I adopted a vegan diet in the spring of 2013. I was twenty-four years old and needed it, for many reasons. It was a five-year, cherished season that defined my identity, until it stood between me and myself—all told, me and life after medicine. If you’re already poking fun at the gravity in my tone and readying your vegan jokes, get your popcorn ready.
In 2012, I graduated college with no conception of veganism. I am an Oklahoman. Veganism didn’t filter through Appalachian or Rocky Mountains.
When I went to California for job training, my first job after college, I met a few vegans. I was stunned. I tried their tofu and thought, “Why?” Nevertheless, their energy flowed and their passion for food was infectious. One day, after my incessant badgering of their lifestyle, they recommended Forks Over Knives. I forgot about it and went about being an omnivore, content with my healthy-enough grilled chicken sandwich selections. But that damn documentary wouldn’t leave me alone—people kept recommending it—so I ordered the DVD.
After a friend’s bachelor party weekend in Austin, where I ate obscene amounts of chicken wings and partook in various vices, the time was ripe for a soul revision. I slid that plastic disc into the slot and was transfixed for the next 96 minutes. The message was clear: a vegan diet can prevent heart disease and you’ll feel incredible doing it. The stories told. The people transformed. If I ate plants alone, fate was in my hands. Something clicked, and I knew I was going vegan.
Three disparate forces combined and mainlined veganism into my soul:
- In 2008, my father had a heart attack at 39 years old. He had a stent placed in his LAD (widow-maker) and went on with his life, but it was a scary event for us all. If heart disease was a real risk for me, why wouldn’t I eliminate it with diet?
- I have type 1 diabetes. The leading cause of death for people with type 1 diabetes is macrovascular heart disease (heart attacks). People with type 1 diabetes have a 2-3x higher rate of having a heart attack than the average American. Again, a personal motivation.
- I was in peak identity crafting years—those magical mid-twenties’ years. In high school I was the football player. In college I was the hard-working, nice guy that liked to party. In either persona, I hadn’t fully found me yet. I was itching to drop my party persona for purposeful living. I readied to rewrite my story. Veganism sounded like a cool challenge, almost a superpower, if I could do it.
Do it I did, and those next few years were awesome. Veganism and I grooved like peanut butter and raisins. My diet was good for the environment, good for the animals, good for conversation, and good for me. I felt amazing. My acne disappeared. Allergies evaporated. Sleep deepened. I started running marathons. I recovered faster. I liked who I was, and people seemed to like talking veganism, with me. Again, this was 2013 in Oklahoma. When out to dinner with friends, I was the center of conversation by virtue of my vegan explanations. After work, I read dozens of books about vegan nutrition. I earned a certificate from Cornell in plant-based nutrition. I became evangelical and preached the plant-based gospel. (For my family and friend’s patience, I am forever grateful. It was a lot to endure.)
I was vegan and all the way in. Head. Heart. Soul.
As my life transitioned into medical school, I hoped my passion for veganism would merge with physicianhood and create meaning, like a passion transplant. I remember questioning my professors after lectures, asking if they knew about the latest plant-based research on cancer treatment, chronic kidney disease, or inflammatory bowel disorder. They of course didn’t, and I knew they wouldn’t. I imagine my professors nicknaming me “the annoying vegan guy”. It’s unbecoming, but I enjoyed those conversations after class and I enjoyed knowing something my professors didn’t; deep down, I started to feel a little superior.
Here I was with type 1 diabetes, on a vegan diet, living inside restrictions (some self-imposed), killing it in medical school (something I didn’t even want to do) and running marathons simultaneously. I was on a power trip.
Gradually over the med school years, veganism would come to represent something altogether different; my connection to the person I was before medical school. Adventurous, curious, and alive. I remained vegan to know who I was then, as I fell deeper and deeper into medicine’s clutches, something I was losing myself inside. In the end, it wasn’t a fair ask of veganism.
My once sparkling vegan persona showed signs of wear and tear. A hamstring pull wouldn’t heal, so I stopped running; and achilles soreness would require I drop off our flag football team. No matter what I did, I couldn’t keep on weight. I developed a fear of exercise for anxiety of pulling a muscle. I felt fragile. By the end of med school’s third year—the busiest hospital year without convenient access to plant-based food—I became depressed and weighed 172 pounds. For reference, I weighed 205 pounds in high school.*
In my boxing match with medical school, veganism was on the ropes, taking repeated upper cuts. As I clung to who I used to be, I was on the mat hearing the eight count.
The day I threw in the towel I remember clearly. I was on pediatrics and had recently recovered from a second cold of the rotation. I was tired, depressed, and hollow. Every other thought concerned animal protein. I was obsessed and desperate. I wanted to feel better. In the weeks prior, inspired by vegan guilt, I’d researched what might be the most ethical animal protein to eat, for a vegan. I don’t remember my criteria or what evidence supported my choice, but I settled on eggs and salmon.
One afternoon, I drove to Trader Joe’s. There—after tepidly crossing the store’s threshold—I located a dozen free-range, organic eggs and a box of frozen, wild-caught salmon. With only those two items, I meandered to checkout, expecting some kind of vegan-PETA alarm to sound my traitorism. Suspiciously, I handed the contraband to the cashier. She rung me up, while I scanned her face for any judgments. She cheerfully asked, “Will you need a bag for that?” I said no and she handed me my items, wishing me a good evening. No sweat off her back. As I got to my car, for safe measure, I scanned over both shoulders to see if anyone saw me exiting the cult.
