Going Vegan for Health: My Experience

I started with flexitarian and 1x meat per week, and even that went badly for me. I have too much trouble maintaining my iron levels with the amount of damage to my gut from celiac. I also have another inflammatory issue that reacts to starch, and that flared on my next attempt to reduce meat (before I knew about the starch issues). I've kept at it, but much more slowly, and we've been able to substitute Impossible burger for some red meat - since it has heme iron, it works much better for me than more unprocessed sources of vegan iron. And since starch-free omega-3 fatty acids are impossible on a vegan diet (chia and flax still have small amounts of starch) and difficult on vegetarian (omega-3 supplemented eggs help), I've become increasingly interested in pescatarianism. There are mollusks and forage-feeding fish with little environmental impact, great omega-3s, and good iron and calcium. Oh, yes, calcium - I have osteopenia, so while I do use tofu and green veggies for dinner of my calcium, it's hard to avoid the convenience of dairy. If I didn't have to coordinate with my family, my dream diet would be a starch-free, high-fiber ketogenic pescatarian diet with lots of fresh veggies and berries. My husband and I are planning to move closer to eating this way once the kids grow up. On the occasions when I've had the energy to do this for myself, I've felt really good. I haven't seen any correlation between eating more raw foods vs. cooked food and health. I see a higher correlation with higher fiber and good health - especially gut health. I do best with 30-35 g fiber a day. Hopefully my experiences are a useful data point for you - of course, we are all different! If I had less issues absorbing minerals, I'd probably do better on a vegetarian or vegan diet than I actually do now.