that, I just ran into this anti-vegan thread. What I do know is that the average vegetarian and or vegan knows little about the science of nutrition. The average MD knows little about the science of nutrition. There is a large scale on going study of european vegetarians which shows their general health and life expectancy is no different than non vegetarians.
The only other thing I know is that it is 100% impossible to learn the science of nutrition by reading internet sites and blogs.
Sometimes, a little off line reading and academic study will bring understanding and clarity to an emotionally charged topic.
Wish everyone the best health. Science seems to be leading us to a plant based, low fat, complex carbohydrate and minimal meat diet.
Vince, I pretty much agree with that, though with the caveat that some people (and some cultures) seem to do very well eating a lot of meat, more than I eat! I think that in general a plant-based, low-fat, good-fat, complex carb diet is what you should be eating. But I don't think the typical vegan diet is like that. There's a big difference between vegetarian and vegan.
ReplyDeleteI think I've read more academic books on nutrition and metabolism than most people would think healthy, but do you have any to recommend?
I don't know. I am far, far, far from vegan, and I won't be citing any academic studies here, but ANY diet high in carbs is going to leave someone feeling sluggish. The vegans I have known have not eaten like that at all. In fact they are probably some of the only people I knew who have truly gotten all their servings of vegetables in a wide variety of colors. The vegan recipes I use (on accident) are actually quite balanced.
ReplyDeleteAlso, hyperlipidemia among average Americans is a whole different animal than a Mediterranean pocket. I am assuming their lipids are high from eating nutritious fats, and their activity level dwarfs ours. I am with you, we don't need to debunk hyperlipidemia among a population that never exercises and is eating highly processed fats like they are going out of style.
I also think meat eaters need to own what we are responsible. I cooked a Thanksgiving turkey from my friend's farm that he personally slaughtered and a large contingent of my family was horrified by that. Yet it's ok to get one from Costco that lived a horrible life and suffered an assembly line death.
NurseVince: If I had to recommend one book to read it would be "The Good Carbohydrate Revolution" by Terry Shintani MD. This is not your typical best selling diet book. There are 30 pages of scientific references backing up the information presented. Money from this book goes to an educational foundation. Dr. Shintani is a practicing physician who has served an underserved pacific islander population in our community for many years. He has a masters degree in nutrition from Harvard University. He knows the science of nutrition. He is not getting rich off of selling diet books.
ReplyDeleteI personally believe that everyone should do what ever they believe is best to do. I have no need to convince anyone that a complex carbohydrate, low fat and low meat diet is best when they "believe" something else.
If you want to "believe" that low carb is the way to go then I won't even try to convince you. We are dealing with a belief.
However, I prefer to deal with facts. As Chris knows well, in the world of ICU medicine we still practice a lot of "voodoo" medicine". That is, we still do things that have no scientific proof as to whether it actually improves outcomes or not. We have made a little progress recently but not much.
In the world of nutrition we have a much better grasp of the facts. Problem is that very few medical professionals know the facts regarding nutrition. Most consumers, vegans, vegetarians, physicians, nurses, patients etc. only know what they hear on TV or see on the internet.
Here are a couple of facts about elevated cholesterol that goes against common or popular knowledge. Dietary cholesterol intake is not the problem in todays epidemic of hypercholesterolemia. You can repeat the preceding sentence and put it in all caps and underline it.
High protein intake and fat intake contribute more to the high cholesterol problems of the western diet.
(of course it would be true that if you did eat ONLY eggs and cream and red meat then it would be a problem,,,but most of us don't eat like this)
But, of course good nutrition is more complicated than just that statement.
My own main "belief" is that people should be given the "facts". The fact is they can control their blood sugars, hypertension an cholesterol levels by their diets.
Hello,
ReplyDeleteI worked as a pharmaceutic-technic-asisstant and specialised on dietetic treatment which lead me later to studieing to become a dietican, so bare with me when i point out some flaws and die hard myth about nutrition in your post.
Firstly, incomplete protein.
There is nothing like incomplete protein. Every protein has all essential amino acids. It is like with the ABC.
If you miss one letter, you can not really write a book.One missing amino acid means no life
Herbivore animals have to get their essential amino acids from plants...so over the meat also carnivore animals would be lost without plants.
Essential amino acids are only in meat because animal ate plants or animals ate animals who ate plants.