I didn’t realize how hungry I’d been. After eating those first eggs and salmon, my body exhaled. I felt full. For months, I’d lived with a familiar faintness of being, like I lived on a feeble floor, capable of crumbling under exertion. That resolved within weeks. By the time fourth year started, I weighed 180 pounds. By the end of fourth year, the hamstring healed, and I was back playing rec league softball.
Still, I was haunted by a sense that I should be vegan, like I’d given up on myself and cause. If I could eat the best diet for self, animals, and planet, why wouldn’t I, even if it required some sacrifice? Thus, throughout residency in California, I ordered an Impossible burger or substituted avocado for meat on my breakfast burritos, while eating eggs and salmon at home. This assuaged the guilt. After all, I had a family history of heart disease. I had type 1 diabetes. I kept heart that one day I’d be vegan again and return to myself. I had to be vegan to be me I felt. I know, it was a strange time.
Then, in late-night hospital twilight, divinity struck.
I was on call, second year of residency. It was one of those nights. We were buried in consults. The units were lively. Dinner was an afterthought. I arrived in the cafeteria at 9PM, with several hours of charting left.
Entering, I surveyed for dinner options: packaged ham sandwich assembled across the country, Larabar (Apple Pie flavored), or grilled chicken with roasted potatoes. I refused to believe these were my only options, so I took another loop. Those were the options, along with a fourth—I could hold off and eat at home. The ham sandwich was out. I was too hungry to wait. My prefrontal cortex needed fuel for charting. Either I eat the chicken or the Larabar.
Every year I make a goals list, and that year’s list included, “Weight > 185 lbs”. I wanted to feel strong again. Wanted to feel vital again. Wanted to feel myself again. With these vague intentions swirling, I almost resigned to the Larabar when a deep knowing arrived, “You can go get what you want. Eat the chicken”. Eat the chicken I did. Didn’t feel a shred of guilt. No rationalization required. I wanted something and went for it. That simple.
You never know when you’ll arrive on the other side of something you’ve long struggled with. After that night, I didn’t consider veganism again. Maybe that’ll change, perhaps not. My battle with self-sacrifice and restriction finally met who I wanted to be, in the hospital cafeteria, and I chose me. I was more important than guilt. I was worth it. Some may deem it selfish, but I’m not so sure, having lived it. It actually felt unselfish. There, it seemed harder to choose the chicken because it meant I had to become who I wanted to be, which didn’t include veganism any longer.
(Note: I recognize the environmental impact animal agriculture represents, thus I choose to eat from sustainable fisheries and local suppliers of beef, chicken, venison, bison, and elk, when available, but at times I eat what’s easiest and available. I do my best while trying to feel my best, which I believe is a balance worth pursuing.)
Couple of closing thoughts.
It’s really hard to let go of something that defined who you were, but oftentimes that letting go process unleashes parts you didn’t even know existed. Taking that leap is terrifying, even as trivial-sounding as Larabar vs chicken.
Your strengths from one life chapter often become your undoing in the next. At times, I wondered why veganism was such a natural fit, how it came so easily, and for the majority of that time, how it never seemed a sacrifice. For one, I really wanted to be vegan for those first few years. I remain a firm believer in a vegan diet’s health promises, particularly in heart disease risk reduction. But for me, the benefits (including the heart disease risk mitigation) failed to outweigh the personal costs. I had to make an individual decision for my mental health and quality of life.
Additionally, diabetes played a role. I had no choice in type 1 diabetes. I was diagnosed at nine years old. Type 1 is an autoimmune disorder and I have to take insulin every day. I have to count carbohydrates. I have to live that restriction. From decades of having, I slid right into the restrictions of veganism. It was no big thing to give up meat. I’d lost my ability to eat at will a long time ago. But for all the diabetes fortitude developed, veganism was different. I did not have to do it. It took far too long to bring that understanding from unconscious to the conscious.
The cafeteria epiphany informed my medicine career choice. There, again, I faced a choice of restriction or going for what I wanted. Choice. Did I deserve to be happy? Deserve to go after what I wanted? In leaving medicine, I chose the chicken too.
I’ve waffled on sharing the veganism journey because of perception. Food riles people up. Food is identity. Food is personal. Yet, I decided to go for it; because I’ve found that living life freely, deciding what’s best in the open, with personal responsibility for outcomes, was better than life led by addiction to the power felt in overcoming self-imposed restrictions that limited who I became.
Yet, this is only my story—into, through, and out of veganism.
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*The vegan diet had a hand in this, yes, but I suspect my medicine ambivalence had a role, too. On summer break in Hawaii between first and second year, all these issues disappeared—including that hamstring pull—while on a vegan diet, but within a week of medical school, all were back. Hamstrung indeed.
(Photo Caption: near epiphany genesis, I launched into identity uncertainty, depths more than five feet deep)
Thank you. This was resonant and helpful to me.
You’re welcome! Happy to hear the experience was supportive.