Health-conscious Americans are adopting meatless diets into their lifestyles more and more these days. Other countries, mostly in Europe, have already learned that eating mostly meatless meals helps health and environmental issues. It’s no secret that eating meat has been linked to chronic diseases such as heart disease, diabetes, and other life-shortening maladies.
Some of these vegetarian diets are very restrictive and others allow a great deal of flexibility. For example, vegans eat only fruits and vegetables and no dairy by-products or eggs. The more restrictive you choose to become, the more difficult it becomes to find variety and get enough protein and maintain your health.
By including meatless meals in your weekly planning, you’ll definitely cut calories and fat (especially saturated fats found in meat), cholesterol, and sodium. Other benefits of following a meatless diet plan include losing weight and helping the environment.
While optimal health can be reached while following a vegetarian diet, you can also find detriments. For example, many vegetarians consume too much sugar and carbohydrates and this overindulgence can also be detrimental to your health. If you don’t get complete protein from your diet, you can become anemic, so it’s important to calculate your protein intake correctly.
Studies on people who are vegetarians compared to those who eat meat often take into consideration their lifestyles, such as how many exercises, how many are smokers, and how many exercises on a regular basis.
Before you consider adapting your lifestyle to one of several available meatless diets, speak to a physician or dietician to see if it’s acceptable for your health issues and the possibility of future problems relating to vegetarianism.