And taurin is an essential protein to cats, not an essential amino acid, just if someone wanted to use the .."taurin is essential to cats but is not produced by plants"-joker
No plants, no essential amino acids.
But it is right that there are different ammounts of essential amino acids in different foods.
Grains are lower in amino aids which are high in legumes and vice versa.
So when you eat more than one plant, the amino acids hold the scale balanced.
Next thing is the B12 issue.
The real issue here is that industrialisation and big range farming has killed the B12 producing bacterias which are normally on every surface.
A cow gets the B12 producing bacterias through eating gras with these bacterias on the surface and in the body of the cow the bacterias multiply and produce more B12.
Because all the chemicals which are sprayed on the fields and are toxic to the bacterias even cows have nowadays problems to get enough B12 which is the reason why farm animals are feed a mix of minerals and vitamins with their food.
How I know this? I live on a farm and started studying to become a vet and learned much about such issues because on a farm there is always something to do with an ill animal.
Normally our grandparents would have also gotten B12 through bacteria fermented foods like sauerkraut. Nowadays that is no longer the case because to simplify the process only one or two different bacterias are used for fermenting foods instead of the wide mix which was present in earlier times.
And this mix produced high ammounts of B12..which we still can see with hawthornberries.
The hawthorn is housing B12 producing bacterias in the skin of their berries..yeah the good kind, the kind which is fully usable for humans.
Just go and look for some research on the material ;)
And yes, hawthornberries contain as much and even more B12 per 100g than cow liver per 100gramms.
So no, you do not have to take supplements made in factories or foods from far far away to get your B12 and other nutrients you need.
The B12 in factories is still produced by bacterias..like sauerkraut, bread, sausages and many other foods are also produced in factories.
Does that make them bad?
And on to part two because I like to go at lenght
ReplyDeleteNext thing..carbs.
Carbs are not bad per se, it is when whole grains are turned into bleached flour and soft buns what makes carbs bad.
Or sugary drinks and all the sweets and stuff.
And we still have the same enzymatic system and digestion tract as our ancestors and our next relatives in the animal kingdom..chimps.
And chimps are mostly eating a diet based on nuts, seeds, leaves, fruits and only 5 to 10% animal based food..eggs, insects, larvae, birds, mice and other small animals.
So why should humans, who have the same enzymatic system and digestive tract, not eat like chimps? 90% plant foods with lots of carb and a small ammount of meat and eggs..ok, maybe we should hold the couple of cases with cannibalismn ;)
I choose to write about that to you because there are millions of unhealthy people on an omnivore diet, chugging soft drinks high on sugar, milk shakes with fat and sugar,fried goods with too much fat..people with heart problems, high blood pressure, diabetic people,..
So when I see people on an omnivore diet getting ill, is beeing omnivore the problem?
When I see millions of unhealthy omnivores who have no clue about nutritional needs of their body.
So with your logic, eating omnivore foods is bad because you get health problems when you eat omnivore foods.
Wrong, people get ill because they have no clue about the need of their body or also have no interest and do not care.
They just eat what they see on the screen, on commercials..manufactured fast foods and snacks.
That is the real problem.
Not vegan or omivore is the problem, the bad food sources are the problem.
My granny is 89. She has her yard and her house, cooking, cleaning, washing.
She is not so vital because she lived on pork chops, skittles, cheetos, hamburgers and coke.
Why veganism doesn´t work?
Because people have no clue.
Why beeing omnivore doesn´t work?
Because people also have no clue.
Oh and please can you tell me what the vegans ate that they became skinny and cancer like?
Or maybe you can give me something to contact them..email maybe?
It would be interesting to dig through their diet plans and everything..at least from the point of a dietician.
Most people I had with problems on their diet was because these people just cut out foods without putting something else in and had a poor diet to begin with.
If you want you can send me a mail and we talk some more or for me to get in contact with the vegans you used as a bad example
camoran83 at web.de
...did you seriously just compare vegans who think they're being healthy with omnivores who couldn't give a crap?
ReplyDeleteDo you really have an autographed Meatloaf picture? Too cool!
ReplyDeleteThanks for this post. I have been reading a million health books recently and looking for the other side of the story... i.e. those who have left long-term vegetarianism/veganism because it did not come with the benefits they were expecting.
ReplyDelete