Why I Became a Vegetarian

Happy New Year!

We're just an hour into 2013, and I'm so anxious to get my blog up and running that I'm staying up extra late to write my first post. It's a topic near and dear to my heart - why I removed all meat from my diet about ten years ago. When people find out I'm a vegetarian, they always want to know why I chose this lifestyle. I figure we should get this question out of the way first.


The answer to this question is quite simple - ten years ago I had a mild heart incident which landed me in the hospital for a couple of days. Technically speaking, what I had was arrhythmia, which is a fancy medical term for an irregular heartbeat. You may have heard people talk about "heart palpitations," and that's pretty much the same thing. The symptoms were alarming: I got dizzy, I felt out of breath, I had intense chest pain, and eventually I fainted. When I woke up, I was in the ER.

My first assumption was that I'd had a full-blown heart attack, but after about an hour I learned that it was just arrhythmia. That was a huge relief, to me and my family, but it still meant I had a serious heart condition that needed to be dealt with. My doctors determined that it was caused by high blood pressure, and recommended a course of medications and lifestyle changes. When one of the hospital's heart specialists quizzed me about my diet, it became clear that what I was eating was killing me, plain and simple.

At that time, my diet consisted mostly of meat and potatoes, the same diet I was raised on, the same foods my parents ate, and the same food I'd been serving my wife and kids for our entire lives. I was alarmed and more than a little ashamed that I was basically eating myself to death, and serving unhealthy food to my family at the same time.

After about a week of biting my fingernails, worrying about every little bite of food, and finally doing some research on the Internet, I became intrigued by the idea of eating a vegetarian diet. I saw it as a challenge, something I would try for a couple of months just to see how it worked. My wife agreed to go right along with me, and I love her all the more for being so supportive.

After just one month of my new veggie lifestyle, my blood pressure was well within the normal range. My doctor was astounded and wanted to know what I'd done - she said she figured the blood pressure medication would help me a little, but didn't expect such a drastic change in just four weeks. I shared the vegetarian diet plan with her, and she approved it as totally healthy. She's even suggested the same diet plan to other patients, and has changed her own diet to include more vegetarian options, though she's not totally meat-free as I and my wife are.

So that's the story. Not everyone's transition to vegetarianism has been so dramatic, and yes, I've had a few "meat relapses" in the past decade. But I love the way I eat now, and I love the fact that I was able to go off my blood pressure medication after just three months. I haven't had a heart incident since, and I look and feel better now than I have since college.

Expect more posts in the coming days, weeks, and months. I'll share some vegetarian recipes and talk a little about why I like to call myself The Veggie Hero.