Wanting to go Vegan but have concerns

I am really interested in going vegan but I have some concerns I was hoping someone could help with. First off I guess I should give a little info on our family. DH, borderline diabetic, and I have two young children, 6 and 8, and we are trying for a third. I also have an estrogen/progesterone imbalance and suffer from IBS.

I was told that going vegan would greatly improve my IBS but I worry about the affects it would have on my estrogen issue. I read that Soy products can increase your estrogene which I certainly do not want to do. Can we as an entire family go vegan while not eating soy and the children still getting the nutrition that they need?

I'd really appreciate any insight you can give me.

 

Hmm ...

I'm no expert, so do not take any advice I give you here to be professional or well-thought-out advice.

Where did you hear that soy products can increase estrogen levels? I haven't heard anything of the sort, but I can't say that it isn't true.

Also, my family has multiple diabetics on both sides, and I'm supposedly at high risk for it too, with my blood type. However, I'm vegan, and controlling your diet and making sure you are getting the right nutrition should help to control a diabetic condition, rather than work against it.

I honestly have my doubts about being able to not eat/drink soy products and be vegan. Unless you ate a lot of cannabis seeds, I don't know where any other convenient sources of protein would be found (not that they aren't out there, they just don't jump into the front of my mind).

 

The best thing to do is find a veg friendly or specialist nutritionist that kind guide you through a specialized program...

 

Thanks for the info both of you. I think I will find a nutrionist in the area to work with.

 

Soy products have phytoestrogens, which are similar chemically to estrogen, but aren't. I think you'll be just fine with soy in your diet but you should ask a nutritionist. You could always drink rice milk and give soy to the kids. And a WONDERFUL source of complete protein similar in composition to soy is quinoa. It's a grain that can be cooked and used like rice. Quite yummy!

 

its probably possible, if you really want it, anythings possible. cant be too hard, or not too hard to make the end result of a beautiful vegan family not worth the small amount of work in comparison.

best of luck to you on your journey and i hope everything works out the best for you and your family =)

ohh-find a good nutritionist, of course some are going to be much more in the know than others. if one isnt a vegan or at least strict veggie himself, i would be very cautious of listening to anything they say.

 

Quinoa has lots of protein?!

Noooo, now I have a reason to eat it! =( Yuck! Haha!

 

Thanks again for the info. I have to make a trip to the health food store today. I'm gonna see if they can make a recommendation for a good nutrionist, I swear I can't spell today.

 

Yep Hik! It's a perfect protein that the body can use very efficiently. Eat it! EAAAAT IT!

 

Do you (or anyone else?) have any good recipies for quinoa? Plain quinoa tastes pretty, er, well, not so great, in my opinion. =P

Where does quinoa grow, anyway; where is it from?

 

It's from Peru (if I'm not mistaken) the natives (Aztecs?) whole culture and religion revolved around it. They knew how nutritious it was. When the Spaniards came they forbid it to be grown and it was "lost", grown only in small garden patches high in the mountains. (It likes colder climates.) In the last few decades it was rediscovered and has steadily gained popularity. Remember you have to rinse it well before you cook it! It has a bitter coating called saponin that tastes pretty nasty. It shouldn't taste bad, it should be mild and slightly nutty. Then, cook it and use it wherever you'd use rice or any other grain. In soups, casseroles, etc. You can make a cold salad with veg and some sort of vinegarette dressing. Make an asian stir fry with it. Use your imagination! I'll try and post some recipes in the vegan forum in the near future.

 

The natives from Peru were the Incas, the Aztecs were from Mexico
I didn't know they grew it, interesting info, thanks JazzMama ... I guess that teaches us to look to the past to know how to deal with our present and build a better future...(i sounded like a bad commercial, no? hehe)

 

Well after doing some research I think we'll be avoiding soy. I'm just not liking what I'm reading. Course now I'm kicking myself because my kids drank soy formula, couldn't breastfeed for personal reasons, for a short while as babies.

We normally try not to do much fast food but after the reading I've been doing I'm avoiding it like the plague! I found sites where you can read the ingredient list for two major fast food chains and there is soy in everything!

 

if you have it cold with chopped cherry tomatoes, spring onions, peppers and other salady type stuff with olive oil and lemon juice and chopped fresh mint its gorgeous.

also if you coat a can of chickpeas with olive oil and cayenne pepper and salt and put them in a medium oven for about 40 mins to an hour till their crispy and then mix these in its sooooooooo yum!

 

May I ask what research you found which is driving you to avoid soy? I'm just curious, as I have never had any problems or heard of anyone who had problems with soy, especially since it's so often considered a miracle plant.

I can see why you'd avoid fast food restaurants regardless, though!

 

Someone on another board gave me this link. Now I'll admit there is alot of bias information on the net and this could very well be one of them but this was just plain scary info.

http://www.soyonlineservice.co.nz/

 

yeah but you know what? everything and anything apparently causes cancer these days. i'm sick of it. i believe hardly any of these 'food scares' any more. if you took everything you read to heart i doubt there'd be anything left that you could actually eat.

 

Websites like that are why you only buy organic soy products.

And I have never heard of any of their claims being true. If soy causes infertility ... I don't know ANYONE who is anywhere close to infertile, and I know lots of people who eat soy constantly!

Phytoestrogen is merely an isoflavone, which is good for you:

http://www.ifst.org/hottop34.htm

If you go there, it gives you a completely different account of phytoestrogen (as well as other isoflavones), and here is a direct quote from that site:

And that's just for cancer, it evaluates other parts.

Anyway, you are indeed right, you can find a lot of conflicting information on the web. This source could also be biased. Many herald soy as a miracle-bean, but ... I think there is a reason why; not because it's a multi-million dollar industry, but because people who historically have eaten soy products have naturally lived to be healthier, and there are no reports I have heard of of people who eat soy products getting any kind of cancer.

Either way, it's probably worth doing some more research on.

 

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/...d&dopt=Abstract&list_uids=15940131&query_hl=1

search pubmed for 'soy' and you'll see loads of papers. most seem positive.

 

I agree...if you avoided anything that could possibly make you sick or kill you, you'd be living in a bubble and not breathing our air.

My method is just to live as healthy as possible without holding myself back from enjoying life.