Hi! My name Jè. I took a big challenge for the sake of my health – to become a vegan.
I grew up in Philippines and meat is a big part of our daily meals. I was perfectly healthy back then but since moving to Canada, I started having plenty of health problems.
In my first month of living here, I started having rashes all over my body. I suspected that it’s an allergy from something I was eating so I slowly eliminated potential allergens from my diet. When I eliminated meat, my rashes finally improved and disappeared. I had to be a vegan for a month and slowly reintroduced meat in my diet. After several months, my body fully adjusted.
Looking back, I wish I have taken that incident as a warning. Two years later, I went for a routine check-up with my doctor when we discovered that I was hypertensive. In Philippines, my usual blood pressure is 120/80 and below. Here in Canada, we were surprised to discover that my blood pressure was always 160/90 and above! When I told my doctor of my frequent dizzy spells and I was having chest pain from time to time, she sent me for more tests. We found out that the electrical activity of my heart was abnormal, my cholesterol and liver enzyme levels were high, my thyroid was inflamed due to an autoimmune condition called “Hashimoto’s disease” and I have scattered polyps in my gall bladder and right kidney.
I still continued with my normal diet for a year after my diagnosis. I gained weight and felt tired all the time, probably also caused by the medication I was prescribed. When I started having constant pain in the right side of my abdomen, I know things are not doing good with my gall bladder. So I firmly decided to slowly transition to a vegan diet.
I hope you have fun reading my little blog and learn how I overcame my health challenges by changing my diet!