Who We Are and How/Why We Became Vegans

Hi, we are Brock and Kim and we are vegan. Whoo! Feels good to get that off our chests.

Brock: Moving on...We are from Arkansas and we were married on 1/1/11. Kim is a 3rd/4th grade teacher and I'm well, I have many jobs...own my own mobile deejay company, Brock Entertainment, do social media marketing for a few businesses, lead worship at Keypoint church, work at a coffee shop, and whatever else I can get my hands on. I like to work!

The reason for this blog is to share our experiences with being vegan and how it has helped us. Reading the past posts on this blog from Kim you will see that we were once on the low carb diet meaning that we were HUGE meat eaters. I can't tell you how much we both loved meat and how much meat we actually ate. It was a lot. Right baby?

You are right! We were hard core meat eaters! I have had some form of meat at every meal since I was a kid. Trust me when I told my dad I was going vegan he was second guessing that I was his daughter! When Brock and I started dating I joined him on his low carb diet. Which I loved! I did lose weight and loved eating all that meat but it left us feeling sluggish and low on energy! Another down side to the low carb life style was having to cut out pastas, rice, potatoes, chips and salsa, tortillas, fruits, and basically anything that not meat or cheese! Not to mention switching to all sugar-free chocolates and candies...which if you didn't know, too much artificial sugar can leave you boated and gassy! No bueno!


So I am sure you are wondering why we went vegan?! Well it all started because we watched the documentary "Fat, Sick and Nearly Dead" on Netflix. (Watch it for free here: http://www.hulu.com/watch/289122) Once we watched that documentary we knew that we needed to change something. Brock was on high cholesterol medicine and we both have a family history of high blood pressure, high cholesterol, cancer, and all sorts of other health problems. We both realized if we stayed on the track we were on we were headed for major health issues! So we started a juice cleanse! Nothing but fresh organic fruits and veggie juice 3 times a day made at home with our new juicer! (We purchased the Breville Ikon BJE510XL like they used on the movie "Fat, Sick and Nearly Dead" and we love it. Best investment ever!) We decided to try and do 21 days of the juice fast. Why? Because they say that it takes 21 days to break a habit and we wanted to break our eating habits. While we were on our juice cleanse we started to feel amazing and we knew that we were going to make some major changes once we were off the cleanse. We came to the decision that we would rather change our diet and lifestyle now instead of in a few years when a doctor would make us because of health issues. Plus, you have a better chance of not getting cancers or heart disease just based on what you eat. Seemed like a no brainer to us. We watched more documentaries (Forks Over Knives: http://www.forksoverknives.com/) and did a lot of research before we finally made the decision on becoming vegan. While on the fast Brock lost 15lbs in the 10 days he did the fast (I made him stop fasting because he was losing to much weight) and I lost 18lbs in 21 days. We have both been able to keep almost all that weight off.

I told Brock that if we were going to make these changes then we were going to go all in and not just make gradual changes. I cleaned out our fridge and pantry of everything that wasn't vegan. Then I went online to find a list of vegan pantry staples and headed to Whole Foods! (The closest Whole Foods is 2 hours away in Tulsa, OK.) Now this is not the normal way of switching to becoming vegan and definitely not the most affordable but we wanted to go all in all the way and not be tempted by something we didn't want to put in our bodies anymore. And so the journey began! We were now living in an all vegan household.

Now on to the questions that we get all the time. How do you get enough protein without meat? Where does your calcium come from if you aren't drinking milk? It's probably super expensive right? So, you just eat salads right or just fruits and vegetables? Or the statements..."Wow, I could never be vegan. I could never live without meat and cheese." LOL! All the questions and statements are funny. Why? Because we were the same way and asked the same questions and made the same statements. Why? Because we were so uneducated about health and what our bodies needed for healthy living...just like most of our country...we were fed the idea of the food pyramid and took that as truth and never bothered to do the research ourselves. We finally did the research!
                               
So let us help answer your questions (Instead of posting lengthy answers that would be full posts of their own, we will post links to sites that have all the answers)...How do we get enough protein without meat? http://www.vrg.org/nutrition/protein.htm and http://www.healthybitchdaily.com/post/do-vegans-get-enough-protein Where does your calcium come from if you aren't drinking milk? http://www.vrg.org/nutrition/calcium.htm and http://www.vegan-nutritionista.com/vegans-eat.html This link will tell you all that we eat as well. So it's probably super expensive right?  It is a little more expensive to get all organic food then the not so healthy version. We look at it this way, we pay a few dollars more now and save on our health care! We are in a health crazed fad right now though and the organic food is a little less than it once was, so that's a plus. You do save money because you hardly eat out. We might eat out once a week. It does take a little more planning though. We try and come up with a meal plan a week in advance because we have to go to the health food store to get some of our ingredients and we don't live right next to one. Once you plan your meals the task of making them is just like making anything else, some are super easy and quick and others are a little harder and take a little longer to make. It's just a different way of cooking because you don't use a lot of the same ingredients you are use too. It isn't hard though.

That's pretty much it. We are vegan and loving it. At the time of this post we have been vegan for 10 months!
We hope that you follow us on our journey and that through this blog and your own research you realize that the normal "American" way of eating is not as healthy for you as you once thought. If you are looking to make a change for your health or to lose weight you have to realize that a quick, fad "Diet" isn't what's needed, a complete and total change in diet is what will work. You can do it. It's all about your mindset. Take the challenge! Do a juice fast and see what happens after it.



(We will be posting some of our favorite recipes and much more in the days, weeks, and months to come. Also if you have any questions at all, at any time, please let us know and we will be glad to try and help you out with whatever your question may be. Thanks!")