@flyingforjesus My health has improved considerably since I started, around 4 months ago, but before that my diet was horrible, mostly meat, some dairy and little of anything else for the first 35 years of my life.
I feel great now, both physically and mentally, but like someone else said literally any kind of diet would make me feel better, I just had no idea how badly my diet was affecting me.
I dived into the vegan diet for health reasons. About 2 years ago my digestive system just changed on me and I started needing the toilet with increased regularity and suddenly no stools were ever solid anymore. My guts were killing me so I went to the doctors, got an ultrasound and a sigmoidoscopy, but neither showed anything.
I was given imodium by the gastroenterologist on repeat prescription and pretty much sent on my way. While I questioned why I should have to take tablets the rest of my life and it wouldn't fix the root cause that was the end of my 'treatment'.
I could only draw my own conclusions as to why I kept getting inflammation. I thought it was dairy related, as I had always got a dodgy stomach after things like eggs, as well as milk and cheeses in large quantities, so I cut down on dairy. The problem was though, I loved everything dairy so I never cut it out completely. Over time things got progressively worse in spite of this cutting down and I kept getting diarrhoea almost every day, going to the toilet anywhere between 5 and 10 times a day, but things were worse the more dairy I consumed in a day. I experimented cutting specific things out as I carried on eating almost exclusively processed meats and other crappy food like crisps. At no point did I think that meat could be doing it to me, although I had a health check at work and my cholesterol was through the roof, so I knew in that way I had to cut down the amount of meat I was shovelling down.
The turning point came when I watched The Game Changers and it totally blew my mind and changed the way I thought about food. I bit the bullet and done a weekly shop with no meat or dairy. It wasnt the healthiest of vegan food, a lot of it was still crisps and processed stuff, but after one week I felt a million times better. To celebrate the effort I put in I went to McDonalds and got a double sausage mcmuffin breakfast (with no egg), I thought it was the greasiest shit ever and I got diarrhoea again. I was starting to realise that meat was also causing my digestive problems.
I decided to carry on with the vegan diet and had a couple of 'cheat days' here and there, but they always made me feel ill. A month in and I didnt even want to eat meat or dairy anymore. I didnt miss it at all.
I stopped taking the imodium, the inflammation was no more, I didnt get heartburn or acid reflux anymore. I feel less lethargic, mentally stronger and don't get that food coma sleepy stuffed feeling no matter how much I eat.
My case is very extreme, but I firmly believe that it shows that neither meat nor dairy are good for the human body in the long run, that the effects of meat and dairy are cumulative and that my condition getting progressively worse shows that eating them will take its toll on your body eventually, even if your diet is balanced. I have only how I FEEL and my own experience to back this theory though. I think if your diet was good before you switched I'm really not surprised you wouldn't really notice a difference, I think it would be too subtle. There are arguments against the vegan diet and some of the science presented in documentaries like the Game Changers, but the overriding aspect for me, is again, how I FEEL.
